AVAILABILITY AND UTILIZATION OF AFRICAN MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS FOR MUSIC PEDAGOGY IN UNITY COLLEGES IN IMO STATE

Abstract

The identity and pride of any nation is her culture. All nations have their own musical instruments for which they are identified with, and which constitute their culture. It is no longer news that African musical instruments are relegated to the background today in Nigerian Post-Primary Schools. This is partly because of the low esteem attached to these instruments by the Nigerian society at large in preference to the Western musical instruments. This paper tries to examine among other things; the African musical instruments available in the Unity Colleges in Owerri and Okigwe both in Imo State, Nigeria and the extent of their utilization in the teaching and learning of Music in the schools under investigation. The population was made up of six Music teachers drawn from the two unity colleges in Imo state. A questionnaire titled, “African musical instruments and their utilization in unity schools†was constructed and used for data collection. For the analysis, the simple percentage was used. The result got from this study reveals that the Western musical instruments are mostly used in the teaching-learning process and also in school functions in the Unity colleges in Imo State. This study is expected to bring positive changes in the attitudes of Post Primary school authorities, Music teachers and the students in the use of African musical instruments in the teaching-learning process as well as in college functions. The research methods used include: Participatory observation, descriptive survey/case study, library method and electronic search.