When did that become an area of research interest to scholars in the music education community?
Well, it’s interesting. The people who brought jazz to the classroom were musicians who learned it out on the street, people who did it the old-fashioned way and then started making books and ways to train students in improvisation. More music educators are becoming jazz musicians as well. It’s a part of the field of music education that’s breaking out right now. More people are paying attention to it, realizing it’s new, and there’s so much that can be explored. What are you doing in your research? I wanted to see if I could illustrate the similarities and skills between learning to improvise and learning a second language. It’s one thing for a music educator to speculate that it’s like learning a second language, and it’s something else to say, ‘These are the skills used in this, and these are the skills in that. They’re actually quite similar and could they possibly be connected.’ If a student improves his skills in one area, does that automatically transfer over and help him improv
