Boundless Grooves: Designing One-to-One Lessons for (Adaptive) Digital Musical Instruments for Disabled Pupils

Music technology has stimulated the development of digital musical instruments (DMIs) that enable more disabled pupils to actively engage in music-making. However, music teachers who are unfamiliar with DMIs sometimes do not know ‘where to start’ with these instruments and refrain from teaching them altogether. With the aim of lowering the threshold to teach DMIs, we initiated an educational design research study in which we designed and tested one-to-one beginner lessons for the Magic Flute (a digital wind instrument), the Adaptive Travel Sax (a digital saxophone), and the Switch Guitar (a guitar that can play three chords through digital switches). The underlying design principles for the lessons were student agency, flexible customization, and multisensory teaching. In the first research phase, we observed and interviewed six pioneer teachers who taught the DMIs. We analyzed their data through thematic analysis, which laid the foundation for the design of the lessons. In the second research phase, the draft lessons were tested and evaluated by seven music teachers and their pupils with disabilities. Based on the thematic analysis of the data from focus group interviews with these music teachers, we enhanced the design of the final lessons. Although the lessons may improve accessibility to DMI education, we found that music teachers do have to navigate between customizing lessons and providing goal-oriented instrumental education. In relation to agency, pupils emphasized the importance of contemporary, self-selected music. Furthermore, there remains a need to develop social-cultural communities to support the adoption and sustainability of DMIs in music education. As such, the study concludes that accessibility not only requires access to DMIs and suitable one-to-one tuition but also the integration of DMIs into mainstream ensembles and music curricula.