Opinions of music students about the effective use of music software: a case study

Abstract

Music software is a digital tool that supports and facilitates musical creativity, performance and production. This study aims to reveal the opinions and experiences of students who receive music education at universities about music software. The research was designed with qualitative methods and conducted with a case study pattern. In the study, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 104 students selected from different universities in Turkey. The interviews included questions about the content, duration and frequency of the courses related to music software, the access and usage status of the software, the contributions of the software to musical creativity and other courses, the role of the software in future music production and the problems they encountered in this field. The data were collected with observation notes and semi-structured interviews and coded with MAXQDA24 qualitative data analysis software and analyzed with thematic analysis method. The findings were presented with visual tools such as cross table and matrix and supported by quantitative data. As a result of the data analysis, it was determined that the number and duration of the courses related to music software were insufficient, the students encountered various difficulties in accessing the software and many students did not actively use these software. In addition, the students stated that music software improved their musical creativity and contributed to their other courses. Moreover, opinions were expressed that music software will play an important role in future music production. The students also emphasized that music software has an important place in education and profession, but adequate resources and support are not provided in this field. This study reveals the current situation regarding the effective use of music software and identifies the problems encountered in this regard. The results of the research were discussed by comparing with the literature and some suggestions were presented for future studies.

Keywords

• music software
• music
• music technology
• music learning

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