"The cellos are coming back" : an exploration of trad cello learning and teaching practices

The latter half of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st have seen a marked rise in the involvement of the cello in Scottish traditional music. Spurred by prominent trad cellists such as Natalie Haas, recent decades have seen the cello both reoccupy its historical role as an accompaniment instrument, and inhabit new roles as contemporary techniques and trends have shaped its performance. However, there currently exist few publicly available teaching resources for the Scottish trad cello and a review of literature, as well as discussions with Scottish trad cello educators and students, suggests that trad cello pedagogy has not been sufficiently explored. Accordingly, this research examines teaching and learning practices for the Scottish trad cello, taking into account its relationship to its classical counterpart and contemporary trad cello performance practice. In doing so, a review of literature is conducted, both of historical literature surrounding the Scottish trad and classical cello and of contemporary pedagogical literature in each of these idioms. Data has also been collected through ethnographic methods (semi-structured interviews, lesson observations, a student questionnaire, and autoethnographic interviews), action research, and a review of literature. Analysis of interviews has been conducted in accordance with grounded theory. Ultimately, a theoretical framework for trad cello learning and teaching practices has been developed, with a cycle of Experimentation, Development of Voice, and Creative Empowerment at its core. This cycle is also supported by the Trad Cello Toolkit, the set of techniques, repertoire, and performance knowledge developed by the trad cello learner. The components of this Toolkit, their associated learning and teaching practices, and their relation to the Core Cycle are explored in detail.