Performing Local Music: Engaging with Regional Musical Identities through Higher Education and Research

Regional differences in Irish traditional music are challenged by processes of globalization but supported by an apparent tribalism and localism amongst Irish people and potential economic valuing of regional traditions. Local musical traditions underpin regional identities, particularly in parts of the west of Ireland, but they also create networks that enhance a sense of community underpinned by intangible cultural heritage. Many students who undertake undergraduate music studies at Irish institutions engage in the study of regional musical styles, requiring them to critically listen to selected performers, often from regions in the west of Ireland. This can create or reinforce a limited canon that places an emphasis on historical recordings. Understanding both regions and traditions as processes, the canon must be revised in the context of new modes of learning and engagement with tradition and communities that are shaped by new technologies and virtual spaces, and by new geographies of the tradition that relocate music-making nationally and internationally. Students become part of the musical community of the region in which they undertake their studies and can most readily immerse themselves in local cultures through observation and participation beyond the classroom