Music schools in Greece provide students with opportunities to participate in various musical ensembles, organized in accordance with the existing curriculum and tailored to their structure and repertoire. Regardless of whether a student orchestra possesses a specific musical orientation, research highlights the enhanced pedagogical value derived from integrating informal music learning processes within these ensembles. This approach aims to cultivate students’ creativity, collaboration, and active engagement in their educational experiences. Such methodologies encompass collaborative practices, peer-teaching (Schiavio et al., 2020), conceptualizing the conductor as a fellow orchestra member (McCaleb, 2022), performing by ear (Varvarigou, 2016), allowing for student-selected repertoire, facilitating learning without requiring notation reading or writing skills (Green & Baker, 2013), and encouraging free improvisation (Wright & Kanellopoulos, 2010). Despite the pedagogical value of these informal learning processes, the ensemble “String Orchestra – Symphonic Orchestra,” which falls under the category “Musical Ensembles (Instrumental Practice or Other Type)” (Government Gazette 2858/B/2015), appears to lack the incorporation of such practices. In contrast, ensembles like the “Contemporary Orchestra” and the “Creative and Expressive Music Ensembles” explicitly describe and promote informal methodologies within the current curriculum, while the ensemble under examination continues to prioritize formal types of music education.

This study aims to explore the perspectives and experiences arising from the practical implementation of informal music teaching and learning processes within a Western classical ensemble. The ultimate goal is to examine the development of students’ musical skills, along with enhancing their active engagement, motivation, and musical expression through practices of improvisation, collaboration, peer learning, and the use of non-conventional notation. The teaching intervention took place at a Music School in Central Greece from October 2024 to January 2025, within the “European Music Orchestra” ensemble, involving twenty-five students of varying musical levels and instruments. Semi-structured interviews with students, field observations by the researcher-educator, and observations by a critical friend-educator, who participated as a musician in the orchestra, were utilized for data collection. The findings highlight the positive impact of integrating informal practices into a formal music ensemble setting, particularly in terms of student autonomy, creativity, instrument familiarity, motivation, and the enhancement of their musical skills self-confidence.

• Curricula and critical approaches
• Meaningful musical experiences

Iro Panagiotopoulou is a graduate of the Department of Music Studies at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) and a postgraduate student in the program “Music Education in Formal and Informal Settings” at the same department. She holds a diploma in piano and advanced theory. She is a secondary education music teacher and currently teaching at the Music School of Livadeia. Her interests focus on music teaching, learning, and conducting ensembles, as well as choral music, both in school settings and within the local community, where she conducts the Mixed Choir of Livadeia “Erkyna.”

Dr. Yannis Mygdanis is a music educator, composer, music education software designer, and postdoctoral researcher at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA). He serves as an adjunct lecturer in the Department of Music Studies at NKUA and teaches in the postgraduate program “Music education in formal and informal settings” at the same university. Additionally, he works as a music educator at the elementary school of Pierce – The American College of Greece. He has presented research at more than 45 international conferences on music, education, and technology and has published over 45 articles in chapters, peer-reviewed journals, and conference proceedings.