1
An origami orchestra
Folded instruments for the development of creativity
MARIA MADDALENA ERMAN,
FRANCESCO NOCERINO
2
Scholastic dispersal is one of the main problems in the management of educational activities
in the degraded urban and suburban area of Naples Underdeveloped social and cultural contexts and
the consequent lack of motivation of children and adolescents contribute to augment the problem.
The shortage of meeting spaces, the lack of outside interests, of ethical values and of positive points
of reference increase the abandonment of disadvantaged children whose lives, lived for most of the
time in the street, expose them to serious risks.
Children and teen-agers have potentials that are not valued by society. They possess hidden
treasures that their education often leaves unexplored. They don't have organized spaces and
allotted times to practice and develop their own potential and to achieve individual self-fulfilment.
In recent decades, psychological studies on creativity, focussing attention on the possibilities
and methods of the free development of human activity, have been very important to the
modification of pedagogical methods and for the development of educational techniques. Using
these premises, the ability to include creativity in education has had its origin. It allows each one to
be himself or her self, to satisfy the need for expression, and to develop and activate all the psychophysical abilities in order to become a full person.
Nowadays, creativity can be understood as an innate potential and as a need of everyone (M.
Mead) which can be expressed at every age (T. Powell Jones). To create doesn't mean to invent: to
create means to elaborate again the reality, to dismember it and then to reassemble information
about it and components of it, to give new and different answers to problems. Creativity is a
combination of mental elasticity, originality and the ability to accept ideas promptly that allow us to
abandon the usual models of thought (“la creatività è una combinazione di elasticità mentale,
originalità e capacità di accettare con prontezza idee che permettono di abbandonare gli schemi di
ragionamento abituali”). Creativity is inter-functionality, a real physiological process that enables
the human potential to make life. This allows life to grow continually on itself (“la creatività è
interfunzionalità, un vero e proprio processo fisiologico, che consente al potenziale umano di farsi
vita, e alla vita di crescere continuamente su stessa”).
In the last few years several projects promoted in Naples and carried out in collaboration
with corporate bodies and voluntary and private partnerships have had the tendency to develop a
better approach to life and to influence choices and motives positively. In so doing this has also
offered new opportunities, alternatives and support.
The "Scuola Estate", "Estate Ragazzi" and "Ragazzi in Città" projects, organised by the
Commune of Naples, have sometimes been carried out in unusual places (gardens, squares and
public parks, libraries, sporting and cultural centres, theatres and churches), offering children and
adolescents the opportunity to know and make contact with their own city, taking care of it and
concretely contributing to its positive development.
The participation of the Centro Iniziative Didattiche Musicali NaturalMenteMusica in these
projec has contributed to the attainment of certain objectives, using essentially a creative musical
approach. As well as playing, production, expression, communication, exploration, stimulation of
inside and outside behaviour, music has been the occasion for development and an opportunity for
growth. The remarkable pedagogical value obtained must have its roots in the interdisciplinary
character of the process, which becomes itself an essentially divergent exercise of the mind,. If art,
3
and contributing to the promotion of a better state of ones personality as a whole, then music is
fundamental to the effective, intellectual and psychological life of the individual.
The lack of adequate space, the shortage of didactic material and musical equipment, the
continuous difficulties moving around the areas where teaching takes place and in finding an
approach for groups heterogeneous both in age and the degree of social disadvantage, have given
rise to the choice of certain methods, developed with serenity and liberty of thought, to promote the
conditions for creative development and also to increase the creative potential of the individual to
the advantage of society.
The participants in the projects have been encouraged to be aware of their own surroundings
and the objects of daily life, to contextualize and then to de-contextualize and to re-contextualize, to
de-construct and to re-construct, participating as well in the leader’s effort to find interesting and
stimulating points of view. The pursuit of these aims and the resulting individual discovery,
problem-solving and manual skills have been developed through a process of logical operations that
has promoted the active participation of musical experience not only in a receptive, but also an
expressive and a communicative way.
Starting from a material which is often the object of prejudice and stereotyped attitudes
because it is linked with an otherwise pedantic and boring activity, the experience with paper which
is inexpensive, safe and easily accessible, can be usefully employed for “sound” purposes too.
The formative approach developed creativity using music as a means, based on the necessity
of a pedagogy of creativity (“… necessità di una pedagogia della creatività”).
The investigation of the sound, the acoustic observation and the classification of various
sonorities that it is possible to produce with a simple sheet of notepaper and the same observations
with different kinds of paper (different material, size and colour) have subsequently drawn their
attention to the acoustic phenomena, and have made possible the discovery and acquisition of the
musical parameters of the sound. This has allowed students to develop their attention,
concentration and memory. The use and the organization of these sounds and noises to produce and
to realize rhythms and a simple ostinato accompaniment of tunes and spoken choirs, sonorizations,
and special effects have developed the rhythmic sense and the coordination. This has also offered
further space to the creative potential of the individual and of the group. Various sound worlds
have then been re-examined, listening to the use of the paper in the music of the "grown-ups".
Listening to this music encouraged the group to produce a small musical composition, made totally
with paper.
The building of musical instrument has always constituted one of the closest handicraft
activities to that of the actual making of music and, in the western tradition, has represented the
translation, in technological terms, of a progress in musical-aesthetical taste. The proposal of this
activity in educational areas develops abilities, techniques and manual competences and develops
the comprehension of the acoustic principles, while increasing at the same time the knowledge of
the structure and physical properties of the materials employed.
Building simple musical instruments, even if with recycled material, is as important as the
production of complex and sophisticated instruments. The creation of simple musical instruments
with recycled material increases the educational value, opening the way to the development of
aspects more pertinent to the areas of emotions and relationships. Above all, essential to the
4
construction of a group of simple instruments is the motivation: to have a good time, to
communicate, and to making music.
The musical instruments made during these encounters, built directly by the participants,
have been carried out using sheets of paper folded according to the “Origami” rules without glue
and/or scissors. The many advantages of the “Origami” art have shown up in the experience with
underprivileged children and adolescents (often subjects with self-destructive, sometimes
unpredictable and potentially aggressive behaviour). Among the many advantages of the method we
would like to point out especially the easy accessibility of paper, its inexpensive cost, the absence of
tools for the construction of the musical instruments, and the safety of the material itself.
The “origami orchestra” produced in this way is a real ensemble of simple musical
instruments characterized by easy construction and by easy use. The instruments of such an
“orchestra” (paper sheets to be folded up ("piegare") and to be employed ("impiegare")
immediately for music making) have been classified according to the Erich von Hornbostel’s and
Curt Sachs’s system, dividing them in the usual three groups: Idiophones, Membranophones and
Aerophones. The Idiophones (Bang, Bi-bang, Petard, Snap) are already well known among the
traditional ”Origami” models. They have been employed especially in ostinato accompaniment. The
Membranophones (Mirliton, Kazoo) are also already known in the tradition of music performed
with so-called poor instruments. They have been employed instead mainly for melodies. The
Aerophones (Whistle, Finger-whistle, Harmonica, Bagpipe) are all whistles of different form and
size. Their importance became particularly apparent during the participants listening experience.
During the experience of the building and use of the origami orchestra, the participants
immediately made an important discovery: they were making music together. The spontaneous
competition among those taking part in showing off their abilities related to the developing
activities (knowing how to do, knowing how to play, knowing how to repair, knowing how to
invent) have usually substituted in a positive way the use of energies otherwise employed in
negative behaviour. For the child participant, looking for and finding the sound (for example:
stronger, stranger, longer,…) has been an incentive to listen to himself and to the others. Finally, a
particular attraction of the paper instruments, especially for the youngest children, is in the
possibility of easy decoration with mixed media. These decorations often reveal the own meanings
and symbolisms of the little “musical instruments makers".
These experiences strengthened the identity and the sense of cooperation among those
taking part. They developed their manual skills, they improved the treatment and respect for
themselves, for the others and the surroundings in which they live, enabling them to overcome their
base instincts and through their active participation in the discovery of the sound universe, in the
being able to conquer the fundamental abilities necessary for musical expression, and in so doing
immediately gaining the joy of "making music together". The musical experiments with the paper,
repeated several times and in different social and cultural contexts, were found to be an open project
appealing because of its formative nature and as expression of a liberated pedagogy which doesn't
transmit a culture already laid down but furnishes rather the means of new thought processes and
new interactions with the surroundings.
The process of "doing" in this experience encouraged self reflection and self-evaluation. The
5
and encouraged hobbies and new activities, offering an opportunity to have fun, to develop good
relationships, together with a positive appreciation of these. It contributed to an improved
connection between home, school and outside school.
The results of such an experience should encourage everyone to hope for a greater
investment in education, and particular in education utilising music for the development of
creativity in youngsters: this means an investment in culture and an investment in society to ensure
the formative growth of the awareness of our future citizens. In other word it should provide a
setting with a solid foundation for the renaissance of
society as a whole.
6
Address for correspondence:
MARIA MADDALENA ERMAN
NaturalMenteMusica - Centro Iniziative Didattiche Musicali
Naples – Italy
Via F. Solimena, 139
80129 Napoli - Italy
[email protected]
FRANCESCO NOCERINO
NaturalMenteMusica - Centro Iniziative Didattiche Musicali
Naples – Italy
Via F. Cappiello, 51
80046 S. Giorgio a Cremano (NA) – Italy
[email protected]
7
Notes
1. Bollettino annuale O.D.S. (Osservatorio Dispersione Scolastica), Comune di Napoli.
2. W. BARMAN – H. RHEINGOLD, Higher Creativity, Jeremy P. Tarcher, Los Angeles (tr. It.
Creatività superiore, Astrolabio, Roma, 1986). J.S. BRUNER, On Knowing. Essays for the
Left Hand, 1964 (tr. it.: Il conoscere. Saggi per la mano sinistra), A. Armando, Roma,
1975). A.J. CROPLEY, Creativity, Green & Co., London, 1967 (tr. it.: La creatività, La
Nuova Italia, Firenze, 1969). E. KRIS, Ricerche psicanalitiche sull’arte, Einaudi, Torino,
1967. G.W. GETZELS – P. W. JACKSON, Creativity and Intelligence, Wiley, New York,
1962. J.P. GUILFORD – R. HOEPFUER, The Analysis of Intelligence, Mc Graw-Hill, New
York, 1971. V. LOWENFELD - W. LA BRITTAIN, Creatività e sviluppo mentale, GiuntiBarbera, Firenze, 1967. V. LOWENFELD, La natura dell’attività creatrice, La Nuova Italia,
Firenze, 1968. M. MENCARELLI, Potenziale educativo e creatività, La Scuola, Brescia, 1970.
M. M ENCARELLI, Creatività, La Scuola, Brescia, 1987 (I ed. 1976). G. REVESZ, Einführung
in die Musikpsychologie, A. Francke Ag. Verlag, Berna (tr. it. Psicologia della musica,
Giunti-Barbera, Firenze, 1954). G. STEFANI – F. FERRARI (edited by), La psicologia della
musica in Europa e in Italia, CLUEB, Bologna, 1986. E.P. TORRANCE, Education and the
Creative Potential, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1963. L.S. VYGOTSKIJ,
Immaginazione e creatività nell’età infantile, Editori Riuniti, Roma, 1970. M. WERTHEIMER,
Productive Thinking, Harper & Brothers, New York, 1945 (tr. it.: Il pensiero produttivo,
Editrice Universitaria, Firenze, 1965).
3. H.H. A NDERSON (edited by), Creativity and Its Cultivation, Harper, New York, 1959 (tr. it.:
La creatività e le sue prospettive, La Scuola, Brescia, 1972). AA.VV., Educazione musicale
di base, La Scuola, Brescia, 1983 (I ed. 1979). M. DELLA CASA, La comunicazione musicale
e l’educazione, La Scuola, Brescia, 1985 (I ed. 1974). M. MENCARELLI, Metodologia
didattica e creatività, La Scuola, Brescia, 1974. S.J. PARNES – H. H ARDING, A Source Book
for Creative Thinking, Scribner, New York, 1962 (tr. it.: Educare al pensiero creativo, La
Scuola, Brescia, 1972). G. PIAZZA, Orff Schulwerk. Musica per bambini, Suvini Zerboni,
Milano, 1978. T. POWELL JONES, L’apprendimento creativo, Giunti-Barbera, Firenze, 1974
(1972). G. RODARI, Grammatica della fantasia, Einaudi, Torino, 1973. G. STEFANI, La
competenza musicale, CLUEB, Bologna, 1982.C.W. TAYLOR – F. BARRON, Scientific
Creativity: Its Recognition and Development, Wiley & Sons, New York, 1963.
4. G. VIANELLO, Elementi di pedagogia e didattica dell’educazione musicale, Zanibon,
Padova, 1983, pag.138.
5. M. MENCARELLI, Creatività, La Scuola, Brescia, 1987, p.56.
6. Comune di Napoli – Assessorato agli Affari Sociali – Servizio Tempo Libero e Politiche
Giovanili: Estate-Ragazzi; Ragazzi in Città; La Città in gioco; Mario e Chiara a
Marechiaro; Laboratori di Educativa Territoriali; Progetto ROM; Progetto Arcobaleno;
Progetto Chance; Progetto Fratello Maggiore. Comune di Napoli – Assessorato
all’Educazione: Progetto Scuola-Estate.
7. The projects “Estate-Ragazzi” and “Ragazzi in Città”, Comune di Napoli – Assessorato agli
Affari Sociali – Servizio Tempo Libero e Politiche Giovanili, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001:
elaborated by Ufficio Progetti (G. Gigante, M. Liberatore, G. Molinari, M. Vilone) e
financed by the Legge Nazionale n. 285/97 Promozione dei diritti ed opportunità per
l’infanzia e l’adolescenza – Ministero della Solidarietà Sociale. Progetto Scuola-Estate,
Comune di Napoli – Assessorato all’Educazione.
8. "Scuola Estate": 1997, 300 partecipants (age 6 to 12 years old); "Estate Ragazzi": 1997, 500
partecipants (age 6 to 17 years old); "Estate Ragazzi": 1998, 800 participants (age 6 to 17
8
years old); "Ragazzi in città": 1997, 500 partecipants (age 6 to 17 years old);"Ragazzi in
città": 1998, 800 participants (age 6 to 17 years old).
9. M.M.ERMAN, Lo sviluppo della creatività nel fanciullo attraverso la pratica strumentale,
NaturalMenteMusica, 1998.
10. M. MENCARELLI, Creatività, La Scuola, Brescia, 1987, pag. 12.
11. A. RIEDL, Paper music, 1970.
12. Up to this sentence “The building of musical instruments has always…” the text was written
by Maria Maddalena Erman, the following part was written by Francesco Nocerino.
13. For the origami diagrams of the models see: FRANCESCO NOCERINO, Schiocchi, fischi e
botti. Strumenti di carta per fare musica, Album di Note fiorite, I, NaturalMenteMusica,
Napoli, 1997. See also: R. ROBERTS, Musical Instruments made to be played, The Dryad
Press, Leicester, 1975 (tr. It. Costruisci il tuo strumento musicale, ERI, Torino, 1981). M.
SIGNORELLI, Bim bum bam strumenti musicali fatti in casa, Nuove Edizioni Romane, Roma,
1979.
14. The origami orchestra project carried out by NaturalMenteMusica - C.I.D.M. in some other
public schools: Progetto “Musica e Gioco” 1998/99 Comune di Marigliano (NA – Italy) - I°
Circolo Didattico Marigliano (NA – Italy); “Musica e Gioco” 2000-01, II° Circolo Didattico
Somma Vesuviana (NA – Italy); “Laboratorio di Musicoterapia Didattica” 1998/1999
Scuola Media Statale “Ulisse Prota-Giurleo” Napoli; Progetto “Giocomusicolandia” July
2001 II° Circolo Didattico Somma Vesuviana (NA – Italy); Corsi di formazione docenti
“Linguaggio, Musica e Creatività” 1998 and “Educazione alla creatività” 1999
Provveditorato agli Studi di Napoli – Ufficio Studi e Programmazione.
9