Music education with practice, policy, and feeling.
The Music Education Podcast treats music education as practical work with emotional stakes. Recent conversations move from belonging and coaching to outdoor composition projects, sensory connection, and the National Plan for Music Education.
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The Music Education Podcast is a reflective interview show about how music education works in practice, not just in principle. It gives space to classroom concerns, projects, policy, inclusion, coaching, and the sensory foundations of musicianship. The show’s recent run is especially interested in belonging. That comes through in Sharon Jagdev-Powell’s conversation around young people, curriculum, organizations, Brent Music Academy, Black Lives in Music, and the experience of finding doors into music that might otherwise stay closed. It is practical, but not dry. The talk returns to joy, creative freedom, and the pressure to justify music by economic value when its human value is also central. Another strand connects music education with the natural world. Kari Prince and Gavin Nicol discuss the New Wood Symphony Project, where young people plant trees and take part in composition and performance connected to a woodland space. Wendy Brewin’s episode with The Sensory Trust broadens that interest into listening, smell, touch, technology, social media, and the work of reconnecting people with nature. These conversations make the show feel less like a policy briefing and more like a meeting point between pedagogy, place, and imagination. Still, policy is part of the mix. Harriet Richards, editor of Music Teacher magazine, appears in an episode focused on the National Plan for Music Education and the questions educators may have about reading, interpreting, and using it. The show’s editorial center is music education as lived work. It is interested in what helps young people participate, what helps educators notice more, and what kinds of projects make music feel possible. The style is open and questioning. It can be enthusiastic about a project without turning vague, and it can ask policy questions without losing sight of actual learners. For PlayNext users, the appeal is the combination of grounded educational detail and humane curiosity. The show is best sampled by listeners who want music education treated as culture, craft, and public responsibility at the same time.
Made for: Suits a listener who teaches, studies, organizes, or thinks seriously about music learning. It also fits anyone interested in creative education projects that connect young people, place, access, and policy.
What sets it apart: The show sets policy beside lived educational practice, moving from the National Plan for Music Education to woodland composition, sensory learning, coaching, and belonging. Its strongest material comes when practical music education questions are treated as emotional and creative questions too.
Listen for authentic and challenging conversation on all things music ed. Brought to you by Charanga. Hosted and produced by Chris Woods of The Chris Woods Groove Orchestra.
Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A thoughtful conversation about belonging, creative freedom, and the doors music educators can open for young people.
Belonging sits at the centre of this episode, which follows how inclusive music education can affect a young person's sense of place, confidence, and creative direction.
Clear guitar lessons for steady beginners.
Practical talk for stronger school music programs.
Playful music lessons built for listening.
A cappella, from the classroom to the loop station.
Practical band-room fixes from a teacher still in the classroom.
The Music Education Podcast episode with Sharon Jagdev-Powell focuses on inclusion, coaching, and the work of Black Lives in Music and Brent Music Academy.
Chris Woods interviews Max Wheeler about You Studio, a cloud-based DAW for schools, discussing its impact on music education and the philosophy behind it.
The Music Education Podcast examines Kari Prince and Gavin Nicol's New Wood Symphony, combining rewilding at Symphony Woods with composition and performance.
Chris Woods interviews Wendy Bruin of the Sensory Trust about connecting with nature through listening, smell, touch, and outdoor activity.
Host Chris Woods interviews Harriet Richards about the UK's National Plan for Music Education, discussing its content and implications for teachers.