Rethinking Gifted Music Education Through Aesthetic Care : A Critical-Theoretical Perspective

Abstract

This article develops a conceptual framework for aesthetic care in gifted music education, integrating care ethics and Foucault’s notion of aesthetic existence. Recognizing that children and adolescents gifted for music face heightened performance pressures, perfectionism, and identity-related vulnerabilities, the study foregrounds the ethical and relational dimensions of music pedagogy alongside technical skill development. Drawing on philosophical, theoretical, and critical literature, and informed by Engeström’s Activity Theory, it conceptualizes aesthetic care as a relational, perceptual, and ethical orientation that cultivates gifted students’ aesthetic sensitivity, reflective engagement, and moral-aesthetic discernment. The framework articulates ten pedagogical principles: dialogic aesthetic engagement, ethical relational care, co-agency in aesthetic creation, culturally mediated experiences, responsive attunement, multi-voiced participation, reflective aesthetic consciousness, developmental differentiation, integrative musicianship, and transformative aesthetic encounters. By linking ethical attentiveness with aesthetic cultivation, this conceptual-theoretical study positions music education as a site for holistic artistic and personal development, offering music teachers a lens to nurture sustainable identities, relational competence, and flourishing musical lives.