Face the Future Looking Back: Understanding Music as a Field of Knowledge One Hundred Years Ago

Italy adhered to the Bologna Process by reforming the arts sector since 1999. However, for administrative reasons and for the complexity of a traditional music education system, the renewal of the sector is slow to set in motion and to position the country in a peer comparison with the international scene, in particular with respect to the development of an innovative topic like that of artistic research. Nevertheless, Italy still provides a particularly rich and important context for the development of research in music, both for the presence of the heritage, for an interesting tradition of critical studies in musicology, and for the viability of its contemporary artists. After having retraced the history of the last seventeen years of reform, we intend broaden our vision to the cultural context of a complex country like Italy, influenced by the action of its Higher arts and music institutions. In particular, we examine the relationship between artistic education as present in the bodies of Italian Conservatoires, Academies and Universities, and how these three orientations are confronting in the common goal of researching for the arts . Finally, we conclude with a reflection on the ways in which these institutions of Higher Education are facing the relation with the productive world of the arts and the contemporary audience, in order to consider their impact on the socio-cultural texture in the Italian context and in an international perspective.