Although there are numerous projects were young people with and without disabilities play music together, inclusive music education usually uses conventional instruments (Gerland 2016). This may be surprising, as to play a conventional instrument may is a high barrier for children with physical and physical limitations. In contrast, sensor-based digital music devices may offer potential in new forms of creative expression and identity (Partti, Sidsel 2010, Brown, Hansen 2014, Riley 2013). In this manner creative artists have already recognized the potential of digitalization for their creative work. Moreover many students with physical impairments already use electronic devices to cope with everyday life, like e-wheelchair, environmental control or even smart home tools.

In our paper we reflect upon results from the first phase of our project “be_smart” (Importance of specific music apps for participation of young people with complex disabilities in cultural education). The project is funded by Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Germany) and runs from Oct 2017 to Sept 2021. The basic assumption of the project is that digitalization holds great potential for participation in cultural education, in particular for people with complex and severe disabilities, but also new barriers and risks of exclusion.

From a theoretical point of view, be_smart is situated in the area of ​​tension between praxeological approaches in sociology and cultural studies, educational theory concepts on educational justice and (cultural) participation. With Wulf et al. (see 2007, 2013) there is a theoretical framework for understanding the social in physical practices and performative creations in dealing with the material environment and in social situations (see Reckwitz 2003). A special challenge is "to explicate the implicit, usually unconscious symbolic orders and codes and horizons of meaning that are expressed in different human practices [...] and enable them" (Reckwitz 2004, 2). Social practices are on the one hand physically bound, on the other hand linked with artifacts and have a specific, material dimension. In educational contexts, it is therefore important to "consider the culturally specific manners of dealing with the corresponding artefacts in the context of which a subjectivation takes place" (Reckwitz 2008,139). Nohl calls socio-physical collectives in which people and things are (mutually) tuned to conjunctive transaction spaces (see Nohl 2011, 169ff.). In doing so, he distinguishes knowledge-learning and ability-learning from educational processes in the narrower sense as the emergence of transaction spaces of people and things. For the study of music pedagogical practice, this approach seems particularly fruitful. He points out that in order to explore such educational processes in the interplay between humans and things, observable practices must be analyzed below namable, institutionalized actions. This requires research methods that reduce the premature translation of observable practice into linguistic symbols.

The crucial question within the project is therefore: Which potentials and challenges offer music apps for the preservation and expansion of cultural participation of youth and young adults with complex disability?

Research design of theo project follows an explorative idea and uses grounded theory methodolgy: Beginning with qualitative telephone interviews with experts in the field.

Twelve experts from four tentative sub-fields were interviewed in qualitative focussed Interviews about their view upon digital music-instruments in inclusive music education settings (Niediek et al. 2018). Subfields are (A) music education projects were digital devices are already included, (B) inclusive music education projects with conventional music instruments, (C) music education in special education for children with severe physical disabilities and (D) use of digital devices in special education. Some of the participating experts work as consultant or advisor in their sub-field, some have many years of experiences in inclusive music projects or in special education. The objective of the sample is not a kind of statistic representation or a static question-and-answer-game but to get narration based information from gatekeepers and experts in the respective sub-fields. The interview outlines are developed with the same basic structure to uncover possible conjoint dimensions, but are provided with customized questions as well, to match the individual expertise of the particular interview partner. Three semi-structured telephone interviews (twelve in total) of each sub-field (A-D) have been be transcribed. Analysis followed qualitative sequence analysis methods.

Our findings give an insight into patterns and beliefs of music teachers about music-education and the role of digital-music-devices in inclusive music-education for students with and without disabilities. In our paper we reflect upon powerful policies that influence practises of music education in the sub-fields that prevent the potentials of digitalisation in inclusive music education from being exhausted. These policies regard to the dimensions of understanding of music as cultural process and product, music as an individual and a collective act and experience, the role of the music-instrument in music-education, and the idea of ability/disability and inclusive/exclusive music-settings. In this manner we try to interprete the question of risk in a positiv way: Exploring potentials of "digital devices for music making purposes" may offer great potential but also implies a lot of risks if not integrated in reflections about beliefs and policies in the field of inclusive music education.

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