BoomTown Music Education and the need for authenticity – informal learning put into practice in Swedish post-compulsory music education

The article reports on a 2-year higher educationmusic programme for young rock musicians in Sweden called BoomTown Music Education. The pedagogical philosophy behind this programme is developed from the findings of two Swedishmusic education researchers, and the programme exemplifies how knowledge about popular musicians’ learning strategies in informal contexts can be utilised when designing post-compulsory music education. The aim of the article is to problematise the BoomTown environment in relation to its informality and authenticity. In addition to a description of the programme, the author’s experiences from visiting this education programme are laid out in order to provide the ground for such a problematisation.