One of the core courses of the Princess Galyani Vadhana Institute of Music’s (PGVIM’s) undergraduate music programme, entitled ‘Music for Society,’ has been running since 2014. The course aims to benefit students focusing on the learning outcome, developing the students’ skills in leadership, enhanced social awareness, organisation, performance and teaching. 

The course’s main objective is encouraging and inspiring students to design music activities based on the context in which we worked, practising in the field for the general public through outreach activities, like participatory music, under the guidance or supervision of the lecturer. The output usually showcases the performance, which is implementing the activities of each site, and the assessment is carried out over the entire course. For more than seven years, the programme delivered thus far has involved collaborations between students and people who live in the neighbourhood around PGVIM, as well as children in slums and remote areas.

Due to the COVID-19 outbreak, the course could not run as usual with regards to gathering people together. Social media, the online platform, is the method of public dissemination because people are aware of the need for social distancing, which has become a factor in organising the course. Social media will be implemented for people to access information and communicate remotely rather than participating in person. Ultimately, the essence of Music for Society –two-way learning between the students and the general public – will be an underlining method and process for the development of the course that can touch the hearts of people in the virtual era.