In today’s interconnected world, higher education institutions must equip students with the skills to address global challenges, emphasizing intercultural exposure and collaboration. This practice paper explores the outcomes of a newly launched Blended Intensive Program (BIP) under Erasmus+, involving the University of Granada (Spain), the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Greece), and the University of Oldenburg (Germany). First implemented in the Spring Semester of 2023, the program is now in its third cycle, combining online instruction with an immersive, in-person teaching event at the host institution.

The BIP’s primary goals include broadening students' perspectives, fostering transversal skills, and developing forward-thinking competencies. Data collected from the first two cycles show that students benefitted from exposure to diverse viewpoints, pedagogical methods, and European contexts. The program enhanced communication, intercultural competence, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills, while also integrating competencies like digital literacy and sustainability practices to prepare students for future professional demands.

This new form of Erasmus mobility -Blended Intensive Program- and this application "Mapping Music Education Research", is evidenced to contribute to building a global perspective in music education, with tangible impacts on students' skills and intercultural understanding. It provided opportunities for in-service and future music teachers to gain new knowledge, network with fellow students and teachers from other European countries and understand the role of music in other cultures and educational settings.

This paper relates to the EAS conference theme by addressing the area of Innovative Educational Approaches. This new form of mobility scheme for higher education allows students to immerse into the content of the program and at the same time develop intercultural skills, tolerance and understanding. It further touches upon the area of adaptment to the changed needs of educational landscapes as it is a flexible and short-term mobility program addressing the needs of postgraduate students and in-service music teachers.

This communication is part of the project “A Sound-Centred Approach to Music Education: A Pedagogical Framework for a New Paradigm in Teaching and Learning Music During Childhood” (SCAME). The project seeks to challenge the dominance of Eurocentric approaches in music education (Bartel, 2004; Gaztambide-Fernández, 2010; Recharte, 2019) by proposing a pedagogy focused on sound and sonic phenomena, closely related to Landy’s concept of ‘Sound-based Music’ (2007, 2012).

This communication presents an action-research study from SCAME’s exploratory phase, conducted from October 2023 to June 2024 with two musical initiation classes in a Portuguese specialized Music Education context. Through seven two-hour sessions with each class and a full-day workshop, the study examined how a sound-centred approach could foster collaborative creativity (Veloso, 2017) in the creation of two sonic pieces inspired by short stories. The process culminated in a final concert, offering a shared performance with the children’s families. Data were collected through video recording, participant observation and group interviews, focusing on the ways in which children engaged with sound, each other and the short stories.

The findings highlight that the children were deeply engaged in the creative process, actively experimenting with new sonic possibilities to express emotions and ideas. Their engagement went beyond simply reproducing familiar sounds, as they worked together to co-create rich, emotionally resonant sonic atmospheres. This collaborative dimension fostered an open exchange of ideas, allowing the children to collectively shape the sonic representation of the stories.

The study suggests that this sound-centred approach offers a compelling alternative to traditional music education practices by promoting direct engagement between children and the medium of sound through collaborative creativity. However, a future successful implementation in conservatories and music academies requires structural changes, particularly in teacher training and curriculum flexibility, to accommodate the unique potential of Sound-based Music Education.