The purpose of this study was to investigate the Neighborhood Music School (NMS), a community music school in New Haven, Connecticut, to determine: (a) how people decide to participate in NMS music programs, (b) the factors that maintain participants' engagement in NMS music programs and (c) the artistic and personal impact of NMS programs on participants.

The NMS is a 100 year-old community music school located in an urban setting with the mission of serving the various musical needs and desires of people from a variety of ethnic, socio-economic, and demographic backgrounds. The NMS enrolls pre-school, school age, and adult students. As such, the Neighborhood Music School is embedded in, and was investigated as part of, the historical mission and evolution of the American settlement house and musical settlement house movements.

The case-study methodology of this study utilized participant-observations that were carried out during the 2009–2010 academic year at the NMS. Data were collected through interviews, observations, field notes and artifacts. The resulting data included comprehensive descriptions of the NMS programs as articulated by teachers, students, parents, administrators and Board members. Their narratives indicated that individuals are intrinsically motivated to participate in Neighborhood Music School's programs and that this motivation is often sustained and deepened due to students' interactions with applied music faculty, who provided students with both the music-theoretical and the technical-expressive understandings required to perform on a variety of musical instruments in a range of musical styles.