Music plays an important part in the lives of people of all ages. It can have symbolic significance for nation-states and regions, can be a source of deep emotional experience for the individual, or can be an expression of life-style, image and social belonging. Music affects, but is itself affected by forces influenced by different purposes and intentions of an economic, ideological, educational, and political nature. Music is linked with the person and the person's interaction with the world around. It is tested and judged on the basis of the person's own experience and everyday practical knowledge. Music is a major leisure interest for virtually all young people. Though linked with image and body, music itself is at the centre. It can involve video, film, graffiti, rock concerts, their own singing or playing, clothes, style, disco, work-out, jazz dance, body-building, jogging, skateboard, snowboard, in-line skates, or computers. More or less all young people have experience and knowledge of music in different forms--but how do they themselves look upon their musical experience and their relation to music? This question should be regarded as fundamental when it comes to educational strategies and quality enhancement within childcare, the school, and teacher training. In order to elucidate the relation of young people to music in general, the Experience and Music Teaching (EMT) project is being carried on at the School of Music, Orebro University, with the support of the National Agency for Education. The focus is on problems to do with young people's musical experience and music teaching in relation to cultural conditions and transcultural processes. In this study, Swedish and English 15-year-olds are interviewed. The perspective is the young people's own--it is a question of how they perceive their relation to music, and of what they consider other people's relation to music to be. (Contains 5 figures.)