The National Review of School Music Education has systematically documented the variations in quality and accessibility of school music education in Australia. Rural and remote schools were found to be particularly vulnerable to relatively poorer quality and accessibility. These findings were not new; they echoed similar observations made by official, academic and practitioner observers over many years. This article recounts an empirical study, replicating some of the National Review's investigatory techniques, that tests the applicability of its observations and findings to six primary schools located in a non-metropolitan cross-border region. It concludes that the quality of the music education indeed varies considerably but that the deficiencies are not principally due to insufficient awareness or enthusiasm at the local school level. Rather they arise from a high turnover of staff in short-term or fractional music teacher positions, from inadequate physical space arrangements within most (but not all) of these schools, and from other resourcing limitations.