Survey of Music History I
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MUHL M106 Introduction to Music Literature 2 credits Spring semester 2019 Ravi Shankar and Philip Glass working on Passages, 1990 (image from Maria Popova, “Remembering the Godfather of World Music: Ravi Shankar + Philip Glass, 1990,” Brain Pickings (13 December 2013), https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/12/13/pa ssages-ravi-shankar-philip-glass-1990/ , accessed 1 January 2020) Classes TR 8:30-9:20, CM 204g WF 10:30-11:20, CM 135 Bulletin description This course is an introduction to fundamental musical concepts and terminology as applied to listening skills. Students will study a selected body of standard genres and styles used in western art music from c. 800 to the present. This semester I am experimenting: rather than the “snapshots” focused on single pieces we have used in this course in recent years, we will consider specific decades (“snapshots”) in the “long twentieth century” (for me starting in 1889, the year Claude Debussy encountered gamelan music at the Paris World Exhibition), bringing together musics from across the traditional boundaries of western art music (aka “classical” music), jazz, popular, and world musics. We will, as usual, begin with a more general unit on the elements of music. A major focus throughout the course will be on developing skills in active listening and writing/talking about music. Prerequisites Co-requisite: MUTH-M103. This means you must currently be taking (or have taken) Theory II. Please let me know if you have questions on this front or are unsure if this course is appropriate for you. This course is not available for Loyola Core credit. 2 Course objectives and learning outcomes The main goal of the course is for students to become more informed and engaged listeners and thinkers about music, able to articulate their observations about music orally and in writing. By the end of the semester, students should improve their ability to: • identify and describe (orally and in writing) key elements of music as embodied in specific pieces (known and unknown) • find and evaluate information about pieces of music and their creators (composers, performers, etc.) • describe how specific pieces of music interact with the time and place of their creation Instructor Dr. Alice V. Clark phone 865-3065 Monroe Hall 303 (note office location!) e-mail [email protected] Office hours by appointment (sign up at avclark.youcanbook.me). This is not a throwaway line; I really do want to see you! I’m around campus a lot, so you’re welcome to drop by my office, but I ask you to make an appointment just to ensure that I’ll be there. Pronouns: She, her, hers Preferred title: Dr. (or Professor) Clark It is often easiest to communicate with me by e-mail between classes; barring emergencies or natural disasters, I will answer messages within 24 hours, except on weekends, during breaks, and while out of town at conferences. (This is a minimal goal, and in real life I usually will reply much sooner, even on weekends!) Please be aware that I will occasionally contact you by e- mail, using your loyno account, so please be sure either to check it regularly or forward it to an account you check regularly. Some background: I started my undergraduate career as a music education major, until I encountered a course in music history that answered questions I hadn’t known how to ask. While I don’t expect you to have a similar experience in this course (!), I hope you will come to value thinking and writing about music as useful in its own right, and as helpful to your work. Textbooks and other course materials There is no textbook to purchase for this course; readings, scores, and other materials will be posted on Blackboard (http://loyno.blackboard.com), placed on reserve at Monroe Library, or available through one of the databases to which the library subscribes. For instance, recordings of many of the works we will study will appear on a series of course playlists on Naxos Music Library, available to members of the Loyola community from the library’s web page 3 (library.loyno.edu ; note that you will have to login, using your loyno userid and password, if you access this or any other subscription service from off campus.) Every musician should own and use a calendar!! Put your assignment due dates into it, along with concerts, gigs, and other commitments. Being a music major, or a professional musician of any sort, is a juggling act, and it really helps to see everything on the page (or the screen) so you can plan ahead and make sure everything gets done. You should also, as a matter of course, always have paper and a writing implement with you—staff paper too, which can be easily printed for free at sites such as http://www.blanksheetmusic.net/ . I may also ask you to print and bring to class in hard copy specific readings, scores, etc. that are on reserve or posted on Blackboard; this will usually be because I want you to be able to examine (and take notes on!) specific aspects of that material during class. Course requirements / Types of assignments There will be some listening and/or reading in preparation for each class, and perhaps also a short video lecture; for many days there will also be a pre-class assignment (usually as a Google form, due one hour before class). Pre-class assignments will be posted on Blackboard at least a week in advance. During class I will not lecture extensively, but we will engage in discussion and activities (solo, pair, small group, and/or full class). That means you must come to class having prepared the assigned reading, listening, and other work! Naturally there will be exams—I know those can cause anxiety, but studies show that learning increases when it is tested, and you will see that exams count for only about a quarter of your final grade, far less in many other classes. That is because this class is less about covering content and more about learning habits of mind that you can carry to the year-long music history survey (which is necessarily content-heavy) and other courses. Writing about music is hard but important, and learning to write clearly and use evidence to prove a case are skills that will serve you whatever you go on to do after graduation. You will therefore complete a series of writing assignments over the course of the term. Note that higher-education professionals generally say that each hour spent in class should be supported by 2-3 hours of work out of class; while we all know that doesn’t usually happen, you should do more than simply show up! That’s not just because I say so, but because you won’t get much out of the class if you aren’t prepared. 4 How should you spend that out of class time? I’d suggest the following: • Start by reviewing briefly the previous class: listen to the music (with score, text, etc., as applicable), reread your notes, and identify anything you don’t understand or any questions you still have. See if you can fill in those gaps by going back over the assigned material; if you can’t, ask! It can also help to ask yourself what the most important points are. • Look to the next class: start by listening to the music (with score, text, etc., as applicable). If it’s got text, read the text in English to get a general idea, but also identify important words or phrases in the original, and look at how they are set to music. (This is one of those times you should draw circles or otherwise point to things in the score or text.) • Do any listening and reading that’s assigned for the next class. Write down any questions you have, and make notes about what you think is most important about this material. • Look ahead: note when the next test is, or start work for the next writing assignment. (If assignment due dates and exam dates aren’t in your calendar, put them there!) • On a regular basis (maybe not for every class): o identify useful terms and practice defining them o for each piece we’ve studied, identify who-what-when-where-why-how, and think about how that piece fits into its time and place o compare pieces to identify differences in genre, composer, style o rewrite notes, combining notes from different sources, making corrections, etc. o think about what you’d ask if you were the one making an exam! Note that some of this can be time-shifted, so in a particularly busy week you can focus on the basics, and the next week you can do some of the bigger-picture things. If you do any of this consistently, though, it will mean you’ve got a good foundation for exam studying. In the end, this is your education—I’ve had mine—and if it’s going to be effective, you must take control of your learning. Like a personal trainer, I can help, but the ultimate responsibility, and the ultimate benefit, is yours. You are always welcome to come to me for advice if you feel at all uncomfortable about your study habits or want additional tips. University policies A number of University policies that apply to this and other classes are separately communicated, but I’ll call attention to some of them here: • Academic integrity: everything you submit for this class should represent your work, and I expect you to be ethical in how you use library materials and other resources.