Winter

Electronic Music I presents an open environment for creativity and expression through composition in the electronic music studio. The course provides students with a background in the fundamentals of sound and acoustics, covers the theory and practice of digital signal processing for audio, and introduces the recording studio as a powerful compositional tool. The course culminates in a concert of original student works presented in multi-channel surround sound. Enrollment gives students access to the Electronic Music Studio in the Department of Music. No prior knowledge of electronic music is necessary.

This course focuses on the knowledge necessary to improvise over the chord changes of standard jazz tunes. We cover basic terminology and chord symbols, scale-to-chord relationships, connection devices, and turn-around patterns. For the more experienced improviser, we explore alternate chord changes, tritone substitutions, and ornamentations. Using techniques gained in class, students write their own solos on a jazz tune and transcribe solos from recordings. All instruments are welcome, and students should write to the instructor prior to the first class to let them know their instrument.

This course focuses on the compositional norms of the "galant" and "high classical" styles of the eighteenth century, especially the instrumental music of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven. We will approach this repertoire from different angles, engaging literature on Formenlehre, schema theory, rhythm and meter, and topic theory. Ultimately, we will explore how conventions and deviations thereof participate in the construction of musical meaning and expression.

Historically one of the most complex and contested regions in the world, Israel/Palestine has a music culture that bears witness to processes of connection and separation. The politics of music in Israel/Palestine grow from conflicted beliefs about authenticity and ownership, the sounds of difference and sameness. The sacred and the secular intersect, and boundaries of practice and genre both divide and unite. Local practices have never been independent of global movement, be it in diaspora, pilgrimage, or the distant residence of refugees. The musical landscape of the region, therefore, has shifted throughout history, accessible primarily through the archaeology of music scholarship. In this proseminar we shall look at specific moments when the musics of Israel/Palestine converged, responding to and shaping historical change and conflict. We shall explore musical repertories and practices of all kinds, whether sacred or secular, vernacular or élite.

This course provides an introduction to ethnomusicology and related disciplines with an emphasis on the methods and contemporary practice of social and cultural analysis. The course reviews a broad selection of writing on non-Western, popular, vernacular, and "world-music" genres from a historical and theoretical perspective, clarifying key analytical terms (i.e., "culture," "subculture," "style," "ritual," "globalization") and methods (i.e., ethnography, semiotics, psychoanalysis, Marxism). In the last part of the course, students learn and develop component skills of fieldwork documentation and ethnographic writing.

This two-quarter course will provide a conceptual and practical introduction to the art, the craft, and the practice of orchestral conducting. The course is targeted particularly toward graduate students in Music Composition, but it is open to advanced musicians with orchestral performance experience as well. Ideally, students enrolled in the course should have had some experience playing or singing in a performance ensemble, and/or have a basic familiarity with orchestral instruments and traditional repertoire. Proficiency in sight-reading, ear-training, and basic keyboard skills are prerequisites for the course, but will not be specifically included in the curriculum.

The second quarter explores extensions of harmonic syntax, the basics of classical form, further work with counterpoint, and nondiatonic seventh chords. Musicianship labs in ear training and keyboard skills required.

The second quarter explores extensions of harmonic syntax, the basics of classical form, further work with counterpoint, and nondiatonic seventh chords. Musicianship labs in ear training and keyboard skills required.

This course, part of the Social Sciences Civ core, looks at musics in different moments of Euro-American history and the social contexts in which they originated, with some comparative views on other world traditions. It aims to give students a better understanding of the social contexts of European music over this period; aids for the basic sound structures of pieces from these different moments; and convincing writing in response to prompts based on source readings or music pieces. Our second quarter (MUS 12200 etc.) runs from the beginning of European Romanticism around 1800 to the turn of the 21st century.

This course aims to develop students' analytical and critical tools by focusing on a select group of works drawn from the Western European and American concert tradition. The texts for the course are recordings. Through listening, written assignments, and class discussion, we explore topics such as compositional strategy, conditions of musical performance, interactions between music and text, and the relationship between music and ideology as they are manifested in complete compositions.