MUSI

This course consists of individual weekly composition lessons.

During the five three-hour sessions of the Dissertation Chapter Seminar each quarter, Ph.D. students in their fourth and fifth years will have the opportunity to share strategies for writing up their dissertations during the years of most intensive research. We shall work collectively to develop these strategies, investigating the on-the-ground research work that students bring to the DCS from the early stages of research to the completion of chapters in preparation for the dissertation-completion year. Each session will begin with a discussion of research-to-writing strategies, and it will conclude with discussion in the seminar of one or two pre-circulated chapters by students in the DCS. Ph.D. students who are not in residence during their fourth and fifth years, because they are conducting research or no longer in residence in Chicago, will participate remotely. The DCS provides students an opportunity for a sustained and supportive dissertation-writing workshop for Ph.D. students in Music.

The Colloquium is a series of lectures followed by discussion and normally given by speakers from other institutions who are specially invited by the Music Department to share their recent research or compositions with students and faculty. All lectures take place on Friday afternoons.

The composition seminar is a weekly session designed for graduate students in composition. It is an open forum for composers to listen to recent music, including their own, and to discuss issues connected with trends, esthetics, and compositional techniques. The entire composition faculty takes part in these sessions. The composition seminar often hosts well-known visiting composers whose works are performed in the city by various groups or ensembles, as well as performers specializing in new music and contemporary techniques.

This course’s goal is to introduce graduate students to the history, development and theoretical underpinnings of ethnomusicology as a research discipline. In our readings, therefore, we will focus our attention on key figures and institutions, especially from the late 19th century forward; on major issues and debates in and beyond ethnomusicology; on the relationships between ethnomusicology and other research disciplines; and on emergent emphases and concerns in ethnomusicological work.

The stark black and white of Madonna’s “Vogue” and the pinks and sparkles of “Material Girl.” The explosive surprise releases of Beyoncé's BEYONCÉ and Lemonade visual albums. The lavish cinematic spectacle of Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood” and the fanbait intertextuality of SM Entertainment’s Aespa. Since MTV’s advent in 1981, hit music videos have made a number of pop songs inextricable from iconic imagery and choreography; ubiquitous digital devices and the rise of platforms like YouTube and TikTok have only increased pop music’s audiovisuality.

Looking at and listening to female pop icons raises fraught questions of agency, representation, race, sexuality/sexualization, bodies, commodification, and capital. In this course, students will gain a vocabulary for talking about both the audio and visual parameters of music video, and they will use this vocabulary to engage with critical frameworks for examining meaning, circulation, and reception in contemporary music videos.

Assignments across the course will allow students to experiment with a range of writing and media genres, including critical close readings, micro-reception histories, thinkpieces, podcast episodes, and video essays.

This course 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.

Designed for beginning composers to practice and hone the nuances of their musical craft, this course introduces some of the fundamentals of music composition through a series of exercises as well as several larger creative projects. Professional musicians will perform students’ exercises and compositions.

This is primarily a creative, composing course. Through a combination of composition assignments, listening, discussion, analysis, and reading, we will explore and practice the fundamental aspects of music composition. Repertoire study, harmony, counterpoint, rhythm, orchestration, timbre, form, transformation, and several other pertinent essentials are included in the curriculum. This laboratory-style, practical course is interactive and discussion-based.