Sophomore Tutorial
MUSIC 97L
Subject & Catalog Number
Course Information
Description
What does it mean to think about music? How might sound, silence, color, time, and form offer us different ways of understanding the music we hear, perform, and create? In Music 97T, we will approach musical thinking through a series of broad questions, each opening a different perspective on musical experience. We will explore the expressive possibilities of sound and silence; the roles of color, time, and form in shaping musical perception; the relationships among virtuosity, repetition, and musical process; and the ways in which music engages with noise, resistance, and the divine. Our investigations will move freely among musical traditions, genres, and historical periods, drawing on recordings, performances, musical scores, and visual art. Rather than beginning with established theories about music, we will begin with music itself, developing our capacities to listen closely, recognize musical relationships, articulate what we hear, and discover how musical experience can transform the ways we think.
Course Notes
This course broadly considers the many relationships between music and story. On one hand, how are music and sound employed to support an external (and often fictional) narrative? On the other, how does music studies tell stories about music to a variety of audiences? Accordingly, this course is divided loosely in half. The first half of the course focuses on storytelling with music; we will survey and analyze a variety of narrative mediums that incorporate music and sound—including opera, film, and games—in order to gain a sense of the roles of the aural dimension in fiction. We will also interrogate the differences between plot and narrative, asking whether or not music has the power to narrate. The second half of the course investigates storytelling about music; here, we explore how music studies crafts narratives about music and musical happenings to communicate an interpretation of events.
Class Notes
Class meets in one lecture each week (Monday) and twice in section (Wednesday and Friday).
This seminar will be taught by Dr. Trevor Bača.
Available for Harvard Cross Registration
NOTE: This course requires additional sections; you will be prompted to choose secondary components during the Add to Cart process
