Undergraduate Program
Selected Course Offerings:
Music History
A number of electives in Music History are offered on a regular basis. They include:
Music 112: Listening to Music.
Professor Craig Wright.
Development of aural skills that lead to an understanding of Western music. The musical novice is introduced to the ways in which music is put together and is taught how to listen to a wide variety of musical styles, from Bach and Mozart, to Gregorian chant, to the blues.
Music 130: Introduction to the History of Western Music: 900 to 1800.
Professor Seth Brodsky.
An introduction to the principal styles of Western art music through an examination of works by outstanding composers, beginning with Gregorian chant and ending with the music of Haydn and Mozart.
Music 131: Introduction to the History of Western Music: 1800 to the Present.
Professor Gundula Kreuzer.
A survey of nineteenth- and twentieth-century composers, genres, and styles of music in Europe and America, with an emphasis on ways of listening.
Music 236: Mozart and the Classical Era.
Professor Craig Wright.
Introduction to the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. A survey of the musical forms of the classical era is followed by an examination of selected compositions by Mozart. Special attention is paid to the piano concertos and late operas, especially those for which there are multiple versions on film.
Music 340: Listening in Nineteenth-Century Paris.
Professor Gundula Kreuzer.
A journey through the musical capital of nineteenth-century Europe. Various facets of Parisian musical life examined in order to trace changes in the public experience of music under the influence of wider political, sociocultural, and technical revolutions. Focus on the rise of grand opera and on legacies for twentieth-century "serious" music and popular mass culture.
Music 444: Composing, 1978-2008.
Professor Seth Brodsky.
Transformations in musical composition and the role of the composer during the last thirty years. Musical works situated against a backdrop of current events, both in popular culture and in the world of composerly production. Readings in cultural and aesthetic theory, as well as responses from critics, scholars, and composers. Works by Boulez, Berio, Ligeti, and others.
Music 467: Mahler, Modernism, and the Symphony.
Professor James Hepokoski.
A study of Mahler's earlier symphonies, Nos. 1-4, in the context of an emerging European musical "modernism," c. 1885-1905. Analysis of selected movements; interpretations of program and structure; consideration of cultural and compositional background.
Music 468: Mozart Operas.
Professor Ellen Rosand.
Mozarts' mature operas from dramatic, historical, and analytical perspectives. Repertory drawn from Idomeneo, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Le nozze die Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte, Die Zauberlflöte, and La clemenza di Tito.
