Music (MUSC)
MUSC 005 College Music Program
Private study in voice, keyboard, strings, woodwind, brass, percussion, and non-western instruments. Such study is designed to meet the artistic, technical, and/or professional needs of the student. Note: This is not a syllabus. Course requirements and assessment will be determined by the private instructor. Private lessons in the College House Music cannot be taken Pass/Fail. Please visit http://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/performance. Students cannot register through Penn In Touch. Registration will be maintained by the music department upon receipt of application and instructor permission. Prerequisite: Permits will be entred after student completes College Music House. Forms available in Music department.
Activity: Studio
0.5 Course Units
MUSC 007 Ensemble Performance
Successful participation in a music department sponsored group. Ensemble groups: University Orchestra, University Wind Ensemble, Choral Society, University Choir, Ancient Voices, Baroque and Recorder Ensemble, Chamber Music Society, Arab Music Ensemble, Samba and Jazz Combo. This course must be taken for a letter grade (Pass/Fail registration option may not be utilized for this course). Prerequisite: Please contact Ensemble Director if you are interested in taking Music 007 for credit.
Activity: Studio
0.5 Course Units
MUSC 010 Marian Anderson Performance Program
Special instruction in vocal and instrumental performance for music majors and minors only. Students must demonstrate in an audition that they have already attained an intermediate level of musical performance. They also must participate in a Music Department ensemble throughout the academic year, perform in public as a soloist at least once during the year (recital), perform a jury at the end of the spring semester, and attend and participate in masterclasses. Prerequiste: Must be a music major or minor.
Two terms. student must enter first term.
Activity: Lecture
0.5 Course Units
MUSC 016 Freshman Seminar
The primary goal of the freshman seminar program is to provide every freshman the opportunity for a direct personal encounter with a faculty member in a small setting devoted to a significant intellectual endeavor. Specific topics will be posted at the beginning of each academic year. Please see the College Freshman seminar website for information on current course offerings http:/www .college.upenn.edu/courses/seminars/freshman.php. Fulfills Arts and Letters sector requirement.
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 018 Freshman Seminar
The primary goal of the freshman seminar program is to provide every freshman the opportunity for a direct personal encounter with a faculty member in a small sitting devoted to a significant intellectual endeavor. Specific topics be posted at the beginning of each academic year. Please see the College Freshman seminar website for information on current course offerings http:// www.college.upenn.edu/courses/seminars/freshman.php.
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: URBS 018
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 030 1000 Years of Musical Listening
We know that we like music and that it moves us, yet it is often difficult to pinpoint exactly why, and harder still to explain what it is we are hearing. This course takes on those issues. It aims to introduce you to a variety of music, and a range of ways of thinking, talking and writing about music. The majority of music dealt with will be drawn from the so-called "Classical" repertory, from the medieval period to the present day, including some of the 'greats' such as Handel, Beethoven, Mozart, Berlioz, and Verdi, but will also introduce you to music you will most likely never have encountered before. This course will explore the technical workings of music and the vocabularies for analyzing music and articulating a response to it; it also examines music as a cultural phenomenon, considering what music has meant for different people, from different societies across the ages and across geographical boundaries. As well as learning to listen ourselves, we will also engage with a history of listening. No prior musical knowledge is required. (Formerly Music 021). Fulfills College Cross Cultural Foundational Requirement.
For BA Students: Arts and Letters Sector
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 032 Composers
This course will center on the biography, works, and cultural context of a specific composer or group of composers. As well as introducing students to the musical works of the composer(s), the course will examine issues such as reception history, the canon, mechanisms of cult formation, authorship and attribution, identity, historical and social contexts, and nationalism and patriotism.
For BA Students: Arts and Letters Sector
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman, Kallberg
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 033 History of Opera
An investigation, through a series of representative works, of the central problem of opera: how does the combination of music, text, and visual spectacle create an art form in which the whole is more powerful than its parts. Today this issue can be examined not only in live performances but also through media such as film, DVD, streaming video-- media to which this four-centuries-old multimedia form has adapted, evolving in still compelling ways. The works chosen for the course provide a chronological survey but also represent the variety of sources on which opera has drawn for it subject matter: myth and legend, the epic, the novel, and the play.
For BA Students: Arts and Letters Sector
Taught by: Calcagno, Goodman
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 034 Music Makers
Courses under this number will treat composer performers and performance. Courses will include a class on Haydn and Mozart (formerly 027;); Beethoven (Formerly 028; and Mahler (formerly 025).
Taught by: Caldwell, Goodman, Kallberg
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 035 Jazz Style and History
This course is an exploration of the family of musical idioms called jazz. Attention will be given to issues of style development, selective musicians, and to the social and cultural conditions and the scholarly discourses that have informed the creation, dissemination and reception of this dynamic set of styles from the beginning of the 20th century to the present. Fulfills Cultural Diversity in the U.S.
Taught by: Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 077
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 044 Thinking About Popular Music
Catchy and controversial, fluffy and hard-hitting: by definition popular music snags our attention and entertains. This course digs into the experiences of musicians and fans, unpacking how popular music manifests the hopes, contradictions, ingenuity, and challenges of life in the United States. Music 44 is organized around three core questions: first, what counts as good music and who gets credit for being creative; second, why has popular music, at various points in history, been perceived as socially dangerous (and musicians as deviant); third, what is the history of borrowing and appropriation, and how do these habits, which overwhelmingly affect musicians of color, continue to play out today? We delve into these questions and more by analyzing the musical traits of specific repertoire, profiling artists' lives, investigating changes in the music industry, and situating popular music in U.S. cultural history from the mid-nineteenth century to today. Lectures introduce the social and cultural history of popular music. Through close listening exercises in and out of class students will learn how to hear and respond to music critically. Selected readings demonstrate for students how to form an argument using musical sources. Discussions in class, presentations and debates, exams, and writing assignments provide students the chance to build, exercise, and improve these skills.
Taught by: Goodman
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 047 That's My Song!: Musical Genre as Social Contract
Music in American history has been fundamental to identity formation because, as one scholar notes, it comprises "the deepest feelings and qualities that make a group unique. Through moving and sounding together in synchrony, people can experience a feeling of oneness with others." This course examines how various musical genres have served as "social contracts" among audiences throughout the process of this country's nation building process. Within America's melting pot ideal, communities of listeners have asserted their powerful convictions about social identity through musical praxis and its "rules of engagement." The discourses surrounding the notion of "genre" have often made these meanings legible, audible and powerful for many. From Protestant church performance practices, to minstrelsy, to Tin Pan Alley to rock and hip-hop, the social agreements of musical genres help us understand the dynamism of American identities.
Taught by: Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 047
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 049 Listening to Nostalgia from the Phonograph to YouTube.
In revising the past, nostalgia invites us to also rethink the present, its ideals and its utopias. This CWiC course covers a century of nostalgia s aural technological mediation, from the invention of the phonograph to today s digital media such as YouTube. We will explore how conflicting forms of aural nostalgia (the longing for the sounds of other times or other places) are seen either as a suspicious refuge or an empowering cultural resource, and how they affect personal and collective identities, such as enhancing self-esteem or providing interpersonal bonds. The objective is to develop the students public speaking skills by voicing their own experiences of nostalgia while trying to understand the broader social, cultural, and communal issues at stake in nostalgic sounds. Through the examination of readings, analyses of recent and archival recordings, exhibits, and discussions, we will examine the intricate roles nostalgia has played at the intersections of aesthetics, technology, politics, marketing, the environment, and various audiovisual media, and how they affect us as individuals and communities. In order to develop their oral communication skills, students will be required to give presentations on two nostalgic topics of their choice in formats that employ different research, organization, and presentation competencies. Every week a small group of students will report on an example of sonic nostalgia found in Philadelphia in the style of a nostalgic radio program (or podcast). Each student will give a more formal oral critique of a nostalgic artifact of their choise, engaging with the plurality of oral (and aural) forms of nostalgia. Prerequisite: Communication within the Curriculum.
Taught by: Pare-Morin
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 050 World Musics and Cultures
This course examines how we as consumers in the "Western" world engage with musical difference largely through the products of the global entertainment industry. We examine music cultures in contact in a variety of ways-- particularly as traditions in transformation. Students gain an understanding of traditional music as live, meaningful person-to-person music making, by examining the music in its original site of production, and then considering its transformation once it is removed, and recontextualized in a variety of ways. The purpose of the course is to enable students to become informed and critical consumers of "World Music" by telling a series of stories about particular recordings made with, or using the music of, peoples culturally and geographically distant from the US. Students come to understand that not all music downloads containing music from unfamiliar places are the same, and that particular recordings may be embedded in intriguing and controversial narratives of production and consumption. At the very least, students should emerge from the class with a clear understanding that the production, distribution, and consumption of world music is rarely a neutral process. Fulfills College Cross Cultural Foundational Requirement.
For BA Students: Arts and Letters Sector
Taught by: Muller,Rommen,Sykes
One-term course offered either term
Also Offered As: AFRC 050, ANTH 022, FOLK 022
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 051 Music of Africa
African Contemporary Music: North, South, East, and West. Come to know contemporary Africa through the sounds of its music: from South African kwela, jazz, marabi, and kwaito to Zimbabwean chimurenga; Central African soukous and pygmy pop; West African Fuji, and North African rai and hophop. Through reading and listening to live performance, audio and video recordings, we will examine the music of Africa and its intersections with politics, history, gender, and religion in the colonial and post colonial era. (Formerly Music 053). Fulfills College Cross Cultural Foundational Requirement.
For BA Students: Arts and Letters Sector
Taught by: Muller
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 053, COML 053
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 053 Music in Troubled Places
In this class, we go beyond the headlines to discuss the history and cultures of peoples who have had to endure terrible suffering, particularly through ethnic conflict and civil war. We will focus on a curious phenomenon: populations typically defined as separate from one another (e.g., Israelis and Palestinians) often have a history of shared or related cultural practices, of which music is a prime example. We will survey a number of current and recent conflict zones and use music as a way to deepen our understanding of the identities and relationships between the peoples involved including through a consideration of my own fieldwork in Sri Lanka. Querying the very definitions of music, trouble, and place, the course then broadens out to consider how musicians have been affected by and/or responded to important global problems like slavery, sexual violence, climate change and other ecological disasters, like Hurricane Katrina. Regions to be considered in our lectures and/or readings include: Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria (including Kurdish musics), Israel-Palestine, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Myanmar/Burma, Uganda, Sierra Leone, North and South Korea, the Marshall Islands, Cambodia, Mexico, and the United States.
Taught by: Sykes
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: ANTH 053, NELC 054
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 056 Seeing/Hearing Globally: Knowing People, Culture, and Places through Travel
Students are provided a general introduction to a country's history, politics, environment, and performance through a range of resources: scholarly literature, film, music, and online resources; with particular focus on sites, communities, and events included in the 12 day intensive travel to that country (either Fall semester Intro with winter break travel; or spring semester Intro with late spring intensive travel). Students are given guidelines for writing about and representing live performances and experiences of exhibits and heritage sites for journaling and are expected to produce a written/creative project at the end of the travel. The itinerary and specific course content will vary according to the travel site and focus of each class.
Taught by: Muller
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 056, ANTH 056, COML 056
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 070 Introduction to Theory and Musicianship: Making Sense of Music.
This course will cover basic skills and vocabulary for reading, hearing, performing, analyzing, and writing music. Students will gain command of musical rudiments, including notation, reading and writing in treble and bass clefs, intervals, keys, scales, triads and seventh chords, and competence in basic melodic and formal analysis. The course will include an overview of basic diatonic harmony, introduction to harmonic function and tonicization. Musicianship skills will include interval and chord recognition, rhythmic and melodic dictation and familiarity with the keyboard. There will be in-depth study of selected compositions from the "common practice" Western tradition, including classical, jazz, blues and other popular examples. Listening skills--both with scores (including lead sheets, figured bass and standard notation), and without--will be emphasized. There is no prerequisite. Fulfills College Formal Reasoning and Analysis Foundational Requirement.
Taught by: Waltham-Smith, Weesner
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 075 Musical Interfaces and Robotics
Musical Interfaces and Robotics is a skills and discussion-based class for students interested in learning the basics of electricity and physical computing specifically for musical purposes. Discussions will be organized around readings related to art and technology with a focus on sound-based works. Students will learn to program Arduinos that control DC motors and respond to physical buttons or sensors. We will learn how to integrate these tools with music applications that communicate with MIDI such as Reaper, Logic Pro, and/or Max/MSP. As a final project students will present a working prototype for a new instrument they've created or plans for an art installation featuring a kinetic sculptural element.
Taught by: Jacobs
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 077 Introduction to Electronic Musicmaking
An exploration of composition, style, and technique in a variety of popular and experimental electronic music genres. We'll study and practice making works in genres including acousmatic music, beat-driven music such as hip-hop and techno, pop songwriting, and sound art. As we proceed, we'll investigate techniques including field recording, sampling, sound synthesis, and generative music. Within each genre, we'll begin from the analysis and technique of exemplary music, then work towards presentation and group discussion of student composition projects.
Taught by: Burns
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 081 Film Music in Post 1950 Italy: Nino Rota and Ennio Morricone
An exploration of cinematic sound through the lens of specific composer/director collaborations in post-1950 Italy, examining scores, soundtracks, and the interaction of diegetic and non-diegetic music with larger soundscapes. Composers Nino Rota and Ennio Morricone serve as case studies, in partnership with directors Fellini, Visconti, Leone, Pontecorve, Pasolini, and Coppola. Highlights include several excerpts form the Fellini/Rota collaboration, including The White Sheik, I vitelloni, The Road, Nights of Cabiria, La dolce vita, 8 1/2, Juliet of the Spirits, Satyricon, The Clowns, Roma, Amarcord, Casanova, and Orchestra Rehearsal. Rota's music for Visconti will be examined in Senso, the Leopard, and Rocco and his Brothers, along with his Transatlantic collaboration for The Godfather. Morricone's work with various directors will be discussed in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, The Battle of Algiers, and Teorema, as well as for American films such as Malick's Days of Heaven and Tarantino's The Hateful Eight. Weekly screenings required. Open to all: music majors, minors, and non-majors; will count toward requirements for music minor. Knowledge of music and Italian helpful but not required. All readings and lectures in English.
Taught by: Samuel
Also Offered As: CIMS 081, ITAL 081
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 099 Guided Research
Individual research under the supervision of a member of the faculty.
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 130 Introduction to European Art Music
This course aims to introduce students to what it means to study the European musical tradition. Students will approach the diverse music that constitute the classical tradition from a variety of scholarly perspectives. The goal of this class is to listen deeply and think broadly. Students will consider questions such as: what sort of object is music? Where is it located? What does it mean to say a work is "canonic"? What is left out of the story? This class will be in dialog with other tier-one classes, and will consider what the historian can bring to the study and understanding of music. Fulfills the requirements of the Music major.
For BA Students: Arts and Letters Sector
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman, and Kallberg
Course not offered every year
Prerequisite: MUSC 070
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 135 Introduction to the Music Life in America
This course surveys American musical life from the colonial period to the present. Beginning with the music of Native Americans, the European legacy, and the African Diaspora, the course treats the singular social and political milieu that forged the profile of America's musical landscape. Attention will be given to the establishment of the culture industry and to various activities such as sacred music, parlor music, concert and theater music, the cultivation of oral traditions, the appearance of jazz, the trajectory of western art music in the United States, and the eventual global dominance of American popular music. Music 070 prerequisite. Preference given to music Majors and Minors. Fulfills the Cultural Diversity in the U.S. College Requirement.
Taught by: Ramsey, Goodman
Course not offered every year
Prerequisite: MUSC 070
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 150 Introduction to Ethnomusicology
This course introduces students to the field of ethnomusicology through a series of case studies that explore a range of traditional, popular, and art musics from around the world. The course takes as a point of departure several works of musical ethnography, musical fiction, and musical autobiography and, through in-depth reading of these texts, close listening to assigned sound recordings, and in- class case studies, generates a context within which to think and write about music. Prerequisite: Fulfills the requirements of the Music major.
Taught by: Muller, Rommen, Sykes
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 170 Theory and Musicianship I
Introduction to and development of principles of tonal voice-leading, harmonic function, counterpoint, and form through written analysis, composition, improvisation, and written work. Course covers diatonic harmony and introduction to chromaticism. Repertoires will focus on Western classical music. Musicianship component will include sight-singing, dictation keyboard harmony. Fulfills College Formal Reasoning and Analysis Foundational Requirement. Required of music majors.
Taught by: Moreno, Primosch, Weesner
Course usually offered in fall term
Prerequisite: MUSC 070
Activity: Lecture
1.5 Course Unit
MUSC 171 Theory and Musicianship II
Continuation of techniques established in Theory and Musicianship I. Explores chromatic harmony. Concepts will be developed through analysis and model composition. Musicianship component will include sight singing, clef reading, harmonic dictation and keyboard harmony. Required of music majors.
Taught by: Moreno, Weesner
Course usually offered in spring term
Prerequisite: MUSC 170
Activity: Lecture
1.5 Course Unit
MUSC 230 Historical Eras and Topics: Earlier Periods
This course offers an in-depth look at topics and repertoires of the "earlier" periods, namely one (or more) of three historical epochs: Medieval, Renaissance, or Baroque. The purpose of this course is to give students the oppotunity to engage deeply with musical works historically, analytically, and contextually, in addition to introducing a range of methodologies within the historical study of Music. (Formerly Music 120, 121,122).
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 231 Historical Eras and Topics: Later Periods
This course offers an in-depth look at topics and repertoires of the eighteenth century to today. Classes focus on one (or more) of four historical epochs: Enlightenment, Romantic, Modern, and Postmodern. The purpose of this course is to give students the opportunity to engage deeply with musical works historically, analytically and contextually, in addition to introducing a range of methodologies within the historical study of music. (Formerly 123, 124).
Taught by: Goodman, Kallberg, Ramsey
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 232 Themes in Music History
In this course, students will have the opportunity to explore music history from a thematic or conceptual perspective, frequently through several eras. Past themes organizing the course include the Voice, the Sacred, Uncanny, Technology, Instruments, Orality and Literacy, and Machines.
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman, Kallberg, Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 234 Music Makers
Courses under this number will treat composer, performers, and performance. This class may also on occasion have a performance component, including collaborations with local performance venues, artists in residence. Courses will include a class on Haydn and Mozart (formerly 027); Beethoven (formerly 28); Mahler (formerly 25); Monks and Nuns; String Quartets.
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman, Kallberg, Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 235 Studies in African-American Music
This course explores aspects of the origins, style development, aesthetic philosophies, historiography, and contemporary conventions of African-American musical traditions. Topics covered include: the music of West and Central Africa, the music of colonial America, 19th century church and dance music, minstrelsy, music of the Harlem Renaissance, jazz, blues, gospel, hip-hop, and film music. Special attention is given to the ways that black music produces "meaning" and to how the social energy circulating within black music articulates myriad issues about American identity at specific histroical moments. The course will also engage other expressive art forms from visual and literary sources in order to better position music making into the larger framework of African American aesthetics. (Formerly Music 146).
Taught by: Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 147
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 236 Performance, Analysis, History
Participation in the course is contingent upon a successful audition. This course must be taken for a letter grade (pass/fail option may not be utilized for this course). This weekly seminar will explore music from the past and present through class discussions of performance, historical context, and analytical aspects of the music led by a professor and/or performer. One example of a class in this number will be an indepth study of chamber music repertoire led by the Daedalus Quartet. Students will prepare for a final performance at the end of the semester as well as a paper/presentation. Students interested in this applied approach to music may also wish to take 256 and/or 276. Prerequisite: Students must successfuly audition to be in the course; previous private study in an instrument is required. Basic fluency in rudiments of music theory is also required.
Taught by: Weesner
Course usually offered in spring term
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 239 Honors Thesis in Music I
Individual research under the supervision of a member of the faculty. Prerequisite: either 130 or 135 or 150; and 170. The objective is the development of honors thesis proposal. Students must complete Honors Thesis I and II (each counting for half a credit) in order to be eligible for departmental honors.
Course usually offered in fall term
Prerequisites: MUSC 130 or MUSC 135 or MUSC 150; and MUSC 170
Activity: Independent Study
0.5 Course Units
MUSC 252 Music, Religion, Ritual in South and Southeast Asia.
What role does music play in articulating religious identities and spaces? What is the importance of ritual musics as they persist and change in the modern world? How does music reflect and articulate religious ways of thinking and acting? In this course, we explore these and other questions about the interrelations between music, religion, and ritual in South and Southeast Asia. Focusing on India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Indonesia, the course emphasizes musics from Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim and Christian traditions; nevertheless, it draws widely to touch upon sacred musics in Pakistan, Nepal, Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, and among some indigenous peoples in the region. Throughout, we explore ontologies of sound; sonic occurrences in religious structures, public processions, and pilgrimage sites; the construction of religion and ritual as ideas forged through colonial encounter and modern scholarship on religion; the politics of sacred sounds in today's public spaces and contemporary media, such as television and online; and the surprising fluidity between popular and sacred musical genres.
Taught by: Sykes
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: ANTH 242, SAST 252
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 255 Accordions of the New World
This course focuses on the musical genres and styles (both traditional and popular) that have grown up around the accordion in the New World. We will begin our explorations in Nova Scotia and move toward the Midwest, travelling through the polka belt. From there, our investigation turns toward Louisiana and Texas--toward zydeco, Cajun, and Tex-Mex music. We will then work our way through Central and South America, considering norteno, cumbia, vallenato, tango, chamame, and forro. Our journey will conclude in the Caribbean, where we will spend some time thinking about merengue and rake-n-scrape music. Throughout the semester, the musical case studies will be matched by readings and film that afford ample opportunity to think about the ways that music is bound up in ethnicity, identity, and class. We will also have occasion to think about the accordion as a multiply meaningful instrument that continues to be incorporated into debates over cultural politics and mobilized as part of strategies of representation through the New World. (Formerly Music 157).
Taught by: Rommen
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 157, FOLK 157, LALS 157
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 256 Music and Performance of Africa
This class provides an overview of the most popular musical styles and discussion of the cultural and political contexts in which they emerged in contemporary Africa. Learning to perform a limited range of African music/dance will be part of this course. No prior performance experience required.
Taught by: Muller
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 253, ANTH 263
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 257 Caribbean Music and Diaspora
This course considers Caribbean musics within a broad and historical framework.Caribbean musical practices are explored by illustrating the many ways that aesthetics, ritual, communication, religion, and social structure are embodied in and contested through performance. These initial inquiries open onto an investigation of a range of theoretical concepts that become particularly pertinent in Caribbean contexts--concepts such as post-colonialism, migration, ethnicity, hybridity, syncretism, and globalization. Each of these concepts, moreover, will be explored with a view toward understanding its connections to the central analytical paradigm of the course--diaspora. Throughout the course, we will listen to many different styles and repertories of music ranging from calpso to junkanoo, from rumba to merengue, and from dance hall to zouk. We will then work to understand them not only in relation to the readings that frame our discussions but also in relation to our own North-American contexts of music consumption and production. (Formerly Music 258).
Taught by: Rommen
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: ANTH 256, LALS 258
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 258 Latin American Music
This survey course considers Latin American musics within a broad cultural and historical framework. Latin American musical practices are explored by illustrating the many ways that aesthetics, ritual, communication, religion, and social structure are embodied in and contested through performance. These initial inquiries open onto an investigation of a range of theoretical concepts that become particularly pertinent in Latin American contexts--concepts such as post-colonialism, migration, ethnicity, and globalization. Throughout the course, we will listen to many different styles and repertories of music and then work to understand them not only in relation to the readings that frame our discussions but also in relation to our own, North American contexts of music consumption and production. (Formerly Music 158).
Taught by: Rommen
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: LALS 158
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 259 Honors Thesis in Music II
Individual research under the supervision of a member of the faculty. Prerequisite: either 130 or 135 or 150; 170; 239. The objective is the writing and completion of Honors Thesis. Students must complete Honors Thesis I and II (each counting for half a credit) in order to be eligible for departmental honors
Course usually offered in fall term
Prerequisites: MUSC 130 or MUSC 135 or MUSC 150; and MUSC 170
Activity: Independent Study
0.5 Course Units
MUSC 270 Theory and Musicianship III
Continuation of techniques established in Theory and Musicianship I and II. Concepts will be developed through analysis and model composition. Musicianship component will include advanced sight singing, clef reading, harmonic dictation and keyboard harmony. Prerequisite: Required of music majors.
Taught by: Moreno, Primosch, Weesner
Course usually offered in fall term
Activity: Lecture
1.5 Course Unit
MUSC 271 Composition I: Historical Practices
Studies in selected 16th through 19th century compositional practices. Possible topics may include 16th century modal counterpoint; sonata forms in Viennese classicism; advanced chromatic harmony. Course includes analysis of relevant pieces and student compositional projects reflecting course topic.
Taught by: Primosch
Course not offered every year
Prerequisites: MUSC 170, 171, 270
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 272 Composition II: Contemporary Practices
Studies in seleted 20th and 21st century compositional practices. Possible topics may include symmetry in post-tonal harmony; composing for piano; the sonata in the 20th century. Course includes analysis of relevant pieces and student compositional projects reflecting course topic.
Course not offered every year
Prerequisites: MUSC 170, 171, 270
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 273 Orchestration
An introduction to writing for the instruments of the orchestra. Course will include study of individual instruments and various instrumental combinations, including full orchestra. Representative scores from the 18th century to the present day will be analyzed. Students will be responsible for several scoring projects and will have opportunities to hear readings of their projects. Prerequisite: at least two semesters of music theory or permission of instructor. (Formerly 285).
Taught by: Primosch
Course not offered every year
Prerequisite: MUSC 070 OR MUSC 170
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 275 Electronic Music
MUSC275 offers an introduction to electronic music/sound production with a focus on analogue systems and performance. Guest artists will join us for in-class visits and performances during the semester. Meetings will take place in the classroom, in concert spaces and in the studio. Preference given to Music majors and minors for registration.
Taught by: Lew
Course not offered every year
Prerequisite: MUSC 070 OR MUSC 170
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 277 Recording Music.
An introduction to music and sound recording with a focus on concerts and live performances. The entire process will be examined from start to finish, including the roles played by composers, musicians, listeners, performance spaces, and recording technology. Meetings will take place in the classroom, in concert spaces and in the studio. Music majors and minors will be given preference for registration.
Taught by: Lew
Course usually offered in fall term
Prerequisite: MUSC 170
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 278 Composition for Musicians
Music 278 is a Composition Seminar that treats composing as both an end in itself and a means for thinking broadly and speculatively about music. We will work on various compositional techniques through exercises as well as 'free' composition, giving attention to skills as well as to personal voice. We will survey the current musical landscape through listening, analysis and dicussion. The question of musical style itself will be pursued, and while we will be oriented to western art music, we will consider a wide range of styles, including popular music. It is assumed that students will have fluency with musical notation. Prerequisite: If course requirement not met, permission of the instructor.
Taught by: Weesner
Prerequisite: MUSC 171
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 330 Seminar in Music History
This is an advanced seminar, primarily for juniors and seniors who are prepared to engage deeply and critically with a specialized research topic. The topic of the seminar is determined by the instructor, and can focus on a particular genre or body of repertoire, music-maker or composer, the cultural and social dynamics of a period in music history. Prerequisites: MUSC 170 or other demonstration of familiarity with music notation and music theory. It is recommended that students also have taken MUSC 130 and at least one 200-level course. However, students who have not taken these courses may be admitted at the discretion of the instructor.
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman, Kallberg, Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Prerequisite: MUSC 170
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 350 Seminar in Ethnomusicology
Advanced study in a selected topic in Ethnomusicology.
Taught by: Muller, Rommen, Sykes
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 370 Seminar in Theory and Composition
This is an advanced seminar, primarily for juniors and seniors who are prepared to engage deeply with study of Composition and Theory. Possible course content includes: compositional practice in the first half of the 20th century (Anna Weesner), study of compositional practices of the past fifty years (including a range of musical styles-James Primosch) and seminar in Theory (Popular Music-Jairo Moreno). Please check department website for specific course term descriptions. https://music.sas.upenn.edu/
Taught by: Moreno
Course not offered every year
Prerequisites: MUSC 170, MUSC 171
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 508 Advanced Musicianship
Advanced techniques of score reading and general musicianship at the keyboard. Goals of the course include increasing proficiency in sight singing (including C clefs).Taking harmonic, melodic, and rhythmic dictations. Accurate performance of rhythms. Prerequisite: Reasonable keyboard and sight-reading facility.
Two terms. student must enter first term.
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 515 Analysis of Twentieth-Century Music
Analytical studies of twentieth-century music.
Taught by: Primosch
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 516 Analysis of 20th Century Music II
Analytical Studies of 20th century music focusing on post World War II music.
Taught by: Primosch, Reise
Course not offered every year
Activity: Lecture
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 520 Composing with Instruments
Students will study the capabilities of instruments, singly and in combination. Historical and contemporary practices will be analyzed. Creative projects will be completed. Please see department website https://music.sas.upenn.edu/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Diels, Primosch, Sorey, Weesner
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 530 Composing with Electronics
Students will study a variety of hardware and software used in making electronic music. Historical and contemporary practices will be analyzed. Creative projects will be completed. Please see department website https://music.sas.upenn.edu/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Diels, Primosch
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 540 Composing with Performers
The goal of this course is to explore and mine for possibilities the space between a score and the performance of a score. What do performers bring to a piece of music and how do composers best anticipate these possibilities? How much "room" for interpretation exists and how do composers capitalize on it? What is performance practice? The course will engage compositional techniques in connection with a wide of range of performance practices. In order to highlight and pursue elements of interpretation in music performance, students will coach performers in both old and new repertoire. The course will involve interactions with live performers, often Penn's string quartet-in-residence, The Daedalus Quartet. Other topics may include notational solutions, the role of improvisation, aleatoric techniques, and music analysis. Please see department website https://music.sas.upenn.edu/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Diels, Primosch, Sorey, Weesner
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 542 Archiving Jazz: Visuality And Materiality In The Phila Jazz Community 1945-2019
This seminar will be organized around three distinct pathways. First, it will serve as an introduction to Jazz Studies and thus be attentive to the ways that jazz music has sparked an interdisciplinary conversation that is wide-ranging and ongoing. Second, we will be partnering with the African American Museum of Philadelphia to consider jazz within the realm of visual art. In light of efforts to map the "black interior," how have visual artists (e.g. painters, sculptors, filmmakers, and photographers) sought to represent jazz? Third, we will endeavor to develop partnerships with the Philadelphia (and beyond) jazz community, especially as it pertains to creating and sustaining an archive that serves as way to understand jazz as an instrument of placemaking and also as a vehicle for jazz musicians to take ownership of their narratives. The seminar will meet at the African American Museum of Philadelphia and be team taught with members of the Museum staff. The course will culminate with a virtual exhibit of visual works and archival materials centering on Philadelphia's jazz community and (if funding is available) a free concert to be held at AAMP. Undergraduates are welcome to register for the course with permission of the instructor.
Taught by: Beavers
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 542, ARTH 519, ENGL 541, URBS 542
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 559 Audio Ethnography
This is an intensive, graduate-level, practice-based course in which students will record, edit, and produce anthropologically informed audio works that record and interpret culture and lived experience. Projects in this class will look beyond conventional linguistic or musical codes to sounds whose semiotic or affective value may be less immediately evident. Through the process of making location recordings, analyzing those recordings, composing them into autonomous works, and critiquing every step of the way, this course will engage with questions of ethnographic representation through the medium of sound. In parallel with contextualizing readings and sound projections, throughout the semester students will work intensively on audio projects, receiving training on recording techniques, audio editing, and basic post-production techniques. The course is an opportunity to open up the question of what might constitute 'audio documentary' or 'ethnographic audio'. Presentation strategies for final projects will be discussed and decided on individual bases. Projects will be situated in relationship to cognate fields, including the anthropology of the senses, interdisciplinary sound studies, ethnomusicology, ethnographic cinema, sound art, sound mapping, soundscape composition, and experimental nonfiction media practices which involve location recording. Through weekly sound projections and home listening, students will also gain a familiarity with existing genres and uses of nonfiction audio in anthropology and related fields.
Taught by: Karel
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: ANTH 559
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 576 Anthromedialities: Experimental Theory and Practice
In recent years much has been made of the "beyond text" turn in anthropology, specifically the need to re-evaluate the singular authority of "writing culture." Several new approaches advocate for non-textual medialities, with representations originating in both sonovisual media and performance. Less, however, has been theorized and advocated about intermediality and the multicompositional practices of transmediality and plurimediality, specifically their more transgressive multisensory epistemology. This course will examine these radical approaches to interacting textual, visual, sonic and performative mediations, theorizing their epistemic and ethical implications, collaborative potentials, affordances in narrative and non-narrative representation, and political and aesthetic investments. Students will both critically engage histories of transmedial anthropology, and produce projects that are multicompositional.
Taught by: Feld
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: ANTH 576, COMM 877
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 601 Texts and Material Culture
Topics may include book, manuscript, and print culture; history of the book; history of music notation; codicology and paleography; textual criticism, philology, and editing; encoding and textual technologies; musical bibliographies.
Taught by: Caldwell
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 603 Aesthetics and Criticism
Topics may include hermeneutics, methods of formulating value judgements, the relationship of evaluation to interpretation, and the role of aesthetics in history.
Taught by: Kallberg
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 604 Historiography and Methodologies
Theories and models of historical investigation. Analysis of historiographic writings and musicological works exemplifying particular approaches, such as transnational, environmental/landscape, gender/sexuality, critical race studies, performance studies, archives, and the digital humanities.
Taught by: Calcagno, Caldwell, Goodman
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: COML 602, ITAL 602
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 605 Anthropology of Music
Topics may include the intellectual history of ethnomusicology, current readings in ethnomusicology, a consideration of theoretical principles based upon the reading and interpretation of selected monographs, and area studies. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions. Prerequisite: Open to graduate students from all departments.
Taught by: Muller, Rommen, Sykes
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 605
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 606 The Interpretation of Oral Traditions
Topics may draw on methodologies derived from jazz studies, chant studies, and ethnomusicology. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 606
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 620 Creative and Compositional Approaches
This course focuses on methods for thinking and engaging creatively through sound, whether compositionally or through other kinds of sound objects. Topics may include: compositional strategies; recording and producing; film; sound installations; experimental ethnography; sound art; and performance practice. Students will begin to put these methodological ideas into practice by developing semester-long projects. These projects can be individual or collaborative.
Taught by: Diels, Primosch, Sorey, Weesner
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 621 Analytical Methods: Twentieth-Century Music
Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions. .
Taught by: Moreno, Waltham-Smith
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 622 Analytical and Theoretical Approaches
This course focuses on the analytical methods and theoretical approaches that circulate in music studies. Topics may include: the politics of listening; score-based analysis; social and critical theories; issues and politics of translation, inscription, and transcription; questions of form; the history of theory; performance studies; the history of musical notation; voice and vocality; and sound studies. Students will typically begin to put these methodological ideas into practice through a series of hands-on assignments which could be either individual or collaborative in nature.
Taught by: Moreno
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 630 Perspectives on the String Quartet
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 650 Ethnographic and Anthropological Approaches
This course focuses on the ethics, politics, and practice of ethnography. Topics may include: fieldwork methods; collaborative practice; ethnography and the archive; power and subjectivity; multimodal approaches; reciprocity and questions of accessibility; oral histories; experimental ethnography; and the politics of transcription, inscription, and translation. Students will begin to put these methodological ideas into practice by developing semester-long ethnographic projects. These projects can be individual or collaborative partnerships, and might also connect students to ongoing community-based research.
Taught by: Muller, Rommen, Sykes
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 700 Seminar in Composition
Seminar in selected compositional problems, with emphasis on written projects. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Primosch, Reise, Weesner
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 705 Seminar in Ethnomusicology
Topics in Ethnomusicology. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/node/53425 for current term course descriptions. Prerequisite: Open to graduate students from all departments.
Taught by: Muller, Rommen, Sykes
Course usually offered in fall term
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 710 Studies in Medieval Music
PLEASE see department website for current term course description. http://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses/music/courses .
Taught by: Caldwell
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 720 Studies in Renaissance Music
Seminar on selected topics in the music of the Renaissance.
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 730 Studies in Baroque Music
Seminar on selected topics in the music of the Baroque period. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Calcagno
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: ITAL 630
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 740 Studies in Classical Music
Seminar on selected topics in the music of the Classical period. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Goodman, Kallberg
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 750 Studies in Romantic Music
Studies of Music in the 19th-Century. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Kallberg
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 760 Studies in Twentieth-Century Music
Seminar on selected topics in the music of the twentieth century. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Kallberg
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 770 Seminar in Afro-American Music
Seminar course description offerings can be found on the Music department website: https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses. Scroll through Current graduate seminar offerings on right.
Taught by: Ramsey
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: AFRC 771
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 780 Studies in Music Theory and Analysis
Seminar on selected topics in music theory and analysis. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Moreno, Waltham-Smith
Course not offered every year
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 781 Writing Sound--Sounding Literature
Seminar on selected topics in sound studies. Please see department website https://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/courses for current term course descriptions.
Taught by: Waltham-Smith
Course not offered every year
Also Offered As: COML 781
Activity: Seminar
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 799 Guided Reading in Musical Scholarship
Guidance in preparation for the A.M. comprehensive examination in the history and theory of music.
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 800 Teaching Music History
The teaching of music history courses to undergraduates.
Course not offered every year
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 801 Teaching Music Theory
The teaching of music theory courses to undergraduates.
Course not offered every year
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 802 Teaching World Musics
The teaching of world music courses to undergraduates.
Taught by: Muller, Rommen.
Course not offered every year
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 994 Preparation of Ph.D. Proposal
Preparation of Ph.D. essay. Completion of Course and submission of Ph.d. essay marks official entry to Ph.D. program.
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 998 Independent Study in Composition
Private instruction in musical composition. May be taken for multiple course-unit credit.
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit
MUSC 999 Independent Study and Research
Individual study and research under the supervision of a member of the faculty. May be taken for multiple course-unit credit.
One-term course offered either term
Activity: Independent Study
1.0 Course Unit