Learning Outcomes:
Students who complete this module will:
- gain or enhance specific listening skills that enable a more detailed understanding of musical form and structure.
- undertake close and sustained study of a number of specific musical works.
- become familiar with social and historical contexts that shape listening and performance.
- develop the ability to write more fluently and confidently about music.
Indicative Module Content:
Week 1 – Introduction: What (and what not) to Listen for in Music
Week 2 – Time and Teleology in late Beethoven
Week 3 – Development and Dissolution in Hindustani raga
Week 4 – Motive and Narrative in Hitchcock’s Vertigo (score by Bernard Herrmann)
Week 5 – Absolutism and Individualism in Mozart’s Requiem
Week 6 – Hearing Difference: the case of ‘Amazing Grace’
Week 7 – Mode, Texture, and Theme in Debussy’s Voiles
Week 8 – Transition and Fissure in Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder
Week 9 – Genre and Identity in ‘Old Town Road’ (Lil Nas X)