MFD10010 Music, Film and Drama: Making, Doing, Interpreting

Academic Year 2021/2022

Music, film, and theatre constitute three distinctive art forms, and as such they each rely upon (and sometimes break) the conventions specific to their medium. Nevertheless, they also share elements of formal structure, thematic content, and perhaps most importantly, an emphasis on temporality, with the expectation that an audience would experience and understand these art forms in real time. These three art forms also influence, intensify, and transform each other, both in situations where they are directly combined, and more generally through dialogue between texts. In this module, we explore the similarities and differences between these art forms, as well as the ways that they interact, by examining three stages of the artistic process: making, doing, and interpreting. Our study of making focuses on aspects of authorship, form, and content. During the doing unit, we turn to elements of collaboration, temporality, and medium. Finally, we consider interpretation as a way of exploring audience, critical interpretation, and cultural impact.
Students will be provided with a weekly resource pack on Brightspace (UCD's virtual learning environment), which will consist of musical and audiovisual examples, reading materials, and PowerPoint slides.