MUSI 1310 Basic Musical Skills

3.0 credits

Lecture / Section 1 (Sam Golter): MWF / 9:00-9:50 am / OCH 107
Class Number: 10699

Lecture / Section 2 (Kevin Davis): MWF / 10:00-10:50 am / OCH 107
Class Number: 10698

Lecture / Section 3 (Beck Brown): MWF / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH 107
Class Number: 10700

Study of the rudiments of music and training in the ability to read music.  Prerequisite: No previous knowledge of music required.

MUSI 2070 Popular Music

Nick Rubin
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 12:00-12:50 pm / Maury 209
Class Number: 12285

Discussion Sections:

Section 101 (Tim Booth): T / 9:30-10:20 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 12286

Section 102 (Tim Booth): T / 11:00-11:25 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 12287

Section 103 (Tim Booth): T / 12:30-1:20 pm / OCH S008
Class Number: 12288

Section 104 (Natalia Perez): R / 9:30-10:20 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 12289

Section 105 (Natalia Perez): R / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 12290

Section 106 (Natalia Perez): R / 12:30-1:20 pm / OCH S008
Class Number: 12291

Section 107 (Ben Robertson): T / 9:30-10:20 am / OCH B012
Class Number: 12596

Section 108 (Ben Robertson): T / 2:00-2:50 pm / OCH B012
Class Number: 12597

Section 109 (Ben Robertson): F / 12:30-1:20 pm / OCH 107
Class Number: 12598

MUSI 2080 American Music

Nick Rubin
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 12:00-12:50 pm / Wilson 301
Class Number: 19570

Discussion Sections:

Section 101 (Savanna Morrison): M / 9:00-9:50 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 19572

Section 102 (Savanna Morrison): M / 10:00-10:50 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 19573

Section 103 (Savanna Morrison): M / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 19574

Section 104 (Kerri Rafferty): W / 9:00-9:50 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 19575

Section 105 (Kerri Rafferty): W / 10:00-10:50 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 19576

Section 106 (Kerri Rafferty): W / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH S008
Class Number: 19577

MUSI 2302 Keyboard Skills (Beginning)

2.0 credits, instructor permission

Lecture / Section 1 (Hanna Young): TR / 11:00 am - 12:15 pm / OCH 113
Class Number: 11074

Lecture / Section 2 (Hanna Young): TR / 9:30-10:45 am / OCH 113
Class Number: 12027

Introductory keyboard skills; includes sight-reading, improvisation, and accompaniment at the keyboard in a variety of styles. No previous knowledge of music required. Satisfies the performance requirement for music majors.

MUSI 2304 Keyboard Skills (Intermediate)

John Mayhood
2.0 credits, instructor permission
Lecture: TR / 12:30-1:45 pm / OCH 113
Class Number:  11075

Intermediate keyboard skills for students with some previous musical experience. Satisfies the performance requirement for music majors. Restricted to: Instructor permission by audition.

MUSI 2340 Learn to Groove

Robert Jospe
2.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 10:00-10:50 am / OCH B018
Class Number: 11889

"Learn to Groove" hand drumming and rhythmic fluency with Robert Jospe. This is a hands on drumming/percussion class using congas, djembes, claves, shakers, etc. This class is designed to enhance ones knowledge of syncopated patterns associated with jazz, rock, African and Latin American music and to improve ones facility in playing these patterns. This course will follow my book "Learn To Groove" and can include music students, non music students and is open to students of all skill levels. The course requires that students have or purchase a hand drum of their own. Congas, bongos, djembes, doumbeks or any other hand drums are appropriate.

MUSI 2342 Learn to Groove Intermediate

Robert Jospe
2.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH B018
Class Number: 12490

"Learn to Groove" hand drumming and rhythmic fluency with Robert Jospe. This is the intermediate level of the class. It is a hands on drumming/percussion class using congas, djembes, claves, shakers, etc. This class is designed to enhance ones knowledge of syncopated patterns associated with jazz, rock, African and Latin American music and to improve ones facility in playing these patterns.

MUSI 2450 Managing Anxiety and Improving Performance with Alexander Technique

Sandra Bain Cushman
1.0 credit
Lecture: T / 3:30-5:30 / OCH 107
Class Number: 14524

This course introduces and offers practical experience with the Alexander Technique. The Technique helps performers, people who suffer from anxiety and people who wish for a more fluid and friendly connection with everyday movement. It helps us to improve our public speaking, our musical and/or athletic performance, and to find a calmer more centered approach to the activities of everyday life.

The Technique has long been taught in universities, conservatories, and drama schools, and has been studied by notable writers, scholars and philosophers for over 100 years. People in all walks of life apply the Technique to improve performance and manage stress.

MUSI 2600 Jazz Improvisation

John D'earth
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 3:30-5:00 pm / OCH B012
Class Number: 11511

The Jazz Improvisation Workshop explores the basic techniques and procedures for improvising in jazz and other musical contexts. No previous jazz or improvising experience is required but students must demonstrate a degree of fluency on their main instrument, an ability to read music and some familiarity with the basics of music theory. An individual interview/audition with the instructor is required before registering for this class.

MUSI 2993 Independent Study

1.0-3.0 credits
Instructor permission and instructor number required to enroll.

MUSI 3020 Studies in 17th- & 18th-Century Music

Richard Will
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 11:00 am - 12:15 pm / OCH 107
Class Number: 13063

This class imparts essential tools for understanding music from the years 1680-1800.  We will study numerous musical examples, ranging from symphony and opera to folk song and free improv for keyboard, by composers including but not limited to Handel, Haydn, Vivaldi, De la Guerre, Mozart, Gluck, and J.S. Bach (and his kids).   We will examine composition, improvisation, text-setting, dramatic staging, the religious expression, and performance, and we will also read what writers of the time said about music.  The goal is to help you form your own opinions and interpretations of 18th-century music—not just the examples on the syllabus, but the many others you may encounter as a performer, composer, or listener.

MUSI 3040 Studies in 20th-Century Music

Joel Rubin
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 11:00 am - 12:15 pm / OCH B012
Class Number: 13459

Want to learn why people were beating each other up in the aisles at the premiere of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring? Why Schoenberg’s music is still avant-garde over a century after it’s creation? How the Jazz Age influenced classical music and vice versa? How folk and world musical traditions influenced classical music? What happened to the music under totalitarian regimes? How art movements like Dadaism and Minimalism influenced the direction of music? Why Boulez declared Schoenberg to be dead, and why he and his colleagues were later termed “fascists”? How did post-war music and electronic influence the Beatles and other pop musicians, and how did pop music and jazz feed into the development of minimalism? What is the place of women, and African-American and other minority composers in contemporary music? How did improvisation and Zen Buddhism influence John Cage and other post-war composers? Is John Zorn’s music classical, jazz or something else? And how on earth did Cage land a spot on “I’ve Got a Secret” or the US Navy band end up performing arrangements of Zorn? We cover that and more!

MUSI 3040, Studies in Twentieth and Twenty-first Century Music, offers insight into understanding the complex developments in Western art music from the turn of the 20th century to the present. We will study numerous compositional movements, composers and their works, looking at aspects such as compositional and performance style and techniques within the broader framework of social, cultural and political movements of the time. We will also read what the composers themselves and other writers from the time said about the music. The goal is to help you form your own opinions and interpretations of the music—not only of the examples that we study in class, but of the many others that you may encounter both during and after this class as performers, composers and/or listeners. While the course materials focus primarily on the Euro-American situation, we will also examine developments more globally, drawing on developments in popular, jazz, folk and world musical traditions.

Fulfills part of the 'Critical and comparative studies in music' requirement for majors. Prerequisite: MUSI 3310

3050 Music and Discourse

Tanner Greene
3.0 credits
Lecture: MWF / 10:00-10:50 am / OCH B012
Class Number: 10701

Studies the range of music that has flourished since the end  of the 19th century including modernist and post-modern art music, popular music, and world music, through historical, critical, and ethnographic approaches. Prerequisite: The ability to read music, or any three-credit course in music, or instructor permission.

3070 Introduction to Musical Ethnography

Nomi Dave
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 9:30-10:45 am / Rotunda Room 150
Class Number: 18444

3120 Jazz Studies

Scott DeVeaux
3.0 credits
Lecture: MWF / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH B012
Class Number: 13460

MUSI 3310 Theory I

Heather Mease
3.0 credits
Lecture: MWF / 9:00-9:50 am / OCH B012
Class Number: 12494

Studies the pitch and rhythmic aspects of several musical styles, including European art music, blues, African drumming, and popular music. Focuses on concepts and notation related to scales and modes, harmony, meter, form, counterpoint, and style. Prerequisite:  Ability to read music, and familiarity with basic concepts of pitch intervals and scales.

MUSI 3320 Theory II

Aaron Stepp
3.0 credits
Lecture: MWF / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH 113
Class Number: 13064

Studies pitch and formal organization in European concert music of the 18th and 19th centuries. Includes four-part vocal writing, 18th-century style keyboard accompaniment, key relations, and form. Students compose numerous short passages of music and study significan compositions by period composers.

Prerequisite: MUSI 3310 or instructor permission.

MUSI 3332 and 3334 Musicianship I and II

2.0 credit

These lab courses give practical experience with many aspects of musical perception, performance, and creation. These will include sight-reading and sight-singing; dictation of melody, rhythm, and harmony; aural identification of intervals, chords, and rhythmic patterns; and exercises in musical memory and improvisation. Students meet with the instructor during the first class period of the semester to determine the appropriate level of their first course. Courses may be repeated for credit, but each course may be counted toward the major only once.

MUSI 3332 Musicianship I

Adam Carter
Lecture: MWF / 12:00-12:50 pm / OCH 107
Class Number: 10702

MUSI 3334 Musicianship II

Rebecca Brown
Lecture: MWF / 12:00-12:50 pm / OCH S008
Class Number: 10703

MUSI 3374 Composing Mixtapes

A.D. Carson
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 11:00 am - 12:15 pm / New Cabell 398
Class Number: 20450

Lab (Rami Stucky): TR / 12:30-1:20 / New Cabell 398
Course Number: 20451

This course focuses on the craft of writing rap songs as well as the collection, selection, and integration of other media to collaborate toward the composition of a class mixtape. Experience writing raps or producing beats will be helpful, but it is not necessary that students have previous experience to take this course. Students will listen to, attempt to deconstruct, create, and evaluate a broad range of music and literature while collaborating on the mixtape. Along with composing the mixtape, students will learn songwriting techniques and some alternate theoretical approaches to composing other hip-hop works.

MUSI 3390 Introduction to Music and Computers

Leah Reid
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 12:30-1:45 pm / OCH B012
Class Number: 14038

Discussion Sections:

Section 101 (Alex Christie): W / 9:00-9:50 am / OCH B011
Class Number: 19914

Section 102 (Alex Christie): W / 10:00-10:50 am / OCH B011
Class Number: 19915

Section 103 (Alex Christie): W / 11:00-11:50 am / OCH B011
Class Number: 19916

Introduction to Music and Computers is an upper-level introductory course in music technology. Students gain theoretical, historical and practical knowledge of electronic and computer music. An emphasis is placed on creative hands-on experience composing music via digital technologies. Theoretical and practical topics include acoustics, recording, editing and mixing, MIDI, sound synthesis, and audio DSP. Students learn a host of skills and technologies useful for working with digital audio.

3390 fulfills the composition requirement of the Music Major.  This is a composition class and key assignments are creative in nature. Note that you MUST register for the Lab (0 credits) as well as the course.

MUSI 3395 Sonic Arts and Crafts

Heather Frasch
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 2:00-3:15 pm / Wilson Hall Makers Space
Class Number: 20435

MUSI 3559 Learn to Groove Advanced

Robert Jospe
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 1:00-1:50 / OCH B018
Class Number: 20082

MUSI 3993 Independent Study

1.0-3.0 credits
Instructor permission and instructor number required to enroll.

MUSI 4060 Women & Music

Elizabeth Ozment
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 2:00-3:15 pm / OCH B012
Class Number: 20449

4410 Orchestration II

Ben Rous
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 2:00-3:15 pm / OCH 113
Class Number: 20448

This course examines the evolution of orchestral music through the lens of tone color and its increasing primacy in musical aesthetics.  We will study the evolving styles of orchestration, from the Classical era through present-day Spectralism.  In the process we will familiarize ourselves with a series of orchestral masterworks spanning these eras.  Styles will be studied through emulation: students will create short orchestrations in the style of composers such as Beethoven, Brahms, Ravel, and Saariaho.  Close students will be able to select orchestral works, and composers, they are interested in studying in detail.  Students may be asked to bring instruments to class for demonstration purposes.

Prerequisite:  Orchestration I, or instructor permission. It is expected that students will have some composition or arranging experience, or some knowledge of orchestral repertoire.

Prerequisite: Orchestration I or instructor permission.

4507 Composers

Michael Puri
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 11:00-12:15 pm
Class Number: 19909

4509 Cultural and Historical Studies of Music

Anna Nisnevich
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 3:30-4:45 pm / OCH B012
Class Number: 18445

4523 Issues in Ethnomusicology

Noel Lobley
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 2:00-3:15 pm
Class Number: 13465

4526 Topics in Ethnomusicology

Nomi Dave
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 2:00-3:15 pm / New Cabell 283
Class Number: 18447

MUSI 4547 Materials of Contemporary Music: Undergraduate Seminar on Timbre

Leah Reid
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 9:30-10:45 am / OCH B011
Class Number: 14039

Materials of Contemporary Music: Undergraduate Seminar on Timbre, is a composer oriented course which focuses on the analysis and application of techniques primarily concerned with timbre or tone color. We will examine music of the last century and observe how composers and researchers have approached timbre. An emphasis is placed on creative hands-on experience. Students will learn skills in analyzing, orchestrating, resynthesizing, and composing with timbre. Timbre will be used as a catalyst to explore pitch, time, space, perception, and color. Assignments will be creative in nature and will apply concepts explored in the course.

MUSI 4559 New Course in Music

Michele Zaccagnini
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 3:30-4:45 pm / OCH 107
Class Number: 18448

4582 Composition II

Leah Reid
3.0 credits
Lecture: W / 2:00-4:30 pm / OCH B011
Class Number: 14040

Composition 2 is an advanced undergraduate music composition course. Students will receive a combination of weekly individual lessons intermixed with monthly group sessions. The course will provide a forum for students to listen, discuss, workshop, develop, and explore inspirations, compositions, and ideas. Over the course of the semester, students are expected to compose a large-scale work or a series of smaller works for the instrumentation and in the style of their choosing (including electronics).

Note: individual lesson times may be scheduled outside the listed course times. Lesson times will be scheduled the first day of class. 

Prerequisite: MUSI 3380, 3390, or permission from the instructor. Students are expected to have some prior composition experience and must be proficient with standard music notation. The course can be repeated for credit.

4610 Sound Synthesis and Control: Designing New Musical Instruments

Luke Dahl
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 2:00-3:15 / Wilon Hall Makers Space
Class Number: 13466

New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME) is a field that explores new ways of performing music with technology. NIME is interdisciplinary, incorporating perspectives from music, sculpture, engineering, human-computer interaction (HCI), and design. In this class we will learn the basic skills needed to design and build new musical instruments. We will implement real-time digital sound synthesis algorithms using the PureData visual programming language, which will run on the Bela embedded audio system. And we will use electronics sensors to measure user’s gestures as input data. The class is primarily project based, and we will prototype a number of new musical instruments and interactions. Students are expected to have experience using computers for music-making, such as MUSI 3390 or MUSI 2350, and experience with PureData or Max is highly desirable.

MUSI 4620 Audio Visual Environments

Michele Zaccagnini
3.0 credits
Lecture: TR / 11:00 am - 12:15 pm / OCH B011
Class Number: 18449

This is a course in audiovisual composition and time-based new media. Over the course of the semester, you will create fixed video pieces, learn interactive & real-time audiovisual techniques, and explore sculptural & networked approaches to combining sound and light.

4720 Instrumental Conducting II

Ben Rous
3.0 credits
Lecture: MW / 12:00-1:15 pm / OCH 113
Class Number: 12499

This course is designed to continue the progress of students on the path toward mastering all requisite skills necessary to be an effective instrumental conductor.  Score study and preparation will form the backbone of the course.  The physical technique of conducting will be analyzed and practiced.  Students will continue to develop their own voice as concert programmers, and will hone their inner ear and musical ideation.

Prerequisite: Instrumental Conducting I, or instructor permission

MUSI 4950 Performance Concentration Seminar

Daniel Sender
1.0 credit
Class Number: 14427

MUSI 4993: Independent Study

1.0 - 3.0 credits
Instructor permission and instructor number required to enroll

MUSI 7510 Cultural and Historical Studies of Music

Scott DeVeaux
3.0 credits
Lecture: M / 2:00-4:30 pm / OCH S008
Class Number: 13469

MUSI 7520 Current Studies in Research and Criticism

Michael Puri
3.0 credits
Lecture: R / 2:00-4:30 pm / OCH S008
Class Number: 13469

MUSI 7524 Fiend Research and Ethnography of Performance

Michelle Kisliuk
3.0 credits
Lecture: W / 2:00-4:30 pm / OCH S008
Class Number: 18451

MUSI 7540 Computer Sound Generation and Spatial Processing

Topic: Digital Signal Processing for Musicians

Luke Dahl
3.0 credits
Lecture: M / 5:00-7:30 /OCH  B011
Class Number: 14692

As musicians and composers we frequently use software tools to modify digital sound. Our ability to effectively deploy these techniques can be improved by understanding what digital sound is, how sounds are changed by these processes, and how they work “under the hood.” Audio Digital Signal Processing (DSP) may seem like technical wizardry, but in this class we will begin to demystify the processes and terms.  What is the frequency domain and why is it important? How does a Fourier Transform work?  What is a filter, how is one built, and why do some of them have poles? Etc. The class will be both hands-on (we will be analyzing and modifying sounds by writing code in Matlab), and theoretical (which may require re-acquainting yourself with some math).

MUSI 7584 Proseminar in Computer Music Composition

Michele Zaccagnini
3.0 credits
Lecture: T / 2:00-4:30 pm / OCH S008
Class Number: 18451