General History of Western Music: Music 307

Autumn 2010

Prerequisites: Junior status, three semesters of music theory, and Music 211 and 212

Lectures: MWF 11:00 a.m.- 11:50

Lecture Location: Music Building Room 320

Discussion sections: Thurs. 9:00 – 9:50 and 10:00-10:50

Discussion section location: Music Building Room 240

Instructor: Judith Kuhn

Office: Room 109, Music Building (Change!)

Phone: 229-4393 (Music department office; leave message)

E-mail (more efficient):

Office hours: MWF 12:30 – 1:30 p.m. and by appointment

Teaching assistant: Kyle Blenkush

Office: Room 131, music building

E-mail:

Office hours: W 12:00 - 1:00 p.m. and by appointment

Required texts and CDs: Be sure you have the correct edition!

·  J. Peter Burkholder, Donald Jay Grout and Claude V. Palisca. A History of Western Music, 8th ed. New York and London: W.W. Norton, 2010.

·  Burkholder and Palisca, eds. Norton Anthology of Western Music, 6th ed., vols. 2-3. New York and London: W.W. Norton, 2010.

·  Norton Recorded Anthology of Western Music, vols. 2-3 (8 CDs). New York and London: W.W. Norton, 2010.

Course objectives

This course will introduce you to music of the mid-to-late nineteenth century and the twentieth century. When you complete the course successfully, you will be able to:

·  Show important historical and musical developments in Western art music during that time in a chronology;

·  Hear and identify important stylistic features and changes in music during this period;

·  Identify important works of the period, and describe their important musical features and historical significance;

·  Plan, research and write a short paper of 2500 words (about ten pages) on a musicological topic, using good grammatical usage and research techniques, and

·  Correctly refer to sources in your text, footnotes and bibliography.

Reading and listening assignments

Required readings in the Burkholder History, and required listening assignments in the Norton Anthology (NAWM) are listed in the class schedule. You will find the lectures more helpful if you complete the reading and listening assignments before the lectures related to them. Please bring the appropriate volume of your Norton Anthology to each class so that you can follow the score as we discuss musical features for each listening excerpt.

Term paper due on November 23; paper topic due (!!) September 17; Bibliography due October 6.

You will be required to write a ten-paged paper (about 2500 words) on a topic relating to nineteenth- or twentieth-century music for this class. In your paper, you should expect to do careful library research, bringing your research up to date and including journal articles in your research. Your papers will be much more persuasive if you support your arguments and generalizations with verifiable facts. Opinions without supporting facts are not persuasive! All submissions must be submitted to the drop box on the D2L class website in Word format. No hard copy is required.

In your papers, you must show sources for all facts and opinions, using footnotes that follow the conventions shown in the music history area’s Writing Guide; failure to give credit for someone else’s research or thinking is plagiarism. When in doubt, footnote!

Plagiarism alert! In your papers, you must show the source for every fact or idea that is not common knowledge; failure to give credit for someone else’s research or thinking is plagiarism. When in doubt, footnote! If I find plagiarism in your paper, it will receive an F, and further action may be taken against you for academic misconduct. University policy defines plagiarism as follows:

·  Directly quoting the words of others without using quotation marks or indented format to identify them; or

·  Using sources of information (published or unpublished) without identifying them; or,

·  Paraphrasing materials or ideas of others without identifying their sources.

The music history area has prepared a writing guide that includes guidelines for writing your paper. A copy has been posted on the class website. A list of sources consulted (bibliography) must also be attached to your paper using proper bibliographic conventions also outlined in the Writing Guide. You will find it helpful to read (if you have not already done so) William Strunk and E.B. White, Elements of Style (New York: Penguin Press, 2005), a pithy little book that has become the classic text on grammar and style. Please feel free to chat with me if you would like help on your term paper. I will include some suggested paper topics in a separate handout.

Exams and quizzes

There will be a mid-term exam (October 18) and a final exam (December 17, 12:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m, Room 320), as well as two scheduled quizzes (September 29 and November 15). Each will have listening and score identification excerpts and may have short-answer components. The mid-term and final exams will also have essays and a time-line exercise.

Listening questions on all of the exams and quizzes will require you to identify excerpts that will be played for you during the exam, specifying:

·  The composer of the excerpt;

·  Its correct title (enough to identify the specific excerpt (i.e., which movement? What aria? Or what act and scene? ) English translations are acceptable;

·  What, if any, larger piece it is a part of and how does it fit into that piece? (i.e., Tu se morte from L’Orfeo, the second movement of Symphony No. 3);

·  Its genre (symphony, sonata, symphonic poem, opera, ballet, etc.);

·  The approximate date of its composition; and

·  Its historical context and distinctive stylistic features.

To help you focus your work on listening excerpts, I have provided listening form on the class website. My experience is that people who do well in this class usually make use of the listening form or something like it. Please take advantage of it to focus your studying!

Please mark your calendar with the dates of quizzes and exams. Requests to take quizzes or exams at times other than those scheduled will generally be denied, except in the most extreme circumstances. Make-up quizzes and exams will be considerably more difficult than those given to the class, and may be oral. In order to receive consideration to take a make-up examination, you must notify me or Kyle of your absence and the reason for it no later than the date of the exam. No more than one make-up examination will be scheduled.

Quick quizzes: From time to time, towards the end of a lecture, I may distribute 3x5 cards and ask you to respond to a question relating to that day’s content. These “quick quizzes” will give immediate feedback (both to you and to me) as to whether you understand the content of the lectures. These quizzes will be included in your class attendance and participation grade (see below). Missed quick quizzes are not make-up-able.

Attendance and participation

Attendance and participation in music history and literature courses is mandatory, worth 10% of the final grade, and will be graded on a pro-rata basis. Absences are excused by the instructor on an individual basis. Excused absences are granted for illness, family emergency or personal exigencies.

Special flu virus note for this semester: There is a possibility that our class may be significantly disrupted by the H1N1 flu virus. Please exercise vigilance in your personal health care, and keep me or Kyle advised as to the cause of any absence. If you feel ill, please stay home, especially at the beginning of the disease, to avoid infecting others. If you must miss significant class time because of flu illness, Kyle and I will make every reasonable effort to find ways to help you keep current in the course. If the format or content of the course needs to be changed as a result of significant absences, you will be notified by means of a syllabus change or a message on the class website.

Absences for performances or for requirements of other instructors:

Faculty policy on such absences: Any time a faculty member, ensemble or program wishes to request consideration for a student excuse to attend or participate in an event that potentially interferes with scheduled course attendance, that request must be submitted to the Chair (preferably electronically) at least one (1) month before the event. The request must be completed with day(s), times(s) and event(s) information, along with a complete list of student names associated with the request. This request will then be circulated to the entire faculty body for notice. Requests of less than a month will be subject to denial without submission of extenuating circumstances.

No more than two such absences will be excused per term.

Grading

Class attendance and participation (including quick quizzes) 10%

Scheduled quizzes 20%

Term Paper (topic =5%, bibliography = 10%, final paper = 85%) 25%

Mid-term exam 20%

Final exam 25%

University policies

If you need accommodation to complete the requirements of this course, please see me as soon as possible. For links to more information on university policies and procedures on academic misconduct, grades, discrimination, incompletes, and accommodation because of disability, military service, religious preference, or other reasons, see http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/SecU/SyllabusLinks.pdf

Class website

This syllabus, and all class assignments and other news about the class will be posted on the class website. You should check it regularly. For information on how to access the class website and get technical help if you are having trouble, see “Using UW-Milwaukee Desire2Learn (D2L) course web sites,” on the class website, or e-mail me or Kyle for a copy if you can’t access the website. Technical D2L questions can be addressed to the UWM help desk: , or 229-4040 (they are smarter than we are about technical questions!).

Class schedule

Weeks 1-2 (2 -10 September): Overview of 19th century, Piano and symphonic music in early nineteenth century

  • NO CLASS Monday, September 6 (Labor Day)
  • Term paper topic proposal due next week!
  • History: pp. 616-648
  • NAWM:
  • 125: Robert Schumann, Carnaval, Op. 9 (1834-5), excerpts:
  • No. 5: Eusebius
  • No. 6: Florestan
  • No. 7: Coquette
  • 127: Chopin, Nocturne in D-flat Major, Op. 27, No. 2 (1835)
  • 130: Berlioz, Symphonie fantastique, fifth movement, “Dream of a Witches’ Sabbath” (1830)

Week 3 (13 September): Early to mid-century chamber and choral music, opera in Italy and France

  • Paper topic proposals (with three sources, correctly cited) due in drop box Friday, 17 September
  • History: pp. 648-677, 702-709
  • NAWM:
  • 133: Schubert, String Quintet in C major (1828): first movement
  • 137: Rossini, Il barbiere di Siviglia: Act II, Scene 5: Cavatina, Una voce poco fa (1816)
  • 142: Verdi, La traviata: Act III, scena and duet (1853)

Week 4 (20 September): Opera in Germany, later nineteenth-century opera and musical theatre

  • History: pp. 677-702, 709-723
  • NAWM:
  • 140: Weber, Der Freischütz: Act II, finale: Wolf’s Glen Scene (1817-21)
  • 141: Wagner, Tristan und Isolde: Act I, scene 5 (1857-59)
  • 145: Musorgsky, Boris Godunov, Coronation Scene (1868-69, rev. 1871-74)

Week 5 (27 September): Music near the turn of the century I

  • First quiz Wednesday September 29
  • List of sources due next week!
  • History: pp. 724-63
  • NAWM:
  • 147: Brahms, Symphony No. 4 in E minor, Op. 98: Fourth movement: Allegro energico e passionato (1884-85)
  • 149: Richard Strauss, Don Quixote, Op. 35: Themes and variations 1-2 (1897)
  • 150: Mahler, Kindertotenlieder: No. 1, Nun will die Sonn’ so hell aufgeh’n (1901)

Week 6 (4 October): Music near turn of the century II, Expressionism (begin Second Viennese School)

  • List Of Sources (Bibliography) due Wednesday, October 6
  • History: pp. 771-820, 823-26
  • NAWM:
  • 156: Debussy, Nocturnes: No. 1, Nuages (1897-99)
  • 159: Satie, Embryons desséchés No. 3, De Podophthalma (1913)
  • 160: Schoenberg, Pierrot lunaire, Op. 21, (1912): No. 8: Nacht
  • 162: Berg, Wozzeck, Op. 7, Act 3, Scene 3 (1917-22)

Week 7 (11 October): Stravinsky’s ballets; American vernacular music before and after World War I; ragtime and jazz

History: pp. 763-69, 829-46, 855-76

  • NAWM:
  • 164: Stravinsky, The Rite of Spring: Excerpts (1911-1913): Danse des adolescents
  • 155: Joplin, Maple Leaf Rag (1899) (note contrasting performances by Joplin and Jelly Roll Morton)
  • 170: Bessie Smith, Back Water Blues (1927)
  • 171: King Oliver, West End Blues (recorded 1928)
  • 169: Gershwin, I Got Rhythm, from Girl Crazy (1930)
  • 172: Ellington, Cotton Tail (1940) 159:

Week 8 (18 October): European neoclassicism; Second Viennese School II

  • Mid-Term Exam Monday 18 October
  • History: pp. 877-84, 820-23, 826-29
  • NAWM:
  • 173: Milhaud: La création du monde, op. 81: first tableau
  • 161: Schoenberg, Piano Suite, Op. 25, Excerpts (1921-23)
  • 163: Webern, Symphony, Op. 21: First movement, Ruhig schreitend (1927-28)

Week 9 (25 October): Populism and politics between the wars I

  • History: pp. 884–892
  • NAWM and e-reserve:
  • 174: Hindemith, Symphony Mathis der Maler, second movement: Grablegung (1934)
  • Score and listening link on e-reserve: Shostakovich, Symphony No. 5, Op.47: Fourth movement: (1937)
  • 175: Prokofiev, Alexander Nevsky, Op. 78, fourth movement: Arise, ye Russian people! (1938-39)

Week 10 (1 November): Populism and politics between the wars II

  • No class November 5 (classrooms used for NATS auditions)
  • History: pp. 892-905
  • 181: Copland, Appalachian Spring: Excerpt: Variations on ‘Tis the Gift to Be Simple (1943-44)
  • 182: Still, Afro-American Symphony: First movement, Moderato assai (1930)

Week 11 (8 November): World War II and its aftermath

  • History: pp. 918-29
  • NAWM:
  • 183: Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, Anthropology (1945)
  • 184: Messiaen, Quartet for the End of Time: First movement, Liturgie de crystal (1940-41)
  • 185: Britten, Peter Grimes: Act III, Scene 2, To hell with all your mercy! (1944-45)

Week 12 (15 November) Post-war complexity and its political undercurrents

  • Quiz, Monday, 15 November
  • History: pp. 906-9, 930-69
  • NAWM:
  • 188: Cage: Music of Changes, Book 1 (1951)
  • 189: Feldman: Projection I (1950)
  • 191: Boulez, Le Marteau sans maître, movement 6: Bourreaux de solitude (1953-55)

Weeks 13 and 14 (22 and 29 November; NO CLASS 24-26 November: Thanksgiving recess): Minimalism and later trends I

  • Term paper due in drop box Tuesday, November 23
  • History: 953-986
  • NAWM:
  • 193: Crumb, Black Angels: Thirteen Images from the Dark Land (1970): Excerpts:
  • Image 4: Devil-Music
  • Image 5: Danse macabre
  • 196: Husa: Music for Prague, 1968 (1968)
  • 197: Reich: Tehillim (1981)

Weeks 15 and 16 (December 6 and 13): Later trends II