Author: Dr. Lavengood

The final unit deals with pop music. You will need to familiarize yourself with pop form terminology if you are not already comfortable with terms like verse, chorus, prechorus, bridge, or refrain.

This week we’ll talk about my research specialty: timbre. (I won’t have you read my research, since I feel that might be awkward to respond to, but you can access my article outlining my methodology here if you are interested.) We will focus on Kate Heidemann’s excellent article on vocal timbre, and you will analyze a song a la Heidemann.

Continue reading Week 9 (Mar 22): Timbre (S21)

This week, everyone will analyze part of Franz Schubert’s “Tragic” Symphony, to review our techniques for tonal music.

Continue reading Week 8 (Mar 15): Analysis Symposium #2 (S21)

This week, you’ll learn a new(ish) approach to sonata form. You’ll also do some practice analysis on your own to see how it differs from what you already knew.

Continue reading Week 7 (Mar 8): Sonata Theory (S21)

This week you will learn how to approach the nuances of rhythm in tonal music. You’ll get introduced to the concepts through Edward Klorman’s excellent summary of popular approaches, listen to several pieces by Strauss, Mozart, Bach, Haydn, and others, and do your own analysis of a song by Clara Schumann.

Continue reading Week 6 (Mar 1): Tonal Rhythm (S21)

For our first analysis symposium, we will focus on a classic piece by Anton Webern: his 5 Movements for String Quartet. We will be looking specifically at movements 2 and 3.

Note for Spring 2021: This piece is not serial, so you do not need to incorporate this technique in your analysis.

Download the score from the readings folder.

Continue reading Week 5 (Feb 22): Analysis Symposium #1 (S21)

This week you will learn about 12-tone serial techniques and the variety of ways this can be implemented. You’ll learn how to identify row forms, do a row count, make a matrix, and interpret serial pieces. You will also do a guided analysis of a piece by Ruth Crawford Seeger, “Prayers of Steel” from Three Songs.

Continue reading Week 4 (Feb 15): Serialism (S21)

This week, you will learn about set theory and segmentation. You’ll analyze music using set theory, apply set theory terminology, and critique the usefulness of set theory.

Note: set theory ≠ serialism! We are learning serialism next week. Make sure you aren’t confusing these things!

Continue reading Week 3 (Feb 8): Set Theory (S21)

This week, you’ll read about the most prominent theory of narrative in the field of music theory and analyze a piece with narrative theory.

Continue reading Week 2 (Feb 1): Narrative (S21)

Postmodernism had a huge impact on academia in the humanities, of which music theory is a part. This week involves some philosophy as you learn about Roland Barthes’s essay “The Death of the Author.”

Continue reading Week 1 (Jan 25): Intertextuality (S21)