Exploring Music 1

Learning Outcomes

Knowledge and Understanding

Having successfully completed this module, you will be able to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of:

• basic principles of writing about music and music history
• some important forms, techniques and styles of European art music from the period 1500-1750, and their cultural contexts

Subject Specific Intellectual and Research Skills

Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:

• describe the principal characteristics of genres such as the polyphonic Mass, concerto, and opera, in this period, and their cultural contexts
• describe the main questions performers face when deciding how to perform early modern music today

Transferable and Generic Skills

Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:

• use word processing software to produce your work to an appropriate academic standard
• use internet tools such as Blackboard to manage aspects of your own learning

This module is a broad overview of European music in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. We approach the music in its cultural context, exploring topics such as how music fit into early modern belief systems, how innovations in instrument building and playing techniques affected composition, and how concepts of spectacle informed the development of stage music in this period. Sessions may be devoted, for example, to subjects such as music in Renaissance convents, music and the plague, and battles over opera in 18th-century London, among others. Lectures provide provide ‘snapshots’ of particular styles and genres, such as the polyphonic Mass, the concerto, or opera, while seminars provide the opportunity to discuss and engage closely with historical and musical materials. The module’s Blackboard site provides a curated collection of video, audio, and readings as well as recorded mini-lectures for each week’s topic within three broad areas: Worship and Belief; Technology and Virtuosity; and Drama and Spectacle.

Teaching methods include

• lectures
• small group work
• IT work using Blackboard

Learning activities include

• group work exercises (in lectures, seminars, practical sessions and tutorials)
• individual study and listening
• accessing and interacting with online resources

Innovative or special features of this module

• live demonstrations of early instruments and playing techniques

Summative

This is how we’ll formally assess what you have learned in this module.

Referral

This is how we’ll assess you if you don’t meet the criteria to pass this module.

Repeat

An internal repeat is where you take all of your modules again, including any you passed. An external repeat is where you only re-take the modules you failed.