Music 2251 (3 credits)
GEL: Visual and Performing Arts (VPA), Global Studies (GS)
GEN: Literary, Visual and Performing Arts (LVPA)
Open to non-majors. No previous musical experience required. Not open to students with credit for 251 or Music majors.
Please consult Class Search to confirm course meeting times, locations and delivery mode.
Course Description
Music 2251 provides a solid introduction to the world of classical music, from its distant origins in Antiquity up through its latest 21st-century manifestations. Given the broad scope of the subject, we do not attempt an exhaustive survey, but evoke the variety of music in its evolving historical and cultural contexts; learn to hear it with pleasure and fascination; and develop listening skills that will be useful for many different kinds of music. You will learn to detect and make sense of basic musical themes and structures, and make your own connections to the varied and evolving emotions and meanings that music has conveyed across the centuries. You will also learn to situate music in its evolving context of genres, composers, styles, societies, eras and historical events, and to consider what the music of past styles and periods might have to do with our lives today.
Music 2251 is intended for beginners; many students have earned a straight A in the course without any prior training in or study of music. Since some students will have previous experience as performers, however, and since different students will have a such broad diversity of musical knowledge, lectures will range between introductory and more sophisticated topics.