Music 190W Week 2

Week 2 reading

Chapter 2, " Vocabulary for Listening and Understanding"; Hacker 1, 2

Week 2 listening

...will be done in class.

Week 2 topic: Musical Discourse

This week's chapter summary is more detailed than most, because I know you are still trying to cope with the course format and what may be unfamiliar computer tasks.

"Musical Discourse" is a way of talking and writing about music. There is no single or standard musical discourse; there can be as many musical discourses as there are musical styles and listeners. It's also important to remember that only a part of our experience of music can be captured in words.

This chapter describes music as a sound phenomenon, music's expressive and functional qualities, and the process of creating, performing, and listening to music.

Physical characteristics of music

The physical characteristics of music are studied in acoustics, a branch of physics. Acoustics is involved in the design of musical instruments, concert halls, and stereo equipment. The acoustics of the space we hear music in are a crucial and often overlooked aspect of the listening experience. Last semester, for example, my students heard the St. Louis Symphony play in Western Hall, then a concert by the WIU Orchestra in Hainline Theatre (located in Browne Hall), a much smaller space. They commented on how much more vivid and forceful the sound of the WIU Orchestra was, even compared to the professional orchestra. Western Hall was designed for basketball, not concerts, so its acoustics let the sound scatter and die out quickly.

We perceive music against a background of silence, or of other sounds. If you did Week 1's writing assignment, you probably became aware of how often we use music to avoid silence. Many students finish that assignment feeling like silence is their enemy, but without silence it would be difficult to appreciate music fully. Allowing silence before and after a period of active listening can make the music sound better.

Expressive and Functional Qualities of Music

On p. 15, David Willoughby, the author of our text, describes art music, which we typically call "classical music." Note that some of the characteristics of art music (such as being able to find new meanings in a piece on repeated listening) are present in jazz, folk, and popular music, and that other cultures besides Western Europe have art musics as well.

Some other ways to identify art music are that it:

has a long, often written history

requires a long period of training for performers

requires some knowledge and listening skills for listeners to get the full effect

is often associated with and supported by the elite in a given society, even though it may be enjoyed by people at all levels of society

Music is "universal" in the sense that all cultures and societies have it, not in the sense that a given kind of music can be fully understood by anyone. Music is not a "universal language" if you think of it as a language that everyone can understand just as they do their own native language.

On the other hand, music and dance do have a special impact that transcends cultural differences, in a way that, for example, the literature of a given society can't. We can be moved by the sounds of music or the motions of dance from a culture that we know nothing about. One assumption of a course like this is that the more you know about an unfamiliar musical style, the more you can appreciate it. In other words, this aesthetic response can be culture-specific or universal (see p. 14).

Many of you will have discovered from Week 1's writing assignment how directly music can be related to moods.

The discussion of music as a process on pp. 18-19 includes the listener. The process begins with a creator, who may compose the music on paper or improvise it (create it at the same time it is performed). Then performers interpret the music. Finally, the music is perceived and appreciated by the listener. All three roles are important. No matter how much acclaim is given to great performers, they depend on listeners for their support. Being an active, informed listener is as important a musical role as being a creator or performer of music.

Study questions

Try to elaborate on or explain each of these ways of dealing with music: as the object of study of the science of acoustics; as patterns of sound and silence; as a work of art; as a universal phenomenon; as a means of expression; as a psychological progression.

Do you understand the three-stage process of music-making outlined on pp. 18-19?

What is improvisation?

Hacker handbook exercise

Each week, I'll ask you to read two short sections of the Hacker writing handbook. Two or three questions on each week's quiz will deal with these topics.

This week the topics are tightening wordy sentences and using active verbs.

Quiz

Here's this week's quiz.

Be sure to enter your name and e-mail address. After you get the page that shows the correct and incorrect questions, make a note of the ones you missed and use Netscape's "Back" button to go back to your quiz. You can change your answers and resubmit the quiz. When you've completed it with 100%, you'll get the writing prompts. Choose one and write your one-page essay, which is due at your class meeting in week 3.

Music 190W page
This file was last modified on 16 May 2000.