Music 224, Music Appreciation, is taught by Dr. Christopher Swanson. The course focuses on learning about significant stylistic eras, major composers and compositions within the Western European concert music tradition. This course filled a pillar requirement under the aesthetic expressions component.
The course does not have an assigned textbook. Instead, Dr. Swanson assigns novels of which we read in preparation for discussion and quizzes in the following class. The novels assigned were Aaron Copland’s, What to Listen for in Music ans Alex Ross’, The Rest is Noise.
Dr. Swanson relied not on the idea of pairing composer to composition title, but instead the pairing of composition sounds to the title. At the conclusion of each class, we were given a list of compositions of which we were expected to listen to and be able to associate with the title. At the beginning of each of the following classes, a listening quiz was given
The heaviest assignment we completed for this course was a contemporary research project. For this particular assignment, I had to choose a music piece from The Rest is Noise and analyze is historically. Following that, I needed to consider that piece of music from perspective of my major and create a project in which the music and the my major would intersect.
I chose to write my paper on Gabriel Fauré’s The String Quartet in E minor, Op. 121. Gabriel Fauré became deaf while writing the composition. Knowing this, I read into his journals of which he explained that he continued writing using patterns and repetition to complete some of his greatest works. This was easily compared to my major of math because the using of repetition and pattern is found in nearly all aspects of the mathematical world.
Attachment for Artifact: Contemporary Research Project Paper