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Learning Outcomes

Upon graduation from Dickinson, Music majors with a composition emphasis will be able to:

• activity (compositions, cultural discourse, performances, texts) through the disciplinary lenses of performance and/or theoretical, cultural, and historical analysis;
• demonstrate skills of critical listening to musical practices, sound worlds, experiences, and scholarship through performance, analysis, composition, writing, and public presentation;
• deploy elements of music to create successful, original compositions.

Upon graduation from Dickinson, Music majors with a music and sound emphasis will be able to:

• develop and articulate coherent interpretations of the outcomes of musical thought and activity (compositions, cultural discourse, performances, texts) through the disciplinary lenses of performance and/or theoretical, cultural, and historical analysis;
• demonstrate skills of critical listening to musical practices, sound worlds, experiences, and scholarship through performance, analysis, composition, writing, and public presentation;
• identify, critically assess, and apply relevant scholarly methodologies to cogently analyze musical and sonic works and worlds, performances, and soundscapes, verbally and in writing;
• identify and critically assess a diversity of primary and secondary sources in conducting research in music and/or sound studies.

Upon graduation from Dickinson, Music majors with a performance emphasis will be able to:

• develop and articulate coherent interpretations of the outcomes of musical thought and activity (compositions, cultural discourse, performances, texts) through the disciplinary lenses of performance and/or theoretical, cultural, and historical analysis;
• demonstrate skills of critical listening to musical practices, sound worlds, experiences, and scholarship through performance, analysis, composition, writing, and public presentation;
• demonstrate the technical, interpretive, and performative skills needed for a successful public recital.

Major

Music Major Core:
One course from MUAC 100 – 102
MUAC 126
MUAC 209
MUAC 131 & 133 OR 133 & 231
1 credit in MUPS 113 and/or 114
One 300-level MUAC seminar

MUAC 401
4 semesters MUEN 009

Students may complete the Arts requirement after four semesters (1.0 course) of involvement in the same music ensemble:

• an instrumental ensemble (Jazz, Orchestra or Chamber music)
• a vocal ensemble (Choir, Chamber music (with a vocal component))
• chamber music

Music and Sound Studies Emphasis
Two additional MUAC electives at the 200-level (210, 211, 212, 206, 221, 225)
One additional 300-level seminar (MUAC 345, 351, 352, 353, 354, 355, 356)

Music Performance Emphasis
MUAC 245 and 246
MUPS 323 and 324
MUPS 423 and 424

Music Composition/Theory Emphasis
MUAC 245 and 246
232 (0.5 credit)
233 (0.5 credit)
333* (0.5 credit)
335 (0.5 credit)
435

 

Minor

Any six full credits in music, one of which must be an MUAC course.

Music Department Ensembles

Students participating in MUEN ensembles will receive .25 credit per semester of co-curriculum involvement.  Students will be graded on CR/NC grade type.

Admission to all department ensembles is by audition at the beginning of the academic year or by permission of the director. Instrumental ensembles meet once a week for 2 to 2 1/2 hours each. Choral ensembles meet twice a week for 1 to 1 1/4 hours each. Credit for participation in department ensembles is noted on participants' transcripts.

MUEN 009-02, College Choir Each year, the College Choir performs two concerts featuring a diverse and moving range of international choral music that reflects Dickinson’s global mindset and intercultural practice. In recent years, the choir has sung in over thirteen languages—including Arabic, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean—and presented innovative programs to address current social and political concerns. The choir also regularly collaborates with other student ensembles—such as the Dickinson Orchestra, the Jazz Ensemble, and the Dance Theater Group—as well as professional institutions in our area. All students—regardless of major—are encouraged to contact the director for an audition.

MUEN 009-04, Jazz Ensemble This ensemble performs classic big band arrangements and also features small combos from the larger group. Concerts regularly feature nationally-known guest soloists.

MUEN 009-05, College-Community Orchestra The Dickinson Orchestra engages music majors, non-majors, community members, and faculty in the exhilarating and edifying process of rehearsing and performing some of the most inspiring and revered orchestral works of the last 300 years.  Participation in orchestra builds skills of analytical and critical listening, time management, discipline, concentration, teamwork, and sight-reading.  Participants gain insight into the interpretive process and elements of style.  Rehearsals culminate in one performance each semester. The spring concert features the winner of the Annual Student Concerto Competition. Programs frequently feature faculty soloists and have included symphonies by Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, requiems by Mozart and Faure, and Handel’s Messiah, as well as contemporary monuments such as Joan Tower's For the Uncommon Woman, and Joseph Schwantner's New Morning for the World.

MUEN 009-01 & 06, Chamber Music This course provides the opportunity to engage in music-making in a small group with your peers, coached by a member of the Dickinson Music faculty. Chamber music entails intimate musical conversations and hones skills of critical listening, spontaneous response, visual cuing, and collaboration. Each chamber group has the option with faculty's discretion to perform their work publicly at the end of the semester.

MUEN 009-07, Lyric Performance Practicum A performance ensemble where students will study and perform arias, songs, ensembles and scenes from opera, chamber music, and musical theatre using modern performance techniques and stagecraft.

Suggested curricular flow through the major

YEAR ONE

Fall

MUAC A 100-level MUAC course

MUPS 113

Ensemble

Spring

Another 100-level MUAC course and perhaps a 200-level MUAC course; MUAC 102 and 126 encouraged

MUPS 114

Ensemble

YEAR TWO

Fall

A 200-level MUAC course: 209 (if offered), 245 encouraged, or MUAC 210, 211, 212, or 221 (music studies emphasis)

MUAC 131 & 133

MUPS 223 (performance studies emphasis)

Ensemble

Spring

MUAC 209 or Music Elective (206, 211, 221, 246, etc.)

MUAC 231 and 233 (composition/analysis emphasis) or MUPS 224 (performance studies emphasis)

Ensemble

YEAR THREE

Fall

MUAC 300-level course

Music Elective

MUAC 232 and 333 (composition/analysis emphasis) or MUPS 333 (performance studies emphasis)

Spring

MUAC 35X (musical studies emphasis) or MUAC 335 or MUAC 345 (composition/analysis emphasis) or MUPS 334 (performance studies emphasis)

Music Elective

YEAR FOUR

Fall

MUAC 401 (all emphases) 

MUAC 35X (musical studies emphasis) or MUAC 435 (composition/analysis emphasis) or

MUAC 423 (performance studies emphasis)

Spring

MUPS 424 (performance studies emphasis)

Music Elective

Suggested curricular flow through the major

YEAR ONE

Fall

MUAC A 100-level MUAC course

MUPS 113

Ensemble

Spring

Another 100-level MUAC course and perhaps a 200-level MUAC course; MUAC 102 and 126 encouraged

MUPS 114

Ensemble

YEAR TWO

Fall

A 200-level MUAC course 209 (if offered), 245 encouraged, or MUAC 210, 211, 212, or 221 (music studies emphasis)

MUAC 131 & 133

MUPS 223 (performance studies emphasis)

Ensemble

Spring

MUAC 209 or Music Elective (206, 211, 221, 246, etc.)

MUAC 231 and 233 (composition/analysis emphasis) or MUPS 224 (performance studies emphasis)

Ensemble

YEAR THREE

Fall

MUAC 300-level course

Music Elective

MUAC 232 and 333 (composition/analysis emphasis) or MUPS 333 (performance studies emphasis)

Spring

MUAC 35X (musical studies emphasis) or MUAC 335 or MUAC 345 (composition/analysis emphasis) or MUPS 334 (performance studies emphasis)

Music Elective

YEAR FOUR

Fall

MUAC 401 (all emphases) 

MUAC 35X (musical studies emphasis) or MUAC 435 (composition/analysis emphasis) or

MUAC 423 (performance studies emphasis)

Spring

MUPS 424 (performance studies emphasis)

Music Elective

Honors

Academic honors within the department is reserved for only our most outstanding students and requires excellence both in academic coursework and a capstone project. The requirements for honors are the same for all tracks within the major:

1. Achievement of a minimum GPA of 3.7 in all courses required for the student’s declared track (composition; music history/theory; musical studies; performance studies) excluding MUAC 401.
2. Satisfactory fulfilment of the ensemble participation requirement in every semester the student enrolls in an ensemble.
3. Achievement of an “A” in MUAC 401, in which students develop and publicly present original research related to a final portfolio project.
4. Outstanding accomplishment (“A”) in an individual capstone project related to the 401 portfolio that is overseen by a guiding faculty member. Courses that qualify for this requirement include: MUPS 424; MUAC 435 and 436; MUAC 493 and MUAC 494. Students may also propose other types of capstone projects by submitting a detailed petition outlining the project (no more than two pages) to the chair by the close of the add/drop period in fall semester.

Co-curricular activities/programs

The Music Appreciation Club

The Music Appreciation Club at Dickinson is open to all students interested in participating in and enriching campus musical culture. The Club sponsors many activities, including post-concert receptions, regular meetings with guest artists and lecturers, and field trips to off-campus concerts and lectures.

The Music Appreciation Club is also the sponsor for the student-led outreach initiative Composed––a group of Dickinson students who transport the love of music into the community via local elementary schools and community agencies. Community students learn the basics of playing guitars, keyboards, or ukuleles, and how to write songs.

Co-curricular activities/programs

The Music Appreciation Club

The Music Appreciation Club at Dickinson is open to all students interested in participating in and enriching campus musical culture. The Club sponsors many activities, including post-concert receptions, regular meetings with guest artists and lecturers, and field trips to off-campus concerts and lectures.

The Music Appreciation Club is also the sponsor for the student-led outreach initiative Composed––a group of Dickinson students who transport the love of music into the community via local elementary schools and community agencies. Community students learn the basics of playing guitars, keyboards, or ukuleles, and how to write songs.

Courses

NOTE: Two half-credits of performance studies in the same instrument will fulfill the Arts requirement.

NOTE: Students may withdraw from performance studies courses with a full refund (minus charges for lessons taken) up to the end of the add/drop period. After the add/drop period, no refund is made.

MUPS - Music Performance Studies

111 Performance Studies Class
Permission of the instructor required.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year, Can't be taken pass/fail

111-01 & -04 Performance Studies: Piano Technique

Introduction to piano technique and keyboard fundamentals in a group setting. Recommended for all students wanting to learn piano at Dickinson (including music majors) with little or no prior experience. Course content includes both group and solo playing, individual practice sessions, basic music notation, listening assignments, and required concert attendance. 
Will meet prerequisite for continued study in piano (114). Prerequisite: permission of the instructor.

111-02 Performance Studies: The Expressive Voice: from Page to Stage

This course explores the basics of expressive singing, confident speaking and the general mechanics of beginning voice study. Learn the anatomy of the voice. Wield the power of a colorful and dynamic speaking voice. Discover the joys of using your voice as a musical instrument. You will encounter group and solo class work, individual lessons, and musical coachings as you interpret text and give voice to your thoughts and feelings. The course is tailor-made to fit a student‘s ability level with individually shaped challenges helping them to read, speak, and sing more expressively. This class does not require the ability to read music.
Will meet prerequisite for continued study in voice (114). Prerequisite: permission of the instructor.

111-03 Performance Studies: Guitar

Introduction to plectrum and finger style guitar technique in a group setting. Recommended for all students wanting to learn guitar at Dickinson with little or no prior experience and for those music majors or future music majors with no guitar experience. Course content includes both group and solo playing, individual practice sessions, music notation, listening assignments, fretboard theory, basic musicianship and required concert attendance. While the emphasis in reading will be on standard notation, tablature and chord chart diagrams will be explored. 
Prerequisite: permission of the instructor.

111-05 Performance Studies: Strings Class

The violin, viola, cello and double bass are all instruments with rich, beautiful, distinctive sounds. Ever wonder why those instruments are at the front of the stage at orchestra concerts? It is the string section that makes up the core of any orchestra’s basic sound. If you’ve ever wanted to learn to play one of these elegantly crafted wooden boxes, here is your chance! This class is open to all students; no prior musical knowledge or experience necessary. This course would be ideal for budding composers who may want to write for strings one day. Course content includes both group and solo playing, individual practice sessions, music notation, listening assignments, bow technique, basic musicianship and required concert attendance. Emphasis will be on reading standard notation in preparation for group performance, culminating in a beginner recital with a pianist. Prerequisite: Permission of the instructor. 

113 Performance Studies I
Private study open to all students who demonstrate some acquaintance with musical notation, and who should continue to study voice or an instrument at the basic level.
One-half or one course credit each semester. Prerequisite: permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year, Can't be taken pass/fail

114 Performance Studies I
Private study open to all students who demonstrate some acquaintance with musical notation, and who should continue to study voice or an instrument at the basic level.
One-half or one course each semester. Prerequisite: for Voice and guitar: MUPS 111 or MUPS 113 or permission of Instructor. For piano: MUPS 113 or permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Can't be taken pass/fail

213 Performance Studies II
Private study open to students who demonstrate a basic technique, and who should continue to study voice or an instrument at the intermediate level.
One-half or one course credit each semester. Prerequisite: 114 and permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Can't be taken pass/fail

214 Performance Studies II
Private study open to students who demonstrate a basic technique, and who should continue to study voice or an instrument at the intermediate level.
One-half or one course credit each semester. Prerequisite: 114 and permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Can't be taken pass/fail

223 Performance Studies II (Performance Emphasis)
Private study for music majors with a performance emphasis. One credit course each semester (MUPS 223-224). May be taken out of sequence.
Prerequisite: MUPS 111 or 113, 114, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies.

224 Performance Studies II (Performance Emphasis)
Private study for music majors with a performance emphasis; culminates in required Upper Divisional juried performance exam. One credit course each semester (MUPS 223-224). May be taken out of sequence.
Prerequisites: MUPS 111 or 113, 114 or 223, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies. Offered every semester.

313 Performance Studies III
Private study open to non-majors and majors with a performance emphasis, who demonstrate a fully developed technical skill and who should continue study on the advanced level. May be repeated for credit with the permission of the instructor.
One-half or one course credit each semester. Prerequisite: 214 and permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Can't be taken pass/fail

314 Performance Studies III
Private study open to non-majors and majors with a performance emphasis, who demonstrate a fully developed technical skill and who should continue study on the advanced level. May be repeated for credit with the permission of the instructor.
One-half or one course credit each semester. Prerequisite: 214 and permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Can't be taken pass/fail

323 Performance Studies III (Performance Emphasis, with junior recital)
A two-semester sequence of private study for music majors with a performance emphasis, culminating in a public junior recital (324) that includes a variety of musical styles and, for vocalists, a variety of languages. A recital hearing is required at the end of 323 to determine if the student is prepared for the required junior recital (324).One course each semester; may be taken out of sequence. Prerequisite for 323: successful Upper Divisional Performance exam at the end of 224, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies. Prerequisite for 324: successful recital hearing at the end of 323, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies.
Attributes: Arts

324 Performance Studies III (Performance Emphasis, with junior recital)
A two-semester sequence of private study for music majors with a performance emphasis, culminating in a public junior recital (324) that includes a variety of musical styles and, for vocalists, a variety of languages. A recital hearing is required at the end of 323 to determine if the student is prepared for the required junior recital (324).One course each semester; may be taken out of sequence. Prerequisite for 323: successful Upper Divisional Performance exam at the end of 224, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies. Prerequisite for 324: successful recital hearing at the end of 323, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies.
Attributes: Arts

333 Performance Studies III (Study Abroad)
Private studio lessons open to music majors and minors who demonstrate a fully developed technical skill and who should continue study at the advanced level while abroad.
One-half or one course credit each semester. Prerequisite: MUPS 213 or 223

334 Performance Studies III (Study Abroad)
Private studio lessons open to music majors and minors who demonstrate a fully developed technical skill and who should continue study at the advanced level while abroad.
One-half or one course credit each semester. Prerequisite: MUPS 213 or 223

413 Performance Studies IV
Private study for non-majors or majors without a performance emphasis who will continue study at an advanced level.
Prerequisite: 314 and permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Can't be taken pass/fail

414 Performance Studies IV
Private study for non-majors or majors without a performance emphasis who will continue study at an advanced level.
Prerequisite: 314 and permission of the instructor.
Attributes: Can't be taken pass/fail

423 Performance Studies IV (Performance Emphasis, with senior recital)
A two-semester sequence of private study for senior music majors with a performance emphasis, culminating in a public senior recital (MUPS 424) that includes a variety of musical styles and, for vocalists, a variety of languages. The course content of MUPS 423 is the research, selection and preparation of the solo recital repertoire for the senior recital (MUPS 424). The culmination of MUPS 423 is an annotated bibliography and written program notes (about the composers, genres, poets, and other relevant information), to be published in the recital program booklet (MUPS 424) One course each semester. Must be taken in sequence within the same academic year. Prerequisite for MUPS 423: MUPS 324, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies. Prerequisite for MUPS 424: MUPS 423, including successful completion of annotated bibliography, written program notes, and Recital Hearing at the end of MUPS 423; permission of the instructor and director of performance studies.
Attributes: Arts

424 Performance Studies IV (Performance Emphasis, with senior recital)
A two-semester sequence of private study for senior music majors with a performance emphasis, culminating in a public senior recital (MUPS 424) that includes a variety of musical styles and, for vocalists, a variety of languages. The course content of MUPS 423 is the research, selection and preparation of the solo recital repertoire for the senior recital (MUPS 424). The culmination of MUPS 423 is an annotated bibliography and written program notes (about the composers, genres, poets, and other relevant information), to be published in the recital program booklet (MUPS 424) One course each semester. Must be taken in sequence within the same academic year. Prerequisite for MUPS 423: MUPS 324, permission of the instructor and director of performance studies. Prerequisite for MUPS 424: MUPS 423, including successful completion of annotated bibliography, written program notes, and Recital Hearing at the end of MUPS 423; permission of the instructor and director of performance studies.
Attributes: Arts

MUAC - Music Academic

100 Topics in Musical Studies
This course will introduce students to aspects of music, sound, and listening (Western classical music, ethnomusicology, sound studies, popular music, jazz) through one or more of a number of lenses, cultural, historic, theoretic, performative, and/or compositional. It will require no previous musical literacy. The course will serve as a gateway to other courses in the department. Three hours per week.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year, Arts

101 Early Musical Migrations
What did the past sound like? What kinds of music did people dance to, worship with, celebrate with, protest with? What musical instruments were used and how were they made? Who participated in music-making, composing, and listening and what did gender, race, or religion have to do with it? How did musical forms shapeshift as people migrated, traveled, conquered, colonized, or were forcibly displaced? How did new musical forms emerge in moments of encounter? These are just some of the questions that this interdisciplinary course will explore. Students will investigate select musical worlds from 900-1750 from the areas now known as Europe and the Americas. Students will acquire skills in critical listening. The ability to read music is not required for this course and non-musicians are welcome and encouraged.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year, Arts, MEMS Elective

102 The Listening Mind
When we think about our response to music, often we describe its emotional and affective impact on our lives—in short, how it makes us feel. This course asks a different question: how do the languages of music provoke our minds by prompting intellectual questions, revealing cultural dynamics, and driving creative inquiry? How have composers, performers, and listeners made sense of the sonic environments around them, and what do their stories tells us about their aesthetic and ethical worldviews? Drawing from a wide range of disciplinary fields and historical examples from 1750 to the present, this course asks students to explore what music can reveal about society—its shifting cultural practices and biases—and our own relationships with the sounds we experience in our daily lives. The ability to read music is not required for this course and non-musicians are welcome and encouraged.
Attributes: AMST Representation Elective, Appropriate for First-Year, Arts

115 Keys to Music 1: Overture
This gateway into the world of music through Western musical practice is your first step on a lifelong journey with music. From reading notes, to singing and being able to identify what you hear, we will learn the vocabulary and ways that you can notate the music of your imagination - all while learning to appreciate the richly diverse world of music. Whether you have a song in your heart or a seed for a symphony, it all starts here. It's the basics of music, but it's just the beginning. Emphasis is upon the acquisition of musical literacy grounded in a thorough knowledge of Western music notation.
The course is intended for non-majors with little or no theory background, and for minors and majors as preparation for MUAC 125. Offered every semester.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year, Arts

125 Keys to Music 2: Sacred Roots
What are the deepest roots of contemporary music, popular and arcane? In this course, we begin by studying the earliest written music in the Western world. We trace its technical developments from the modal music of the secluded monastery to the contrapuntal complexity of Renaissance musical cathedrals. Doing so, we begin assembling a tool kit for musical performance, composition, and analysis, including modes and the incipience of the major-minor key system.
The course includes two fifty-minute classes of aural skills lab each week. This course is cross-listed as RELG 318. Prerequisite: 115, placement exam, or permission of the instructor. Offered every fall semester.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year, Arts, Humanities, MEMS Elective, Quantitative Reasoning

126 Keys to Music 3: The Enlightenment
Many aspects of today’s music were shaped by principles of the Enlightenment. In this class, discover how those ideals transformed Western musical language in the 17th and 18th Centuries. We will examine the dualism of major and minor keys while learning how to arrange and string together harmonies. Studying music through discussion, analysis, critical listening and written exercises will augment your toolkit for composition and informed performance.
The course includes two fifty-minute classes of aural skills lab each week. Prerequisite: 125, placement exam, or permission of the instructor. Offered every spring semester.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year, Arts, Quantitative Reasoning

131 Introduction to the Art of Composition
So you think the art of composing epic symphonies died with guys like Mozart, Beethoven, and Tchaikovsky? You think you need to wear a wig and be dead to compose great music? Think again! All around us, in concert halls, community centers, schools, private and public galleries, in large cities, small towns and even in isolated, rural settings, new music in the great Classical tradition is being performed and heard, music created by living composers, music of recent and current generations, your generation no less, music by people you may meet or already know. And you, too, can learn to develop a sophisticated, articulate musical voice of your life and times. Think: Symphony for the 21st century. In this one-semester, half-credit course, students learn about the living art and discipline of music composition through lectures on its history and current practice, listening assignments, and incremental composition exercises resulting in completed, small-scale works. Students will learn how the elements of sound comprise tools for conveying artistic expression, order, and meaning.
.5 credit course. Prerequisite: Ability to read music in both treble and bass clefs.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year

133 Living Music, Modern and Contemporary
All around us, in concert halls, community centers, schools, private and public galleries, in large cities, small towns and even in isolated, rural settings, new music is being performed and heard, music created by living composers. You may never have heard such music, as it is a small fraction of programming on mainstream media. Nevertheless, this amazingly diverse repertoire passionately voices and reflects contemporary life, experience, and society. This is music of recent and current generations, your generation no less, music by people you may meet or already know. This half-credit course offered each semester explores such music, recent and contemporary (20th- and 21st-century) compositions and composers in the Western art-music tradition. Students will become acquainted with a wide variety of styles, will gain deeper understanding of the elements of sound as tools for artistic creation, and will hone analytical listening skills.
.5 credit course.
Attributes: Appropriate for First-Year

137 Music Creation and Production
Traditionally, the act of composing music involves the creation of music notation, but the advent of mass-market digital-audio workstation software has revolutionized the music industry. This course explores a diversity of ways in which recorded and synthesized sounds can be used directly as raw material for music composition. Students will become acquainted with and gain experience using a variety of audio recording and editing techniques for the purpose of learning how to craft musical works using digital audio workstation and other computer music software. No prior no prior musical knowledge or experience necessary.
.5 credit course. Two of these .5 credit courses will fulfill the Arts requirement.

206 Music in the United States
This course explores the wide variety of music that composers and musicians created to reflect their own experience of and attitude toward American culture. The course explores not only the diverse means by which identity is encoded in musical language, including race, class, gender, ethnicity, and local practices, but also the ways in which music is employed within American culture, including religious life, social movements, wartime conflicts and protest movements, labor, and geo-political commentary. Unlike other courses at Dickinson, Music in the United States draws examples from a lengthy time-span (1600s to the present day), fosters critical listening skills (i.e., how do I listen to jazz?), and interrogates the dialogues between musical genres that are often viewed as being on opposite sides of the "high/low" art divide (classical, religious, folk, blues, jazz, pop, rock, hip hop).
Offered every two years.
Attributes: AMST Representation Elective, Arts, US Diversity

209 Listening Across Cultures
Is music a “universal language�? How might we listen to, consume, and participate in music across a diverse cultural spectrum without engaging in “cultural tourism� or appropriation? Can we listen across cultures? Working with a wide range of approaches to these questions, this course introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of ethnomusicology (the study of music and sound in relation to social life). Students will study sound recordings and ethnographic films, read widely, and examine material objects (like musical instruments) drawn from socio-politically and geographically diverse case studies. No previous musical training or note reading skills are necessary.
This course is cross-listed as ANTH 205. Offered every two years.
Attributes: AMST Struct & Instit Elective, Arts, Global Diversity

210 Topics in Global Music
A topics course in which students explore a global musical culture or analytical issue (selected by the FTE) in greater detail and depth. This course builds from the survey/methods design of MUAC 209 (Ethnomusicology) and allows students to engage more deeply with advanced study of a specific music culture (e.g., South African music; Jewish music; global jazz) or of a specific analytical/historiographical issue within the discipline (e.g., colonialism; diaspora; transnationalism; multiculturalism; ecomusicology; improvisation).
Attributes: Arts, Global Diversity

211 Music, Gender, and Performance
Global divas, trans voices, and all girl bands: these are some of the topics we will consider. This course examines relationships between gender, music, and performance from an interdisciplinary perspective (music and sound studies, ethnomusicology, gender and queer theory, performance studies). We examine debates around issues of sex and gender and nature and culture through the lens of musical performance and experience and draw on musical examples from a diverse range of socio-cultural contexts from around the world. Some questions we consider include: To what extent is participation in particular musical scenes dictated by gendered conventions? What might the voice tell us about gender or sexuality? How might the gendered performances and the voices of musical celebrities come to represent or officially “speak� for particular publics? How does music shape our understanding of emotion, our experience of pleasure? Class discussions will focus on careful readings of the assigned texts and listening/viewing assignments. Majors across the College are welcome and no musical note reading skills are necessary.
This course is cross-listed as WGSS 301.
Attributes: AMST Representation Elective, Global Diversity, WGSS Transntl/Global Perspect

212 Popular Musics of the Portuguese Black Atlantic
Samba, semba, fado, morna, tropicália, bossa nova, kudero: these are all popular music/dance forms from Portuguese speaking cultures. This interdisciplinary course explores popular music from 20th-21st century Brazil, Cape Verde, Angola, and Portugal as lenses into histories of Portuguese colonialism and African diaspora. We will listen to sound recordings, watch documentary films about performance, and read and discuss widely. We will ask questions about relationships between musical expression and the enduring legacies of colonialism. We will study music making in relation to power and resistance. We will explore issues of cultural appropriation, musical exoticism and hybridity in the marketing of local musics for international “world music� consumers.
This course is cross-listed as AFST 220, LALC 212, and PORT 320.
Attributes: Global Diversity

221 Music in Media
Music has been a central participant in digital storytelling since the technological advances of nineteenth-century opera. Through critical reading, listening, and viewing, you will become familiar with influential theories of musical representation, common compositional strategies for scene-building, and analytical modes of criticism and interpretation of music in film, television, video games, and other forms of media. The ability to read music is not required for this course and non-musicians are welcome and encouraged.
This course is cross-listed as FMST 210.
Attributes: AMST Representation Elective, Appropriate for First-Year, Arts, Film & Media Studies Elective

231 Keep the Peace, Spare the Clash: Basic Composing, Note against Note
Two or more musicians, equal in importance, have to agree to some basic principles so as to make beautiful sonorities together and not merely clash in chaos. One such set of rules is the 500-year-old Western practice of counterpoint, the art and technique of combining multiple parts to create well-organized sounds and not sonic disorder. In this class, students learn to use this compositional technique, composing short etudes and studying 15th-18th-Century composers and repertoire as models. Each semester culminates in a short contrapuntal work for 2, 3, or 4 voices.
May be taken out of sequence. Two semesters, 0.5 credit each semester. Prerequisite: MUAC 115 or 125 or substantial evidence of previous compositional experience, advanced theory placement by exam (e.g. into MUAC 126, 245 or 246) and permission of instructor.

232 Keep the Peace, Spare the Clash: Basic Composing, Note against Note
Two or more musicians, equal in importance, have to agree to some basic principles so as to make beautiful sonorities together and not merely clash in chaos. One such set of rules is the 500-year-old Western practice of counterpoint, the art and technique of combining multiple parts to create well-organized sounds and not sonic disorder. In this class, students learn to use this compositional technique, composing short etudes and studying 15th-18th-Century composers and repertoire as models. Each semester culminates in a short contrapuntal work for 2, 3, or 4 voices.
May be taken out of sequence. Two semesters, 0.5 credit each semester. Prerequisite: MUAC 115 or 125 or substantial evidence of previous compositional experience, advanced theory placement by exam (e.g. into MUAC 126, 245 or 246) and permission of instructor.

233 Living Music, Modern and Contemporary
All around us, in concert halls, community centers, schools, private and public galleries, in large cities, small towns and even in isolated, rural settings, new music is being performed and heard, music created by living composers. You may never have heard such music, as it is a small fraction of programming on mainstream media. Nevertheless, this amazingly diverse repertoire passionately voices and reflects contemporary life, experience, and society. This is music of recent and current generations, your generation no less, music by people you may meet or already know. This half-credit course offered each semester explores such music, recent and contemporary (20th- and 21st-century) compositions and composers in the Western art-music tradition. Students will become acquainted with a wide variety of styles, will gain deeper understanding of the elements of sound as tools for artistic creation, and will hone analytical listening skills.
.5 credit course. Prerequisite: 133.

237 Music Creation and Production
Traditionally, the act of composing music involves the creation of music notation, but the advent of mass-market digital-audio workstation software has revolutionized the music industry. This course explores a diversity of ways in which recorded and synthesized sounds can be used directly as raw material for music composition. Students will become acquainted with and gain experience using a variety of audio recording and editing techniques for the purpose of learning how to craft musical works using digital audio workstation and other computer music software. No prior no prior musical knowledge or experience necessary.
.5 credit course. Two of these .5 credit courses will fulfill the Arts requirement.

245 Keys to Music 4: Desire and Discord
Drama, fantasy, desire, tragedy, the supernatural, and virtuosity take center stage in the evolution of chromatic harmony as Romantic composers move away from the elegant, formal, constraint of the Classical period. Larger-than-life imagination permeates the Western works of the 19th Century paving the way for the sounds now so integral to the film and cinematic world. Through critical reading and analysis we delve into serpentine chord progressions, endless melody and epic-scaled forms to unlock the principles behind the music of gods and demons, love and vengeance, desire and death, all of which inevitably push the major/minor system to the brink of dissolution.
The course includes two fifty-minute classes of aural skills lab each week. Prerequisite: MUAC 126, placement exam, or permission of the instructor. Offered every fall semester.
Attributes: Arts

246 Keys to Music 5: Brave New Worlds
As Western culture and life endured some of its most tumultuous upheavals, Western music similarly experienced its own world-shaking changes. Composers and performers engaged in rabid experimentation like mad musical scientists, seeking new methods and materials to give voice to life in the Atomic Age and after. Many Western musicians sought inspiration and materials in the musics of other cultures. In this course, we continue to fill our musical toolkits with new elements for performance, creation, and analysis, studying the music from the 20th Century to the present, as well as scales and techniques such as Indian ragas and Arabic maqam. The course includes two fifty-minute classes of aural skills lab each week.
Prerequisite: 126, placement exam, or permission of the instructor. Offered every spring semester.
Attributes: Arts

251 Visible Music, Music Embodied: Introduction to Conducting
When large groups of people want to make complex music together, they need a way to coordinate their efforts, not only to start and end together, but to set a tempo, to help them change tempos without wrecking, to help them balance, and to unify their performance from a mere sum of parts into a refined whole. Ironically, such a musical leader cannot use sound to help a group of musicians shape their own sounds, and so the art and technique of conducting have developed to convey musical meaning by visual gestures. This class introduces students to score-study techniques and to the code and practice of physical gestures that guide ensembles in rehearsal and performance.
Prerequisite: 245.

331 Intermediate Composition Lessons: Composing with Electronic Media
Drawing on the experience gained in MUAC 231/232, students will learn to compose original works for solo instruments, small chamber ensembles, and electronic media in one-on-one study. Emphasis will be placed on developing original solutions to compositional problems and challenges and to incorporating technology in compositional works and practice. When possible, the works will be read and/or performed and recorded.
.5 credit course. Prerequisite: MUAC 126, and 231 or 232, and 233 and permission of the instructor

332 Intermediate Composition Lessons: Composing with Electronic Media
Drawing on the experience gained in MUAC 231/232, students will learn to compose original works for solo instruments, small chamber ensembles, and electronic media in one-on-one study. Emphasis will be placed on developing original solutions to compositional problems and challenges and to incorporating technology in compositional works and practice. When possible, the works will be read and/or performed and recorded.
Prerequisite: MUAC 126, and 231 or 232, and 233 and permission of the instructor

333 Living Music, Modern and Contemporary
All around us, in concert halls, community centers, schools, private and public galleries, in large cities, small towns and even in isolated, rural settings, new music is being performed and heard, music created by living composers. You may never have heard such music, as it is a small fraction of programming on mainstream media. Nevertheless, this amazingly diverse repertoire passionately voices and reflects contemporary life, experience, and society. This is music of recent and current generations, your generation no less, music by people you may meet or already know. This half-credit course offered each semester explores such music, recent and contemporary (20th- and 21st-century) compositions and composers in the Western art-music tradition. Students will become acquainted with a wide variety of styles, will gain deeper understanding of the elements of sound as tools for artistic creation, and will hone analytical listening skills.
.5 credit course. Prerequisite: 233.

335 Composition Studies I: Orchestration
Drawing on the experience gained in MUAC 231/232, students will learn the complexities, challenges, and best practices in composing for all standard, Western, acoustic instruments. Students will arrange works by other composers for instrumental combinations and will also create original works for large chamber ensembles of mixed instrumentation. When possible, the works will be read and/or performed and recorded.
Two semesters, 0.5 credit each semester. Prerequisite: MUAC 246, 231, 232, 233 and permission of instructor.

337 Music Creation and Production
Traditionally, the act of composing music involves the creation of music notation, but the advent of mass-market digital-audio workstation software has revolutionized the music industry. This course explores a diversity of ways in which recorded and synthesized sounds can be used directly as raw material for music composition. Students will become acquainted with and gain experience using a variety of audio recording and editing techniques for the purpose of learning how to craft musical works using digital audio workstation and other computer music software. No prior no prior musical knowledge or experience necessary.
.5 credit course. Two of these .5 credit courses will fulfill the Arts requirement.

345 Keys to Music 6: Theorizing Possibilities
Having filled your musical toolkit with elements and techniques in previous semesters of this track, develop and apply your own theories of music. We will learn and apply sophisticated methods of analysis and theorizing, methods that propose what makes music coherent, how it makes sense, what holds a piece together. Reaching beyond the received, Common-Practice theory of parts 1 – 5, this course explores a wide variety of music theories from the 18th Century up to the present.
Prerequisite: 245 or 246.
Attributes: Writing in the Discipline

352 Seminar in Early Music
Studies in selected topics of the history of music ca. 900-1750.
Prerequisite: 101 and 126 or permission of the instructor. Offered alternate years.
Attributes: MEMS Elective

353 Seminar in Music and Sound Studies
Studies in selected topics related to music and sound studies.
Prerequisite: MUAC 206, 209, 210, 211, 212, or 221, or permission of the instructor. Offered alternate years.

354 German Music and Politics
The boundaries of this course are narrow in space—Germany, Austria, and the Czech Republic—but wide in the types of political topics that we will discuss: hero worship, nationalism, ethnic/racial definitions of a Volk, anti-Semitism, multimedia productions, genocide, political critique, censorship, and aesthetic debates. Students will also have an opportunity to explore a musical-political topic of their own through a short research unit.
This course is cross-listed as GRMN 350 and JDST 316. Offered alternate years. Prerequisite: 102 or permission of the instructor.

355 Seminar in Ethnomusicology
Studies in selected topics in ethnomusicology. Ethnomusicology, broadly writ, is concerned with examining the relation of musical expression, forms, and reception to socio-cultural life. As such, it is interdisciplinary in nature, straddling the humanities, the arts, and the social sciences. Critical analysis and understanding of socio-cultural difference, in relation to expressive culture, features as central to ethnomusicological theory, method, and writing conventions. Possible course titles include: “Music and Place,� “Reading Musical Ethnography,� “The Social Lives of Musical Instruments,� “Ethnographic Research in Music and the Performing arts: Qualitative Methods.�
Prerequisites: Dependent upon topic.
Attributes: Social Sciences

356 The Social Life of Music and Sound
Come explore soundscapes, from Dickinson’s campus to soundscapes of human rituals (bells, cries, sung weeping, hollers), to soundscapes of urban spaces and soundscapes in nature. Come investigate diverse musical and performance worlds. This seminar introduces students to ethnography as a genre, as a set of practices for understanding music and sound in relation to social life. Some questions we consider: What is the relationship between fieldwork and story, music and representations of music? What might be some of the ethical considerations when conducting research with musical communities in the present? We will do deep dives into sound recordings, films, texts, and photographs; do local sound walks; and students will develop basic skills in interviewing, sound recording, and ethnographic writing. Each student will develop an independent small-scale ethnographic project on a topic of their choosing. Musical note reading not required. Interested non-majors who do not meet prerequisites are encouraged to seek permission of instructor.
This course is cross-listed as ANTH 205. Prerequisite: One of the following (MUAC 209, 210, 211, 212) OR one anthropology course OR permission of instructor.
Attributes: Social Sciences

357 Ear to the Earth
What might we learn about our relationships to the environment by orienting our ears to the earth? From the sounds of melting glaciers in the Antarctic to indigenous sound worlds in the rainforest of Papua New Guinea, where a gifted composer might have once collaborated with sounds of waterfalls and birds--- what can learn about our environment by listening to it? What perspectives might tuning into sound lend to thinking about climate change and resilience? This interdisciplinary seminar introduces students to a diverse range of approaches to using sound and music as modalities through which to understand human relationships to the natural world and the environment, from diverse historical moments, cultural contexts, and geographies. Our explorations will include: environmental sound recordings and soundscape compositions, documentary films and ethnographic accounts, and emerging work at the intersection of acoustic ecology, the arts, the humanities, and the social sciences. Students will conduct local place-based observations in select outdoor environments. Guided writing assignments on sound recordings, site observations, readings, and viewings, will assist students in developing skills in description, analysis, and reflection. No musical note reading skills are necessary.
Prerequisites: MUAC 209, 210, 211, or 212 OR ENST 161 (for ENST/ENSC majors) OR permission of instructor
Attributes: Arts, ENST Humanities/Arts (ESHA), Sustainability Connections, Writing in the Discipline

358 Art, Music, Movement: The Innovations of the Ballets Russes
The Ballets Russes (Russian Ballet), founded by Serge Diaghilev, was a laboratory for the development of modernist ideas about music, dance, theater, and the visual arts in the early 20th century. The company promoted ground-breaking artistic collaborations and some of the most important musical scores of the twentieth century, including The Firebird (1910), Daphnis and Chloe (1912), The Rite of Spring (1913), Parade (1917), The Three-Cornered Hat (1919), Pulcinella (1920), Les Noces (1923), Le Pas d’acier (1927), Apollo (1928), and The Prodigal Son (1929), were commissioned by Diaghilev. In addition to raising the stature of musical composition in ballet, one of the Diaghilev enterprise’s five resident choreographers was female—a rarity among ballet companies both then and now. In this course, we will examine the artistic innovations of Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes in music, dance, and design from the company’s debut in 1909 to Diaghilev’s death in 1929. We will also consider the limitations of the enterprise and the attitudes of its leading figures. Tracing the evolving aesthetic, cultural and political circumstances the Diaghilev company navigated, our course will explore early 20th century modernism and the troupe’s enduring contributions to music, art, and dance.
Pre-requisites: Any 200-level MUAC course. This course is cross-listed as THDA 302.
Attributes: Arts, Writing in the Discipline

360 Introduction to Audio Engineering
Want to make high-quality editing and mixing like the pros? Thinking of a career in the recording industry? Then this is the class for you. Students will learn basic audio-engineering theories and skills, how to use sound recording and editing software and professional-quality recording equipment, how to assemble and implement digital audio workstations, and how to edit and mix recordings. Some competence in basic algebra is recommended.
Offered every summer session.

401 Senior Colloquium
The senior colloquium brings majors together in the final year of their coursework and provides them with a forum in which they will research, develop, and execute their capstone projects within the major (the guidelines for which will vary depending on student’s emphasis within the major). In addition students will present their senior work in a public lecture/recital known as the annual Music Majors Colloquium at the end of the fall semester.
Prerequisites: One course from each of the following: a) 100, 101 or 102; b) 126, 245 or 246; c) 209; and d) 345 or any 350-level MUAC course.

431 Advanced Composition Lessons
Drawing on the experience gained in MUAC 331/332 and/or 335/336, students will be guided in one-on-one lessons to compose original works of broader scope for chamber ensembles. Students will develop increasingly sophisticated and original solutions to compositional problems and challenges. When possible, the works will be read and/or performed and recorded.
Prerequisite: MUAC 246 and 331 or 332 or 335 and 333 and permission of instructor.

432 Advanced Composition Lessons
Drawing on the experience gained in MUAC 331/332 and/or 335/336, students will be guided in one-on-one lessons to compose original works of broader scope for chamber ensembles. Students will develop increasingly sophisticated and original solutions to compositional problems and challenges. When possible, the works will be read and/or performed and recorded.
Prerequisite: MUAC 246 and 331 or 332 or 335 and 333 and permission of instructor.

435 Composition Studies II: Portfolio and Project
Drawing on the experience gained in MUAC 335/336, students will compose a substantial work for large chamber ensemble or larger (orchestra, band, choir). Students will also revise and refine works created earlier in their previous composition courses to achieve a polished portfolio of works for a variety of instruments, ensembles, and media. When possible and at the discretion of the professor and the director of the relevant ensemble(s), the work will be read, recorded, and possibly performed.
Prerequisite: MUAC 333 and 335 and permission of instructor. Students in Music Composition Emphasis must take concurrently with 401.

436 Composition Studies II: Portfolio and Project
Drawing on the experience gained in MUAC 435 students will revise and refine works created earlier in their previous composition courses to achieve a polished portfolio of works for a variety of instruments, ensembles, and media. Students will also continue to develop new works of greater depth and sophistication. When possible and at the discretion of the professor and the director of the relevant ensemble(s), a work will be read, recorded, and possibly performed. This class is required for all composition students undertaking Honors and recommended for seniors who wish to continue their composition work achieved in MUAC 435.
Prerequisite: MUAC 435 and 401.

437 Music Creation and Production
Traditionally, the act of composing music involves the creation of music notation, but the advent of mass-market digital-audio workstation software has revolutionized the music industry. This course explores a diversity of ways in which recorded and synthesized sounds can be used directly as raw material for music composition. Students will become acquainted with and gain experience using a variety of audio recording and editing techniques for the purpose of learning how to craft musical works using digital audio workstation and other computer music software. No prior no prior musical knowledge or experience necessary.
.5 credit course. Two of these .5 credit courses will fulfill the Arts requirement.

493 Senior Seminar in Analytical Theory
Advanced independent study in musical analysis culminating in the creation of a major analytical essay. Open to seniors majoring in music.
Prerequisite: 245, 246, the relevant 300-level seminar, and permission of the department chair.