Martin Goldray

This FYS seminar will examine the various genres of music that have pervaded cultural life in the West, focusing on classical music, folk, rock, and punk. The first semester will begin with the foundations of classical aesthetics in ancient Greece and continue with the study of landmarks of classical music through the Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical periods. The spring semester will begin with 19th-century romanticism and continue with the development of 20th-century modernism, the rise of mass media and technology, the splitting of culture into high and low, the rock & roll revolution, and the more recent attempts at bridging the gap between high culture and popular cultures. The students in this seminar will have weekly conferences through October Study Days and then biweekly conferences for the rest of the school year.

This course will examine punk rock as a musical style and as a vehicle for cultural opposition. We will examine the musical, cultural, and political conditions that gave birth to the genre in the 1970s and trace its continuing evolution through the early 2000s in dialogue with, and sometimes in opposition to, other musical genres such as progressive rock, heavy metal, ska, and reggae. We will begin with the influence of minimalism on “proto-punk” artists such as Velvet Underground and Patti Smith, which will provide a foundation for seeing how minimalism—as well as modernism, atonality, and electronic music—continued to resonate in punk and rock music generally. We will examine the intellectual background of early UK punk with readings by Guy Debord and Situationist International and look at the theories of Gramsci and Foucault on the question of institutional power structures and the possibility of resistance to them. To deepen our understanding of punk style and the culture of opposition, there will also be readings by Adorno, Bakhtin, Barthes, Antonin Artaud, William Burroughs, Kathy Acker, Julia Kristeva, and others. We will trace the splintering of punk into various sub-genres and the challenges of negotiating the music industry and remaining “authentic” in a commercialized culture. Another major focus will be the Riot Grrrl bands of the 1990s as the catalyst for third-wave feminism. Given the DIY aesthetic at the heart of punk—in addition to listening to, analyzing, and reading about the music—students who want to get creative will be given the opportunity to work with musicians and write some punk songs. In light of the large amount of valuable documentary film footage relating to punk culture, the course will include a film viewing every other week. 

The impact of The Beatles has been immeasurable. In their seven years as a recording band, they explored and enlarged every aspect of songwriting technique, producing one musical milestone after the next. This class will trace the development of The Beatles chronologically through their 12 original English albums and the singles that were released alongside them. We will focus on the ways The Beatles used harmony, phrase structure, rhythm, structural ambiguity, and sonority in continuously innovative ways. We will also look at some of the of musical styles and cultural phenomena that The Beatles assimilated and transformed—from early rock & roll, Motown and the Goon Show to 1960s counterculture—and explore how The Beatles, in turn, influenced music and culture in the 1960s. There will also be guest-led discussions by other members of the music faculty on the following topics: The Beatles and the evolution of studio recording, the use of electronic music techniques (Yannelli), Norwegian Wood and the great sitar explosion (Higgins), electric guitar techniques (Alexander), and acoustic guitar techniques (Anderson). 

This course will examine punk rock as a musical style and as a vehicle for cultural opposition. We will examine the musical, cultural, and political conditions that gave birth to the genre in the 1970s and trace its continuing evolution through the early 2000s in dialogue with, and sometimes in opposition to, other musical genres such as progressive rock, heavy metal, ska, and reggae. We will begin with the influence of minimalism on “proto-punk” artists such as Velvet Underground and Patti Smith, which will provide a foundation for seeing how minimalism—as well as modernism, atonality, and electronic music—continued to resonate in punk and rock music generally. We will examine the intellectual background of early UK punk with readings by Guy Debord and Situationist International and look at the theories of Gramsci and Foucault on the question of institutional power structures and the possibility of resistance to them. To deepen our understanding of punk style and the culture of opposition, there will also be readings by Adorno, Bakhtin, Barthes, Antonin Artaud, William Burroughs, Kathy Acker, Julia Kristeva, and others. We will trace the splintering of punk into various sub-genres and the challenges of negotiating the music industry and remaining “authentic” in a commercialized culture. Another major focus will be the Riot Grrrl bands of the 1990s as the catalyst for third-wave feminism. Given the DIY aesthetic at the heart of punk—in addition to listening to, analyzing, and reading about the music—students who want to get creative will be given the opportunity to work with musicians and write some punk songs. In light of the large amount of valuable documentary film footage relating to punk culture, the course will include a film viewing every other week. 

The impact of The Beatles has been immeasurable. In their seven years as a recording band, they explored and enlarged every aspect of songwriting technique, producing one musical milestone after the next. This class will trace the development of The Beatles chronologically through their 12 original English albums and the singles that were released alongside them. We will focus on the ways The Beatles used harmony, phrase structure, rhythm, structural ambiguity, and sonority in continuously innovative ways. We will also look at some of the of musical styles and cultural phenomena that The Beatles assimilated and transformed—from early rock & roll, Motown and the Goon Show to 1960s counterculture—and explore how The Beatles, in turn, influenced music and culture in the 1960s. There will also be guest-led discussions by other members of the music faculty on the following topics: The Beatles and the evolution of studio recording, the use of electronic music techniques (Yannelli), Norwegian Wood and the great sitar explosion (Higgins), electric guitar techniques (Alexander), and acoustic guitar techniques (Anderson). 

In this class, students will study the history of Western music from the beginnings of modernism at the end of the 19th century, with music by Debussy and Mahler, to music of today. The focus will be on the study of major works in various genres (symphonic music, opera, chamber music, and vocal music), but we will also examine the changing social and intellectual contexts of the period such as the influences of two world wars, the rise of mass entertainment, the development of recording and broadcast media, and the changing role of the arts in society.

The first semester will cover the basic techniques of conducting, score-reading and analysis, interpretation, period styles, instrumental techniques, orchestration from a conductor’s point of view, and a comparison of conducting styles. The repertory will range from Baroque to new music. The second semester will focus on leading rehearsals with live players.

In this class, we will study the major styles and techniques of Western classical music. No prior knowledge of music or music theory is required. Technical and analytical terms will be introduced as we go, but students who have had some background in music theory will be able to do more advanced work in conferences. The material will range from the music of the Middle Ages to the present day. Musical works will be examined in detail, as well as in the context of various other issues: What was the role of art in society? How did music relate to the other arts? What social and economic issues affected the dissemination of music? What role does history and interpretation play in our understanding of music? Students will meet for weekly conferences during the first six weeks of the semester and every two weeks thereafter.

This course will provide an opportunity for students to refine and deepen their listening skills with music that the students select themselves and bring to the class. The material for the course will be generated entirely by the students. We will spend a little time at the beginning of the semester developing a terminology for describing and analyzing music, focusing on harmonic and rhythmic techniques, structure, how voices and instruments are used, recording techniques, and how lyrics and music can be related. Each of the weekly meetings of the class will be devoted to student presentations and class discussions. Students will present every three or four weeks. The goals of the class are to listen more actively and critically, to find ways to express verbally what we’re hearing, to sharpen our understanding of our likes and dislikes, and to share our musical interests with others.

See course description under Lectures and Seminars.

In recent years, a number of philosophers have examined the experience of music: Does it express emotions? And, if so, how? Does it convey meaning? Can we use the idea of narrative to help understand music without a text? Etc.? This class will begin by examining some different perspectives on the role of music—and art in general—in life and thought, including that of the Ancient Greeks, Kant, Hegel, Dewey, and Adorno. We will then look at the work of more recent philosophers. The ideas presented in the class will always be related to musical examples; the class will equally involve reading and attentive listening. Musical examples will come mostly from the Western classical tradition, but some other traditions may also be relevant. The goal of the class will be to see how music and philosophical thought can illuminate each other and, hopefully, to deepen our awareness of the range and power of music. We will use analytical techniques in looking at pieces of music, but prior knowledge of music theory is not required.

See course description under Lectures and Seminars.

Interpretation is a central activity in human experience. It’s how we make sense of things from works of art to peoples’ actions, but much of the time we’re unaware of how we go about making our interpretations. In the classical music world, interpretation is central and usually carefully considered. Every moment of a classical music performance is mediated through the performer’s interpretation. Much of what we do as performers goes far beyond the instructions on the page. Are there rules or constraints on this process? What criteria can we use to evaluate performances? How have performance styles changed, and how can we relate those changes to our contemporary tastes? In this class, we will look at scores and listen to performances from the entire history of Western music and reflect on the many interpretive decisions made by singers, instrumentalists, and conductors. We will study historical sources and write critical appraisals of performances. Readings will range from historical writers such as Leopold Mozart, C. P. E. Bach, Tosi, Muffat, North, Frescobaldi, and Quantz to contemporary writers such as Taruskin, Harnoncourt, and Haynes. There are no conferences.

See full description under Lecture and Seminars.

In this course, we will listen to and study Russian music from the first half of the 19th century to the present in the context of the important historical events and intellectual movements that galvanized Russian artists: the desire to find the appropriate expression of Russian identity, the ambivalence toward the achievements of Western Europe, the ideals of civic responsibility, the aestheticism of the later 19th century, the repressions of Soviet society, and the various expressions of opposition to that society. The first unit of the class will cover music in Tsarist Russia, with composers such as Glinka, Tchaikovsky, Musorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Scriabin; the second unit will cover the composers of the Soviet era, principally Shostakovich and Prokofiev but also composers who left Russia and whose careers were largely in the West, such as Rachmaninoff and Stravinsky; the third unit will look at the rock, punk, and post-punk cultures that arose in the 1970s. No prior music courses or knowledge of music theory is required.

Music is central to most of our lives. How can we understand the experience of music? What does music express? If it expresses emotions, how do those emotions relate to the emotions we experience in everyday life? Can music without words express emotions with as much clarity as music with words? As a background to these questions, we will also be looking at issues concerning the nature and experience of art of general; and we will examine the views of writers such as Plato, Kant, Schopenhauer, Dewey, and Adorno and compare how they understand the role of art in society and in our own experience. The musical repertory will include medieval and Renaissance music, music by Bach, songs by Schubert, and examples from the symphonic repertory by composers such as Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Tchaikovsky, and Stravinsky. We will study those works using the techniques of formal analysis that are generally used in music-history classes but also attempt to draw out the many contextual threads: How are they embedded in a culture, and how do they reflect the temperament and orientation of the composers? While most of our musical examples will be from the classical repertory, other styles will also occasionally be relevant. The goals of the class will be to understand how musical and philosophical thought can illuminate each other and to deepen our awareness of the range and power of music. No prior knowledge of music theory or history is required; we will introduce and define the terms we need as the class proceeds.