MUSI 320 - Advanced Studies in Musical Genres

Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)

Topic for 2018/19b: The Symphonic Poem. The symphonic poem is a unique pre-cinematic descriptive musical genre in which extra-musical influences, such as a poetic idea or a literary narrative, shape the content and structure of the music. In this course we investigate the literary and philosophical influences on selected symphonic poems of Franz Liszt (France/Hungary), Peter Tchaikovsky (Russia), Richard Strauss (Germany), and Jean Sibelius (Finland). While these four big names could easily occupy the entire semester, we also consider others from countries such as Spain, the United States, and Mexico. The course is designed to tackle unresolved questions about this popular but problematic genre, such as “does a listener need to know the programmatic background in order to understand the music?” Literary influences range from Shakespeare to Nietzsche to the Finnish Kalevala. Course materials include readings of select passages from literary works, source readings from the writings of composers and critics, and musical scores and existing analyses of these works. Michael Pisani.

Prerequisite(s): MUSI 105, MUSI 106 and at least MUSI 205 or MUSI 248, or permission of the instructor.

One 3-hour period.