Course Overview

This course examines the history, social significance, and musical style of jazz. It focuses particularly on two of the central periods in the development of jazz: the Swing era (ca. 1930-45), which saw the rise of the “big bands” and the emergence of jazz as a great national popular music of America; and the Bebop era (ca. 1945-60), during which jazz became self-consciously difficult in the manner of so-called art music. We will immerse ourselves in intensive description of the music in order to understand better the extraordinary fusion of spontaneous creativity and careful intellectual structuring that characterizes jazz. We will also give in-depth consideration to socio-cultural dimensions of the music such as racial identity, American identity, and the impact of economic and technological factors.

Learning Achievement

- to gain an appreciation of the richness and variety of jazz through close study of a representative selection of pieces - to think critically about basic aspects of musical creation and production such as composition, arrangement, improvisation, and the function(s) of notation - to develop an awareness of the complex interrelationships between the arts and cultural/ideological attitudes concerning society, property, etc. V14

Competence

Course prerequisites

Grading Philosophy

Course schedule

Course type

Online Course Requirement

Instructor

Ren-Yan Chen

Other information

Graduate Institute of Musicology

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