Monday, January 16, 2017

New Courses!

Tomorrow I start the new semester and it is looking great....and full....very full.

My normal Carnegie Mellon Spring load would contain Eurhythmics II and Eurhythmics IV for the BFA music majors, and Vocal Methods for the Music Education certification students, but there are some exciting additions this year. 

I will also be teaching Intro to Dalcroze Eurhythmics for Music Students (with preference for music grad students) and I am 1/3 of the trio teaching the School of Design new course, Persuasion, required of all 2nd semester Junior Design majors (Communication, Product, and Environment tracks). I am so pleased to be joining Dan Lockton and Michael Mages in presenting this content. My primary contribution is to present fundamentals of experience (a la Eurhythmics for Designers). We will explore space-time through bodied interactions in a quazi eurhythmics setting...big room, no shoes, 9' Steinway, and all participatory. I am excited to present some music basics like beat, tempo, meter, phrase, cadence, tension/release, rhythm, accent, agogics, etc. but related to normal lived experience rather than to specific musical examples. It is an opportunity to reveal the musical in everyday life...I think Dalcroze and Messiaen would be proud. 




Persuasion (required of all Junior design majors)
51-372

Persuasion is an important skill for designers to have—both in design practice itself, and in professional situations. Your ability to put across your message, to get other people to agree with you, to value your work, and to want to work with you, will be central to your career, both inside and outside of design. Equally, understanding what persuades you and others—how we are influenced by other people, by media, by our environment, by design—is a crucial reflective skill to develop in better understanding yourself, those around you, and society more widely.


Intro to Dalcroze Eurhythmics for Music Students (with preference for music grad students) [21 hours]

In this introduction to Dalcroze Eurhythmics designed for graduate level students with significant music background, students will explore fundamentals of music and musicianship through movement, improvisation, and ear training. Students actively explore the concepts of music in a setting designed to achieve understanding through successive interactive experiences. Based on the method developed by Emile Jaques-Dalcroze (1865-1950) this course aids the music student in the practice of artful performance through a greater physical understanding of musical subjects and musicianship.    


Intro to Dalcroze Eurhythmics for Non-music Majors (open to anyone) [21 hours]
57-463, 57-815

In this introduction to Dalcroze Eurhythmics designed for students of varied musical backgrounds, students will explore fundamentals of music and musicianship through movement, improvisation, and ear training. Prior music training is not required for acceptance into the Intro to Dalcroze Eurhythmics for Non-music Majors. Students will explore basic concepts of music in a setting designed to achieve understanding through successive interactive experiences. Based on the method developed by Emile Jaques-Dalcroze (1865-1950) this course will aid the music novice in a greater understanding of musical subjects and musicianship through the lens of their own participating body.


Dalcroze Eurhythmics I - IV (required of all BFA music majors) [140 hours]
57-161, 57-162, 57-163, 57-164
57-761, 57-762, 57-763, 57-764

Dalcroze Eurhythmics I, II, III, and IV amount to 140 hours of comprehensive professional musicianship training. Through extensive study of improvisation, ear-training, and rhythmic movement, the Dalcroze Eurhythmics coursework offers an ideal and efficient course of study to reinforce the understanding of musical concepts, enhance musicianship and focus awareness on the physical demands of artistic performance.

Throughout the four semesters we break down and analyze the bodied, performative aspects of the following subjects: time-space-energy, tempo, dynamics, articulation, beat/pulse (binary, ternary beat units), divisions and multiples of beat-units (regular and irregular), rhythmic patterns based on binary and ternary beat-units, metric organization, complementary rhythm, augmentation, diminution, accelerando, ritardando, phrasing, anacrusic and crusic phrases, repetition, imitation leading to canon, ties, syncopation, structure, form, accents (metric, dynamic, agogic, tonic, timbre, harmonic), meters combining binary and ternary beat-units, cross-rhythms (3:2, 3:5, 5:2, 3:4, 4:5), rhythmic sight reading/ dictation/ improvisation, all rhythms to the level of the 64th note, metric transformation (3/4 vs. 6/8 or 8/8 vs. 4/4, etc.), and the rhythmic vocabulary of Oliver Messiaen (ametrical, additive, augmented and diminished rhythms, retrograde and nonretrograde rhythms). 

In all four semesters of the eurhythmics curriculum, extensive attention is paid to training the inner-musician. How does one organize the sounds one hears? What does it mean to feel music? What are the variables to consider when choosing tempi and expressing rubato? With extensive work in conducting, interpretation, score reading, and chamber experiences, the Dalcroze Eurhythmics class is the ideal compliment to the Carnegie Mellon School of Music core courses in Solfege, Theory, and History. 

Artful performance consists of more than just the accurate execution of pitches and rhythms. The experience of music is, at its roots, a physical endeavor, and the Dalcroze Eurhythmics curriculum, initiated at Carnegie Mellon in 1921, is strategically placed to support our students in the discovery and reinforcement of their personal musicianship; a holistic, physical integration of time–space–energy–instrument–sound–body.