Music 36

Special Topics: Composers

John Cage, Ruth Crawford Seeger

Larry Polansky

Spring, 2005

Dept. of Music

Work

Attendance

An essential part of the class, especially attendance at your colleagues presentations. It’s a small class, so in-class participation is quite important.

Readings and Listenings

See the syllabus for a rough idea, but we’ll be specific each week about listening assignments.

Two in-class presentations

One each on Ruth Crawford Seeger and John Cage. Pick (with my collaboration) one work (piece, book, writing) and teach it to the class. 1/2 hour each. A complete outline and 1-2 page set of notes for your presentation are due to me and the rest of the class at the time you give your presentation. We’ll have roughly two of these a week, usually on Fridays.

Final

We’ll have a final at the end of the class. This will cover all the readings, listenings, and discussions of the class. It won’t be hard, it’ll just assume that you’ve done the readings and the listenings, come to class and paid attention.

Class concert

As a class, we’ll put together a concert of the two composers’ works. Everyone will be involved in this, in a number of ways, and it will be a central focus of the class for the whole term.