Course Number: 171*/3.0 X 3L (Course Code Explanation)

Open To: B.Mus. and B.Mus./B.Ed. students, non-B.Mus. students

Area(s): Musicology/Ethnomusicology

Instructor(s): Dr. Kip Pegley

Term(s): A

Day(s) and Time(s): Th: 6.30-9.30

Room: DUN-AUD

Calendar Description

A survey of important trends in 20th century Western popular music. Topics include genres, individual artists and groups, record labels and stylistic trends, and sociological issues.

NOTE Also offered at the Bader International Study Centre, Herstmonceux.

Additional Information

Students first are introduced to a series of musical terms and concepts (timbre, vocables, modulation, etc.), which they will be expected to integrate into class discussions and individual musical analyses. The course then moves historically through 20th-century Western popular music; we begin with blues, R&B, and country and western, after which we trace these musical genres into early rock 'n' roll. North American and European popular musics from the 1950s through to the 1990s are then examined; topics range from individual artists and groups (the Beatles, Bruce Springsteen) to record labels and stylistic trends (Motown, Stax), to musical genres (punk, heavy metal), and finally, to sociological issues (gendered and racial representations).

Evaluation will be based on in-class tests and a final examination.