Current Music Courses

Rose Hill, Spring 2026 Courses

MUSC 2120 - Introduction to Music Theory
Intro to Music Theory is a course designed for the student who wants to learn the basics of reading music notation (music written on the staff using treble and bass clefs), as well as the fundamentals of music theory such as scales, keys and key signatures, and intervals. This course assumes little to no formal musical training, and students need not be able to read music before taking this class. Students who do read music already, but lack some knowledge in theory fundamentals, are also encouraged to take this course.

MUSC 2140 - Fundamentals of Keyboard Musicianship
This is an intensive hands-on course in the basic skills necessary for the expression of musicianship at the keyboard. First, we learn to read, write, and interpret the fundamental elements of music theory: pitch, clef, and interval; rhythm and meter; scales and key signatures. Then, we apply these tools to the analysis and realization of triads and seventh chords, using both Roman numerals and jazz lead-sheet notation. No prior background assumed.

MUSC 2141 - Keyboard Lab
Offered in conjunction with MUSC 2140. This practical lab focuses on applying music-theoretical skills at the keyboard: playing diatonic scales and chord progressions; mastering specific compositions from the classical repertoire; developing a reliable sense of rhythm and meter; acquiring basic improvisational strategies and the technique of realizing jazz and popular styles from lead sheets

MUSC 2146 - Music Theory II
Music Theory II is a continuation of the required three-course music theory sequence. The class will deal primarily with the principles of diatonic harmony as found in classical music of the Common Practice era, as well as through more contemporary and popular styles. Students will learn about chord construction and progressions, and continue in the study of voice-leading principles (as exemplified by four-part writing) begun in Music Theory I. This course is required for all Music majors.

MUSC 2231 – Introduction to Jazz Improvisation
Introduction to the practice of jazz improvisation including scales, chords, transcription, stylistic analysis and performance. Students will play through exercises in class and transcribe solos for their own instruments. Open to all students regardless of background and experience.

Rose Hill, Fall 2025 Courses

MUSC 2145 - Music Theory I
Music Theory I is the first in a series of three required semester-long courses designed to offer a comprehensive overview of the theory of tonal music, especially of classical music during the Common Practice era, but also relating to the other genres, such as jazz and popular music. This course will cover the following subject areas: fundamentals of music theory, 2 and 3-voice counterpoint, triadic harmony, and the basics of four-part writing. This course is required for all music majors and minors. Students who do not have any prior music theory experience may be required to take an introductory level course, MUSC 2120, as a pre-requisite. Instructor permission should be granted before enrolling.

MUSC 2300 - Electronic Music and Music Production
An introduction to the creation, editing, and sequencing of electronic and recorded music using MIDI, computer software, sampling, and audio recordings.

MUSC 3200 - Ethnomusicology: Methods and Practices
This course provides a general introduction to the study of ethnomusicology, including its history, theory, and ethnographic field methods. We discuss critical ethnomusicological readings, which will introduce the discourse, critical issues, debates, and paradigms that have shaped the field. This course will also examine the interdisciplinary nature of the field, particularly as it intersects with gender and race theory and cultural studies. We will listen to and study music ranging from samba to bhangra and Afrobeat. Students will conduct fieldwork using the methods and ethical considerations discussed in class.

Lincoln Center, Spring 2026 Courses

MUSC 2037 - Disability and Music
The discipline of music scholarship has a history of integrating critical and cultural studies, such as race and gender. During the past 15 years, music scholars have produced hundreds of publications convincingly demonstrating that music narrates, reflects, and constructs disability. This seminar pursues various applications of the intersection between music and disability with topics covering disability’s profound role in shaping musical identities (especially those of composers and performers) and representations of disability within musical discourses and narratives.

MUSC 2121 - Ear Training
Ear Training is an aural skills class designed to enhance the student musician’s ability to hear music in context as well as increase fluency in sight-reading and performance. Students will learn to both recognize by ear, and sing on command, the diatonic intervals, as well as training in rhythm and solfège. While there is no course pre-requisite, students must be fluent in reading music and have some knowledge of music theory fundamentals, such as the topics covered in Introduction to Music Theory (MUSC 2120).

MUSC 2222 – Music Composition
This class will engage in the study of instrumental music composition covering a wide range of stylistic approaches and historical genres. Students will compose several short musical works over the course of the semester culminating in a final project that will be performed in a workshop setting by professional musicians.

MUSC 3031 - Rock and Pop Since WWII
Rock and pop music have played key roles in Western culture for more than half a century. This course considers the roots and musical features of rock and related styles, their changing status within "mainstream" culture, and the musical and ethical issues they raise. From the R&B music of the early 1950s to the British invasion, punk, disco, rap, alternative, and the spread of electronica, pop musicians have moved billions of people while raising questions about race, gender, generation gaps, commercialism, and globalization.

MUSC 2045/DTEM 2045 - Music & Digital Technology (cross-listed)
This course investigates the interactions between music and technology in the digital media environment of the late 20th century to the present. Drawing from central theories in the field of media studies, sound studies, Black studies, and science and technology studies, the course will expre a range of case studies of recording, listening, and performance, focusing on the technological affordances and socio-technical imaginaries that mediate the experience of music. This course covers all manner of topics related to the production, recording, distribution, and reception of digital music formats—including how computational affordances shaped music production in the late 20th century; global resonances of electronic music culture and related patterns of rac and gender; and the extractive practices and political economy of compressed audio formats (like the mp3) and music streaming platforms. Students will have the opportunity to work on their own digital audio projects to gain or enhance critical tactile experience in the basic mechanics of sound engineering.

Lincoln Center, Fall 2025 Courses

MUSC 2048 - World Music and Dance
This course will take an approach based on the premise that to study music is to study people, community, history, religion, politics and dance, as well as to study musical styles, forms and instruments. This approach provides the student with an appreciation of the sound, power and meaning of music as it exists within culture.

MUSC 2147 - Music Theory III
This course is the last in the required three-course music theory sequence. It extends the principles of harmony and voice leading learned in MUSC 2146 (Music Theory II) and covers chromatic harmony, especially as practiced in the 19th century and in popular styles, as well as advanced musical forms.

MUSC 3122 - Music, Enlightenment, and Revolution
From the 1750's to Beethoven's music in the early nineteenth century, this course examines the cultural issues of this crucial period in music history and their reflection in the compositions of such composers as Pergolesi, Gluck, Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven. It considers how changing ideas about nature, government, social class, improvisation, dance, and language--as well as national rivalries, war, and technological advances--shaped the music that has come to represent the "classical" era in European art music.

MUSC 4000 - Music and Nationalism
Since modern nationalism first emerged in the eighteenth century, music has been used in many ways by nationalists to shape and to stand for their cultural and political claims. This interdisciplinary course will examine how music helped motivate the earliest interest in "folklore," and how "classical" and even recently "popular" musics have drawn on these foundations. We will examine how historians, musicologists, folklorists, composers, sociologists and others have treated music in this context.

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