Musical Criticism
Code: 100644 ECTS Credits: 6| Degree | Type | Year | Semester |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2500240 Musicology | OT | 3 | 2 |
| 2500240 Musicology | OT | 4 | 2 |
Contact
- Name:
- Francesc Xavier Chavarria Talarn
- Email:
- francescxavier.chavarria@uab.cat
Teaching groups languages
You can check it through this link. To consult the language you will need to enter the CODE of the subject. Please note that this information is provisional until 30 November 2023.
Prerequisites
No prerequisites required, although basic knowledge of technical vocabulary from different musical fields -i.e. classical, urban, contemporary, traditional music- is recommendable.
Objectives and Contextualisation
- Identify the main processes that make up musical communication and learn to describe them appropriately
- Have up-to-date observation and critique tools available to apply to observations of musical situations
- Know the new digital media, social networks and apps, shaped as a tool for dissemination and music criticism
- Enrich the possibilities of oral expression in the analysis of musical situations
- Write short critical writings aimed at various supports (blogs, IG posts, short radio spots, etc.)
- Develop critical thinking about musical facts and Musicology in a way that contributes in the future to improving the field of studies
Competences
- Musicology
- Identify and compare the different channels of reception and consumption of music in society and in culture in each period.
- Relate concepts and information from different humanistic, scientific and social disciplines, especially the interactions which are established between music and philosophy, history, art, literature and anthropology.
- Relate musical creations with their different contexts, differentiating between the social functions of music, its roles and that of the musician in society and in relation to other artistic manifestations.
- Students must be capable of applying their knowledge to their work or vocation in a professional way and they should have building arguments and problem resolution skills within their area of study.
- Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
- Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
- Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.
- Take sex- or gender-based inequalities into consideration when operating within one's own area of knowledge.
Learning Outcomes
- Accurately describing the artistic object with the specific language of art criticism.
- Apply the conceptualisation of philosophy, history, literature and anthropology to musical research.
- Communicate using language that is not sexist or discriminatory.
- Develop habits for transfer to the ambit of musical dissemination and information the musical training acquired.
- Establishing relationships between science, philosophy, art, religion, politics, etc.
- Evaluate the consumption of music in contemporary society.
- Identify the complexity of music reception processes.
- Identify the connections between current musical creation and the sociopolitical and cultural circumstancesticas in which it takes place.
- Integrate knowledge acquired in the production of clear and concise appropriate to the academic and specialist communication.
- Produce correct, precise and clear argumental and terminological writing of knowledge acquired, both in the area of musical specialisation and dissemination.
- Producing a written text that is grammatically and lexically correct.
- Summarizing the characteristics of a written text in accordance to its communicative purposes.
Content
- Write about music. Listen, describe, explain
- Strategies for musical criticism: a diachronic vision
- Institutions and discourse in music criticism
- Music criticism and mass media: what media for which kind of music?
- Writings and audiovisuals for criticism in social and new medias
Methodology
The course encourages an open format of a seminar, with an active learning that involves all the students. The course contents will be achieved mainly from the reading and critical discussion of the course readings and other materials, as well as the analysis and debate on the proposed audiovisual cases. Supervised work in the classroom will be done in person in the classroom.
Throughout the theoretical-practical class sessions, collective work on various audiovisual and written materials will be shared. The work material will be proposed mainly by the teaching staff, although the contribution of the students will be encouraged. Collaborative work will also be promoted in small groups in the classroom, organized to reflect and discuss the proposed materials, from which written or audiovisual materials will be derived and considered in the final evaluation.
These activities will be complemented, insofar as circumstances permit, with attending live concerts from which the student will have to prepare critical works that will be presented throughout the course.
Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.
Activities
| Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type: Directed | |||
| Attendance to live concerts, which will be the material to prepare the pieces of criticism | 10 | 0.4 | |
| Theoretical and practical classes | 50 | 2 | 11, 1, 7, 5, 8 |
| Type: Supervised | |||
| Personal or group tutorials (online or offline) | 5 | 0.2 | |
| Support for the personal exercises in writing and audiovisual format | 20 | 0.8 | 2, 1, 4, 5, 8 |
| Support to prepare the individual composition of written pieces about live concerts | 5 | 0.2 | 2, 6, 10, 11, 1, 4, 7, 8, 9 |
| Type: Autonomous | |||
| Personal work analysis and study on bibliographic and audiovisual materials proposed for the course | 34 | 1.36 | 2, 4, 5, 9, 12 |
| Personal work in audiovisual supports related to music criticism | 10 | 0.4 | 2, 6, 10, 11, 1, 4, 7, 8, 9 |
| Personal work on writing exercises related to music criticism | 10 | 0.4 | 2, 1, 4, 5, 8, 9 |
Assessment
CONTINUOS ASSESSMENT
There will be three assessable activities that will be scheduled and announced in class and on Moodle:
-Written exam corresponding to the first part of the subject (30%).
-Written exam corresponding to the second part of the subject (30%).
-A series of writing assignments, concert review practices, and audiovisuals done in groups (30%).
The remaining 10% will be assessed on the basis of class attendance, participation in class debates, and the proactive attitude towards the case studies presented by the teaching staff.
The subject offers the possibility of assessment. To be able to access assessment, students must have previously been assessed in a set of activities whose weight is equivalent to a minimum of 2/3 parts of the total qualification. To be able to access assessment, you must have obtained a minimum average rating of 3.5.
Students will obtain a Not assessed/Not submitted course grade unless they have submitted more than 1/3 of the assessment items.
On carrying out each evaluation activity, lecturers will inform students of the procedures to be followed for reviewing all grades awarded, and the date on which such a review will take place.
SINGLE ASSESTMENT
-Written exam corresponding to the first part of the subject (35%).
-Written exam corresponding to the second part of the subject (35%).
-A series of writing assignments, concert review practices, and audiovisuals (30%).
The date will be published in the Campus Virtual.
In the event of a student committing any irregularity that may lead to a significant variation in the grade awarded to an assessment activity, the student will be given a zero for this activity, regardless of any disciplinary process that may take place. In the event of several irregularities in assessment activities of the same subject, the student will be given a zero as the final gradefor this subject. Assessment acts in which there have been irregularities of this type cannot be recovered.
Assessment Activities
| Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Exercises (writing and audiovisual formats) related to music criticism | 30% | 2 | 0.08 | 2, 6, 3, 10, 11, 1, 4, 7, 5, 8, 9, 12 |
| Proactive attitude and participation in class activities | 10% | 0 | 0 | 2, 6, 3, 10, 11, 1, 4, 7, 5, 8, 9, 12 |
| Test (I) | 30% | 2 | 0.08 | 2, 6, 3, 10, 11, 1, 4, 7, 5, 8, 9, 12 |
| Test (II) | 30% | 2 | 0.08 | 2, 6, 3, 10, 11, 1, 4, 7, 5, 8, 9, 12 |
Bibliography
Ballester, Jordi and Germán Gan Quesada (eds.), Music Criticism, 1900-1950, Turnhout: Brepols, 2018.
Batista, Antoni. “Paraula i música : la crítica musical a la premsa / tesi doctoral d’Antoni Batista Viladrich ; directora: Amparo Moreno Sardà.” Tesi doctoral - Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Facultat de Ciències de la Comunicació, Departament de Periodisme i de Ciències de la Comunicació, 2003.
Blum, Stephen y Philip V. Bohlman (eds.). Ethnomusicology and Modern Music History. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1991.
Cantón García, José Antonio. «Prensa y música, divulgación y crítica». Comunicar: Revista científica iberoamericana de comunicación y educación, 23 (2004): 43-47
Carreira, Xoán Manuel. «Variaciones sobre la crítica musical». Ritmo, 51-508 (1981): 29-36
Cascudo García-Villaraco, Teresa. «Apuntes sobre la crítica musical». Doce notas preliminares: revista de arte, 9 (2002): 113-122
Cascudo, Teresa y Palacios, Maria: Los señores de la crítica.Periodismo musical e ideologia del modernismo en Madrid (1900-1950). Madrid: Doble J, Editorial, 2012
Cascudo, Teresa. “BANALIZAR EL FRANQUISMO A TRAVÉS DE LA CRÍTICA MUSICAL.” Revista de musicología vol.41, núm.2 (2018): 692–695
Chiantore, Luca; Domínguez, Áurea; Martínez, Sílvia. Escribir sobre música. Barcelona: Musikeon Books, 2016
Citron, Marcia J. Gender and the Musical Canon. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993
Cruz, Nando. "El periodismo musical en la era del clic, el blog y el link." Periférica Internacional. Revista Para El análisis De La Cultura Y El Territorio, 1(10) (2018) 67–75.
Gay, Joan et al. Xavier Montsalvatge : una estètica des de la premsa : selecció d’assaigs i crítica musical / edició a cura de Joan Gay, Laura Pallàs i Josep Pujol ; selecció de Jordi Codina i AntoniColomer. Girona: Diputació de Girona, 2012.
Graf, Max: Composer and Critic. Two hundret years of Musical Criticism. Norton and Company. New york, 1946
Monelle, Raymond. «La crítica de la interpretación musical». En La interpretación musical, editado por John Rink. Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 2006, 249-262.
Rink, John (ed.). The practice of performance: studies in musical interpretation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995
Ros Fábregas, Emilio. “Retos de la musicología en la España del siglo XXI: de la reflexión a la aplicación práctica en el aula”. Revista de Musicología, 29-1 (2006), pp. 11-44.
Software
No specific software needed