Musical Notation II
Code: 100653 ECTS Credits: 6| Degree | Type | Year |
|---|---|---|
| 2500240 Musicology | OB | 3 |
Contact
- Name:
- Bernat Cabré Cercós
- Email:
- bernat.cabre@uab.cat
Teaching groups languages
You can view this information at the end of this document.
Prerequisites
The minimum musical knowledge requiered is equivalent to A-level/High school level Conservatoire studies.
It is recommended to know how to edit scores with professional software (preferably Finale or Sibelius).
It is highly recommended to have successfully passed the course "Musical Notation I" and to have passed the 1st year courses "Musical Language I" and Musical Language II".
Objectives and Contextualisation
The course is intended to provide students with the theoretical and practical knowledge required to read, transcribe and perform the different systems of musical notation from the 15th and 16th centuries. This course complements Musical Notation I and finds its logical continuation in the optional course Musical notation of the Baroque era.
Competences
- Demonstrate a sufficient level of knowledge of historical and current musical language and theory, including the rudiments of harmony and counterpoint, to be able to correctly approach the study of composition.
- Know and understand the historical evolution of music, its technical, stylistic, aesthetic and interpretative characteristics from a diachronic perspective.
- Relate knowledge acquired to musical praxis, working with musicians through the analysis and contextualisation of different repertoires, both related to historical music and to the different manifestations of contemporary music.
- 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.
Learning Outcomes
- Acquire fluency of sightreading to practical musical ends.
- Apply different models of musical notation in musical praxis.
- Be familiar with editions of early music.
- Discuss musical theory and praxis with musicians.
- Identify the main systems of writing in Western music, both vocal and instrumental (10th to 17th centuries).
- Identifying the context of the historical processes.
- Integrate knowledge acquired in the production of clear and concise appropriate to the academic and specialist communication.
- Make condifent use of vocabulary relative to musical paleography.
- Make historical distinctions between the different systems of musical notation.
- Produce correct, precise and clear argumental and terminological writing of knowledge acquired, both in the area of musical specialisation and dissemination.
- Transcribe the main systems of Western music according to the modern conventions of notation and edition.
- Use the appropriate terminology in the construction of an academic text.
- Write critical papers on musicology that are planned and organised efficiently.
Content
1. Transversal theme: Theory (Throughout the course, general editorial criteria for the transcription and editing of early music will be introduced, as well as the theoretical foundations of Renaissance music.)
2. White mensural notation from the 15th and 16th centuries.
3. Instrumental tablatures (I): plucked and bowed instruments.
4. Instrumental tablatures (II): keyboard intruments.
Activities and Methodology
| Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type: Directed | |||
| Course content study | 25.5 | 1.02 | |
| In-person classes | 37.5 | 1.5 | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11 |
| Type: Autonomous | |||
| Completion of the transcription exercises | 40 | 1.6 | 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 |
| Reading the recommended bibliography | 20 | 0.8 |
The thematic blocks will be developed from theoretical and practical classes in which the musical fragments and pieces proposed at the Virtual Campus will be transcribed to contemporary musical notation. Students will have to satisfactorily solve the exercises that are entrusted as course's tasks. These exercises will be carried out following the standards of historical music editing, will be edited with professional applications (Finale or Sibelius preferably) and will be delivered on the day and time established.
This course requieres dedicating no less than three hours, two days a week for autonomous work, as well as the management of the basic bibliography. The acquisition of the Willi Apel manual The Notation of Polyphonic Music 900-1600, Cambridge: The Mediaeval Academy of America, 1961 (5th ed.) is highly recommended. (French translation: The Notation of polyphonic music 900 - 1600, Sprimont: Mardaga, 1998).
In the event of confinement, teaching will be adapted to semi-attendance or virtuality. In this case, course exercises must be submitted electronically.
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.
Assessment
Continous Assessment Activities
| Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Attendance, active participation and exercicies of the course | 30% | 24 | 0.96 | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 |
| Practical content test | 50% | 1.5 | 0.06 | 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 |
| Theoretical content test | 20% | 1.5 | 0.06 | 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 |
A system of continuous assessment is proposed, which will consist of the weighted evaluation of the following formative activities:
- Class Attendance and active participation (10% of the final grade).
- Completion of course exercises (20% of the final grade).
- A test on theoretical content (20% of the final grade).
- Two partial tests on the practical content (50% of the final grade).
Clarifications to the evaluation
- In order to calculate the final grade of the subject, the two partial exams must be passed independently. Suspended midterm exams must be re-assessed in the resit exam.
- In no case will it be possible to pass the course with the exams suspended. If a final grade higher than five (5) is obtained due to the course exercises and/or to class participation, but the average grade of the test is inferior to this number, the student will fail the course with a final grade of four (4) .In short, the course can be passed with failed class activities ,but not with failed overall exams.
- If the provisional final grade is a suspension due to the qualification of the course exercise, this activity, or its contents, will have to be retaken in the resit exam.
- Class participation and attendance is not re-evaluated.
- Extraordinary assignments will not be accepted due to failing or not delivering course activities and/or partial exams in the established time and manner.
- In order to be eligible for re-evaluation, you must have taken both partial exams and obtained a minimum grade point average of three (3).
- Only the suspended contents will be evaluated in the retake exam and a maximum grade of six (6) may be achieved.
- The day and time of the review of the exams will be communicated through the Course Moodle's Calendar on the Virtual Campus. In case of total confinement, a procedure will be established to review the exams by videoconference toallstudents who request it.
- Failure to attend or participate in class, even if justified, will result in the loss of 20% of the final grade.
- No individual examinations will be held outside the assigned day and time for the group-class as a whole except in cases of documented force majeure.
- Students who have not participated in any exam or exercise will be considered "non-assessed".
Single evaluation
The date of its completion will be reported on the Virtual Campus.
It will consist of:
-Theoretical content test, 45%
-Exercise of transcription to modern notation, 45%
-Exercise of transcription to ancient notation, 10%
Bibliography
- APEL, Willi, The Notation of Polyphonic Music 900-1600, Cambridge (Mass): The Mediaeval Academy of America, 1961 (5a ed.). (Traducció francesa: La Notation de la musique polyphonique, Sprimont: Mardaga, 1998).
- APEL, Willi, French Secular Music of the Late Fourteenth Century, (Cambridge, 1950).
- BENT, Margaret, "Notation: 3. Polyphonic mensural notation, c1200 - 1500", Oxford Music Online. Grove Music Online.
- BUSSE BERGER, Anna Maria, Mensuration and Proportion Signs. Origins and Evolution, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993.
- CALDWEL, John, Editing Early Music, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985 (2a ed. 1995).
- CHEW, Geoffrey, "Notation: 4. Mensural notation from1500", Oxford Music Online. Grove Music Online.
- CHEW, Geoffrey, "Notation: 5. Alphabetical , numerical and solmitation notations", Oxford Music Online. Grove Music Online.
- DEFORD, Ruth I., Tactus, Mensuration, and Rhythm in Renaissance Music, Cambridge UP, 2015.
- HOULE, George, Meter in Music, 1600 - 1800: Performance, Perception and Notation, Indiana UP, 1987.
- JACOBS, Charles, Tempo Notation in Renaissance Spain, NY: Institute of Mediaeval Music, 1964.
- QUEROL, Miquel, Transcripción e interpretación de la polifonía española de los siglos XV y XVI, Comisaría nacional de la música, 1975.
- ROCCO ROSSI, Francesco, La notazione rinascimentale. Libreria Musicale Italiana. Lucca, 2022.
- VENDRIX, Philippe, "La notation à la Renaissance", a Histoire de la notation du Moyen Âge à la Renaissance, Minerve, 2003.
Software
Recommended software:
- Finale (https://www.finalemusic.com/)
- Sibelius (https://www.avid.com/sibelius)
. Lilypond (http://lilypond.org/index.ca.html)
Language list
| Name | Group | Language | Semester | Turn |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (PAUL) Classroom practices | 1 | Catalan | second semester | morning-mixed |
| (TE) Theory | 1 | Catalan | second semester | morning-mixed |