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Course Syllabus

MUSC 2120 Music Theory IV

  • Division: Fine Arts, Comm, and New Media
  • Department: Music
  • Credit/Time Requirement: Credit: 3; Lecture: 3; Lab: 0
  • Prerequisites: MUSC 2110 with grade of C or better
  • Corequisites: MUSC 2140
  • Semesters Offered: Spring
  • Semester Approved: Summer 2019
  • Five-Year Review Semester: Spring 2025
  • End Semester: Spring 2025
  • Optimum Class Size: 16
  • Maximum Class Size: 20

Course Description

This course is a continuation of Basic Music Theory, including 19th Century chromatic harmony, composition, analysis and 20th Century harmonic practices. Prerequisite: completion of MUSC 2110 with a grade of C or better. Must be concurrently enrolled in MUSC 2140.

Justification

This course, required of music majors throughout the state of Utah, prepares music majors to transfer with Junior class status to music programs at four year colleges and universities. The second year of theory is taught at all Utah universities at the 2000 level, and statewide articulation agreements stipulate the transfer of this credit so long as a student receives a grade of C or better.

Student Learning Outcomes

  1. Students will demonstrate an ability to analyze the various kinds of harmonies studied throughout the semester.
  2. Students will demonstrate an ability to analyze both sonata and rondo forms.
  3. Students will demonstrate an ability to use the harmonic languages learned in the course in their own creative works.
  4. Students will demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of the evolution of harmonic function from the 18th through the 21st centuries.

Course Content

This class will include assigned text readings, in-class analysis, and lectures on:1. Neopolitan Chords2. Augmented Sixth Chords3. Enharmonic Respellings of Chords4. Chromatic Modulatory Techniques5. Sonata and Rondo Forms6. Modal Harmonies7. Synthetic Scales8. Free Atonal Harmonization9. Serialism and Tone Row10. Secundal and Cluster Chords11. Quartal and Quintal Harmonies12. Polychords13. Polytonality and Polymodality14. Pandiatonicism15. Microtones16. New Forms of Notation17. Aleatoric/Chance Music.