Summer 2004 - Summer 2008

In this "proactive seminar" course Jeremy Haladyna challenges each participant to grapple with what's sounding today in concert music across the globe. Here it is still not a question of music packaged for and disseminated only on mass channels, though part of the course will involve determining to what extent that situation is now changing. Starting with the repertory of the major world concert venues and "art-music" festivals, we will attempt to identify as many distinct vectors within postmodernism as we can.

Which vectors can trace their ancestry clear back to the middle '60s when the too-tight modernist snakeskin in art music began to be shed? Which vectors have arisen only since 1990? How do composers such as the UK's Steve Martland or America's John Adams seem to align philosophically with the movement? Do prominent Asian and expatriate Asian composers such as Chen Yi and Tan Dun seem to fit? Does the postmodernist movement fly in the face of continuing technological development in music, or can we posit some degree of congruence?

There's clearly a lot to think about, and for the composers in the class, "it's your here and now."

THIS COURSE IS OPEN TO ALL CCS/L&S MUSIC MAJORS first and then to ALL OTHER MAJORS on a space-available basis.

There will be student listening and internet assignments, selected library reserve articles on postmodernism and a final project in which students will elect either to author a position paper (with citations) or a postmodernist musical composition, along certain guidelines.