MusB Music

Year of entry: 2027

Course unit details:
Analysis of Tonal Music

Course unit fact file
Unit code MUSC20012
Credit rating 20
Unit level Level 2
Teaching period(s) Semester 2
Offered by Music
Available as a free choice unit? Yes

Overview

This course builds on the theoretical and analytical foundations established in the first year by expanding students’ knowledge and understanding of analytical techniques of tonal music. Students will be introduced to representative and diverse methods for analysing this repertoire, including Schenkerian voice-leading analysis and the innovative techniques of the New Formenlehre (the study of musical form), applying these approaches creatively and critically to late Classical and early Romantic repertoire.  The second half of the course focuses on the music of neglected women composers, highlighting and celebrating their vital contributions to the development of Romantic form. By the end of the course, students will have sharpened their analytical abilities while gaining a deeper, and more inclusive appreciation of this pivotal period in music history. 

Pre/co-requisites

Unit title Unit code Requirement type Description
Tonality: Form and Harmony MUSC10011 Pre-Requisite Compulsory

This technical course requires score reading, so a discussion with the Course Unit Director prior to enrolment is advised. 

Aims

This unit aims:

  • to develop students’ music-analytical and interpretative skills;
  • to serve as an introduction to the analytical theories of Heinrich Schenker, one of the leading twentieth-century figures in the understanding of tonal music;
  • to allow students to acquire the tools to undertake their own basic voice-leading analyses and read Schenker’s graphs critically;
  • to familiarise students with other theories of musical form via William Caplin’s theory of formal functions (1998) and James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy’s Sonata Theory (2006) with a similar emphasis on theoretical understanding and practical application;
  • to explore the music of under-represented women composers working in the 19th century and highlight their vital contribution to the development of Romantic form;
  • to evaluate critically the theories introduced on the module;
  • to lay foundations for further analytical and technical work in the third year. 

Teaching and learning methods

Core course content will be delivered in two-hour lectures: these will introduce relevant theories, discuss several examples, and help students to apply these with the aim of developing critical thinking and technical ability. Following the initial exposition of concepts and techniques, teaching will centre largely around short weekly exercises to be completed in preparation for discussion and class evaluation in the seminars.

In weekly Analysis seminars students will work individually and in small groups on tasks that consolidate their understanding of the material covered in the lecture, and receive feedback on weekly analytical tasks.

Individual learning support is offered through consultation hours.

Online Canvas provision.

Students enrolled on this module  participate in the Ƶ Music Theory and Analysis Reading Group, which meets three times during each semester on the first Wednesday of the month. 

Knowledge and understanding

By the end of this course students will be able to:

  • demonstrate their understanding of various music-analytical methods appropriate for tonal repertoire;
  • carry out analyses of a range of Western score-based music using accepted models, and have understood more complex analyses;
  • create basic voice-leading analyses of short tonal works, alongside other appropriate analytical approaches to musical form.

 

Intellectual skills

By the end of this course students will be able to:

  • demonstrate their increased knowledge of a range of repertoires in Western music, especially the music of neglected women composers
  • read, understand and create basic Schenkerian graphs;
  • engage critically with the theories of music covered on the course.

 

Practical skills

By the end of this course students will be able to:

  • demonstrate skills in the clear presentation of specialist musical notation;
  • apply theory as a tool for interpreting musical form, design and structure;
  • show an ability to produce analytical work independently within an increasingly self-directed environment.

 

Transferable skills and personal qualities

By the end of this course students will be able to:

  • undertake group work and collaboration in the analysis seminars;
  • demonstrate developing team-working and collaboration skills;
  • exhibit attention to detail - developing precision and accuracy through close reading of scores and analytical models.

 

Employability skills

Analytical skills
Analytical and critical thinking - breaking complex structures into manageable components and understanding how parts relate to a whole
Group/team working
Effective collaboration with peers and course lecturer
Innovation/creativity
Creative problem solving - fulfilling a set task with creativity and methodological rigour and with the resources available
Project management
Time management skills - submitting material to fixed deadlines and balancing independent work and study with deadlines
Oral communication
Oral skills (seminar discussion)
Other
Pattern recognition - identifying recurring structures, processes and relationships

Assessment methods

Coursework (summative)50%
Exam (summative)50%

 

Feedback methods

  • Oral feedback on weekly analytical tasks given in Analysis seminars and lectures
  • Written feedback on all formative and summative coursework 
  • Additional one-to-one feedback (during consultation hour or by making an appointment)

 

Recommended reading

Students should make every effort to familiarise themselves with a wide range of music from the period 1700-1830, supplemented by the course unit director's reading suggestions.

  • Agawu, Kofi, ‘Schenkerian Notation in Theory and Practice’, Music Analysis, 8 (1989), 275–301.
  • Bent, Ian, Analysis (London, 1987).
  • Cadwallader, Allen, and David Gagne, Analysis of Tonal Music: a Schenkerian Approach (3rd ed., Oxford, 2010).
  • Caplin, William E., Classical Form: a Theory of Formal Functions for the Music of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
  • Cook, Nicholas, A Guide to Musical Analysis (Oxford, 1987).
  • Forte, Allen, and Steven Gilbert, An Introduction to Schenkerian Analysis (London, 1982).
  • Grimes, Nicole, ‘Formal Innovation and Virtuosity in Clara Schumann’s Piano Trio in G minor,
  • Op. 17’, in Joe Davies, ed., Clara Schumann Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021).
  • Hepokoski, James, and Warren Darcy, Elements of Sonata Theory: Norms, Types, and     Deformations in the Late-Eighteenth-Century Sonata (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006).
  • Horton, Julian, ‘Criteria for a Theory of Nineteenth-Century Sonata Form, Music Theory and Analysis, 4/ii (2017), 147–91.  
  • Hyland, Anne M., Schubert’s String Quartets: the Teleology of Lyric Form (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023).
  • Pankhurst, Tom, SchenkerGUIDE: a Brief Handbook and Website for Schenkerian Analysis (London, 2008).
  • Schenker, Heinrich, Five Graphic Analyses (New York, 1932, repr. 1969) with an introduction and glossary by Felix Salzer.
  • Smith, Peter H., ‘Liquidation, Augmentation and Brahms’s Recapitulatory Overlaps’, 19th-Century Music, 17/iii (1994), 237–61
  • Wingfield, Paul, ‘Beyond “Norms and Deformations”: Towards a Theory of Sonata Form as Reception History’, Music Analysis, 27/i (2008), 137–77. 

Study hours

Scheduled activity hours
Lectures 22
Project supervision 11
Tutorials 11
Independent study hours
Independent study 156

Teaching staff

Staff member Role
Anne Hyland Unit coordinator

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