| Faculty Fellows
2003
Department of Music, Mason Gross School
of the Arts
Department of Music, Mason Gross School of the Arts
The Introduction to Music (Music
101) course is one of the most heavily subscribed courses
on campus. To date, it has concentrated on a circumscribed
number of compositions by European “classical”composers or
Americans working in the same tradition. Our position in reformulating
this course is that its goal can no longer be to instruct
on the basis of a narrow canon of musical taste, nor to segregate
certain musical genres of analysis. Rather, we plan to present
theories, frameworks, and approaches to the study of all the
world’s music and to promote a more general understanding
of the role of music in human life.
The newly-formulated course will address how people define, create, value,
and use music in cultures around the world, exploring basic elements of rhythm,
melody, timbre, texture, harmony, and forms. Larger themes will also be examined,
including music and the environment; music as cultural memory; and music and
technology. Using this culturally diverse approach, each class will focus on
one of the elements of music or one major theme, exploring it through its various
cultural and historical manifestations.
Andrew Kirkman studied at the universities
of Durham, London (Kings College) and Princeton, and has
worked at the universities of Manchester, Wales, and Oxford.
He is currently Associate Professor of Music at Mason Gross
School of the Arts, Rutgers University. His research centers
on sacred music of the fifteenth century, and he has published
and lectured widely on English and continental music of the
period, including the music of such composers as Dufay, Ockeghem,
Walter Frye and John Bedyngham. Binchois Studies, a collection
of essays edited jointly with Dennis Slavin, was recently
published by Oxford University Press. He also directs “The
Binchois Consort”, a professional vocal ensemble dedicated
to Renaissance music, with which he records for Hyperion
Records, and is a freelance violinist.
Nanette de Jong - Assistant Professor,
Rutgers University. Specialist in Caribbean music and avant-garde
jazz; founder and director of “RU Salsa Band,” 2001 recipient
of Human Dignity Award.
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