| Unit name | Critical Analysis of Media Music |
|---|---|
| Unit code | MUSIM0020 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | M/7 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
| Unit director | Dr. Heldt |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Department of Music |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
The unit is designed to introduce students to different theoretical perspectives for looking at music in screen-media texts, and to the choice of different analytical tools and methods, depending on the features of the screen-media texts and the music in question.
The unit introduces the students to characteristic examples from different periods of the history of film, television and the internet, from silent cinema to recent Youtube clips, including original as well as pre-existing music, and to appropriate theoretical frameworks (including narrative theory, semiotics, genre theory, critical theory) and analytical methods to adequately understand and describe different aspects of screen-media music, and the relationship between the modes of production and consumption of screen-media texts and their music.
The unit also aims to equip students to discuss music in screen-media texts in a variety of formats: in classroom discussion, in academic writing, and in the audiovisual form of a video essay.
On successful completion of this unit, students will be able to:
1. understand and critically discuss a range of theoretical approaches to music in screen-media texts with regard to their disciplinary origins, conceptual foundations and potential analytical usefulness;
2. analyse music in screen-media texts from a variety of theoretical perspectives, and apply terms and concepts from different theories appropriately;
3. discuss different screen-media music practices and aesthetics in relation to modes of media production and consumption and to related aspects of cultural history;
4. apply verbal and non-verbal (e.g. graphic) techniques to represent features of screen-media music in a given text;
5. provide insight into music in screen-media text in audiovisual form.
Teaching will be delivered through a combination of synchronous and asynchronous sessions, including seminars, tutorials, and self-directed exercises.
1. A video essay of up to 10 minutes on an aspect of music in one or more screen-media texts (30% of the unit mark). The video essay will allow students to demonstrate learning outcomes 1-3 and 5.
2. A coursework essay on the music in a screen-media text (4,000 words; 70% of the unit mark). The essay will allow students to demonstrate learning outcomes 1-4.
1. James Buhler: Theories of the Soundtrack. New York: Oxford University Press, 2019.
2. James Buhler & David Neumeyer: Hearing the Movies. Music and Sound in Film History. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 22016.
3. Michel Chion: Film, a Sound Art (trans. C. Gorbman). New York: Columbia University Press, 2009 (orig. Art sonore, le cinéma, Paris 2003).
4. Mervyn Cooke: A History of Film Music. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
5. Jonathan Godsall: Reeled In. Pre-existing Music in Narrative Film. London & New York: Routledge, 2018.
6. Guido Heldt: Music and Levels of Narration in Film. Steps across the Border. Bristol& Chicago: Intellect, 2013.
