Popular Music

This course will explore popular music history and practice through both its cultural impact and its diverse stylistic tangents, from rhythm and blues and 1950s rock 'n' roll, to hip hop, electronic dance music, and other recent genres. The course will focus on 1945-2017, and centrally consider US-UK traditions though there will be some attention to areas of Scandinavian popular music history. The course will examine both cultural and technical aspects of popular music practice. Recordings and artists will be discussed in relation to their musical and social contexts and the course will equally explore issues of race, gender, and commercial aspects of the popular music industry. The course will additionally explore aspects of the histories of both record production and music technology and how technological innovations and limitations affected musical creativity from 1950s practices up to the modern computer-based DAW (digital audio workstation).

A candidate who successfully completes MUSV2003 will have
– have knowledge about the main developments in popular music from 1945-2000.
– have an increased understanding of style, genre, and technology in relation to popular music practice and history.
– have knowledge about how the development of technologies for recording, music production and distribution has influenced the history of popular music, 1945-2000.
– know music examples that represent the different areas of popular music history.
– have specialized knowledge of the critical theory and discourses around the relationships between popular music, cultural discourse, and the music industry.

Skills:
A candidate who successfully completes MUSV2003
– can identify and describe the characteristically musical features of different styles of popular music.
– can, based on musical recordings, recognize a selection of important popular music artists.
– can analyze and debate different recordings of popular music.
– can formulate her/his knowledge in both oral and written forms.

Lectures and seminars.