Music 243 - Jazz Form & Analysis

An upper level theory course designed for majors or students with prior jazz performance or theory experience. Students do not need a background in jazz to enroll in this course, and this course may be used to satisfy one of two required courses for the theory and analysis requirement for the music major.

Among the topics to be explored in the course will be melodic, harmonic and formal concepts from: hot jazz of the 1920s, big bands of the 1930s and 1940s, bebop of the 1940s, the post-bop legacies of hard bop, cool jazz and their manifestations today, as well as the jazz avant-garde and fusion of the 1960s and 1970s. Students will gain an understanding of the formal principles of various types of small and large ensemble jazz composition and improvisation.

Required coursework will include melodic, harmonic and formal/structural analysis of compositions, arrangements, and improvisations from various historical and stylistic periods within the development of jazz. We will carry out these investigations through listening, transcription, and composition/writing projects. This is not a performance course; however, certain assignments will require basic performance exercises on piano and/or another instrument with which the student is familiar (including voice).

Requisite: MUSI 241 or consent of the instructor. Fall semester. Professor J. Robinson.