Graduate Music Theory & History Electives 

Please Note: 

• If you have passed the music theory and history portion of the exam, you are eligible to take graduate theory and history electives. Please see below for a list of available options.

• If you did not pass the Theory and/or History portion of the graduate exam, you'll need to complete your remedial requirements first. See this page for directions on how to access these courses in Albert. If you are a graduate student, you are strongly advised to complete your remediation requirements as soon as possible. 

• If you need department consent to register, please complete the Registration Consent Form. 

Music Theory Electives Running in the Fall

Please check Albert for detailed section information, including Class Nbr.

Course Title: Survey of Analytical Techniques (MPATC-GE 2207) 

• Notes: This course runs every Fall semester, starting Fall 2025. The syllabus will be available by Spring 2025. The course is open to all graduate music students, but is especially recommended for PhD and DMA students preparing for candidacy exams. 

• Instructor: Panos Mavromatis

• Link to Syllabus
  
  

Course Title: North Indian and Balinese Gamelan Analysis (MPATC-GE 2202) 

• Notes: This course only runs in odd-numbered years (e.g. the course will run in Fall 2025, 2027, etc.)

• Course Description:  In recent years, there has been a marked increase in theoretical and analytical writing on musics that lie outside the European art music tradition. This course focuses on two traditions: North Indian Classical and Balinese gamelan music, incorporating transcription, analysis, and critical engagement with recently published theoretical writing. Students explore compositional and improvisational techniques, processes, and forms used in these musical traditions. 

• Instructor: Chris Matthay

• Link to Syllabus

Course Title:  Music and the Senses (MPATC-GE 2209)

• Notes: This course only runs in even-numbered years (e.g. the course will run in Fall 2024, 2026, etc.)

• Course Description: Our senses are inextricably linked. Sounds can create the illusion of visual movement, a pianist's gestures alter the way we perceive duration, a change in musical timbre can make a cup of coffee taste more bitter, and the flash of an object can make an unnoticed sound audible. Drawing on research in cognitive psychology and neuroscience, this course explores the dynamic way our senses influence our experience of music and multimedia. Through class discussions and projects, students apply research in multisensory perception to their own area of specialization. 

• Instructor: Sarah Louden

• Link to Syllabus

Music Theory Electives Running in the Spring

Please check Albert for detailed section information, including Class Nbr.

Course Title:  Music Theory Pedagogy (MPATC-GE 2116) 

• Notes: This course runs every spring semester. 

• Course Description: This course introduces students to the specialized discipline of teaching music theory. Through extensive study of recent debates, current scholarship, and online resources, students develop a broader understanding of the pedagogical context for undergraduate theory and aural skills training, and best practices for presenting these materials in a 21st-century classroom. With a defined focus on professional development, this course prepares students for college-level classroom teaching. 

• Instructor: Sarah Louden

• Link to Syllabus

Course Title:  Recent Theories of Rhythm and Time (MPATC-GE 2205) 

• Notes: This course only runs in even-numbered years (e.g. the course will run in Spring of 2026, 2028, etc.)

• Course Description: Based on recent research in music theory, ethnomusicology, music cognition, and linguistics, this course will survey a diverse range of approaches to musical time. We will explore models of temporal experience in a variety of musical styles, focusing on selections from the classical and twentieth-century Western repertory as well as world music. In particular, we will explore the conceptual and psychological foundations of rhythm, meter, expressive timing, memory, form, and the interaction between music and text. Seminar participants will be expected to follow the general weekly readings and class discussion, as well as study in-depth a particular theoretical approach and/or musical repertory of their choice, culminating in a final project.

• Instructor: Panos Mavromatis

• Link to Syllabus
  
  

Course Title: The Music of Igor Stravinsky (MPATC-GE 2206)

• Notes: This course only runs in odd-numbered years (e.g. the course will run in Spring of 2025, 2027, etc.)

• Instructor: Panos Mavromatis

Course Title: 16th-Century Counterpoint (MPATC-GE 2018)

• Notes: This course only runs in even-numbered years (e.g. the course will run in Spring of 2026, 2028, etc.)

• Course Description: Study of compositional approaches in the 16th & 18th century including species counterpoint & fugue.

• Instructor: Panos Mavromatis

• Link to Syllabus

Course Title: 18th-Century Counterpoint (MPATC-GE 2019)

• Notes: This course only runs in odd-numbered years (e.g. the course will run in Spring of 2025, 2027, etc.)

• Course Description: Study of compositional approaches in the 18th century. Students will engage with 18th-century practice through analysis and model composition.

• Instructor: Panos Mavromatis

• Link to Syllabus 

Course Title: Contemporary Music 

• Course Number: MPATC-GE 2039

• Semesters Offered: Runs every Fall Semester

• Course Description:  In-depth study of selected topics in music since 1945 emphasizing developments in the recent avant-garde. Topics include: modernism; tonality, atonality, and centricity; the “emancipation of dissonance” to the “liberation of sound;” Schoenberg’s “method of composition with twelve tones” to integral serialism; the Romantic idiom in the Modern era; Igor Stravinsky and his legacy; John Cage and his legacy; Minimalism and its legacy; Music and the audible spectrum: microtonality, the noise/music continuum, and the sound/silence continuum; Technology’s impact on the composition, performance, and culture of music; Postmodernism; The “shock of the new” and the mainstreaming of the avant-garde. 

• Instructor: Rebecca Kim

• Link to Syllabus

Course Title: Music of East and Southeast Asia, Past and Present 

• Course Number: MPATC-GE 2086

• Semesters Offered: Runs every Spring Semester

• Course Description: A survey of traditional and recent music making from areas of East Asia (China, Tibet, Japan, Korea, Mongolia), Southeast Asia (Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Philippines, Myanmar) and the Indian subcontinent. In addition to examining the musical systems and techniques that define specific practices, readings and discussions cover issues from Asian American cultural studies. Open to undergraduate and graduate students familiar with music terminology and notation. 

• Instructor: Rebecca Kim

• Link to Syllabus

Course Title: Baroque Performance Practice

• Course Number: MPATC-GE 2441

• Semesters Offered: This course only runs in odd-numbered years (e.g. the course will run in Spring of 2025, 2027, etc.)

• Course Description:  This course offers students the opportunity to explore topics in historical performance practice circa 1600-1750 through practical applications. Topics include performance context, phrasing and rhetoric, ornamentation and improvisation, continuo realization, rhythm and notation, tuning and pitch, orchestral and vocal ensembles, and opera. The class culminates in a project that allows students to apply historical performance practices in a live performance of a period work or as a realized composition or improvisation.

• Instructor: Morwaread Farbood