Rethinking the Undergraduate Music History Sequence in the Information Age

  • Melanie Lowe Vanderbilt University

Abstract

This essay presents a case study of the new undergraduate music history curriculum at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music. While one course in the sequence is a chronological survey, the other courses adopt a variety of approaches. The result is a flexible curriculum that addresses a multiplicity of learning and teaching styles. Recognizing the ease with which students can access vast oceans of information, it also places greater value on the acquisition of musicological skills than on the absorption of music historical information.

Author Biography

Melanie Lowe, Vanderbilt University

Melanie Lowe is Associate Professor of Musicology and Chair of the Department of Musicology and Ethnomusicology at Vanderbilt University's Blair School of Music. She is the recipient of many teaching awards, among them the Reverend James Lawson Lectureship (Vanderbilt University, 2008), the Madison Sarratt Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching (Vanderbilt University, 2001), and the Princeton Graduate Alumni Excellence in Teaching Award (Princeton University, 1993). She is also the author ofPleasure and Meaning in the Classical Symphony (Indiana University Press, 2007) as well as articles on other 18th-century topics, music in American media, classical recording, and teen pop culture. 

Published
2015-03-18
Issue
Vol 5 No 2 (2015)
Section
Roundtable

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

  1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
  2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
  3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).