Western Musicology in China: A Personal Perspective

  • Craig Wright Yale University
Keywords: China, pedagogy, conservatory

Abstract

The positive interaction between Chinese and American musicologists is due, in part, to a number of Chinese musicologists who have studied at American universities, including Yale. These musicologists are now teaching at the important Chinese conservatories in Beijing and Shanghai. In describing how Western music and traditional Chinese music have been taught, these colleagues provide a history of teaching ideologies, methodologies, and textbooks that are little known to Western scholars. 

 

Author Biography

Craig Wright, Yale University

Craig Wright received a Bachelor of Music in piano and music history at the Eastman School of Music (1966) and a PhD in musicology at Harvard (1972), and since 1973 has taught at Yale University where he is currently the Henry L. and Lucy G. Moses Professor of Music. At Yale, Wright’s courses include his perennially popular introductory course “Listening to Music” and his selective humanities courses including “Exploring the Nature of Genius.” Among his six books are Music and Ceremony at Notre Dame of Paris (1989), Music in Western Civilization (2005), and Listening to Music (6th edition, 2007). He is presently at work on a volume entitled: Mozart’s Brain: Exploring the Nature of Genius. In 2004 Wright was awarded the honorary degree Doctor of Humane Letters by the University of Chicago and in 2010 was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Published
2012-01-12
Section
Roundtable