Undergraduate Music 2023-2024

This course will examine key ideas and methodologies in music studies, incorporating approaches from a range of ‘disciplines’ such as musicology, ethnomusicology, performance studies, music education and community music. We will discuss a diverse range of topics including: cross cultural definitions of music; the role of music in society; different methodological approaches to the study of music history; how music is learnt in different places and times; and the relationship between music, economics and technology. The course will draw on case studies from musics both within the ‘western’ canon (such as European art music and popular music), as well as musical traditions from across the globe.

This course will engage students in practical music making, developing skills in performing and composing. Students will receive 10 hours of tuition with a specialist instrumental / vocal tutor, and attend lectures on genre, performance style, composing / arranging techniques, rehearsal etiquette, and stagecraft.

In groups of 5-8 performers, students attend a series of rehearsal sessions, where they will plan and manage a group creative project, culminating in a 10-minute performance as part of a mini festival in December. 

Students will be expected to attend concerts, join an ensemble, and participate in occasional workshops.

Combining key components in digital technology and musicianship, Digital Musicianship encourages music students to acquire basic digital skills that will help them explore a wide range of music making in the 21st century, through skill building in the applications of technology to the discipline of Music. This hands-on, project-based course introduces basic knowledge in digital music technology, and key issues related to the music making in the 21st century.

Building on “Performing and Composing 1”, this course will guide students to developing their own range of interests in creative musical practice. Students will work towards a portfolio of creative outputs, which can include a range of compositions and musical arrangements, and recordings of solo / ensemble performances.

Students receive 10 hours of one-to-one tuition on their chosen instrument / voice, and attend lectures and tutorials focussing variously on issues related to performance, composition, and music technology.

In this course you will explore ways of writing and talking about music. Lectures will focus on recent work in music studies, showcasing the kind of scholarship you will encounter later in your degree. Tutorials will provide opportunities for experimenting in a range of formal and informal styles, working both individually and in small groups. By the end of the course you will gain a deeper understanding of both established writing conventions and emerging forms of multi-media communication.

 In this course, basic concepts of Western tonal music such as primary triads, cadences, idiomatic chord progressions, and voice leading are taught using exercises in harmonic analysis, figured bass, and part writing. More advanced concepts such as secondary dominants and chromatically-altered chords are also introduced. In parallel to lectures and seminars, students will work with software designed to reinforce key concepts such as clefs, intervals, key signatures, and scale structures.

Students will explore a range of elementary issues in musicology relating to some of the following: music history, theory and analysis, sociology of music, psychology of music, aesthetics, ethnomusicology, world music, early music, opera, concert music, jazz, popular music, music in film and television, musical performance, composition, music technology and the economics of the music business.

The course will consider a range of music taking into account the kinds of methodologies and discourses in which this music is discussed.

This course offers students an excellent opportunity to acquire foundational skills in music technology from sound recording for ensembles and orchestras to the technology-based compositions and sound design for games using digital audio workstation software. The course content is entirely project-based, and upon the successful completion of the course, students will become well-versed in the intermediate-level skills in music technology and well-prepared for advanced music technology courses in the 3^rd and 4^th year.

This ten-week course will introduce compositional skills that are of importance to contemporary composers. These important skills are grouped into five key areas: Tonality, Melody, Texture, Rhythm and Timbre. Students will learn these skills and techniques and assimilate them very quickly, being assessed on two pieces of compositional work over the half-session.

The Emerging Musical Practitioner is open to, and relevant for any musician who would like to explore wider vocational options in music; whether as a composer, educator (formal or informal), musicologist or performer.

This course focusses on student-led ensemble and solo performance. Students will receive 10 hours of tuition with a specialist instrumental / vocal tutor, and attend lectures on performance practice, style & genre, successful ensemble performance, practising, rehearsal etiquette, and stagecraft.

Students will be given the chance to present individual concepts for an ensemble performance project. Each successful bid will be allocated a group of 5-8 performers, who will develop each concept into a 10-minute public performance, as part of a mini-festival at the university in December.

Students must have achieved a CGS award of C3 or higher in performance at Level 1, 2HS in order to be able to progress to this course in year 2.

Students will develop a critical awareness of form and structure in music by studying various approaches to musical analysis. The course will draw on a range of analytical methods and musical genres, such as functional harmony and classical form, pitch-class set theory, rhetoric in music, and computer-aided analysis.

This course offers students an introduction to the field of ethnomusicology, including the historical development of the field, how to conduct fieldwork and some of the field’s key theoretical perspectives. The course will introduce students to a range of musical traditions from around the world through case studies that demonstrate the close relationship between music, society and culture (topics include nationalism, colonialism, identity, race and globalisation). Teaching will take the form of lecture-seminars, reading group sessions and tutorials. The course also has a strong practical element where students will have the opportunity to conduct ethnomusicological fieldwork including ethnographic interviews.

This ten-week course will introduce compositional skills that are of importance to contemporary composers. These important skills are grouped into five key instrumental areas: Woodwind, Brass, Percussion, Strings and Electronics. Students will learn these skills and techniques and assimilate them very quickly, being assessed on two pieces of compositional work over the half-session.

This is a fully interactive course designed to develop students' musicianship skills whilst examining the pedagogy and resources required to transfer musicianship skills to participants in a diverse range of settings regardless of starting ability, thus equipping students to become emerging musical practitioners in a range of education and community music settings. Participatory music making, socio-cultural learning and experience of working in groups will be explored in this course. 

This course focusses on solo performance. Students will receive 10 hours of tuition with a specialist instrumental / vocal tutor, and attend lectures on performance practice, interpretation, style & genre, practice regimes, managing performance anxiety, presentation and stagecraft. Students will be given opportunities to perform during performance lectures, receiving feedback from their peers and teaching staff, and honing their abilities to critique and evaluate performances. Students will work towards a 15 minute recital in May.

This course will explore practices and research from the fields of music, therapy, public health and medicine, to rigorously explore the relationship between music, health and wellbeing. 

The course differs from its 15 credit counterpart through its extended work in conjunction with NHS Grampians Public Engagement team in the design and implementation of music, health and wellbeing interventions.

This course introduces theoretical and practical aspects of sound design in a wide range of media, including film, TV series, games and interactive platforms. Along with an in-depth analysis of sound design in films and TV series, such as Mirror by Tarkovsky, Gravity by Cuarón, and Weekend by Godard among others, students will acquire practical tools, technologies, and methodologies to create sound design for film and fixed media. Students are also introduced to Unity and FMOD, a game sound design framework used by AAA games, and encourage them to explore possibilities of sound design with new technologies.

This course will introduce students to learning and teaching in music education contexts.  Through reflection and practical engagement, students will begin to develop a range of skills essential for teaching in the secondary school.

Two quotes provide an overarching provocation for this course:  

 ‘Every Community Musician believes they invented Community Music’ (Imry 2013, cited in Camlin 2015)

‘Good intentions are not enough to avoid bad results when you make art with people‘ (Matarasso 2019) 

This course is designed to explore and challenge what community music is and can be, and what it potentially means to each of us as individuals. Using the two provocations above as well as Kushner Walker and Tarr’s 2001 Publication Case Studies and Issues in Community Music the course will explore the practice of Community Music through rigorous academic study, and practice through observation and participatory lenses.

The second semester of this year long course is run in collaboration with the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance and the European University of Cyprus. This collaboration allows the study of community music internationally.

This course develops individual instrumental/vocal  skills.  Students work on one-to-one basis (20 x 1 hour lessons) with a specialist instrumental / vocal tutor on their principal study. Alongside instrumental and vocal lessons students are  encouraged to join one of the department's many ensembles working in weekly rehearsals towards high quality public performances. The course is assessed by a 20 minute recital, a tutor report and a performance essay.

Students must have achieved a CGS award of B3 or higher in year 2 in order to be able to progress to this course in year 3.

This course will build on knowledge and techniques studied and assimilated in earlier composition modules in order to create substantial, original new creations. Students will be required to assimilate new techniques and work them into their own emerging musical language for the assessment procedures. Students will be required to regularly critique existing works using these techniques and this will form part of the formative assessments.

There was an abundance of song in nineteenth-century Britain. On the street and in the home, on the stage and in the classroom, singing was by turns ordinary and astounding – a feature of everyday life and a wonder to behold. This course introduces students to some of the best-known songs and singers of the era while providing them with the tools to explore many more pieces and performers off the beaten track. No detailed prior knowledge of nineteenth-century song is required. 

Conducting is an interactive course designed to develop a strong practical and academic knowledge and understanding of conducting. The course seeks to continue unpacking the many mysteries surrounding the so-called magic performed by conductors in rehearsal and performance explored initially in Introduction to Conducting.

Any sound, to be heard, needs space. To think about, write, and perform music, you need to consider the space or place where it is to be played. In this course – taught by a team of researchers in musicology, composition, performance, and sound art – you will explore ways in which to investigate, imagine, design, and realise sound-in-space.

This course provides each student the opportunity to design and implement a community music project of their choosing, working with a range of community partnerships in the Northeast of Scotland.

This course introduces and develops the main underpinning principles of the programme, providing a forum for analysis and discussion of education in the practical context of classroom teaching.  A range of issues common to all students as developing professionals will be reflected upon, in particular, issues which have implications for direct action in the classroom such as inclusive practice.  Through Professional Enquiry, it provides students with knowledge and understanding of policy, theory and research in the context of developing professional practice.

Within a school setting students will critically reflect on their own practice in relation to key features of an inclusive learning environment, focussing on the role of the teacher.

Through observation of classroom practice, students will develop capacities and practise skills that enable them to prepare, plan, and implement learning, teaching, assessment and evaluation of learners.

This course will chart the emergence of a new 'national' style in English music and the birth of the first music we can arguably call 'English' since Purcell. Students should come away from the course with a fundamental understanding of this heady period, and its importance in national musical development and cultural preception.

This course will
explore theoretical and practical aspects of sound design in a wide range of
film and media, particularly focusing on new media, such as games and
interactive platforms.

This course will entail research work which will contribute to musicological understanding (at undergraduate level). Students will research a topic of their own choice (subject to approval), demonstrating knowledge and understanding of their chosen subject matter in the form of a 10,000 word dissertation. 

This course focusses on advanced performance, working towards a 30-minute public recital in May.

Students will receive 20 hours of tuition with a specialist instrumental / vocal tutor, and attend lectures on performance practice & interpretation, style & genre, writing programme notes, practice regimes, managing performance anxiety, presentation and stagecraft. Students will be given opportunities to perform during performance lectures, receiving feedback from their peers and teaching staff, and honing their abilities to critique and evaluate performances.

Students must have achieved a CGS award of B3 or higher in year 3 in order to be able to progress to this course in year 4.

The aim of this course is to allow promising student composers the opportunity to develop their own 'voice' by giving them a degree of creative freedom in what they produce. By the end of the course students are able to compose in a variety of genres, conveying a sense of structure and form in their music as well as working independently. Assessment is via a portfolio of compositions. Lasting c.20 minutes in performance.

This course further develops knowledge and understanding of national policies, and priorities in education relevant to inclusive education classroom practice. Students will extend their knowledge and understanding of the curriculum in Scottish schools and develop professional skills and abilities relevant to the transition to teaching. Through Professional Enquiry 2 emerging critical skills will deepen, while knowledge and understanding of the diversity and quality of educational research relevant to the development of practice will be developed.

This course will empower students to engage proactively with the complex social and political concepts, theories and perspectives around equality, equity and social justice. 

The first part of the course will develop a knowledge and understanding of the range of terminology, concepts, theories, and perspectives connected with this area of study, using the 2010 Equality Act as an overarching framework. This will be undertaken through the study of relevant academic literature and participatory activities.  

The second part of the course will demonstrate how these concepts, theories and perspectives can be applied to the student’s understanding of their individual musical practice(s).  

As different cultures and nations have come into contact through European colonialism and globalisation, so too have their musics. In this course, we will approach the issue of cultural encounter through the prism of music, and music’s ability to represent and to bring into dialogue different cultural identities. ‘Music, Representation and Cultural Encounters’ will adopt a cross-disciplinary approach examining current scholarship in musicology, ethnomusicology and popular music studies. In the course, we will encounter a number of familiar (and not so familiar) repertoires and genres, including opera/western art music, jazz, popular music, Mediterranean and North African genres.

As part of the BMus (Hons) Education degree programme, this professional placement provides further opportunity for students to apply and develop their knowledge of issues in Scottish Education and pedagogical theory, building towards the transition into their induction year.