After much deconstruction and analysis of music, my Year 11 Music students are about to embark on their first formal Musicology task. In Queensland, Australia, Musicology is a dimension of the current senior syllabus.[i] It involves “the study of music in social, historical and cultural contexts… it entails researching, analysing and evaluating repertoire… in a range of contexts, styles and genres, to synthesise and express a music viewpoint, and enhance musicianship”.[ii]

They will be arguing what period a ‘lost score’ might be attributed to – it is not a ‘typical’ or ‘obviously characteristic’ work from an historical period (which shall remain nameless, as they found out about my Twitter account and this website!), but one that sits between periods of musical change. They will have to determine what evidence from the score/recording best supports their viewpoint. As mentioned, this is their first task, so it will be couched by the criteria of the proposed period.

In the weeks leading up to this we have been working on the perception and analysis of music elements, and we have stepped into some evaluation. I pretty much ran with the approach I identified in a previous post to assist students move through this. Our ‘visible thinking’ is messy – the board is covered with Post-it notes (which often fall off mid conversation!) – and there is much opportunity for unpacking and discussion of student responses.

Things get messier. As I group the Post-it notes containing their analytical fragments and insights according to music elements, as I add arrows and connectors between these ideas, and as I separate the often conjoined ideas from one Post-it note we hit our first (collective) ‘speed bump’…

“Music elements don’t work in isolation…”, I utter the statement that will hopefully become familiar and known.

“You can’t have a melody without some aspect of duration… and this melody is ‘realised’ by a timbre…”

“The melody will be housed by some greater tonal organisation – a tonality – and be structured or formed to communicate the intended music idea…”

Music elements are often so intertwined, which is nothing new, but we run into problems if we analyse them one by one. If we work though the list: duration, pitch (melody), pitch (harmony), pitch (tonality), expressive devices…. we soon start repeating ourselves. This leads to ‘dry’ analysis – often not purposeful (unless pitched for a musical analysis textbook), and often not affording students the opportunity to engage in higher-order cognitions… A checklist of analysed parts need to be reconstructed to form a meaningful whole.

This is where I really like the objectives of Musicology – they allow students to move into higher-order thinking. I have identified these in the aforementioned post, but will place them here again (I have placed the cognitions in bold):

1. perceive and interpret music elements and concepts in repertoire and music sources
2. analyse and evaluate music to determine the relationships between music elements, concepts and stylistic characteristics
3. synthesise findings, justify music viewpoints and communicate music ideas.

The syllabus helpfully provides some description of these processes:

“when students perceive and interpret music elements and concepts, they identify and show understanding of the meaning of words, sounds and symbols. When students analyse and evaluate music, they investigate, review and critique repertoire, extract and clarify information. They draw conclusions through the evaluation of a range of repertoire and other music material. When students synthesise findings, justify music viewpoints and communicate music ideas, they consider possibilities and make judgments about music repertoire…”[iii]

These provide a very useful step-though for teaching and learning, and can be used as a process itself. One could ask, “what’s important here?’ (perception and interpretation), “what are the details?” (analysis), and “what can I hold these parts up against to test their suitability for my argument/viewpoint?” (evaluation), and “how are these collective parts significant?” (synthesis and justification). Not perfect, I know, but helpful in having students ‘live’ the criteria.

But, again, things get messy.

How do you decide what you need to analyse? In the ‘first-level’ cognitions, students are asked to perceive and identify. Where should they start? The word ‘perception’ (in the syllabus glossary),[iv] and by my own understanding, involves being astute and discerning. To do this, they need two things: a) a good question, and b) a criteria. The first should allow students to explore the three criteria and all of the cognitions thoroughly; the second should provide a purposeful frame for their response.

How, then, do you start the analysis? I propose that it is with a frame of reference in mind – a criteria. This will be linked to the ‘good’ question – one that places students in a place from where they need to solve a musical question or problem; a place where a purposeful viewpoint is advanced. This criteria will feed the validity of the viewpoint, becoming an evaluative frame for analysis and evaluation, and a frame for the response itself.

This evaluative frame moves beyond the problematic music element by element analysis, and the step-though approach. The frame might be a style (e.g. characteristic of Baroque music), ones expectations (what we might expect musically if the song is, for example, a sad song), or themes embedded in the question (e.g. innovation, repetition, an identity, a narrative etc…). So, in effect we start with the second half of the second criteria (evaluate), insomuch as establishing a guide for use to work from – to perceive and interpret the right things, to deconstruct and analyse them… Once these analysed parts are completed and evidenced, they can be held up against the criteria established (which may be presented as characteristics, expectations or themes) and see if they measure up (support the argument/viewpoint) – if not, mention why, or discard them. Finally, we push together all of the analysed parts (that have been retained through evaluation) and assemble them under the established frame (the criteria). At this point the argument can be positioned in logical sequence, perhaps grouped together as items, or using the frame as subheadings to assist with structure…

This process is still a little messy, but working with music often is. It is never really linear – as a performer, composer or musicologist, we don’t start at the start and ‘bricklay’ our way to the end. We move back-and-forth, amend and discard thinking, interlace ideas… Moving through an analytical task in the way described above might help the cohesion of the argument and its linkage to the uses and manipulations of music elements and compositional devices that are rich in assisting us answer the question…

I have updated my Musicology Analysis Template in an attempt to ‘get at’ this process – it is better than the previous incarnation, but is still problematic in some aspects (especially representing the interlinkage of music elements). Perhaps you have some strategies to share? I’ll bet they’re ‘messy’ and hard to ‘re-tell’, but isn’t that why working with music is so good!

[i] Music: Senior Syllabus (2013) – Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority

[ii] ibid. p. 2

[iii] ibid. p. 3

[iv] ibid. p. pp. 28-32

Photo credit: http://hcl.harvard.edu/libraries/loebmusic/exhibitions/solti/markings/