Program start date | Application deadline |
2023-09-18 | - |
2023-05-02 | - |
2023-09-26 | 2023-07-17 |
2024-01-16 | - |
Program Overview
Course overview
The Musicology pathway in the MA Music programme qualifies graduates to embark upon their own research. While honing specialist skills, this pathway teaches students bold approaches to music as a practice and an academic discipline.
Contact the department
If you have specific questions about the degree, contact
Dr Berta Joncus
.Program Outline
What you'll study
Each Masters degree is awarded after the accumulation of 180 credits, made up of compulsory and option modules.
Compulsory modules
You take the following compulsory modules:
Module title | Credits |
---|---|
Advanced Music Studies Advanced Music Studies30 creditsThis module offers an overview of the formative debates in musicology over roughly the past three decades. Through a series of thematised readings each week, students will be introduced to a variety of issues that have permeated recent musical discourse, including gender, sexuality, race, canon, technology, performance, analysis and notation. As well as investigating topics in art music, popular music and ethnomusicology, this module will consider other fields that have influenced musicological discourse, such as anthropology, philosophy and sociology. Throughout, students will be invited to debate the ways in which the history of music has been written: how certain music and musical cultures have entered into or been excluded from canons; how recent writing on music has attempted to redress such exclusions; and what the future of musicology might hold. With this in mind, students will be encouraged to write essays that innovatively apply the concepts and issues explored during the module to a topic of their own devising. They will also complete two or three short reviews of a mixture of recent musicological articles and presentations given in the Music Research Series. Students should come away from this module not only with a firm understanding of the field, but also with the methods by which it has been (and is being) researched. |
30 credits |
Sources and Resources in the Digital Age Sources and Resources in the Digital Age30 creditsIn the twenty-first century, scholars and performers of music no longer have to rely on published scores, but can work directly from digitized originals or create their own editions. This module delivers the expertise to do both, and illuminates the processes, both historical and contemporary, through which scores are prepared. Students are trained to work with scholarly resources and all manner of music sources, from manuscripts to digitized autographs to early recordings. Skills are absorbed in lectures and workshops that explore different editorial methods, and the rationales and biases that undergird them. Private tours to London collections, and seminars on cutting-edge editorial projects, complement lectures and workshops. Students learn to command specialist terminology, to assess an edition’s quality, and to use and critique sources of all kinds. |
30 credits |
Option modules
You choose two modules from a selection that currently includes:
Module title | Credits |
---|---|
Analysing Contemporary Music: From Serialism to Spectral Noise Analysing Contemporary Music: From Serialism to Spectral Noise30 creditsContemporary music ain't what it used to be. Though always multifaceted and to some extent mongrel, the musical avant-garde is now more mixed and sprawling than ever before. And yet efforts to grasp these current tendencies within the field, as well as historical contexts, often remain stuck in bubbles of either analytical specificity or generalised postmodern speculation. This module sets out to act as a corrective to both of these tendencies by balancing grounding analytical depth with historical and cultural breadth. Accordingly, lectures apply various analytical methods to a broad range of contemporary music both to unlock the music’s workings and to explore its position as a bridge to culture more generally speaking. The module encourages students to think about the historical development and expansion of contemporary music while using analysis to prise open broader interpretative and theoretical issues. We focus in the first instance on post-tonal musical languages such as serialism, extended tonality and atonality. We then move on to examine proliferating styles from across the contemporary spectrum, including spectral music, sound art, noise, extreme metal, new conceptualism and improvisation. |
30 credits |
Contemporary Ethnomusicology Contemporary Ethnomusicology30 creditsThis explores contemporary approaches in ethnomusicology. The focus is on contemporary theoretical issues in the field, although current concerns will be situated within the history of ethnomusicological discourse. The module will address a range of topics and issues, such as globalisation and diasporas, the “world music” phenomenon, ethics, urban ethnomusicology, cognitive approaches, musical experience and phenomenology, music technology, and issues of gender, sexuality, and ‘race’. During the module, you will gain familiarity with the connections between ethnomusicology and related disciplines such as anthropology, and with debates concerning disciplinary boundaries within music studies.
This module does not require prior knowledge of ethnomusicology.
Coordinator: Dr. Barley Norton |
30 credits |
Contemporary Music: Practices and Discourse Contemporary Music: Practices and Discourse30 creditsThis module traces just a few of the paths, among many that might be identified, tracked and evaluated, through late twentieth- and early twenty first-century musical cultures, focusing on some key repertoires and the debates which surround them. The Modernisms of this period, however much their creators may have insisted on an aesthetic of rejection and beginning again from first principles, have their aesthetic, and even some of their technical, origins in early twentieth-century Modernisms, whether musical or emerging from other art forms and cultural practices. While the Postmodernisms that overlapped with, as well as succeeded, them are frequently associated with the blurring and even breakdown of previously-erected barriers between "High Art" and "Low Art", this module will attempt to assess the significance of such movements and musical phenomena as part of a continuing tradition of "serious", even "classical" musical endeavour: a tradition whose validity and success will receive consideration here. |
30 credits |
Critical Musicology and Popular Music Critical Musicology and Popular Music30 creditsThis module will provide historical context by tracing the way in which popular music has posed problems for and also made a significant contributions to the development of musicology as a discipline. It will introduce students to key debates and issues, conceptual terms and methodological approaches and highlight the various intellectual legacies that feed into the study of popular music (such as the ‘discovery’, valorisation and study of the ‘folk’ and folk song; and the ‘critical theory’ of Adorno and the Frankfurt School seen as a response to commodification, the introduction of recorded sound and anxiety about ‘mass culture’; the cultural politics associated with the ‘counter-culture’ and ‘new social movements’). The module will highlight how the development of scholarly debates about popular music has been informed by interdisciplinary dialogues, an embracement of ‘the popular’ as a political project and the gradual institutionalization of popular music studies within the academy. To take this module you should have: Prerequisite skills: a general awareness of theoretical debates about popular music; a familiarity with various styles of popular music and musicians; an ability to write in a critical and analytical manner. Coordinator: Professor Keith Negus |
30 credits |
Ethnographic Film and Music Research Ethnographic Film and Music Research30 creditsThis examines the uses of ethnographic film/video in music research and enables you to develop the practical, technical and theoretical skills necessary to make your own short ethnographic film on a music topic in a critical and self-reflexive manner. Through a critical reading of key ethnographic films about music, you will address questions of aesthetics, representation and ethics that arise in the process of filmmaking. You will also consider the use of digital media in musical ethnography more generally and assess the methods of analysis afforded by the visual documentation of music practices. In complement with theoretical seminars, practical workshops on the methods of digital video recording and editing will familiarise you with a variety of approaches to ethnographic filmmaking and techniques of sound recording. For this module you will develop skills in filming using video cameras and editing using Final Cut Pro. However, it does not require you to have prior experience of filming and film editing. Convenor: Dr. Barley Norton |
30 credits |
Music Management Music Management30 creditsThe course offers provides a series of case studies addressing entrepreneurial practices and modes of production. You will cover essential topics in music management and music in the creative industries.
You will deal with creative sector issues and case studies within this discipline, taking into account the cross-over with other areas. As well as studying producing companies, this also includes consideration of creative agencies.
Topics covered include: ensemble management; orchestral management; concert programming and curatorial work; education and public outreach; film, TV, music for games; record production and record labels; copyright, PRS, publishing; social media and music; freelance perspectives: marketing and publicity. |
30 credits |
New Directions in Popular Music Research New Directions in Popular Music Research30 creditsThis module provides a critical appraisal of the philosophical, conceptual and methodological limitations of existing approaches to researching popular music, whilst exploring ways of overcoming these and finding new research directions. The module surveys a cross section of studies that have been conducted in different contexts, with varied methodologies informed by contrasting agendas: This includes scholarship focussing separately on industries and production, texts and meaning, reception and consumption and scientific research on music. You think across disciplinary boundaries, informed by an oft-repeated maxim; that innovative and significant research entails the art of asking the right questions. Hence, you ask new questions of old research, and set up new questions for potential future research. The module will complement musicological techniques by drawing from methods deployed across the arts and humanities, business and the sciences when exploring methodological techniques for researching such questions.
|
30 credits |
Performance as Research (Ethnomusicology) Performance as Research (Ethnomusicology)30 creditsThe course develops your knowledge and understanding of musical performance as a research technique, particularly in relation to the music of other cultures. It addresses practical, theoretical and conceptual issues concerning music performance, including the nature of musicality, processes of learning, theories of improvisation, modal theory, and the body in music performance. Theoretical understanding is developed in conjunction with practical, experiential learning. You develop a research-centred performance project by learning to perform from a repertory outside their primary music culture, or by developing expertise in a new area of performance practice. This may include learning to perform a new instrument and/or genre; developing improvisation skills; or the arrangement and performance of pieces from a particular music tradition. You present a short performance that demonstrates your developing skills. |
30 credits |
Popular Music and its Critics Popular Music and its Critics30 creditsThis module explores the development and deployment of critical discourses on popular music, focusing on the ways in which commentators – journalists, academics, bloggers, consumers – have used words to represent sound and to construct systems of meaning and value for the music they have loved and hated. Spanning the 20th-century but focusing on present-day practices, the module will address discourses on jazz, rock, dance and pop in which commentators have attempted to articulate the excitement and anxiety these musics inspired as they came into being. Although much critical work has been done in print, the module will also consider how other media (radio, television, the internet) have shaped their own descriptive and evaluative practices. Students will be encouraged to think about the relationship between critical listening and critical languages; between popular and academic discourses and modes of evaluation; and about the changing place and status of the popular music critic and scholar. To take this module you should be familiar with various styles of popular music, and have the ability to research and write in a critical manner. Knowledge of music theory is neither assumed nor necessary. |
30 credits |
Research through Musical Performance Research through Musical Performance30 creditsThe module combines investigation of theoretical perspectives towards musical performance (as) research with practical exploration through individual projects. It explores the diverse ways in which such practice can be informed by research and (the more challenging question) can constitute research in and of itself. A wide range of repertoires and approaches will be considered, ranging from historical performance practice issues and the challenges presented by contemporary notated scores to creative practice in the most diverse performance contexts, both physical and electronic. A central concern will be the extent to which the processes of performance should be documented, and ways in which technology can be harnessed to aid such documentation. The module will culminate in individually negotiated projects, in which elements of practice will be demonstrably related to the theoretical foundations established during the course. The module will consist of (i) lecture/workshops with specialists across a variety of different fields (some of which may take place outside the regular timetable) and (ii) practical sessions drawing on students’ experience as performers and researchers. Each student will have the opportunity to present their project in progress at one workshop and to discuss both its practical and written elements in a one-to-one tutorial. In addition, students will be encouraged to attend relevant research seminars, including interaction with practice-researchers from other departments in order to broaden their experience of different disciplines and approaches towards practice research. To take this module you should have experience as a performer (not necessarily at Masters level); an ability to write about performance issues in a critical and analytical manner; an ability to carry out independent research. Though the module is not restricted to any specific musical traditions, some knowledge of Western art-music repertoires and notations will be expected. |
30 credits |
Sound Agendas Sound Agendas30 creditsThrough lectures, discussions and tutorials – including reference to core theoretical concepts in sonic art as well as current thinking concerning studio-based composition and artistic practices using sound – the module develops a theoretical framework for practice. Pivotal historical developments in the application of audio technologies in sonic art are presented, placing compositional techniques in their wider context. The issues and genres considered include: theoretical underpinnings of musique concrète, elektronische musik, futurism and fluxus; interactivity and live electronics; silence and noise; post-digital aesthetics; sampling and plunderphonics; utterance and text-sound composition; audiovision; acoustics and architecture; perception and interpretation; acoustic ecology and phonography. The factors that gave rise to these issues and genres and the artistic results are considered. This understanding provides a basis for experiment and critical evaluation through creative work and subsequent theoretical investigation. Convenor: Dr. John Drever |
30 credits |
Philosophies of Music Philosophies of Music30 creditsEveryone has philosophical ideas about music. They tend to come to the fore when we want to dismiss certain works as ‘noise’ (the ‘definition’ problem), or bypass historical context by claiming an interest in ‘the music itself’ (the ‘ontological’ problem), or assert a belief in the profundity of music, or the embodiment of emotions in music, or the parallels between music and language (these are semantic and epistemological problems). They arise too when we defend ourselves by saying that all values are relative (except, apparently, that one, which is supposed to be a universal truth), and that non-western cultures and subcultures have every right to make a claim on the notions of art and the aesthetic. And philosophical issues also lie at the heart of the ethical decisions that arts administrators and politicians have to make about the distribution of funds in a world of scarce resources – should we allow ourselves to weep at Tosca whilst ignoring tragedy in the streets?This module provides a gathering-point for discussion and examination of the many concepts that play a role in the ways in which we define, understand, evaluate and justify music. Its aim is to say things so clearly that we can tell when we are talking nonsense, and it does this by analysing ideas systematically in relation to the writings of important figures in the field (see the bibliography on learn.gold).
To take this module you should have: some knowledge of the traditions of music (whether classical or popular or non-western), a good standard of linguistic literacy, and a willingness to challenge your own ideas as well as those of others.Coordinator: Anthony Pryer |
30 credits |
Dissertation
Module title | Credits |
---|---|
MA Music Dissertation MA Music Dissertation60 creditsThe dissertation acts as focus of the knowledge and skills acquired during the programme, and gives you the opportunity to undertake genuinely original work, employing relevant research methods and building upon the advanced and systematic understandings developed in other elements of the programme. The dissertation can be in the form of a critical discussion of a problem in musicology, analysis, or an appropriate repertoire, or a critical edition of a musical document. Most work on the dissertation will be independent study, supported by frequent and individual consultation with the appointed supervisor throughout the academic year, with particular emphasis on term three. |
60 credits |
Download the
programme specification
. If you would like an earlier version of the programme specification, please contact theQuality Office
.Please note that due to staff research commitments not all of these modules may be available every year.
For 2021-22 and 2020–21, we have made some changes to how the teaching and assessment of certain programmes are delivered. To check what changes affect this programme, please visit the
programme changes page
.How to apply
Apply now
You apply directly to Goldsmiths using our online application system.
Before submitting your application you’ll need to have:
your academic qualifications
email address of your referee
who we can request a reference from, or alternatively a copy of your academic referenceyour educational transcripts
or certificates
personal statement
– this can either be uploaded as a Word Document or PDF, or completed online.Please see our guidance on writing a postgraduate statement
You'll be able to save your progress at any point and return to your application by logging in using your username/email and password.
When to apply
We accept applications from October for students wanting to start the following September.
We encourage you to complete your application as early as possible, even if you haven't finished your current programme of study. It's very common to be offered a place that is conditional on you achieving a particular qualification.
Late applications will only be considered if there are spaces available.
If you're applying for funding, you may be subject to an earlier application deadline.
Selection process
You will normally be required to attend an interview, and you may be asked to submit examples of your written work in advance (such as an essay of at least 1,500 words on a relevant topic).
Find out
more about applying
.How to apply
Apply now
You apply directly to Goldsmiths using our online application system.
Before submitting your application you’ll need to have:
your academic qualifications
email address of your referee
who we can request a reference from, or alternatively a copy of your academic referenceyour educational transcripts
or certificates
personal statement
– this can either be uploaded as a Word Document or PDF, or completed online.Please see our guidance on writing a postgraduate statement
You'll be able to save your progress at any point and return to your application by logging in using your username/email and password.
When to apply
We accept applications from October for students wanting to start the following September.
We encourage you to complete your application as early as possible, even if you haven't finished your current programme of study. It's very common to be offered a place that is conditional on you achieving a particular qualification.
Late applications will only be considered if there are spaces available.
If you're applying for funding, you may be subject to an earlier application deadline.
Selection process
You will normally be required to attend an interview, and you may be asked to submit examples of your written work in advance (such as an essay of at least 1,500 words on a relevant topic).
Find out
more about applying
.