Recorded Music (REMU-UT)

This course will contextualize the holistic core curriculum of the Clive Davis Institute. By linking the Institutes academic disciplines, philosophy and culture to creativity and discovery in practice, a more tangible frame of reference will emerge. The course will offer several colloquium conversations with senior faculty, working artists in music, fine arts, architecture, journalism, fashion, and technology. This exposure will lead students to a better understanding of the relationship between academics and artistic and commercial achievement.

As with Creativity in Context 1 in which the purpose of the course is to contextualize the core curriculum of the The Clive Davis Institute to incoming first year students, this course delves deeper into the exploration of creativity throughout various disciplines and career structures. In opening this course to the NYU community, we will be linking academic disciplines, philosophy, and culture to creativity and discovery in practice. The course will offer seven workshop style lecture/conversations with senior faculty, and working artists or professionals who have traveled an varied journey throughout their careers. This exposure to, and opportunity for a deeper conversation, will lead students to better understand the relationship between academic study & self-development, artistic & commercial achievement, as well as coupling art and industry with politics and current events.

This colloquium series offers enrolled students an in-depth study of living stories of inspiration, integration and intuition within their craft. Each week, students meet and hear from some of the biggest artists, executives, entrepreneurs of today as they take a peek behind the metaphorical “curtain” and delve deeper into those life stories and creative journeys. The idea is for students, many of whom are aspiring creative entrepreneurs, to hear directly from, and ask questions directly to, those special guests, in moderated conversation—and to think more deeply about their craft by way of readings and discussion. We will explore how our guests discovered their talent, their grit and their potential and get the scoop on milestone moments that shaped their career and life.

A part of our summer high school residency program, this comprehensive production course will cover the various steps and techniques involved in producing a record. Students will gain a practical understanding of the key tools required to transform an idea into a tangible recording. Students will explore the world of sequencing, synthesis, microphones, recording, mixing, and mastering. In doing so, students will be given a complete palette of tools and skills empowering them to produce and record professional sounding music.

A part of our summer high school residency program, this course provides a broad overview of the music industry’s structure, main business segments and the underlying forces driving current developments and the opportunities that these changes usher in. Topics include: day-to-day business activities, major revenue streams, key roles (including members of an artist’s team-manager, agent, etc.) responsibilities, deals, and current economic and technological developments. Focus is given to different salaried and freelance music industry career fields and pathways and the competencies, skills training and experiences needed to break in and realize long term professional success. By the end, you will have a greater understanding of how the music industry works and the roles you see yourself playing in it now and in the future.

As a companion course to both REMU-UT 0500 Fundamentals of Music Production and REMU-UT 0501 Foundations of Music Business in Recorded Music’s Summer High School Program, this course is designed to introduce students to various topics and issues that define the art and culture of the music industry today. By engaging in hands-on activities, field trips around New York City, workshops, seminars, and first-hand conversations with leading industry professionals, students will enrich their understanding and perspectives about the music industry, and how it propels New York City’s cultural life. 

This course provides students with the creative skills and theoretical information to work successfully with artists in the recording studio toward the conceptualization and completion of a short EP or full-length LP. By the end of the course, students have the necessary skills to communicate with and produce excellence from musical performers in the recording studio. To that end, this course instructs students in the selection of appropriate musical material, arrangement of the material, the construction of the sound in the studio, and the artistic ensemble of the recorded sound on the completed album. Working first in small groups and then individually, students gain practical experience by recording and mixing sound with professional artists in the studio, under careful supervision. In preparation for the third year, students are asked to consider possible distribution modes for the final product and a range of identifiable publics. This class also arms students with a working knowledge of the recording techniques of specific genres of popular music. We analyze the recorded repertoire of a diverse range of genres?such as rock, pop, R & B, hip-hop, jazz, blues, country, and electronica?as time permits and according to student needs. Students are asked to purchase a number of ?classic? albums in the genre in which they intend to pursue their work, and they deconstruct those albums for aural clues to imagine how they might have been put together in the studio. As time permits, we also visit creative producers in the recording studio to monitor how they work with artists and develop recorded material. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

The purpose of Producing The Record: Side B is to teach technical proficiency, business self-sufficiency, and creative methodology, in the area of studio music production - better stated as realization. Students are exposed to a variety of complimentary realization methodologies through case studies, traditional lectures, and hands-on exercises. The curricular approach is holistic; with lessons presenting pure music, technical and engineering skills, project management, and historical reference in equal parts. The course is complimented by +/- 40 hours of independent studio time for students (in pairs) to develop their skills as engineers, producers, and discoverers & developers of talent.

This course offers students the opportunity to face the challenges of recording an ensemble in a realistic professional recording studio setting. The class will execute a series of recording and mixing sessions. Each student will be given the opportunity to produce, co-produce, engineer and assistant engineer in the recording of a live ensemble. Students will be responsible for coordinating logistical and creative issues associated with each recording. The importance of pre-production, social skills, and teamwork will be greatly stressed, as there will be a set recording time limit for each ensemble. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

Storytelling and the gift of listening are critical skills that can be developed and a podcast can be more than a monologue or an interview. A podcast can be a rich environment for using sound to tell a story. Sound can be used in many ways, whether it is used to set the scene, illustrate a concept, or enliven a journalistic situation. The course will introduce students to the power of sound to illustrate and enrich a podcast, through listening and production. Weekly listening and assignments will be presented and discussed in class to encourage and inspire.

This course will develop a working knowledge of the sampling, sequencing, editing, recording and mixing tools used by music producers to create the individual voices and sonic identities within contemporary music production. In particular, we will be looking at Digidesign?s Pro Tools, Propellerhead's Reason, Akai's MPC 4000 and SSL?s K9000 automated mixing console. Over the course of the semester, students will learn how to assemble original compositions using these technologies and apply them through various popular music styles. Students are encouraged to bring in source and reference material. The course culminates in a final project that features the student?s original composition. Note: There is a lab fee for this class. Familiarity with Pro Tools is preferred, but knowledge of Logic or Digital Performer is also acceptable.

This course provides artistic and technical guidance to students pursuing production based capstone projects and will assist students in creating a cohesive and comprehensive recording and production plan. It is through this course that production capstone seniors receive their studio allotment. Production mentors will advise and monitor your progress, and keep you focused on the task at hand: successful realization of your capstone studio production component.

The pillars of this advanced production workshop are experimentation and conceptual production for recording. This deeper analysis of our work will transfer to a more engaged stage application that we will discover through investigative practice. Using technology that meets each students’ requirements, the student will create a language and story for their compositions that will develop throughout the semester and eventually follow from the studio to the stage (and vice versa). This is a class where the student will become comfortable with their work, from a variety of angles and magnifications, so that they have more clarity of their capacity as artists, songwriters, and producers. Not only have the lines blurred for producers, but between the role of the artist, songwriter and musician alike. We are in an era where we have the opportunity to become self-sufficient in our practice, and take charge of our sound from a deeper perspective. The relationship we have to the production, as well as the technical and aesthetic control of that production, will help us to maintain a better communication with our practice.

Defining record production requires both broad definitions of the art itself as well as specific identification and analysis of the component parts. Although the defining attributes of production can be vague in nature, production personnel customarily have mastered one or many (or none!?!?!) of the components; these components include knowledge and expertise in (not in order of importance); instrumental and theoretical musicianship, musical arranging, recording engineering, midi and DAW programming, mixing, listening (musically and interpersonally), the record business, record label record/radio promotion, artist management, less-than-formal cultural studies, personal and group psychology, megalomaniacal drive and powers of persuasion, budgetary management, personal wealth….and the list goes on. While the description above might indicate that mastery of any one of these skills is sufficient to produce records, our goal is to realize a reasonable degree of proficiency in all of them. In music production, as in life, the more one knows about more things, the better-equipped one is to navigate successfully. As this is an advanced course, the objective is a fluid, professional-level working knowledge and ability to utilize the myriad technical, musical, business management, and psychological facets of music production in the rapidly changing landscape of both technology and the mainstream record label operational paradigm. All that said - the great wonder of record making is that the fundamental value at its core remains the same as it has been since the beginning of popular recording – a compelling performance of a great song. Note: There is a lab fee for this course

This class builds upon the techniques of the recording studio and the techniques of producing recorded music begun in Engineering the Record I, IIand Producing the Record Side A and B and will explore advanced techniques used in surround and immersive sound recording and mixing. Today, surround and immersive audio can be found in all areas of popular entertainment: music, film, television, streaming, games, etc. By using the multichannel studio facilities of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, students will further learn to record and mix in surround and immersive audio formats. Assigned work will take place in Studio 1 and Studio 4.

This course will enable students to create music soundtracks and sound design for short formats like television, radio, and web commercials, animated movies and podcast projects in the length of up to 30 seconds. Course participants will have access to the department?s most advanced library of sounds and samples. Students are encouraged to bring in source video material when scoring to picture. At the end of the course, the clas will produce a DVD and/or CD with final works. Guest composers will address different aspects of film scoring techniques and compositional styles. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

This course will give students a framework to practice and create music that has come to be known as electronica. An expansive, constantly morphing genre, electronica now includes styles as diverse as: house, trance, techno, glitch, freestyle, breakbeat, jungle, dub, grime, industrial, drum 'n bass, chillout, new age, experimental hip hop, hardcore, broken beat, downtempo and ambient. This course will investigate some of the defining musical systems, sounds, figures and concepts in electronica, culling examples from the beginnings of recorded sound to the present. Through weekly recorded assignments, text, listening and viewing assignments, students will consider some of the most intriguing figures/styles in electronic music as signposts for their own work. A 7-week production-based companion course to the Topics in Recorded Music: Electronica course. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

This course will cover various professional Music Production Techniques & Strategies such as: Sampling (& Sample Chopping), Drum Programming / Drum Design, Synthesis & Sound Design, Music Theory (in the context of Music Production), MIDI Editing, as well as numerous Mixing Techniques. Over the course of the class, through the utilization and knowledge of these various skills, students will learn how to create Original Music Compositions & Productions. The primary DAW platform for the course is Ableton. While a Beatmaker / Composer / Producer must be well versed in the application of various software and hardware tools, as well as the many Production skills & techniques, they must also have artistic vision and creative efficacy. So while the course is about Music / Beat Construction and the tools involved, there will also be a strong emphasis on innovative envision, inventive mobility, and how to think / strategize like a Music Producer.

We are currently in the midst of a generational shift in the fundamental instrumentation of the live performance of many styles of music. As in the 1950’s when live groups shifted from woodwind and brass lead instruments to the electric guitar, today live groups are increasingly moving away from electric guitars and other traditional rock/pop instruments toward digital instruments. Today’s performer in many styles of music will often find themselves either performing with or alongside a laptop/computer, usually running Ableton Live. The “laptop” person in a band has become an integral part of live groups and having the skills to fill this increasingly important role will make our graduates more in demand in live performance roles, particularly if they are also accomplished instrumentalists and/or vocalists. People who know and understand techniques for synching computers with live performers and visuals are also in demand as designers and engineers for large scale concert tours and spectacles like Cirque du Soleil. Having visited the set of Broadway musicals, it is clear that programming and running laptops to coordinate music, visuals and lights is becoming integral to musical theater performances as well. This course will teach some of the techniques required to utilize laptops in live performance, integrate the technology into bands with live instruments and vocalists, as well as multi media applications (i.e sync to visuals, lighting, etc.). It will focus on using the Ableton Live software which has become the industry standard for live performance tasks. This course will culminate in a live performance at the end of the semester in which students will be required to do a performance incorporating live instruments and vocalists, laptops, MIDI controllers and visuals.

During this course, students will acquire an in-depth, theoretical and practical knowledge of Digital Audio Workstations using the industry standard Pro Tools software through a weekly, lab-based workshop. Each class will be a combination of lecture and immediate application. An emphasis will be placed on getting to know Pro Tools, getting inside Pro Tools, creating sessions, working with media in sessions, audio recording, audio editing, file management techniques, MIDI recording, editing techniques, mixing techniques, backups and stereo mix-down.

During this course, students will acquire an in-depth, theoretical and practical knowledge of Digital Audio Workstations using the industry standard Logic Pro software through a weekly, lab-based workshop. Each class will be a combination of lecture and immediate application. An emphasis will be placed on getting to know Logic Pro, getting inside Logic Pro, creating sessions, working with media in sessions, audio recording, audio editing, file management techniques, MIDI recording, editing techniques, mixing techniques, backups and stereo mix-down.

We live in an age of digital production where so much of today's music is produced with comparatively few tools, and at the heart of the modern production set up, whether in the bedroom of the studio, is software that uses MIDI. One of the most versatile of today’s platforms which can be used in production, live performance, and even as a visual tool is Ableton Live. Ableton is unique amongst the contemporary software programs making music in that it is the only one that was created by working musicians who were looking for a tool that allowed for both the seamless creation of ideas and could also serve as a performance instrument. In the past 15 years, Ableton has played an important role in creating countless tracks and records in numerous genres and the go-to software for live performance, whether for vocalists and bands or for massive spectacles like Cirque du Soleil. In this course, we will cover Ableton's unique abilities to manipulate audio which make it the preferred platform for remixing and mash-ups. We will cover the fundamentals of the software, explore techniques to program beats, chordal and melodic ideas, as well as cover creative workflow - how to use Ableton to quickly generate ideas for producers and songwriters. Finally, we will discuss its use as a live performance tool for use with live instrumentalists and vocalists, as a DJ tool and even as a VJing tool. 

This course starts up where the first semester left off, with hardware sequencers followed by extensive training on major software sequencers with the intention of discovering the advantages and disadvantages of each. The final project will consist of programming sound alike productions of famous songs. The students will have to exhibit their newly acquired programming and sequencing skills to get as close as possible to the original recording.

All Recorded Music majors are required to complete at least one internship for a minimum of 2 credits in order to graduate. Please review the Recorded Music Internship website for registration information.

All Recorded Music majors are required to complete at least one internship in order to graduate. Recorded Music majors are required to complete 2 points as part of their Business Area requirements. Please see the ReMu Internship Site for registration information. This course is only for ReMu majors with more than one internship this semester.

In recent years, access to affordable audio recording equipment and software has given rise to a new breed of recording engineer and producer. Intuitive software design, plus short-cut “how to” videos and websites can make for rewarding early experiences for the DIY engineer, but those resources may only tell part of the story. A producer or engineer’s versatility and efficiency are often limited without a deeper understanding of the processes. This course aims to help students understand fundamental principles that form the basis of tried and true recording techniques, allowing them to make informed decisions in each stage of the recording process and, ultimately, make better recordings. Through a series of discussions, hands-on exercises, recording sessions, and projects, students will learn about the propagation of sound, microphone design and implementation, signal flow, basic signal processing, and fundamental recording and mixing techniques. Emphasis is placed on critical listening, preparation, class participation, professionalism, and teamwork.

Engineering The Record II builds upon the fundamentals of sound recording established in ETR I. Through a series of discussions, hands-on exercises, and recording sessions, students will refine their skills in the recording studio from the organizational, technical, and creative/artistic points of view. Integrating skills from Critical Listening for The Recording Studio and Writing the Hit Song, student teams will reverse-engineer a well-known recording and reproduce it as a “sound-alike.” Emphasis will be placed on critical listening, preparation, class participation, and teamwork.

The objective of the workshop is to demonstrate advanced mixing techniques that can be applied both on a large format console and in a digital audio workstation (ProTools). We will discuss proper procedures for setting up your project mixes in the studio and in ProTools, as well as the procedures for working with tracks from outside projects that you did not record. The proper procedure for documentation and studio etiquette in the mixing session will be stressed. Mixing the low-end energy for different genres of music (hip hop, pop, rock, jazz, etc.) and how they will differ in size and proportion. We will discuss the conceptual positioning of the vocals in these genres of contemporary music. We will also explore the techniques of using delays for creating space and depth, spreading out mono vocals, and mono track to pseudo stereo imaging. The proper use of signal routing, equalization and dynamics will be stressed. Finally, we will investigate the technique of mix buss compression for the enhancement of the Stereo Mix and the outputting of mixes for mastering (creating the premaster) in a mastering studio environment. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

As with literally every facet of music production, mixing audio had been hugely impacted by the paradigm shift created by digital technologies. That said, the architecture and function of virtually all digital software and hardware is based on the models developed through analog hardware and processing. The objective of this seven-week intensive course is - using the best and most appropriate of both the digital and analog tools - to refine our mixing skills and expand our repertory of techniques. This will include both digital in-the-box processing and analog processing ? console (via SSL and API) and outboard equipment, and combinations of the two.

Mastering is the last creative step of production and the first technical step of manufacturing, broadcast, or distribution. Record labels demand proper mastering to insure that their product holds its own in the marketplace. Producers and artists insist that none but the most qualified ears master their music. Now, with the rise of music downloads, Internet radio, high-resolution discs, and many other forms of distribution, a solid understanding of mastering techniques and new media is vital to the music professional. The course will endeavor to illustrate the powers of mastering as well as its limitations. A wide range of processing techniques and advanced editing methods will be demonstrated and compared. Tools of the trade will be surveyed with emphasis on what distinguishes gear as truly "mastering grade." Critical listening and the psychoacoustics of decision-making will be explored. Students will do their own mastering on material supplied by the instructor, as well for each other's music, for critiques and comparisons. Attention will also be given to how to prepare for a professional mastering session and how to interact with the mastering engineer. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

Mastering is the last creative step of production and the first technical step of manufacturing, broadcast, or distribution. Artists, producers, and record labels demand proper mastering to insure that their product holds its own in the marketplace and insist that none but the most qualified ears master their music. Now, with the rise of music downloads, Internet radio, high-resolution discs, streaming and many other forms of distribution, a solid understanding of mastering techniques and new media is vital to the music professional. The course provides an in-depth exploration of the tools and techniques involved in professional mastering. The course will endeavor to illustrate the powers of mastering as well as its limitations. A wide range of processing techniques and advanced editing methods will be demonstrated and compared. Tools of the trade will be surveyed with emphasis on what distinguishes hardware and software as truly "mastering grade." Critical listening and the psychoacoustics of decision-making will be explored. Students are taught how to better master their own productions, as well as to recognize when to turn to a mastering professional. Emphasis will be on listening and objective comparison in guiding the mastering approach and in judging its success. Ample real-world case studies will be used to demonstrate approaches and results. Students will do their own mastering on material supplied by the instructor, as well as on each other's music, for critiques and comparisons. Attention will be given to how to prepare for a professional mastering session and how to interact with the mastering engineer. Assignments are drawn from the instructor’s day-to-day work as a mastering engineer. For the final assignment, students will be grouped into two-person teams. Team members will trade positions as “client” and “mastering engineer,” each mastering the other’s production. Students will visit the instructor’s commercial mastering studio to hear their work and to observe the instructor’s approach to some of their productions.

Drum sounds have the potential to exhibit as much personality on a recording as a vocalist or soloist but we seem to have lost the 'art' part of realizing great drum sounds. Drum sounds can be difficult to obtain if the engineer has not done some 'great master' engineer archaeology. Through this course with Drummer/Producer Rich Pagano, the creative student will learn the techniques necessary to expand their acoustic drum-sound "library." This hands-on studio course covers techniques of drum and head selection, micing, tuning, 'room' sound beauty and phase while recording and recreating the "classic" drum sounds typified by Led Zeppelin, Abbey Road, Motown, Blue Note Jazz, punchy '70s and more. In the end, we will apply it all to a 'modern' drum sound realm.The workshop will be complemented with extensive historical documentation culled from personal interviews with engineering legends, session set-up sheets and studio photos.

As recording budgets shrink, so to has the size and grandeur of the traditional recording studio.  Even with this decrease, digital audio has enabled us to improve creative functionality with a much smaller real estate footprint and upfront investment.  This course will introduce students to the concepts, gear, and techniques necessary to facilitate a pragmatic and economical hybrid integration of analog processing and "in-the-box" DAW-based recording technology.  Students will develop a personal approach to building and customizing their own affordable and scalable project studios that meet their sonic and aesthetic needs.  Topics will include analog summing mixers, A/D and D/A conversion, customizing signal flow and signal processing, and MIDI and DAW controllers.  Hector Castillo has been working int he NYC music science as a producer, mixer and engineer for more than ten years.  He has worked with artists such as Björk, Lou Reed, Rufus Wainwright and Philip Glass.  He is a winner of four Latin Grammy awards.

Integrating aspects of music appreciation and rhythmic training, this class will explore the broad stylistic diversity of Latin American music today by tracing the roots of some of its most impactful styles and connecting them with its newest manifestations. New Perspectives in Latin Music: The North will focus on the Caribbean and the US. The instructor will provide an overview of rhythms, vocal characteristics and musical forms of genres such as Cuban son, merengue, salsa, timba and reggaetón analyzing the new trends and crossovers that this music is experiencing now. The course will also discuss the fluid exchange between these new movements, American popular music and the global scene. All class meetings will incorporate critical listening sessions combined with rhythmic training that will include body percussion, circle singing and improvisation. All new skills and elements will be directly applied in performance, composition and production assignments, including exercises on vocal phrasing and freestyling, beat making and songwriting. The instructor will provide a library of original samples to draw from. Throughout the semester, the students will have a chance to interact directly with internationally renowned percussionists, producers, vocalists and songwriters who will provide their own original approach through guest lectures on selected topics. Basic DAW skills required.

Integrating aspects of music appreciation and rhythmic training, this class will explore the broad stylistic diversity of Latin American music today by tracing the roots of some of its most impactful styles and connecting them with its newest manifestations. New Perspectives in Latin Music: The South will focus on South America. The instructor will provide an overview of rhythms, vocal characteristics and musical forms of genres such as cumbia, Brazilian samba, Afro-Peruvian festejo, and Uruguayan candombe analyzing the new trends and crossovers that this music is experiencing now. The course will also discuss the fluid exchange between these new movements, American popular music and the global scene. All class meetings will incorporate critical listening sessions combined with rhythmic training that will include body percussion, circle singing and improvisation. All new skills and elements will be directly applied in performance, composition and production assignments, including exercises on vocal phrasing and freestyling, beat making and songwriting. The instructor will provide a library of original samples to draw from. Throughout the semester, the students will have a chance to interact directly with internationally renowned percussionists, producers, vocalists and songwriters who will provide their own original approach through guest lectures on selected topics. Basic DAW skills required.

This course provides an intensive workshop setting where students create music soundtracks for their films, working closely with composers and/or music from a library. Each student has access to state-of-the-art systems, such as ProTools, Reason, GarageBand, Logic Audio, and Cue: The Film Music System. All students have access to the Information Technology Services (ITS) Arts Technology Studio, which is equipped with the latest technology in sound and music production, including digital sound and video editing capabilities. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

This course is the “hands on” continuation of REMU-UT 1106 Musicianship: Music Theory & Construction. It is designed to guide students through the process of applying all of the concepts taught in the classroom to their particular instrument. Students will work with the instructor to design a personal program that will focus on one or more of the following 6 areas of study: performance guitar lessons, advanced guitar lessons, piano lessons, theory application (performance focus), theory application (songwriting and composition focus), theory application (production focus).

This course is the “hands on” continuation of REMU-UT 1106 Musicianship: Music Theory & Construction. It is designed to guide students through a sonic exploration of all of the concepts taught in the Musicianship: Theory and Construction classroom. Students will work in a small group setting exploring the following 2 areas of study: theory application (songwriting) and theory application (digital production).

The 1930’s and 1940’s are widely considered to be the seminal era of popular music. The harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic architecture along with the lyric writing of Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn, the Gershwin brothers, Victor Young, Rodgers and Hart as well as Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein have become the foundational language upon which all popular music is built. Additional areas of focus include the post Depression era folk music of the time period as archived by music historian Alan Lomax, and the growing influence of Latin rhythm, harmonic cadences, and song structures. This course addresses both the scholarship of this musical era and the music itself. The music portion of the class has students transcribing, dissecting and analyzing songs from the most influential writers, musical protagonists, and arrangers, of the time. It will explore the differences and similarities of compositional approach as well as the cultural relevance of each. Students will gain valuable in-depth insight into how the music was crafted as well as how each style, composer, and movement influenced most of, if not all of the sounds we hear today. Focus will be on analysis and performance of over 100 songs from the 1930’s and 1940’s culminating in a period specific “Speakeasy-style” live performance in collaboration with The Clive Davis Institute’s Stage Presence and the Art of Performance class, taught and directed by Nora York. This performance will explore depression era style protest songs as well as uptown “Cotton Club” style Night Club repertoire. Classes will alternate between two specific formats: “Discussion + Lecture” one week followed by “Analysis + Performance” the next. Discussion + Lecture sessions will focus on the cultural importance of the artists, composers and arrangers being examined. Each lecture section will begin with a discussion of the previous week’s assigned reading/listening/viewing material. Specific pieces of music will be assigned during these sessions to be learned and analyzed for the following week’s “Analysis + Performance” sessions.

Having covered the major song forms and experimented in different styles of writing in the ReMu core class Writing the Hit Song, Advanced Songwriting Workshop provides students with a platform to write, co-write, and exchange constructive feedback on songs that establish and engage their own songwriting voice.

Music sits at the forefront of creative and cultural revolutions, and songwriting remains the fundamental form of its expression. In this course, students will focus on the creative process of songwriting, and will contextualize the art form within a fundamentally shifting industry. Students will write, co-write, and analyze songs in order to establish and engage their own unique songwriting voice.

This course is a cultural anthropological study, as well as a hands-on melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic analysis of major world artists and their concepts. From Africa and its artists to the Middle East and the rhythmic diaspora that has influenced, if not created, the music?s of the Americas, the Caribbean, and every island in between. Focus will be on the arranging, writing for, and analysis of the music, as well as exploring the recording process.

The 1960’s and 1970’s are widely considered to be one of the most formative eras of innovative popular music. The harmonic, rhythmic and melodic architecture of Phil spector, The Beatles, Tamla / Motown records and Satellite / Stax records (commonly referred to as "The Big Four”) has become the common language of present day pop music. This course will focus on transcribing, analyzing, and performing charted songs from each of the The Big Four as well as other major contributors of the time. Presentation will be in chronological order. It will also explore the origins of the many different splinter movements of the late 70’s from New Wave and Punk to Disco and Hip-Hop, dissecting the craft of each movement’s pioneers. Students will gain valuable, in-depth insight into how the music was conceived and created. Additionally, we will discuss how each artist and style influenced many of the sounds we hear today. The course will collaborate with REMU-UT 1310 Stage Presence & The Art of Performance for an end of semester performance. For this performance students will be expected to create an authentic sonic landscape based on the concepts and styles that fueled this important time of immense cultural and artistic growth.

Immersive Sound is one of the most significant developments in years, rivaling previous developments in visual and aural formats. From monaural sound to stereophonic sound, analogue to digital audio, or NTSC and high definition television to virtual reality, the audience is now provided with a natural, life-like three-dimensional aural experience. Unlike anything heard before, immersive audio creates the sensation of height all around the listener, transporting them into a more thrilling and deeper audio experience. Surround sound works because of the four ways humans perceive sound: audible, binaural, spatial, and cognitive. A surround sound mix often allows for more intimate, quieter overall sound as there are more point sources to deliver unique sounds for the ear to perceive. Compared with two-speaker, conventional stereo, surround sound offers better perception of object and sound location. Listeners more readily identify the general direction from which sounds are initiated with more accurate perception of tone due to the additional placement options of sound sources. There is also a significantly greater perception of ambience, since the listener can be more immersed in the listening field. But, what does all of this mean? Only by listening with a tuned and critical ear can one make critical evaluations.

A survey of songwriting techniques and approaches as demonstrated in the works of Lennon & McCartney, Paul Simon, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell and others. Song form, harmonic and melodic progression and transformation will be examined, along with lyric writing techniques. Students will participate via their own songwriting or by a detailed examination of their favorite songs.

Building on the concepts and techniques introduced in Writing the Hit Song, students in this class will fine-tune their skills in song and lyric writing through creative experimentation, individually designed assignments, analytic discussions, and intensive workshopping in a supportive critical environment. Through group meetings and one-on-one consultations, this course will impel students both to find and hone their own voices as songwriters and to move well beyond their familiar topical and stylistic approaches. Students in this class will also have opportunities to collaborate with members of the musicianship workshop and advanced engineering classes to produce fully realized recordings.

In order for the budding producer to realize their potential in the studio, the ability to describe what is being heard and the skill to articulate possible audio issues is a necessity. Critical listening skills take years to develop and this course is designed to speed up the process of creating ?Golden Ears? and give the student a head start. Through listening exercises, students will develop critical listening skills. Using pink noise, students will learn to identify frequency ranges, boosts and cuts in the theoretical as well as in the practical using music. Weekly drill sets will include: A/B Drills, comparing original recordings with altered versions, identification of time delay, and the onset of reverberation. The course will use the David Moulton?s Golden Ears CD?s and The Producer as Composer ? Shaping the Sounds of Popular Music by Virgil Moorefield as texts. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

This course is an independently funded incubator where enrolled students will serve as the support structure for selected Clive Davis Institute artist projects. By augmenting or acting as the selected artist’s team, students work closely with the instructor, the artist and invited music industry collaborators to provide real time support which may include management, label services, marketing and promotion, publicity, A&R, creative direction, branding and vision, social media, business planning, content creation and day-to-day logistics. Students will be given a budget to coordinate and execute agreed and defined strategies and plans created in conjunction with the artist, with the goal of furthering the artist's career development.

This course introduces students to the art of crafting hit songs. We study the ?great? writers of popular music, from Irving Berlin to Babyface, and we make practical applications of that knowledge as we craft songs both collaboratively and individually. Students gain a rudimentary knowledge of musicianship, as well as an overview of the pragmatic aspects of commercial songwriting, including copyrighting and publishing. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

This course emphasizes a no-nonsense and demystifying presentation of the three elements of music — rhythm, melody, and harmony. You will review and analyze a variety of musical examples — written and recorded — to demonstrate these concepts with a focus on contemporary western music (everything from the Beatles and Stevie Wonder to Wilco, Radiohead, and Katy Perry). The second half of the course is a practical application of the tools. You will learn how to transcribe rhythms, hear chord progressions, and arrange and compose at a basic level. The goal of the course is to enable you to break down a song competently and have a fuller appreciation of what producers/arrangers/composers/songwriters do — skills you will undoubtedly need for a career in the music industry.

In this course we'll look at how punk exploded in both London and New York in the 1970s, and how the two scenes, though widely divergent in ideals and sound, nonetheless helped shape one another. Discover the tactics that shook up a complacent music industry, overthrowing 1960s rock gods with the raucous, amphetamine punk revolution that still resonates in the sound and style of bands today. The proliferation of independent labels, spearheaded by Rough Trade, became a DIY (do it yourself) model that would be followed round the world and is particularly relevant today as musicians increasingly turn to the Internet as the most immediately effective outlet. Music we'll listen to may include The Sex Pistols, the Clash, and the Slits; film screenings may include The Great Rock 'n Roll Swindle and Rude Boy; and readings may be culled from books by Steve Blush and others.

This course investigates the Latino/a presence in New York City through a history of its music. We move chronologically through the genres of Cubop, Mambo, Boogaloo, Salsa, Bachata, Merengue, Latin Freestyle, Hip hop, and Reggaeton to think about the performances of these musical styles as forms of documentation. Through engaged and attentive listening to recorded examples, we will begin to develop an ear for nuance. This careful register will enable us to actually hear the particular immigration histories, processes of racial formation in the U.S., shifting conceptions of gender and sexuality, the dynamics of the recording industry, inter-generational conversations and bilingual play, which are articulated in the music itself. We will complement this musical writing of (and on) the city with outside texts including fiction, scholarly articles, class lectures, and field trips.

How much do technologies of listening and playback affect our experience? From the first mechanical devices for the inscription and playback of sound waves to the phonograph, to tape machines and 8 tracks, to CD players and iPods, the record player has radically changed music and popular culture, influened social and political movements, and altered the nature of memory and auditory consciousness. In this seminar, we will trace the history and impact of recording machines on popular music, the psychology of hearing, and intercultural relations. Each class will focus on an era, moving chronologically from the earliest dreams of preserving voices as re-sounding objects to the current ubiquity of internal and external soundtracks. Our approach will combine a variety of different perspectives-including theoretical, musicological, technological, and historical-to produce a concise picture of the production and reception of records and record players through the years.

Starting with the elemental language of the Cuban son, the task of this seminar will be to analyze key moments in contemporary Cuban music from the 1930's to the present (both on the island and off), while necessarily gesturing towards the forces that worked to shape it. We will study the recordings of musicians and groups such as Maria Teresa Vera, Antonio Machin, Chano Pozo, Cuarteto d'Aida, Graciela Perez, La Lupe, Beny More, Willy Chirino, Los Van Van, Irakere, and Bamboleo. The class will use these recordings as a lens to read Cuban historical texts, musicological writings, oral histories, journalistic articles, poetry and novels.

Miles Davis—legendary trumpeter and bandleader, pioneer of multiple musical pathways, and enduring icon of all that is hip—stands as one of the most influential and revered musicians of the 20th Century. His career figures as an historical roadmap of modern improvised music: with an unerring ear, he drew freely from jazz, classical, R&B, rock, funk, hip hop, electronic and other sources, creating singular sonic fusions, effectively changing the course of an entire musical community seven times. Every aspiring performer, producer, songwriter, composer and creative entrepreneur searching for success in today’s popular music industry can learn from the genius of Miles. Some of the greatest pop musicians of the last 50 years, from Joni Mitchell to Fela Kuti to D’Angelo, have enriched their music by engaging with the profound musical innovations that Miles helped bring to the fore. Offered to students in what would have been Miles’s 90th year, each class in this ambitious seven-class course is divided into two components: the first half of each session focuses on historical-critical studies. While completing focused readings, and undertaking listening and viewing assignments, students investigate the social, cultural, musical and business aspects of Miles’s monumental accomplishments. The second half focuses on musicianship, performance, composition and production. Listening closely to Davis’ music and completing in-class and out-of-class assignments under careful mentorship, students deconstruct Miles’s compositional and studio choices, and work collaboratively to create, refine and produce their own original musical works.

This course provides an overview of the history and cultural importance of the rock musical on Broadway over the last four decades, beginning with the landmark 1968 production of Hair rock, to show how forms of pop music have come to dominate musical theater. We'll examine the history and impact of the rock musical by listening to original cast albums, watching videos of performances (and film versions) and reading critical commentary on rock musicals presented on and off Broadway (perhaps Rent and Movin' Out, depending on what class members may have seen). Seminar guests, including cast album producers and others, will join the class at sessions to be determined.

No other island has had as great an impact on contemporary music as Jamaica. This seven week course will introduce the class to the spectrum of Jamaican music, from its origins in Africa, New Orleans and New York, to its intertwined relationship with American hiphop. Students can expect to learn about subjects including: Rasta, Ethiopia and the role of H.I.M. Haile Selassie in the 1930s and beyond; mento, the salacious, swinging folk that predated ska; how and why ska evolved into rock steady in the 1960s; the function of jazz within reggae; the pivotal figure of Robert Nesta Marley, O.M and the Wailers band; the role of producers like Lee ?Scratch? Perry and Clement ?Coxsone? Dodd; dub and Jamaica?s invention of using the recording studio as an instrument; the joys of the myriad Jamaican harmony trios, and their significance in the 1970s; aspects of Jamaica?s two party political system and their impact on the music; sound systems and their role in the Jamaican diaspora; and how dancehall crossed the bridge between Jamaica and black America that Bob Marley had dreamed of building.

Enhanced by multiple samplings by hip-hop artists, a successful international musical and an upcoming Hollywood feature film, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti's popularity has exploded since his passing in 1997. Now Fela's fame and authority has ascended to its rightful place in the pantheon of inspirational activist artists like Bob Marley and John Lennon; the first and - so far - only artist from Africa to attain that level of recognition. In this course we examine a number of topics related to Fela and his music and politics: the history of colonial and post-colonial Nigeria; Nigerian traditional and indigenous popular music and their relationship to global pop; Yoruba arts, culture and spiritual beliefs; the intertwining connections between African and African-American music that underpin Fela's sound, Afrobeat; Fela's family history; his unique trajectory as an activist artist who evolved his own sound, Afrobeat; the formative phases of his musical and political development in Nigeria, London and Los Angeles; his role as bandleader and the opening of his club, the Shrine and his state-within--a-state, the Kalakuta Republic; the truth behind the sensational aspects of his lifestyle; Fela's provocative defiance of a series of military dictatorships and frequent incarcerations; Fela's music and lyrics and their co-relation to his times; his relationship to the African and global music business; Fela's relationship with women. Afrobeat Aesthetics; Fela's visual representation of his message; his and the Queens' fashion and dance style.

In name alone, Led Zeppelin carries mountains of meaning: the most successful and arguably the most influential rock band of all time. The creators of a mythic, mystical, guitar-based style that gave birth to the sounds and iconography of heavy metal. Song-crafters whose studio mastery, utilizing recording technology of the day, generated some of the most enduring rock recordings of their era, establishing standards that still define a stylistic and emotional extreme of popular music. The four British musicians who came out of the electric blues scene of the late ‘60s, recording and touring as a unit for a mere twelve years, together achieved a legendary stature that requires much study to fully appreciate more than thirty years after their demise. This course will consider the history of Led Zeppelin from a variety of perspectives: social and stylistic context; the nuts and bolts of their music—live and in the studio; the hows and whys of the band as a business. Using books, articles, videos, and a generous sampling of music, the course will follow their arrival in the final, psychedelic heyday of swingin’ London of the ‘60s; through their roots in folk and acoustic blues and later experimentations with Indian and North African music, and their rise in an era that was hungry for a heavier, more bombastic sound. The course will include special focus on the group’s technical leader and visionary, guitarist Jimmy Page, who came with prior credits as a sessionman and guitarist in the blues-rock band the Yardbirds, as well as other major players in the Zeppelin story—engineer Glyn Johns, manager Pater Grant—who helped build the sonic and popular juggernaut that the band became. In-class guest speakers will be featured, many who participated or witnessed the Led Zeppelin phenomenon, as well as a screening of the group’s concert film The Song Remains The Same.

In the world of popular music, the word ?soul? has come to mean so many things ? a style, a sound, an attitude, a way of singing, a way of belonging. And a way of categorizing music for the sake of bringing it to market. Yet, there was a time that ?soul? referred to a very specific kind of music in a very specific time and place. This course will trace the exciting history of soul music and the enduring culture that sprang from it, beginning with the rise of rhythm and blues in the ?50s, through the turbulent ?60s, to its crowning moment in 1967 with the arrival of its best-known avatar, the Queen of Soul -- Aretha Franklin. Through reading, discussion, listening sessions, guest speakers and video presentations, we will consider: the various definitions of ?soul?, the roots of soul music and the stars of the style. How the music reflected the social and political spirit of the ?60s, and predicted the triumphant future of black music in America. How the consideration of soul music necessarily raises issues of racial identity, conflict, and dialogue. How the continuing dialogue between white and black America takes place in a musical arena that we still label ?soul?. We will also trace the gospel birth, ?pop? musical development, and explosive arrival of Aretha Franklin ? the ?Natural Woman? whose voice delivered Soul into mainstream popularity and brought African American authenticity into the popular realm. We will look at the many ways that soul music morphed after the ?60s,giving rise to black musical styles like funk, disco, and hip hop, and focus on the evolving relationship of soul music and American race relations as well. This path of inquiry will offer a means to understanding the continuing impact of the music and culture of the soul era, as well as Ms. Franklin?s continuing reign.

Often described as “a prophet,” the pioneer Bob Marley transcended the genre he helped develop, Jamaican reggae, to become a musical and revolutionary leader of the 20th Century. On the way, the bi-racial Marley smashed restrictions of race and class imposed on his generation by the colonial system. How did Marley, an effectively fatherless child from a tiny village, achieve his rise to global authority and influence, musically, socio-politically, spiritually, personally and in terms of the industry? Vivien Goldman was Bob Marley’s trusted chronicler and has written two books about him. We will examine the history of Jamaica, its culture and connection with Britain; Marley’s evolution as a writer and musician; his creative partnerships with artists like The Wailers and dubmaster Lee Perry; his lifelong battle to control the business of his music; and his commitment to pan-Africanism and Rasta as a way of life. There will be Special Guests and Screenings. Experience this rare opportunity to learn about Bob Marley from someone who first worked with him at his record company, Island, then wrote about him at home, on the road and in the studio.

This course will review; studio design, layout, acoustics and construction techniques. The focus will be on gaining an understanding of how studio architecture impacts the way that facilities function and support: tracking, mixing, editing, and mastering. The acoustics of studios will be discussed with basic theories of: acoustic isolation, ambient noise conditions, basics of acoustic measurement and internal room acoustics reviewed. Construction techniques to address both acoustic isolation and internal room acoustics will be reviewed. Also reviewed will be the role of both sound absorbing and diffusing materials in successful studio design. Some critical listening exercises will be required!

In the early modern era, the movement, migration, and dispossession of Europeans and Africans to the “New World” encouraged the transmission of diverse cultural practices within new contexts. In particular, the “African Diaspora” was forged, as multiple tribes and ethnicities were forcibly transported throughout the Americas during the Atlantic slave trade. In the Americas, varied forms of traditional African life and culture were both preserved and transformed within the confines of enslavement, while distinct ethnic practices converged in newly formed communities and settings, as well as in relation to (ethnic) European Diasporic practices. The topics of this course will travel across the Atlantic and three centuries, as we explore how the sounds of the African Diaspora have been (per)formed, transmitted, circulated, and commodified within the development of popular sounds in the Americas. Diasporic Sounds will begin by engaging the spiritual, improvisatory, rhythmic, and corporeal aspects of how sounds of the African Diaspora were (re)created throughout the New World. Focusing on the United States, the Caribbean, and Brazil, this course will continue to explore the ways in which these diasporic sounds both related and differed across regions and contexts, reflecting the diversity implicit within how we investigate (Africa’s) Diaspora. While the course considers the specific contexts of Africans throughout the Americas, students will gain an understanding of the relationship between identity and popular sound by considering how sounds of the African Diaspora became thematized, commodified, and circulated in the context of an increasingly industrial and globalized world economy during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. As we explore the range, singularity, and hybridity of (African) Diasporic sounds, we will also cover a number of genres and their performers, including (but not limited to) the folk spiritual of the U.S., Haitian Compas, blackface minstrelsy, samba, Hip Hop, Bomba, Cuban jazz, and reggaeton, in addition to styles such as bluegrass, techno, and British soul.

No single album engendered more debate in the 1980s than singer-songwriter-producer Paul Simon's culture-crossing Graceland. Controversially recorded in 1985 (and released in 1986) in a collaborative format in South Africa in defiance of the UN cultural boycott, the album is a highly complex amalgam of Simon's trademark cerebral, interior lyrics super-imposed upon pulsating Africa rhythms played by South Africa's top instrumental musicians; Louisiana zydeco; and special cameos by artists ranging from Linda Ronstadt to the Everly Brothers. Graceland won the Grammy for album of the year, bolstering Simon's career in the process but serious questions were raised about the nature of the cross-cultural/cross-national project. Was it a genuine collaboration that benefited both Simon and his African colleagues, or was this the latest form of musical exploitation and colonialism? As the album that inaugurated the world music debated that still remain with us, Graceland - now celebrating its 25th anniversary - is worthy of in-depth academic scrutiny. This class proposes to put the album and its associated debates in full cultural, political and musical context. We will look at Simon's prolific pre-Graceland career and the rise of world music and globalization in the 1980s - also paying some attention to the volatile cultural politics of south Africa in the 1980s. We will then study Graceland itself and delve into the controversy. And finally we will look at world music, culture and politics in the aftermath of Graceland. Students should expect to leave the class with an enriched understanding of the role that Western musicians play in an increasingly complex trans-national world system, where forms of collaboration and artistic exchange are fraught with as much promise as they are with challenge.

Fifty years after his death at the age of 40, John Coltrane still stands as one of the most legendary and celebrated cultural heroes of the 20th century. He’s revered as a patron saint of creative discipline and artistic commitment far beyond the realm of modern jazz, the musical arena in which he excelled. His compositions are widely known and his saxophone sound often imitated, and instantly recognizable: brittle, dark, and deeply searching—a sonic signature that has become a standard for the ideals of musical freedom, personal expression, and spiritual priority in popular music. Today, Coltrane’s influence stretches throughout the musical sphere—from rock and hip hop to classical and electronica—pushing a sense of individual identity and political stance. Yet, despite universal adoration, Coltrane’s life and music remain an enigma: more praised than examined, more acknowledged than fully understood. Offered to NYU students as a means to understanding and learning from John Coltrane’ story—and applying those lessons of his career to their own music—each session in this ambitious seven-class course offers twin components. One part focuses on historical-critical studies: while completing focused readings, and undertaking listening and viewing assignments, students investigate the social, cultural, musical and business aspects of Coltrane’s recordings and other accomplishments. The other portion of the course deals with musicianship, performance, composition, and production: listening closely to Coltrane’s music and completing in-class and out-of-class assignments under careful mentorship, deconstructing Coltrane’s compositional and studio choices, and working collaboratively to create, refine and produce original musical works.

One of the great recording artists of the 20th century, Michigan-born Stevie Wonder started as a child prodigy on Motown in the 1960s before emerging as a visionary and socially conscious performer-producer-songwriter. Merging r&b, jazz, rock, classical and pop sounds in innovative and melodious ways, Wonder – who today boasts 22 Grammy® Awards to his name – released in the 1970s an acclaimed string of albums (Music Of My Mind, Talking Book, Innervisions, Fullfillingness’ First Finale, Songs In The Key Of Life) that set the bar for artistic achievement in recorded music. This course introduces students to the life and work of Stevie Wonder, giving students insight into the artistic, business and technological forces that inform his creative output. In learning about Stevie Wonder, students will discover the under-researched black singer-songwriter movement of the ’60s and ’70s. Running parallel to the widening of the album rock market in the early 1970s, which inspired the rise of such artists-songwriters as James Taylor, Carole King, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Jackson Browne and Laura Nyro, was the rise of the black singer-songwriter-auteur, keyed by the success of Wonder, Curtis Mayfield, Bill Withers, Donny Hathaway, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, and others. It’s a story overlooked by most chroniclers of the era, as R&B and soul music historically has been deemed dance and/or party music; yet the contributions made by these “triple-threat” artists opened the door for a whole new sound – sometimes without leaving the dance floor behind. Students will also learn of the technological advances in recorded music that allowed Stevie Wonder a forum for his singular vision. In specifically looking at Wonder, and the range of issues surrounding the creation and release of his 1973 album Innervisions, the class will document this movement, incorporate the artists of this movement into the larger pop music history, and illuminate their contributions as vital to the work of those who followed – Prince, Rick James, El DeBarge, Babyface, Sade, Maxwell, D’Angelo, India.Arie, Mary J. Blige, John Legend, Jay-Z and more.

No corporation in the 21st century has so far had more impact on recorded music than Apple. Apple has not only forever impacted the distribution and retail of recorded music; just as importantly, it has changed the way people around the world consume and experience popular recorded songs. Founded in California in the late 1970s by entrepreneurs Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ron Wayne, Apple Computer Inc.’s first consumer product was the Apple I personal computer kit. Since then – and particularly since the watershed year of 1998 - the company has rebranded itself via an unparalleled multinational business and aesthetic strategy that focused on the release of groundbreaking and innovative personal computing products like the iMac, the iPhone and the iPad, resulting in 42 billion dollars in annual sales (as of 2010). Even as the music industry fell into a decade-long sales slump during the 2000s, the introduction of Apple’s iTunes music store and iPod toward the start of the decade produced on a financially profitable model for secure, legal downloading, in spite of (or because of) Apple’s controversial pricing strategies. In this course, students will investigate the history of Apple, and delve into the company’s 2nd wave singular aesthetic/design and business strategy. Finally, students will consider the company’s impact on the dissemination and reception of music over the years, particularly at the dawn of the 21st century. Students should walk away from the course with a greater sense of how a company founded (largely) on Steve Jobs’ entrepreneurial vision managed to overcome its lean years to ultimately dominate the music industry and turn outsize profits at a time otherwise marked by widespread economic and cultural instability.

James Brown may well be the most important figure in 20th century recorded music. As "The Hardest Working Man in Show Business" his thrilling performances, starting in the mid-1950s, elevated expectations for rhythm and blues music. In the 1960s he became a daring bandleader, a standard-bearer in the soul music boom and the chief innovator behind funk music, while creating the uniquely expressive, singing-and dancing template that inspired later-day personalities from Michael Jackson to Prince, Usher to Bruno Mars, Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings to Janelle Monáe, and many more. Brown was also a key figure in the civil rights movement, and he excelled as an entrepreneur, emerging as one of the first African-American artists to own a production company, dictate his own release schedule and retain control of his publishing income. unmatched multi-decade chart successesWith an unmatched multi-decade chart success, Brown is a symbol of black expression and creativity, the Godfather of Soul, With his beats and attitude JB is the forefather of hip-hop: his is , forging a singular artistic career arc from post-war jump blues to the new Millennium. Hean icon of American culture. This unique course will investigate the career of James Brown, encompassing the changing musical and sociopolitical contexts that informed his genius and shaped a revolutionary artistic form. Reading biographical texts and critical works on race and identity by writers like Robin Kelley and Manning Marable, students should walk away from the course with a more sophisticated understanding of one of the great musical innovators and a greater sense of how those innovations tied into changing musical fields and identity politics of the latter half of the century.

Started in 1959 in Detroit by songwriter and then budding entrepreneur Berry Gordy, Motown quickly became dubbed "Hitsville USA," as it served as home to artists like The Supremes, The Temptations, Mary Wells, Smokey Robinson, Stevie Wonder, Martha and the Vandellas, Michael Jackson and the Four Tops, to name a few. Motown literally changed the concept of the record label and redefined the very idea of entrepreneurship in recorded music, serving as core inspiration to artists from The Beatles to Beyonce. Motown's incredible legacy of success served a crucial role in helping to integrate popular music and thereby helped to rewrite the narrative of race and class in America. One of the greatest examples of an artist expanding the boundaries of his art, of his company?s limitations, of the public?s expectations, and subsequently of what it meant to be a pop artist, is the album What?s Going On by Marvin Gaye, issued by Motown in spring 1971. As we narrow our focus to study this album its roots, its creation, the difficulty with its release, its astonishing success students will be introduced to the legacy of Motown Records. Readings, class lectures, guest speakers, video and audio clips will answer the questions, Who was Marvin Gaye? How did he get to a place where felt he needed to create this album? Why was it difficult for him to get the song and the album released? What was Motown doing politically the years before? What was company policy that created an issue around the album content? What did it mean to be an artist and a producer at Motown or not?

Nirvana's Nevermind is often listed alongside The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band as one of the most important albums in rock history. Spearheaded by the late Kurt Cobain, Nirvana also helped shape the development of alternative independent rock in the 1990s. This unique course will consider the music and culture that shaped the rise of Nirvana, and the music and culture that Nirvana gave rise to. We'll examine the development of semi-popular music in the 1970s and its relationship to popular music; the development of the self-sufficient independent rock underground of the 1980s and its rejection of popular music; and Nirvana?s explosion into the mainstream in 1991 and popular music?s embrace of the rock underground. As we read texts like Michael Azzerad's Come as You Are and watch documentaries and music videos, we?ll investigate broader issues of subculture and bohemia, and their relationship to each other as well as to the pop mainstream. Students will consider why punk values triumphed in America in 1991, why Nirvana were the band that made it happen, and how the repercussions still shape the ambitions of bands and their audiences today.

This course will give students a framework to consider the convergence of music and technology that has come to be known as electronica. An expensive, constantly morphing genre, electronica now includes styles as diverse as: house, trance, techno, glitch, freestyle, breakbeat, jungle, dub, grime, industrial, drum n' bass, chillout, new age, experimental hip-hop, hardcore, broken beat, downtempo, and ambient. This course will investigate some of the defining features and concepts in electronica, culling examples form the beginnings of recorded sounds to the present. Through text, listening and viewing assignments, students will consider some of the most intriguing figures/styles in electronic music as signposts for innovation.

Founded over twenty years ago in an NYU dorm room by then-student Rick Rubin and his partner Russell Simmons, Def Jam is now widely considered the greatest record label in the history of hip-hop. Def Jam led a cutting-edge revolution by transforming New York's black street music and culture in to a global youth movement. This course will offer students an in-depth look at the evolution of the record company as we study the careers of the label's chief executives-Rubin, Simmons, and Lyor Cohen-and the marketing methods used to sell the label's unorthodox stars. We will listen to recordings by and study the careers of the label's most important artists including LL Cool J, the Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Slick Rick, Onyx, Method Man, Jay-Z, DMX, Ja Rule, and Kanye West. In addition to the required reading, we will also view selected music videos and documentary films, and there will be class visits to the class by former Def Jam artists, producers, and staff members. Students should leave the course with a better understanding of the executives who founded the label, the artists who recorded for it, and the development of hip-hop in general- as well as with an enhanced ability to think and write critically about hip-hop culture.

Many people recognize the name Island Records from its merger with hip-hop label Def Jam in the form of "The Island Def Jam Music Group." However, there may be no obvious connection with the Jamaican-British roots of this influential pioneering independent record label. This course considers the epic saga of Island Records from its inception in the 1960s to its current incarnation as part of the Island/Def Jam conglomerate. Founded in 1959 by maverick entrepreneur Chris Blackwell at the time of his native Jamaica's independence, Island Records soon moved its operations to the UK, and then on to America, initially via deals with indies such as A&M. By distributing other young independents such as Virgin, Chrysalis and EG, the label became a laboratory for much of pop's exciting progress, illuminated by musical discoveries like Bob Marley and U2. Through each struggle and turning point, the label's knack with musical talent has saved the day, leading to its sale, first to Polygram in 1982; and subsequent absorption when Polygram itself was sold to the Universal Music Group in 1998. Any student interested in learning more about the history of how and why a small independent record label with a vision grows to become a hugely influential international force will benefit from taking this class. Final project includes a research paper related to Island Records or a comparable independent label; and reading includes White Bicycles by Joe Boyd. Artists students will listen to may include: Bad Company, Cat Stevens, Fairport Convention, Burning Spear, John Cale, Aswad, Sly and Robbie, Grace Jones, Baaba Maal, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Roxy Music, Toots and the Maytals, and Steve Winwood and Traffic.

The course begins with a brief overview of early electronics and first traces the movement of these musical ideas into the popular music avant-garde of bands such as Neu! and Cabaret Voltaire. Using Giorgio Moroder's production of the Donna Summer classic "I Feel Love" as the tipping point, the class will focus on the emergence the musical style SynthPop and examine artists including Kraftwerk, New Order, and Depeche Mode. Through various texts, media and demonstrations we will survey the genre from its post-punk beginnings through its decade's dominance on the charts before finally being 'unplugged' by grunge. Beyond historical considerations, we'll finish with an exploration of the music's legacy and study its development into a number of new genres as well as the latest software and technology making it.

As the lead singer and songwriter of of rock group Queen - and famous for songs like "Bohemian Rhapsody," "Killer Queen," "Somebody to Love," "Don't Stop Me Now," "Crazy Little Thing Called Love," and "We are the Champions" - Freddie Mercury is arguably the most gifted and flamboyant of 20th century rock stars. As a musical auteur, frontman and visual genius, Freddie Mercury found creative ways to merge the avant-garde and the mainstream in pop, to the tune of 300 million in album sales. Often neglected in discussions of Mercury's stardom, however, are his Asian heritage and African roots (he was born Farrokh Pluto Bulsara to parents Bomi and Jer Bulsara in Zanzibar, Tanzania), his interest and work with black and Asian musicians, and his bisexuality. The multiple (open) closets in which he worked and his subversive musical and visual content demand a total re-examination of the assumed whiteness, Western-ness and straight-ness of the rock front "man" mythology. But the often fraught journeys of contemporary queer pop stars like George Michael, Mika, Adam Lambert, and Lady Gaga suggests how far and not so far the music industry has come. This course proposes to deconstruct Freddie Mercury's impact on popular music, with a special focus on issues of race, gender, celebrity, post-coloniality, globalization and the hidden aspects of his public image. Among topics for consideration: Freddie Mercury's early Bollywood and Hendrix influences; Tanzanian and Bombay pop culture of the 50s; the politics of flamboyancy (Liberace to Elton to Morrissey and Mika); post-colonial super-stardom; Mercury's impact on contemporary artists like Lady Gaga; his influence on glam rock and the ways that his trans-national identifications complicate our notions of "white" male rock singing; Queen's '70s multi-tracked vocal excess; revisiting Queen's critical reception by the rock press.

In recorded music, a performer's visual image has always been of great importance; perhaps now more than ever. This practical course is designed to inform students about the art and business of creating visual images in recorded music. Visual image production includes creating album covers, publicity photos, promotional videos as well as the overall personal image and "brand" of the artist. As we discover the players that produce such images and the means by which they pursue their craft, we will also analyze the Art Historical source material and the cultural and theoretical discourse that they have inspired and been inspired by. In collaboration with students in the Artist Development Lab course, students will participate in a photo shoot and will end the semester with a portfolio of their assigned artist?s marketing and publicity materials. Photo students are particularly encouraged to enroll. Note: This course will incur a lab fee for non-majors.

The concept of what gets constituted as “classic” or “canonical” is a vexed issue in popular music, as it is in literature and other fields. On one hand, “classic” suggests pre-eminent status, high standards, top quality. A classic album is one that has been deemed by many – or even just a select, influential few – as a standard bearer. On the other hand, the term classic can infer elitism and exclusion, and can signal a sort of inflexible members’ only club: too often, the work of American and British white male rock artists is often venerated in this tradition at the expense of women and people of color and non-first world subjects among others. Taking this ongoing debate around the idea of classic as a starting point for discussion rather than an impasse, this unique course investigates the concept of the "seminal” album. For our purposes we can define a seminal album as one that has managed to further influence, in a groundbreaking way, the development of future forms of artistic expression. During the class, students will take a subjective look at one or several "classic" albums, and deconstruct how and why a particular album has come to be considered as seminal in the trajectory of popular music. In particular, students will deconstruct the music, the production and the marketing, putting the album in full social and political context and exploring the range of reasons why it has garnered classic status. We do this, of course, at a time in which the very meaning and future of the album is up for grabs given the ubiquity of digital retail formats that put an inordinate emphasis on the value of the single.

Funk can be described as an African-derived aesthetic, an approach to embodied rhythm. By the late 1960s, it evolved from early roots in styles like jazz to become a powerful and influential standalone genre and culture popularized by figures like James Brown and Sly Stone. In many ways, funk has become the dominant sound of popular music in the 21st century. In this course, students will study the history, culture and politics of funk, as we track its crossover rise in the 1960s and 1970s, its relationship to disco and sampling in hip-hop, its ability to engage protest and subversive politics, and the way the music continues to be informed by issues of race, nationalism, class, gender and sexuality. This particular iteration of the funk class will focus primarily on the cultural contributions of two of funk's greatest visionaries: George Clinton, bandleader of musical group/army Parliament-Funkadelic, and Maurice White, the under-recognized architect of multi-format crossover band Earth, Wind & Fire. As we listen to audio and watch video clips, read scholarly and journalistic writing on funk, and conduct original research projects about the music, we'll see how the turbulent politics of the 1970s found unique expression in EWF and P-Funk's respective recordings, lyrics, artwork and stage shows.

David Bowie’s life and work offer a template for how to survive and continue to evolve as a musical artist. David Bowie has kept the music industry, his fans and the world guessing throughout a career that spans over four decades. Bowie himself put his secret best in his prophetic 1972 song, “Ch-ch-ch-ch Changes”; a multi-talented performer, writer and visual artist, Bowie has played his career like an instrument, selecting trends of every generation to process, absorb and adapt into successive phases of his ever-evolving chameleon persona. In this day of ceaseless multiple media, Bowie’s most recent, and typically perverse, coup was keeping secret the recording of his 2013 album, The Next Day, over a two-year recording period. The manipulative bravado of knowing when and how to keep a star’s inaccessibility and mystery, or to expose oneself, as Bowie did on TV in his own darkest days, has given David Bowie a singular, enduring mystique, glamour and respect. Examining the arc of his work is a window into significant scenes of every decade since the 1950s, and offers insight into: the British Blues scene that produced the Beatles and the Rolling Stones; the hippy free festival counter-culture; r’n’b; futurism; electronica;glam and gender games, improvisation; soul; funk; dance; disco; minimalism; ambient; avant-garde theater; and above all, the endlessly evolving sound of US and UK young clubland, including recent jungle and garage, to which Bowie consistently returns to recharge and find a new direction to make his own.

Rarely does one group capture the sound and spirit of an era, then expand their original music concept—through songs, film, and even the business of music itself—to a degree that their echoes can be clearly heard forty years later. The Talking Heads, the New York foursome that were born in the cultural maelstrom of New York’s punk scene of the 1970s, achieved all of that and much more in their fifteen year history. Led by forward-thinking frontman David Byrne, the group were the apotheosis of what an “art band” should sound like, driven by musical curiosity while rocking hard and maintaining popular embrace. The band’s timeline encompasses the musical development of popular American music from the ‘70s until now, touching upon groundbreaking trends (punk, disco, World Music and hip-hop), technologies (synthesizers, sampling), musical approaches (song constructionism, lateral thinking), themes and arguments (artist-as-producer, musical imperialism.) That Byrne’s own career continues to produce singular music is further proof that the enduring impact of the Talking Heads is due for serious academic study.

One of the top-selling and most gifted and musically versatile artists in the history of popular music, Prince remains an enigmatic and visionary multi-talented performer, songwriter and producer. Prince’s unique history is worth deconstructing: when the 19-year-old shopped his music to recording companies in 1977, he demanded creative control. In a striking move Warner Brothers Records, with no precedent, gave it to him, kicking off a longstanding, groundbreaking, genre-straddling career that continues to this day. To this day, Prince’s music addresses sexuality, politics, social issues and personal identity in a way unseen in previous generations of popular music. He confounded his core R&B audience with New Wave experiments; angered his rock following with gender-bending displays; caused the government to force the recording industry into parental advisory labeling; frustrated his label with non-commercial choices, challenging the notion of what is commercial; established his own label; melded the live and recording business with unique delivery systems of his output, and much more. Prince’s trailblazing path was a prime example of the strength of a new generation of Midwestern, baby boomer performers who carried a bold “Gen X” attitude: Prince (from Minnesota) was born in the same three-month period as Madonna (Michigan) and Michael Jackson (Indiana). This class, through readings, music listening, video clips, film screenings, special guests and performances, will explore the joys and contradictions of Prince’s music and business practices.

No single personality dominated the landscape of urban mainstream popular culture in the 1990s (and since) more than producer, rapper and entrepreneur Sean "Puff Daddy" Combs. By 2013, hip-hop and black culture have become globally mainstream; the immense popularity that hip-hop enjoys today is directly rooted in the profound cultural changes that Combs and his peers instigated. Combs emerged from his humble professional beginnings in the early 1990s as an A&R man at Andre Harrell’s Uptown Records to fashion himself as a profoundly versatile and wildly successful performer, actor, reality-TV star, producer, songwriter, fashion and restaurant entrepreneur and philanthropist. His current net worth estimated at $550 million makes him the richest man in hip-hop and one of the wealthiest artists in the history of popular music. He is a multiple Grammy-winner and won an Oscar in 2012 for his work as a film producer. Though sometimes not treated with seriousness he deserves, Combs has had a profound effect on global culture of the last twenty years. Through the success of his Bad Boy Records label, which distributed genre-defining artists like the Notorious B.I.G., Combs helped forever alter and change the sound and visuals of hip hop and R&B. Combs drew on Russell early business success to redefine the image of the hip-hop entrepreneur as aggressive, brash and full of self-assured swagger. He also helped redefine the concept of celebrity branded entertainment and he mainstreamed innovative marketing techniques (like street teams) in the music industry. This class will investigate the social and cultural and political changes of the 1990s and how Sean Combs was catapulted to success by those changes. Through critical readings, viewings and listening assignments, the brilliance, tragedy, strategy and serial entrepreneurship of Sean Combs will be interpreted, discussed and dissected.

In the past few decades, “sound studies” has emerged as an official field of critical inquiry: it is best defined as the study of the production, circulation, and materiality of sound and its historical, social, cultural and political effects. Investigating sound — beyond investigating music alone — is a fascinating and rich way to engage in the power and politics of pop music performed by artists as wide ranging as the The Velvet Underground, The Smiths, Nina Simone, Sun Ra, Kendrick Lamar, and FKA twigs, and to delve into the powerful writing of scholars like Daphne A. Brooks, Alexandra T. Vazquez, Gayle Wald, and Alexander G. Weheliye. This course offers an overview of the sound studies with a focus on how the burgeoning interdisciplinary field’s diverse range of issues and methodological questions contribute to ways of writing music criticism on popular music. Students will specifically consider how becoming more aware of our relationship to sound in its various forms creates new ways of understanding how race, gender, and sexuality are heard, felt, and experienced in popular music. Topics and approaches to sound studies discussed in the course include the following: how theories and concepts of listening, of the voice, of noise, and of affect and/or emotion relate to the formation and production of racial, gender, and sexual difference and vice versa; understanding sound reproduction in relation to technology and audiovisual media; and how sound or soundscapes structure everyday life. Students will be asked to experiment with their writing in weekly response papers on music that both students and the instructor will share with the class as well as with critical karaoke presentations. At the end of the course, weekly response papers will be collected into a portfolio, which will include an introduction by students that summarizes their writing for the course. Additionally, students will have the opportunity to create their own experimental sound pieces as well as attend a music performance in New York City, for which students will write reviews that incorporate sound studies theories and concepts.

The dictum says that you have to learn to fail before you can truly succeed. And so failure has recently become a buzzword with regard to contemporary creative endeavors in the arts, humanities, business and science. In 2014, the New York Times announced the rise of “The Failure Age:” the flipside of our relentless push toward entrepreneurial achievement and innovation is the tragic reality of companies that have gone bust and seemingly bright ideas that have imploded or ended in catastrophe. We live in an age dominated by reality television winners and losers; by television shows like Flight of the Conchords, Girls, Bunheads and Shameless, and films like Birdman, that delve into personal failure in unprecedented and sometimes hilarious ways; and by social media videos and memes laced with hashtags like #fail and #epicfail that promote people’s embarrassing mistakes and failures, whether staged or otherwise. Yet, we hold fast to the belief that there is an art to failure: we’re routinely encouraged to fail as long as we glean inspirational lessons from our mistakes, gaffes and foibles and self-correct toward ultimate success. Every high-achieving artist and entrepreneur has some sort of relationship to failure; in fact, fear of failure is a chief driver that underwrites creative success. This class considers failure as it relates to the contemporary popular arts. What is it exactly that we think we can learn from failure? And more to the point, what does our amplified 21st century interest and obsession with failure say about us? We take a deeper look at case studies of failures in popular music, movies, theater and beyond as a way to further our understanding of the complexity of the creative process, especially as it comes into tension with pressures of industry and commerce. As we do so, we’ll take a look at Lauren Berlant’s theory of cruel optimism as well as Jack Halberstam’s work on the queer art of failure. George Lipsitz’s ideas about creative miscommunication in popular music come into play, as do Sara Jane Bailes’ studies of failure in theater and performance art. We branch out from there to focus on feature films about the deeper recesses of artistic failure like The Coen Brothers’ Inside Llewyn Davis, documentary features like Jodorowsky’s Dune, and sour mockumentaries like I’m Still Here. We look at under-researched areas in popular music like one-hit wonders, sophomore slumps, also-rans, bankrupted record labels and tech start-ups, and more. Among the case studies we may tackle: Milli Vanilli, Rebecca Black, “American Idol’s” William Hung, Brian Wilson’s collapsed Smile, Britney Spears’ mid 2000s meltdown, and Kanye West’s award-show speeches. Along the way, we’ll consider our culture’s changing ideas about ambition, hubris, excess, disappointment, resentment, self-destruction, burn-outs, interruptions, misunderstandings, communication breakdowns, industry obstructions and creative blocks. We stop to consider how failure is not a static concept but gets articulated diversely in different cultures, nations and time periods; and we think about the rise of racialized concepts of failure like “ratchet” in popular culture and television shows like Empire. Students should leave the class with greater understanding of changing definitions of success and achievement in a downturned 21st creative economy, and richer ways to consider the varies of artistic ambition and achievement in a culture that valorizes winning while both trashing and fetishizing failure.

You’ve already made use of ‘artificial intelligence’ if you’ve ever received a recommendation from a service like Pandora or Spotify or Netflix, or if you’ve asked Siri for directions. These streaming services are virtual agents designed to make our lives more efficient and pleasurable. Still, most of us don’t stop to deeply consider how much we make use of algorithms on a daily basis. Presently, drones can autonomously perform music, algorithms can write, produce and recommend songs, and we live among a range of other interactive multi-modal systems, bots and human-machine hybrids and interfaces. In the coming years, these innovations will exponentially develop. The future of how we make and consume art and entertainment is sure to be impacted by our controversial relationship to increasingly intelligent — and potentially sentient — bots and machines. Though it may take time to fully accept, humans are not necessarily the only beings that can spontaneously create music. This ambitious course provides students with a sweeping introduction to robotics especially as it relates to popular music. We investigate the history and present of robotics, and we take a special interest in how metaphors of humanoid robots, cyborgs, and androids in 20th century science fiction have deeply influenced our thinking about these matters (not to mention dystopian ideas of the coming ‘robocalypse’). Beyond the work of writers like Isaac Asimov and Philip K. Dick and film directors like Stanley Kubrick and Ridley Scott, robot tropes show up the work of musicians like Kraftwerk, Devo, Gary Numan, Rammelzee, Daft Punk, Janelle Monae, Squarepusher and Roger & Zapp. Electronic music inventor Ray Kurzweil’s ideas about the Singularity — that future moment when machines think for themselves— are a reminder that innovators working in the music space have long been at the pioneering forefront of questions about robot intelligence. As we consider the differing development of robots in Japan, the US and the African continent, we’ll touch on how innovations in the field are impacting labor; war and the military; spirituality and ethics; and ideas about transhumanism related to race, class, sexuality and gender. PLEASE NOTE: This is not a ‘making’ class; it is a theoretical course in which students are expected to think deeply and intellectually about the past, present and future of robotics in relationship to changing ideas about art, entertainment and technology.

Music recommendation and discovery refers to the formal and informal processes through which audiences learn about new and existing songs, artists and musical styles through suggestion and influence. Spending most of our time on academic social theories on how audiences and masses congregate and aggregate, the class will investigate the historical evolution of the audience in recorded music. We specially focus on the history and culture of how consumers become exposed to music through print editorial, online and offline retail, fanzines, gossip rags and blogs, radio, live music festivals, social networking sites and online recommendation engines, to name a few. Because the storage capacity of the Web has made available a seemingly infinite amount of recorded music product, the ?problem? of how audiences find out about music ? and how they spread the word to others ? has become more important than ever. The first third of the course is heavily grounded in theory. It introduces students to social theories of crowds, fans and media reception (we may look at Machiavelli, Le Bon, Tarde, Sighele, Allport, Fiske, Marshall, Adorno, Ehrenreich, Cannetti and Gladwell) that inform the way we still to this day think about masses and audience. The second part of the course is grounded in historical analysis. It looks at the historical evolution of music discovery and recommendation, paying close attention to early or ?old school? (or pre?digital era) issues, looking at the tastemaking function of well?connected and knowledgeable ?influentials? like 1950s radio DJs and TV show hosts, 1960s Rolling Stone journalists and consumer guide writers, as well as the often surreal histories of music connoisseurs, record collectors and groupies. The final third of the course is grounded in the study of contemporary criticism on discovery and recommendation. It focuses on the rise and proliferation of networking, word?of?mouth and online music discovery spaces like MySpace, YouTube, Facebook, imeem, Bebo, Pitchfork, Pandora, iLike, Last.fm and others in the social networking and online music discovery/recommendation space. Students will be expected to write a grounded academic research final paper on music discovery and recommendation, and in exceptional cases, students may work in groups to develop conceptual ideas for a business product, company or service in the discovery/recommendation field.

Hugh Masekela, Shakira, Paul Simon, David Byrne, Yma Sumac, Freddie Mercury, Peter Gabriel, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Fela Kuti, Youssou N'Dour, Manu Chao, Grace Jones, MIA, K'naan, Damon Albarn....In this seminar, we look at the changing role of the recording artist as world citizen. Cosmopolitanism has been described as the willingness to competently engage in a range of different cultures. We’ll read seminal works on cosmopolitanism and on popular culture by authors like Ulf Hannerz, K. Anthony Appiah, Henry Jenkins and Paul Gilroy. We’ll grapple with the challenging terminology scholars have deployed to address issues related to globalization and diaspora. We’ll analyze work created by artists with cosmopolitan backgrounds and influences as well as cosmopolitan experiences of cities and cosmopolitan objects in transit: mobile and mashed-up pop culture products, often stripped away from their original contexts. We’ll consider the rise of the “world music” genre in the 1980s (spearheaded by artists like Simon and Byrne) and we’ll address the creative output of musicians like N’Dour and M.I.A, each of whom has respectively grappled with the challenge of producing cosmopolitan art and style. We’ll also pause to consider the continually evolving Asian/Asean and Middle Eastern pop culture industries. By the end of the course, students should acquire a greater understanding of the role music plays in helping to shape the global world order of the last 30 years; and, conversely, the impact of the current geopolitical climate, particularly after the events of 9/11, on the creation and distribution of pop music.

Terms like “techpreneur,” “technopreneur” and “e-preneur” all refer to the same subject: entrepeneurs who specialize in work in new or emergent media or entrepreneurs who have created pioneering ventures for mobile or the Internet or beyond. In this weekly discussion series, students will meet and hear from key entrepreneurial figures and innovators in music technology, with a focus on New York based tech figures who have launched recognized or profitable music-focused startups. The idea is for students, many of whom are aspiring entrepreneurs, to hear directly from, and ask questions directly to, established tech entrepreneurs, in moderated conversation. In anticipation for a guest class visit, students may be required to investigate websites, read biographical or contextual material, or attend events outside of class time. Students will be expected to ask informed questions of the guests and to develop responses throughout the course of the class. All events and speakers are subject to change.

The history of popular sound in the United States illuminates how music, movement, and performance are key to a contemporary understanding of how individual and group identity has been composed throughout the nation’s history. Unpacking this sonic history reveals how identity is connected to how race is heard, both historically and at present. In this course, we explore how race is constructed in the development of global popular music and the culture of sound in and before the 20th century in the United States. This course, in particular, will especially focus on music of the global African Diaspora from the late nineteenth century until the 1960s. We will examine how the sounds and performance of blackface minstrelsy—the first native form of popular music in the U.S.—became the basis of contemporary popular sound, ranging from Tin Pan Alley to blues and jazz, as well as to country and rock ‘n roll. Irving Berlin, Big Momma Thornton, Elvis Presley, The Supremes, Johnny Cash, Mick Jagger, Tina Turner, and Jimi Hendrix are but a few of the many artists who will be considered in relation to the history of American popular music and (racialized) sound. Students will consider critical race theories, primary and secondary accounts of popular performance, as well as selected audio and visual material to investigate how race ties into various ideas about individual and community identity, nationalism, and imperialism. In addition, students will gain a nuanced understanding of the relationship between sound, race, and American Music, as they develop critical listening skills to deconstruct how music is performed, heard, and embodied in more contemporary contexts through lectures, discussion, as well as multimedia and written projects. While racial identity will remain central to how we deconstruct the sounds and performance of popular music, aspects of identity such as gender, class, and sexuality will also be closely considered.

The 1950s was one of the most impactful and turbulent decades of the 20th century. It is widely known as a time marked by post-WWII affluence and prosperity, stifling conservatism and the widespread promotion of middle-class family values, the Korean war, and intense racial strife in the south. But the 1950s also introduced the concept of the teenager, the rise of fast food restaurants, the advent of television and credits cards. It was also, of course, the decade that gave birth to rock and roll, and every other musical genre and style since. This class looks at the formative decade of the 1950s in American music, with a focus on genres like rock ‘n’ roll, pop, swing, R&B, blues, country and rockabilly. Seminal artists we’ll place into context and deconstruct include Mitch Miller, Patti Page, Sinatra, Little Richard, Les Paul, Elvis Presley, Fats Domino, Ray Charles and Hank Williams. The class will be composed of lectures, group discussions, guest speakers, and numerous video and audio clips. Students should walk away from the class with a much richer understanding of a defining decade that shaped the lives of students’ parents and grandparents and still continues to inform the contemporary moment.

Fortnite’s concerts with Marshmello and Travis Scott. Open Pit’s DIY music festivals in Minecraft. League of Legends’ K-pop and hip-hop groups. Indie label Monstercat’s deals with Rocket League and Roblox. Sony Music’s gaming imprint Lost Rings. Grand Theft Auto’s 75 billion minutes of in-game music listening. “Fantasy record label” apps like FanLabel that allow fans to assemble their own “brackets” of artists that they think will do best on the charts. These are just a handful of examples of how music and games are increasingly overlapping as industries, experiences and cultures. There are strong mutual incentives at play: Game developers are blooming into full-fledged media brands and are looking to the music business for both financial and cultural capital, while music companies are looking to diversify their revenue, experiment with more interactive technologies and tap into the power of highly engaged communities online. In the process, this merging of entertainment worlds is also rewriting conventional wisdom of what it means to be an artist, a performer, gamer and especially a fan. This course will give students the critical frameworks and vocabulary to dissect how games are being incorporated into every corner of the music industry — from the moment music is created, to the strategies that inform how music is then disseminated, marketed, monetized and performed. We will draw from a combination of theoretical readings and real-world case studies to dissect video games that center music in their player experience on the one hand, and musical projects that draw direct inspiration from games in their approaches to design, marketing, business and fan engagement on the other hand. Because this field is relatively new, many of these case studies may emerge in real time as the course unfolds. This course will be reading-, writing- and play-intensive, with required and suggested games and soundtracks for students to play, watch or listen to every week. Throughout the course, students will have the opportunity to workshop their own creative, marketing and/or business strategies for hybrid music/game projects, walking away with a concrete plan of action for incorporating the fast-paced gaming industry into their own careers.

Created in the early 1970s, Dub is an often overlooked Jamaican music genre (and an off-shoot of reggae) that was among the first to use the recording studio itself as an instrument; and the DJ’s who “toasted” atop the re-imagined, deconstructed tracks became the inspiration for America’s first hiphop DJ’s, many of whom were of Jamaican extraction. Dub, spearheaded by iconic figures like King Tubby and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, has grown from an experimental eco-minded recording strategy to become the source, inspiration and foundation of generations of global music, such as punk, hip hop, ambient, techno, rave, drum ‘n bass, grime, dubstep and today’s EDM and dubstep. Part of this course will look at the unique and undiscovered connections between punk, dub and the start of hip hop, all of which began within the same few late 1970s-early 80s years. All three genres were shaped by greater availability to recording equipment and shared an enterprising, activist attitude that the punks called D.I.Y. As we’ll come to discover through readings, lectures, and guest visits, the idea of Dub Nation is to envision how the music became a powerful unifying force for various sub-cultures and communities all over the world. Just as it did in beleaguered 1970s downtown Kingston, dub music became integral in defining a sense of place and identity for cities reeling from urban blight, such as Chicago and Detroit, homes of House and Techno. It fulfilled a parallel function for tribes such as the gay community, for whom music has long been a rallying-flag. Students should expect to walk away from the course with mastery of the transnational history and culture of dub music, greater knowledge of the music’s key players and a greater understanding of how dub culture, technology and aesthetics inform contemporary music scenes and industries.

The aim of this course is to explore how popular music has been used as an instrument of protest, with a special focus on twenty-first century developments. Although the 1960s is often regarded as the “golden era” of protest music in the United States, many events that have occurred in and outside the nation since 9/11 have led contemporary pop musicians to accept the charge left by musician and activist, Nina Simone: “An artist’s duty, as far as I’m concerned, is to reflect the times.” Thinking through significant American events—including, but not limited to, September 11th 2001 (“9/11”), the re-election of George W. Bush in 2004, Hurricane Katrina, the 2008 financial crisis, same-sex marriage debates, global warming debates, the Presidential election(s) of Barack Obama, the #BlackLivesMatter movement, the nomination of Donald Trump as the 2016 Republican Presidential candidate, and—this course will consider the following questions: What constitutes “protest music” in contemporary popular culture? How do artists create music that inspires others to resist, exist within, or even recognize structures and systems that limit the freedoms of individuals and communities throughout society? How are “isms” and “phobias,” such as racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, Islamophobia, etc., addressed in popular music, and what are the aesthetic, lyrical, and performative characteristics that contribute to the creation and reception of that music? How have technological developments (i.e., the Internet, social media, streaming music, etc.) impacted the way in which artists, producers, and consumers use music as a tool for social activism and protest? What are the possibilities and limitations of protest music within the global capitalist economy in which popular music circulates? After a brief introduction to the history of protest and music in the U.S. at least since the 1960s, each week will focus on a significant moment of crisis or significance in the history of politics and popular music between 2000 and the present. We will consider how these moments were reflected in or sparked by musical and communal protests, as we engage in close readings of selected songs, albums, and video recordings by artists such as Beyoncé, The Dixie Chicks, Lady Gaga, John Mayer, M.I.A., TV on the Radio, John Mellencamp, Pink, Frank Ocean, Kanye West, Hoozier, Erykah Badu, PJ Harvey, J. Cole, Tom Waits, and Kendrick Lamar. In addition to these close readings of performances, we will consider both journalistic and scholarly writings that inform the week’s topics and musical analysis.

This 7-week course explores the career, impact, and legacy of music producer/composer James Dewitt Yancey. Known variously as “Jay Dee,” “J. Dilla” or simply “Dilla,” Yancey’s professional music career was short, spanning a dozen years before his death from a rare blood disease in 2006. But his influence in that period shifted the sound of popular music; and in the decade since the passing of the Detroit-born artist, his ideas have compelled a new generation of musicians — both in the electronic and traditional realms — who have drawn inspiration from Yancey’s music and seized upon his rhythmic and compositional ideas, chief among them a unique conception of time.

In music, is anything really original? The cry of “All music sounds the same these days!” is not just a contemporary critique; it has been a perennial complaint throughout the history of pop music. This class – a collaboration between the History, Writing & Emergent Media and Performance and Songwriting areas of the Clive Davis Institute – will grapple with the vital role that recycling plays in the creation of music, and thus offer divergent and often counterintuitive perspectives on creativity and originality. Through the course of 14 weeks, we'll look at the nature of creation and creativity, and also the way that ideas are reused and renewed; from classical interpolation of folk songs; to basic chord progressions; to cover songs; to the rise of remix; to the cultural thunderclap of digital sampling and its legal implications; to technological trends and fads. Each class will work through a pertinent cultural case study. Part history, part songwriting and production course, the work will be both mental and physical, philosophical and creative, as students will be asked to not only read, write, and debate, but also to complete several music and media composition and production exercises. By exploring the real nature of musical influence and innovation from historical example and through personal practice, students will discover liberating notions of authorship and artistry, enabling them to relinquish the quest for the new, and empowered with techniques to create the good and the vital.

Queer theory is a scholarly field that might be applied to the study of popular music to illuminate how queerness shapes and is shaped by popular culture. This scholarly field emerged out of LBTQ and queer studies to destabilize normative categories of gender (male/female), sexuality (heterosexual/homosexual), and their power relations that have structured American society. Even though queer identities, experiences, and lives have become more accepted in contemporary culture, queer performers still remain largely marginalized in popular music. However, queer performers and queer performances have always been central to popular music and culture, contributing to the destabilization of systematic gender and sexuality norms. This course will explore the relationship between queer theory and popular music, as we consider ways that the spectrum of queer identities has been articulated, constructed, performed, and consumed within popular music and society at large. In addition to introducing students to foundational texts in queer theory and identity studies, we will critically consider how the lives, performance, music, and reception of selected musical figures have contributed to the conversation of queer identity and sexuality in popular culture—from the blues of the 1920s to trap music of the contemporary era. While the class will focus on specific eras of popular music and selected artists, each class will concentrate on a topic that considers queer theories, reading practices, and performances to explore the myriad ways queer identities are central to and impacted by popular culture and society at large. We will also consider how queer identities in and out of popular music are mediated by culture and societal norms, and how these identities are further impacted by race, class, gender, and religion. Bessie Smith, Rosetta Tharpe, Billy Strayhorn, Little Richard, Fanny, Sylvester, Annie Lenox, George Michael, Prince, Meshell Ndegeocello, Ru Paul, Frank Ocean, Lady Gaga, Young Thug, Azalea Banks, and Tyler the Creator are but a few of the artists and cases we will consider within our application of queer theory to the analysis of popular music, sound, and culture in this course.

This course will engage with the contemporary and changing jazz scene — including the work of dynamic artists like Esperanza Spalding, Ambrose Akinmusire, Nicole Mitchell and Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah — as a means of telling “new” stories about jazz (with a special focus on identity, activism and the representation of traditionally marginalized voices).   Conventionally, the story of jazz has often been upheld in terms of cultural triumph, as a transcendent response to African-American struggle. Jazz has also usually been presented as a story of succession, a chain of creative genius passing from one ‘Great Man’ to the next. These have been persuasive frameworks that define the art form by a canon and a fixed set of values, inscribing a kind of perimeter. What happens outside that borderline — the legacies of multiple avant-gardes, the work of cultural or commercial hybridists, and all too frequently the voices and vantages of women — is by this definition marginal, almost literally an outside concern.    This class seeks to correct that marginalization by focusing on issues of intersectional identity and activism (including the #metoo and #blacklivesmatter movements and much more) as they relate to the evolving nature of 21st century jazz. Over the years, jazz has evolved with its circumstances through every station of its history—whether that meant tailoring performances to the length of a 78-rpm record or holding up a mirror to the moral and political turbulence of the 1960s. So the complicated cultural and technological landscape of the early 21st Century provides us with an exciting model for reconfiguring jazz history.   In this course, students can expect to learn more about jazz music, as well as issues of identity, intersectionality, and activism, and to read pertinent cultural theory. We’ll also discuss how changes in the music refract and absorb our current political climate. By way of lectures, readings, guests and more, we’ll explore how the music we (mostly) call jazz can still engender a pointed expression of identity and culture.   This class is held in conjunction with Winter JazzFest NYC.

Joni Mitchell looms as one of the most adventurous, literary and iconic songwriters of the last century. Though reductively known for hippie-era, folk-pop touchstones like the starry-eyed anthem “Woodstock,” the ecology-theme’d “Big Yellow Taxi” and the broadly philosophical “Both Sides Now,” Mitchell’s work far transcended any quaint ‘60s ideologies or styles. As a musician, and songwriter, she is regarded by her peers as second only to Dylan in influence and awe. Mitchell’s honed her skills in the politically-charged, Bleecker St. folk revival of the mid-’60s, then perfected them amid the Laurel Canyon, introspective singer-songwriter movement of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. Even amid those forward-thinking milieus, Mitchell stood apart. From the word choices in her lyrics to the chord structures of her music, Mitchell’s songs have resisted categorization at every turn. Beyond her free approach to genre, Mitchell’s work has stirred controversy for her examinations of women, her representations of race and her commitment to the politics her lyrics seem to espouse. Fascinating contradictions abound: Mitchell has expanded the roles, and perception, of women in music while disavowing feminism. She helped bring to pop aspects of African-American jazz and African music while also appearing on the cover of her album “Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter” in black face. She has written anthems of the environmental movement and the counter culture while looking askance at the role of pop stars in politics. In “The Boho Dance” she detailed her own bourgeois values, as well as the hypocrisies of rebellion. The course will unpack these contradictions while also detailing the artist’s impact on popular music and her uncommonly intimate role in the life of her fans. The course will illuminate the scope, and specifics, of Ms. Mitchell’s poetry, while establishing her placement at the pinnacle of modern wordsmiths. Unlike her closest peers, Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, Mitchell never leans on abstractions in her writing. She’s amazingly literal, yet still manages to achieve poetic leaps. By detailing Mitchell’s verbiage, the course will be of special use to students interested in lyric writing.

This class will analyze how specific changes in the way popular music was produced, distributed, promoted and categorized during the 1980s led to the economic and legal challenges which began to erode existing business models within the entire multinational music industry from the 1990s on. We will often look beyond major label hits to see the profound influence underground dance clubs and emerging trends had on the mainstream. As we listen to songs like Blondie's "Rapture"(1981), The Clash's "The Magnificent Dance," (1981), "Sweet Dreams" by the Eurythmics (1982), Talking Heads's "Slippery People" (1983), Run DMC's " It's Like That" (1983), Shannon's "Let the Music Play" (1983), Dhar Braxton's "Jump Back" (1986) and Keith Sweat's "I Want Her" (1986), students are expected to become familiar with the pivotal changes in musical taste and production techniques that occurred during that landmark decade. This will include the innovative role that specific digital drum machines and sampling keyboards (Linn, Juno, Casio, Roland) played on breakthrough singles like Devo's "Whip It" (1980), D Train's "You’re the One for Me" (1981), Soul Sonic Force's "Looking for the Perfect Beat" (1983),) and Janet Jackson's "What Have You Done for Me Lately" (1986). Digital instrumentation and storage mediums comprehensively transformed the dominant sound of '80s studio recordings and remixes. Students are expected to assess how bedroom MIDI studios, affordable sampling technology, and the cost of commercial CDs vs. rampant bootlegging would later bring troubling new legal concerns to bear upon record companies during the 1990s. We’ll consider how these intellectual property issues culminated in battles over the paradigm-shifting file sharing software that prefigured today's music streaming systems. From a business perspective, students will also learn about the significance of shifting regional and national trends in music radio through the 1980s (as measured by “R&R” magazine ratings and ad rates). This will lead to a better understanding of how music video outlets, major label promotion strategies, and multiple recording formats (vinyl, cassette, CD,) popularized new artists. (Hello, mixtape culture!) A major aim of the class — which will focus on changes in R&B and rap music due to dance clubs and remix culture— is for students to develop a greater understanding of the impact of socioeconomic factors on '80s pop music trends. By the end of the class, students should also have a greater general recognition of the volatile dynamic of systemic racism on national chart position, radio formats, and record sales. Feminist initiatives will be viewed through a more culturally inclusive Post-Colonial Womanist lens. The rising popularity of reggae and other “world music” will see us discuss issues of cultural imperialism, authenticity and appropriation. We’ll also look at the impact British post-punk and new wave artists like The Clash, The Specials, Joy Division, Art of Noise, Soft Cell and Adam Ant had on both classic and college rock radio in the U.S., as well as how AIDS and multiple drug epidemics reshaped the American dance music market. Students should be able to trace how multimedia documentation and corporate sponsorship by companies like Swatch Watches (Fresh Fest) and Budweiser (Superfest) helped mainstream the hip hop underground. Students will recognize and appreciate how a sudden pivotal influx of black music executives facilitated more artist-owned imprints and more artist rights.

In this independent study, students with a demonstrated interest in music writing, journalism and/or curation will have the opportunity to pitch a long-form project or several smaller pieces (reviews, blog or vlog posts, podcasts, artist profiles, interviews, etc.); draft, write and rewrite; and have their work edited by one or more professional instructors culled from the Institute’s Writing, History & Emergent Media Studies full-time faculty. This course serves as a companion and contributor to students’ Professional Development coursework and is relevant for entrepreneurial writers, journalists and curators who are in the process of launching writing- or reporting-centric business ventures (including, but not limited to: ad-supported blogs, online music hubs, documentary video projects, audio or visual podcasts or album box sets with a strong written / liner notes component). This course is repeatable for credit, and is open only to Recorded Music majors.

Emerging from the bohemian pubs and squats of mid-1970s West London, The Clash went on to define the political face of punk worldwide with world-famous, genre-defining songs like “White Riot,” “White Man in Hammersmith Palais,” “London Calling,” “Rock the Cashbah” and “The Call-Up.” Though the band employed various drummers and guitarists, the core trio of Strummer, co-writer Mick Jones on guitar, and bass player Paul Simonon, became as familiar to fans as individual Beatles had been in the previous decade. With two former art students in the band, their agit-prop aesthetic, extended from their early flyers to their DIY style, rooted in combat or utilitarian clothes. Musically, their aesthetic was also inclusionary, and the band allied themselves with fellow rebel musics, reggae and early hip-hop. Positioning themselves on the front line, The Clash was also pro-female, championing peer band The Slits, and they were always eager to promote an anti-racist, rebel culture agenda which remains instructive in today’s fraught political climate. In this unique course, students will consider the first wave of UK and US punk at the dawn of multiculturalism; how The Clash became such defining figures within it as they confronted social and political issues plucked live from the streets. Amid the seeming collapse of hippy dreams, the traditional class structure, and the privileges of colonialism, first wave UK punk was the soundtrack for a fractured time that arguably reflects our own: IRA bombs, anti-police street riots, anti-Fascist/racist demonstrations and festivals, strikes, power cuts. Plus, we’ll examine the contradictions of the band’s role as radicals in the American charts and the internal conflicts that tore apart the group. Their choices and legacy as activist artists will be considered in terms of its meaning in today’s fractured and fractious political climate.

On the surface, hip-hop and jazz might seem to be different genres, born of different histories. Jazz emerged in the 1920s and prioritizes traditional musicianship; hip-hop emerged in the 1970s and favors non-traditional approaches, such as its inaugural trope of two turntables and a microphone. But it’s more progressive to consider jazz and hip-hop as two interrelated personas of black music, connected by a shared interest in black aesthetics—including improvisation, flow, groove, vibe, antiphony/call and response, emotionalism/feeling and percussive attack. This unique course sheds a light on the ongoing and intertwined historical relationship between jazz and hip hop: early 70s artists like The Last Poets and Gil Scot Heron broke new group by conducting early prototype rapping over jazz grooves; by the late 1980s, intrepid hip-hoppers like Stetsasonic, Jungle Brothers, A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, and Public Enemy crafted original rhythm tracks drawing on jazz samples from the likes of Maceo Parker and Lonnie Liston Smith. The alternative hip hop movement known as Native Tongues—groups like ATCQ, De La Soul, Gang Starr, Black Sheep, and Digable Planets) forged new bohemian ground, toying with low-end rhythm and sonics. R&B visionaries of the 1990s like D’Angelo, Erykah Badu, The Roots, Slum Village and J Dilla, and Lauryn Hill fused R&B, soul, hip-hop aesthetics and jazz into a seamless ‘neo-soul’ movement, paving ground for today’s music leaders operating at the nexus of jazz and hip-hop like Anderson.Paak, Badbadnotgood, Robert Glasper (and his various bands), Kendrick Lamar and Chance the Rapper. Each class is divided into two components: the first half of each session focuses on historical-critical studies about the relationship between jazz and hip-hop. While completing focused readings, and undertaking listening and viewing assignments, students investigate the social, cultural, musical and business aspects of the relationships between hip-hop and jazz. The second half focuses on musicianship, performance, composition and production. Listening closely to music and completing in-class and out-of-class assignments under careful mentorship, students investigate compositional and studio choices at the nexus of hip hop and jazz, and work collaboratively to create, refine and produce their own original musical works.

To date, few 21st century recording artists have had as much galvanizing impact as Kendrick Lamar. The Compton, California reared rapper/MC first gained mainstream public attention in 2012 with his groundbreaking major label debut Good Kid, M.A.A.D City, a character-driven concept album matching rich, near-literary storytelling with complex rhyme flow and melancholy beats. His two follow-up studio albums have each set standards: 2015’s Grammy winning To Pimp a Butterfly was wildly praised by critics and listeners as a hip-hop masterpiece, mixing fiery radical black politics with cinematic, neo-jazz production; and 2017’s dazzlingly complex Damn continued down that path, exploring political activism and mental health, among other issues. For its part, Damn became the first ever hip-hop album to be awarded the prestigious Pulitzer Prize for Music, perhaps signaling a new phase of establishment respectability for the genre. Besides his studio albums (including his impressive curatorial contribution to the 2018 Black Panther soundtrack), Lamar has excelled at mixtapes, music videos and acting performances. This course puts the work of Kendrick Lamar in the context of post civil-rights, post-9/11 and post-2008 economic crash hip-hop culture and criticism. In particular, students can expect to address topics like: the rise of resurgent radical black politics (Black Lives Matter, NFL football protest, etc.), the growing popularity of Afro-Pessimism and black existentialism, as well as burgeoning interest in black power aesthetics, neo-negritude and other cultural initiatives. We’ll also look at Lamar’s deployment of religion and faith in his music and videos, as well as his take on masculinity. We'll think about the larger context in which Lamar’s music resonates: that includes thinking about how his music has unfolded in different ways through the Bush, Obama and Trump presidencies; the 21st century impact of technology and social media on popular music; musical and sonic changes revolving around emo rap, electronic dance music, country, indie rock, and R&B; and it includes thinking about Lamar’s work in relation to the work of peers like Kanye West, Drake, Nicki Minaj, 50 Cent , L’il Wayne, Jay Z, Frank Ocean, Lupe Fiasco, 2 Chainz, Migos, Wacka Flocka Fame, Young Thug, L’il B. Danny Brown, Chance the Rapper, and Gucci Mane. Over time, Lamar’s work has engendered substantive critical reflection by scholars and journalists that can bear weight to, and give context to, his music. Students who take this course will be required to think deeply about those critical responses. Each session in this two-credit, seven-class course will include readings, listening, multimedia presentations and performances, plus a variety of special guests, to help explore the music and life of Kendrick Lamar from a variety of perspectives.

British singer-songwriter Amy Winehouse had a relatively short musical career in the 2000s and 2010s before her passing — only two studio albums in total — but the impact she left on global popular culture remains revelatory. Merging vintage jazz and old school R&B with contemporary trends in pop, and hip-hop songwriting and production, vocalist Winehouse broke provocative new ground as a fledgling songwriter on her first album Frank (perhaps most notably on the genius single “ Fuck Me Pumps” co-written by producer Salaam Remi);  then rose to prominence on the heels of her Mark Ronson produced 2007 Back to Black, a Grammy-winning album featuring trenchant autobiography, Motown and Phil Spector era girl-group sounds, insouciant dance tunes, and stark heart-torn balladry, delivered with Brit-punk irreverence. Though her life was cut tragically short by addiction issues, Winehouse is emblematic of several trends coming together at once: the Brit-pop resurgence of the late 2000s (Lily Allen, Corinne Bailey Rae, Adele, Duffy, etc.), the decade’s retromania for nostalgic sounds, the return of a neo Ronnie Spector ‘bad girl’ culture in pop music, a post-feminist appropriation of punk rock arrogance, and the insurgence of a stylized all-genres approach to pop consistent with the “anything goes” rise of YouTube and streaming service culture.  However, Winehouse did not rise to popularity in a vacuum. Though jazz songstresses like Billie Holiday are often cited as Winehouse’s influences, she herself has cited Mahalia Jackson, Dinah Washington, and Texas-born Young Disciple expat Carleen Anderson, as singers she admired; moreover, the so-called “neo-soul” and black bohemian artists of the late 1980s and 1990s created the immediate template that made space for the ascent of Winehouse in the 2000s. In particular, Dallas-reared singer-songwriter Erykah Badu deserves significant recognition for fusing together jazz, R&B, and hip-hop in the late 1990s around old-school solutions. Late 1990s and early 2000s classic albums like  Baduizm and Mama’s Gun created the stylistic arena in which those aforementioned singers of the late 2000s would experiment, and Badu’s underappreciated late 2000s New Amerykah sets — to say nothing of her iconic fashion and boho-spiritual Soulquarian style — would provide the template for Black Lives Matter informed, art-as-activism, albums which would arrive in the next decade by artists like Solange, Beyoncé and Kendrick Lamar.  From different sides of the pond, and born of different eras, Badu and Winehouse can be seen as symbolic sister rebels cut from the same punky, irreverent, revolutionary spirit. This class primarily juxtaposes the two icons, illuminating the historical tensions between whiteness and blackness; between vaudeville and the black chitlin’ circuit, between Tin Pan Alley and the Brill Building, between an individualistic, anarchic British Jewish woman and a collective-minded, post-Hip Hop Dallas-born African-American “race woman.” Each session in this two-credit, seven-class course will include readings, listening, multimedia presentations and performances, plus a variety of special guests, to help explore the music and life of both of these icons, and where they intersect, from a variety of perspectives.

This 7-week course explores the remarkable — and in some ways overlooked — six-decade-long career of Paul McCartney. That many of his achievements happened while a member of The Beatles should not obscure a holistic view of McCartney’s particular genius and ample innovation, which includes: forging a new role for the bass guitar in pop music; transforming popular songwriting; introducing electronic instrumentation and avant-garde composition to the mainstream; merging the functions of artist and entrepreneur; and modeling a blueprint for longevity in the arts and popular culture. We study McCartney in all these dimensions, and revisit important critique as well; in so doing, we seek to understand the meaning of being an artist, a partner, and a professional; and the means of making artistry a lifelong endeavor, with stages of growth, decline, change, and rebirth.

Women are making significant contributions as creative and business leaders in all areas of the music industry. In this course, students will learn about entrepreneurship as a process that can be applied to launching and sustaining a successful creative business enterprise in the music industry. Students will first engage in a historical and critical examination of the role that women have played, and the skills that have enables them to succeed, as creative and business leaders in popular music. Class discussions will focus on helping students identify and develop the skills and strengths they need to become future artistic and business entrepreneurs. Guest speakers will include women entrepreneurs who are leading companies and who have successfully started their own business ventures in the music industry. Students will learn the circumstances and strategies behind their success. By the end of the course, students will put together an individual short term and long term plan to advance their careers as future executives and leaders in the music industry.

This 14-week colloquium puts students in direct conversation with executives, entrepreneurs, and artists to answer the question: What would a truly equitable music business look like for Black Americans? The music business was founded in the early 1900s, in the midst of the Jim Crow era, and the modern industry still retains its contours. Segmented into market sectors which segregate both artists and executives by race and ethnicity, the business of music — by structure and design — continues to place white executives in charge of marketing a culture largely derived from Black Americans, while placing artists and executives of color in marginalized positions. And yet, the narrative of the music business has not been one of constant defeat for Black Americans. In fact, most of the progress out of Jim Crow has been the result of a succession of Black entrepreneurial successes and victories; and these strategies give us also a great sense of possibility. The American music industry, like so many other institutions, is currently being challenged by coalitions and initiatives, as never before, to confront and overcome its deep structural inequities. Racism is far from the only problem: There is the systematic diminishment and exclusion of women; patriarchy and sexism are twinned with and reinforce white dominance. Instead of incremental reform, what actions could we take, both inside and outside the business, to create more radical models that no longer disenfranchise Black people, diminish women, and center whiteness? The final projects will put these ideas into the forms of actionable proposals and business plans.

Many modern music legends achieved their level of singular greatness by instinctively or intuitively making radical, left-curve artistic decisions. Think of James Brown staying on the "One"; John Cage closing the piano lid and sitting still for 4'33"; David Bowie creating lyrics through a random text generator. Miles Davis committing jazz heresy with cut-n-paste post-production techniques. In some cases, these creative decisions were so galvanizing that they irrevocably shifted entire worlds of music-making and they altered the very possibilities of artistic discourse. Many achieved this not merely by breaking convention or habit, but by some alternative philosophical stance and strategy (often called radical thinking): reimagining creative approaches and musical concepts; avoiding rules by creating new ones; embracing mistakes and inviting happenchance. This hybrid course blends writing/history/emergent media studies and production studies. The dual purpose is to serve as an introduction to a liberating creative strategy based on a philosophical stance, and an invitation to apply that philosophy to actual music-making. The course will familiarize students with a wide stylistic range of music-makers who employed radical-thinking approaches as a means to creating music, engaging with disruptive theories and/or experimenting with technologies and ideologies, from Oliver Messiaen, John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Ornette Coleman, Miles Davis, Archie Shepp, The Art Ensemble of Chicago, Yoko Ono, Anthony Braxton, Henry Threadgill, Brian Eno, Sun Ra, Laurie Anderson, Meshell Ndegeocello, Oneohtrix Point Never, Blood Orange, and Kanye West. Students delve into diverse histories of artistic improvisation, chance, intuition, free expression, stream of consciousness, and other approaches. Students will read work on musical freedom and risk by writers like David Borgo, David Toop, and others, as well as investigating anti-normative movements like Dadaism and Fluxus, as well as artistic practices like oblique strategies, generative music, free jazz, and the habitorium. Then—with direct guidance from the production co-instructor, a radical music creator in their own right—students will divide into teams, and the co-instructor will interact with the student teams for 3 or 4 weeks, guiding and helping to develop specific project ideas. Furthering upper-level studies in REMU classes like Experiments in the Future of Performing and Experiments in the Future of Producing, students will be encouraged to explore risky, alternative, and radically experimental avenues of artistic creation. By the end of the course, each team will have produced two or three projects—recordings, multimedia presentations, and/or performances—incorporating ideas and strategies that reflect the historical and cultural avant-garde principles they have been studying. Students will discover a vocabulary and establish a foundational understanding of the concepts and history of the topic. The final week may include a class presentation of the top project from each team, with musicians and/or industry guests commenting on each. The ultimate course goal is for students to break out of routine and create outside the box through exposure to new frameworks, through the shattering of norms and habits, and through an embrace of the unconventional, weird, the out-there.

In the 1990s, Billboard named singer-songwriter-producer Mariah Carey the most commercially successful artist of that decade. Today, she remains the eleventh top-selling artist in music history. Though her commercial relevance is undeniable, there has been minimal scholarly investigation into Carey's cultural importance, and the widespread influence of her musicianship and artistry. That neglect is profound, because few artists have had as much impact on vocal style as Mariah Carey, and her inspirational ballads and dance tracks have transformed the sound and feel of pop. Her massive success across styles like pop, R&B, and hip-hop has also changed the industrial business of superstar-oriented popular music. This first-of-its-kind course proposes to deconstruct Mariah Carey's legacy, with a special focus on issues of race, gender, celebrity, globalization and spectacle. Among topics we'll consider: Mariah Carey's use of melisma; the politics of camp, diva-dom and flamboyance; bi-racial identity and passing; changing 90s definitions of the mainstream and alternative; femininity, control and freedom (economic, vocal, etc.); Carey's outsize success at making Christmas music; how and why women of color tend to become marginalized in pop even as they remain at the center of its very construction.

The name “Taylor Swift” has become synonymous with a number of big ideas. To some in the music industry, the eleven-time Grammy winner (including three Album of the Year awards) defines 21st century country music’s pivot to pop radio. To others, Taylor Swift is the pop star of the 2010s (with the album sales and chart history to back it up— With sales of over 200 million records worldwide, Swift is one of the best-selling music artists of all time). When deployed pejoratively, however, the name “Taylor Swift” can signal anything from white privilege to white feminism to white taste in an era of intersectionality and Black Lives Matter conscientiousness. Taylor Swift may be a loaded phrase for some, but the career of Taylor Swift is more simply an embodiment of music’s American Dream. Raised on a Christmas tree farm in Pennsylvania, teenage Swift would move to Nashville and become one of the most lauded young songwriters in history. Her music was infatuated with love, innocence and romantic fantasias that would sour in the natural way those fairy tales do as a young woman grows up. By her early twenties, she was a full-fledged pop icon, having ditched Music Row for producers like Max Martin and Jack Antonoff, and tabloid fame. Along the way, there were feuds, squads and political discourses aplenty. Swift has encountered the type of controversies that would destroy most pop stars’ careers and acclaim. But at age 31, she has never been more awarded or acclaimed as a singer-songwriter. Meanwhile, her impact is felt in the success and style of younger singers/songwriters like Olivia Rodrigo, Conan Gray, Phoebe Bridgers and Clairo. This course proposes to deconstruct both the appeal and aversions to Taylor Swift through close readings of her music and public discourse as it relates to her own growth as an artist and a celebrity. Through readings, lectures and more, the class delves into analyses of the culture and politics of teen girlhood in pop music, fandom, media studies, whiteness and power as it relates to her image and the images of those who have both preceded and succeeded her. We’ll also consider topics like copyright and ownership, American nationalism and the ongoing impact of social media on the pop music industry.

In 2021, New Zealand pop star / singer-songwriter Lorde released a five-song EP of tracks from her Solar Power album, rerecorded in the indigenous Māori language. Five years prior, pop stars like Pharrell Williams, Dave Matthews, Radiohead, and Sia raised their voices at Standing Rock, North Dakota in support of the protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline—one of many increasing threats to the sovereignty of Indigenous Nations. Their celebrity presence was key to attracting mainstream media coverage. However, those artists were largely following the lead of Native hip-hoppers like Supaman, Snotty Nose Rez Kids, and Prolific, who’d already been at Standing Rock since the start of the protests, rallying their own communities. This course will engage students around the growing globalization of Indigenous Peoples movements that intersects culture, politics, and economics. These days, Indigenous musicians like Aboriginal Australian rapper Baker Boy and Canadian First Nations vocalist Jeremy Dutcher are gaining in visibility, topping critics’ year-end Best-Of lists and taking home awards. This “Creative Natives” wave is being felt far outside of music, too: Tzotzil fashion designer Alberto López Gomez from Chiapas, Mexico was featured in New York Fashion Week; Māori filmmaker Taika Waititi won an Oscar for JoJo Rabbit; influential art critics heralded White Mountain Apache music performance artist and film scorer Laura Ortman at the 2020 Whitney Biennial, and Seminole/Muscogee Creek showrunner Sterling Harjo’s Reservation Dogs is the new hit on FX/Hulu. Over the course of seven weeks, students will engage with a wide range of international Indigenous performers and music(s) they may have never heard before—from Māori metal to Saami yoik-rap, Quechua huanyo-pop, Inuit throatsinging, Maasai hip-hop, Hawaiian reggae, Tokelauan dance-pop, and even Tuareg rock. Meanwhile, they will discover how Indigenous artists have not only achieved national, even international, acclaim in popular mainstream music genres, they are increasingly “indigenizing” them with languages, instruments, and vocal techniques from their own cultural traditions. We will also look at some Indigenous stars who broke barriers to achieve mainstream fame as singular personalities and cultural ambassadors: artists like Yma Sumac, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Israel Kamakawiwo’ole, and more. And also, we’ll survey the impact of Indigenous artists and music on the both the mainstream recording industry, as well as the growth of Indigenous-directed business entities doing things on their own terms. Through readings, lectures, and class discussions, students will be introduced to important scholarship on Indigenous identity, (de-)colonization, cultural appropriation, aesthetics, and so on. Any student interested in socio-cultural movements, roots music trends, arts-centered activism, and the ways in which music introduces audiences to the messages within each of these—especially regarding themes like climate justice, human rights, social inclusion, and sovereignty issues—will benefit from taking this class. Students can also expect to leave the course with a greater awareness of, and hopefully appreciation for, the growing global presence and popularity of Indigenous sounds, voices, and views.

Music is a spiritual practice.  Music and spirituality are intricately related, with spirituality often being the inspiration for the creation of music, and music so often creating the desired atmosphere for a spiritual occasion.  This course will explore the relationship between the two by investigating the role of spirituality in music and the role of music in spiritual practices around the world throughout history. All creators of art eventually must reconcile with the spiritual nature of living life as an artist.  Whether they reject the notion entirely or look at their artistic practice as lifelong meditative practice – this course will help them find answers.  By exploring the history of the relationship between spirituality and religion in music as well as the role of ritual, students will contextualize and articulate their own spiritual paths with a sense of confidence. Through weekly readings, listenings and creative assignments, students will explore all rhythmic, harmonic and melodic aspects, as well as the historic significance of sonic information as it relates to spirituality, mysticism and self-reflection.  Basic understanding of and access to a Digital Audio Workstation (Garage Band, ProTools, Logic, Ableton etc) is a requirement as students will be given access to recorded music stems in order to create their own sonic collages within the given parameters of each genre. Students will complete a library of their own works throughout the semester to accompany their reflective writing on each musical style and the culture from which it comes.

In today’s music industry, it has never been easier for DIY artists to self-produce, self-release and self-promote their own music. This has led to a golden age for so-called “independent artists” operating outside of traditional label structures. But as opportunities have emerged for independents, so has a whole industry of middlemen, services and self-appointed experts selling solutions for indie success in the streaming era, as well as mainstream co-optation of indie aesthetics. It all begs the enormous, difficult, hard-to-pin-down question: What is indie? What has indie meant historically? How has the definition changed over time? What does it mean today? Is it a “sound”/“vibe” or a set of politics? In this class, we’ll survey the roots of indie rock (looking at the beginnings of labels like Dischord, Rough Trade, Merge and Kill Rock Stars as examples), chart the trajectory of the term as it became more mainstream through the 2000s, and consider what it means today in the age of streaming. We’ll read about and listen to loads of classic independent releases from the past half century, hear from current indie label operators, and have engaging in-class discussions on the state of “indie” today.

This 14-week course explores how machines changed the way we make music — and how machine music created new paths in rhythm, harmony, sound, and composition — through the lens of Detroit and the Detroit-born electronic producer-composer James Dewitt Yancey. Known variously as “Jay Dee,” “J Dilla” or simply “Dilla,” Yancey’s professional career was short, spanning a dozen years before his death from a rare blood disease in 2006. But his influence in that period shifted the sound of popular music; and his ideas have compelled a new generation of musicians — both electronic and traditional — who have drawn inspiration from Yancey’s music and seized upon his innovations, chief among them a unique conception of musical time. In this course, which spans genres from jazz to Motown R&B to funk to techno to hip-hop, we use Detroit as a grounding context for understanding how music evolves, and how we evolve with it.

This course is an in-depth exploration of the history and influence of the genre known as Reggaeton. A hybrid of Spanish-language hip-hop and dancehall with roots in Panama and Puerto Rico, Reggaeton is one of the most dominant genres in music today. The biggest artist in the world, Bad Bunny, is a Reggaeton artist who sings entirely in Spanish while regularly breaking streaming and touring records across the globe. Over the last decade, the genre's consumption has continued to grow, not just in the millions of people who make up the Spanish-speaking diaspora around the world, but with younger listeners of other languages. In part because of its infectious rhythm, Reggaeton is often misunderstood as party music. In fact, Reggaeton is a catalyst for change on a changing planet. It is a view on colonialism, imperialism, gender stratification, identity politics and the fight to right historical wrongs. It is also a sign of the increasing cultural and political power of Latinos on the world stage. This course will explore the true roots and meaning of this primarily Afro-Latino art form with roots in a revolution of sorts against the suppression and exploitation of marginalized communities, its evolution in the music business, and its place in contemporary popular culture.

Nearly three decades after Andre Benjamin – not yet known as André 3000 – declared, "The South got something to say!" amid loud boos at the 1995 Source Awards, Atlanta's influence in hip-hop is no longer in dispute. From its modern music's roots as a version of Miami bass, to Outkast's Southern-fried spin on the gangster rap of California and Texas, to the turn-of-the-century trap boom and beyond, Atlanta firmly established itself as the center of the rap universe in the 2010s, thanks to a blueprint that harnessed culture, technology and geography in equal measure. Recent Atlanta artists like Gucci Mane, Jeezy, Migos, Young Thug, Future and Lil Baby – along with their equally important producers, including Zaytoven, Shawty Redd, Lex Luger and Metro Boomin – built upon the foundation of their Southern rap forebears to change songwriting, music distribution, fashion and more. But as important to the equation were the social and political contexts that enabled (and necessitated) their successes, including Atlanta's status as "the cradle of the Civil Rights Movement" and "the Black Mecca" – and also its interconnected struggles with income inequality, drugs, guns and gentrification. The impact of the city's trap music can be traced through modern hip-hop's digital spread, from Chicago drill to Soundcloud rap, and then back again. This course – with a focus on the years 2013 to 2020, amid the industry-saving domination of platforms like YouTube and Spotify – will explore how and why artists from little or nothing, outside of rap's traditional strongholds of New York and Los Angeles, were ripe to take advantage of the dawn of digital streaming, and how the rise of Atlanta trap – as a sound, a subject and a physical space – affected the city, hip-hop and popular music writ large.

Lana Del Rey is one of the most accomplished and influential pop musicians of the 21st century. Over the course of eight critically acclaimed studio albums, the six-time Grammy nominated artist has introduced a sad core, melancholic, and baroque version of dream pop that in turn helped shift and reinvent the sound (and mood) of mainstream music in beyond the 2010s. Through her arresting visuals and her thematic attention to mental health and tales of toxic, damaged love, Del Rey provided a new platform for artists of all genders to create “anti-pop” works of substance that could live in a mainstream once categorized as bubblegum. In 2019, VICE writer Duncan Cooper wrote of Del Rey, “it's hard to imagine an Eilish, a Lorde, or a Halsey without her first.” In this course, we will deconstruct Lana Del Rey’s sometimes enigmatic contributions to 21st century pop stardom, looking through the lens of gender, class, race and whiteness, and taking into considerations topics like nostalgia, inauthenticity, persona, melancholy, noir aesthetics and cancel culture. Lana Del Rey is a highly controversial and polarizing pop star: she has been scrutinized for glamorizing sexual abuse, multiple instances of cultural appropriation, willful misogyny, and for her harsh criticisms of women. In this course, we will consider Lana Del Rey’s relationship to 21st century feminism, and whether she might be regarded as a Bad Feminist—one who makes significant contributions to the cause, yet shuns the movement as a part of her identity. Through an extensive analysis of her music (including lyrics, production, and visuals), interviews, critical thinkpieces and essays, as well as by reading texts like Simon Reynolds’ Retromania: Pop Culture’s Addiction To Its Own Past, students will gain a deeper understanding of Del Rey’s role and impact in music. Students can also expect to learn about artists adjacent to Del Rey, and to more thoroughly consider the relationship of pop music in the 2010s (and 2020s) to social justice movements like #BlackLivesMatter, #MeToo, and #TimesUp.

The movie soundtrack emerged as a driver of popular culture in the late 20th Century: albums like Saturday Night Fever and Flashdance in many ways became more influential and successful than the films whence they came, the crest of a Golden Age of soundtracks that lasted for more than three decades. In this 7-week course, we explore the rise, reign, and ongoing impact of the soundtrack as a work of art, its role in the filmmaking process, as a marketing tool, and a galvanizing force in music and film. We track the evolution of the soundtrack from original cast albums for Broadway shows and Hollywood musicals; to the first wave of score-dominated soundtracks that featured one or two popular songs as tentpoles; though the artistic wave of 1960s and 70s soundtrack albums, to the blockbuster years of the 80s and 90; and explore the reasons for the slow decline of the soundtrack’s power in the 21st Century. Through it all, we will have conversations with great directors and music supervisors, music producers and artists, and engage in reading and coursework that explores the past and in creative work that points to the future. This course is designed to serve and engage multiple student communities at Tisch, from recorded music to film and TV.

A professional composer leads a theoretical and practical course dealing with artistic and technical aspects in composing music for film and television. Through analysis, demonstration, and controlled practice, students learn and deal with the specifics of the composer?s job, duties, and responsibilities, and develop listening and production skills necessary for the creative use of music. The course provides an inside look into a relationship between composer and music editor, and explores music as a creative tool. In addition to musical considerations, the business and personal relationship between composers and directors/producers is discussed. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

Raf Simons. Supreme. Undercover. Rick Owens. Takahiro Miyashita The Soloist. Helmut Lang. Number (N)ine and many more have built collectible fashion empires and massive secondary resale markets with soaring price points for rare items inspired by the attitudes, and in collaboration with, the greatest music and artists of all time: Bowie, Cobain, Jagger, Yeezy, Public Enemy, and many more. This course will look closely at the timeless iconic brands, artists, and spirit which transfers from song, to runway, to street. We will look at rare and collectible pieces, the resellers marketplace, limited collaborations, licensed images, and the new generation of designers who carry the torch of music in the pieces they create.

This course will explore many of the major Music, Youth and Subcultural movements of the last 40 years in terms of "Fashion". We will look at what was/is being worn and the relationship between the clothing, the music and the culture at large. Some of the individuals and genres covered will be Glam, Punk, Hip-Hop, Goth, Grunge, Skater, David Bowie, Vivienne Westwood, Courtney Love, Sean Combs, Madonna, Jean Paul Gaultier, NWA, Marilyn Manson, Pharrell Williams and American Apparel. We will also examine the role of the stylist in this process. Students will have reading and research assignments and final research paper (10 pages). The readings will introduce the exploration of these subjects through the lens of Cultural Studies. The class will examine these subjects/objects historically as well as in terms of Race, Class, Gender and Sexuality. The students should walk away with a much greater understanding of the relationships between these individuals and movements, and their relationships to the culture and politics of their time.

Music copyright laws were developed in the 19th century to protect sheet music, and continued to protect the “legible” aspects of music in the wake of developing recording technologies at the turn of the twentieth century. Thus, sound is often one of the most contentious aspects of music copyright cases, as copyright laws have historically been based upon a score, lyrics, or specific aspects of a recording. This class will study significant cases of copyright infringement in the history of American popular music. After an introduction to the history of copyright laws developed in the 19th century, each week will be devoted to deconstructing the songs in question and their production, the specifics of the legal case/trial, and both the impact and meaning of the verdict within the history of copyright law in the U.S. Cases that we will cover include disputes around songs such as “Ta Ra Ra Boom De Ay” from turn-of-the-twentieth century, to “Hound Dog” (Big Momma Thornton vs. Elvis Presley) and “Come Together” (Chuck Berry vs. The Beatles) of the rock and roll era, to Vanilla Ice (vs. Queen and David Bowie) and De La Soul (vs. The Turtles) in 1990s hip hop, to Beyoncé’s “Baby Boy” (Armour vs. Knowles) and Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” (Marvin Gaye vs. Robin Thicke) of the twenty-first century. We will study the legal cases themselves, along with invited (legal) scholars and guests, to investigate how copyright law and ideas of intellectual property in music and sound within popular culture have developed through these cases. We will also deconstruct the relationship between the original and contested recorded sounds, as well as how this relationship was considered within each case.

If you've been to a 3D or Imax movie, if you've tried Google Cardboard or Oculus Rift, if you've listened to music on surround sound speakers or noise-canceling headphones, if you’ve explored an interactive website, visual album, pop-up store or app, seen a Punchdrunk show or visited the Burning Man Festival, you are by default a consumer of immersive experiences. One of the main drivers of culture and technology in the 21st century, immersion is defined as the process by which one or more of the senses become saturated as environmental objects surround envelope or come in closer proximity to us. Virtual and augmented reality, innovative video games, and the idea that consumers area always “plugged in” via mobile devices are just some of the ways we experience immersion in contemporary commercial terms. But the concept is not new: scholars like Benjamin, McLuhan, and Debord have long been concerned with theorizing the “sensorium” and media spectacle. Immersion underwrites so many developments in media and elsewhere: film close-ups, site-specific theater, photography, moving panoramas and dioramas, haunted houses, houses of mirrors, and certain forms of installation art. Immersion is also widely considered to be the key to learning new languages or mastering different cultures and tourism, so it plays a key role in 20th and 21st century globalization. This class looks at the history and culture of immersion and how emergent technology has impacted immersion. It also considers how our ongoing demand for proximity has shaped contemporary entertainment and technological needs; immersion is now a multi-billion dollar global business. We especially look at immersion in popular music – spanning everything from Satie to ambient music to surround sound, panoramic sound and Dolby to theme parks to 21st century ‘experience websites,’ spectacular live shows, app culture, brand experiences, pop-up stores, holograms and holophonics. Students should leave the class with greater understanding of immersion as a cultural principle and a better knowledge of how entertainment industries will be meeting consumer need for immersion in the past now and into the future.

In this class, students will study the history, evolution and social importance of hip-hop from its underground inception in the Bronx in the early 1970s to its current ubiquity as global youth culture. Using audio-visual materials, critical readings and taking class trips when possible, students will consider the issues, themes, and conflicts that inform hip-hop culture, paying specific attention to the significance of key artists in music, fashion, dance and visual art. Students are encouraged to pay attention to and attend hip-hop events around the city and in the daily media. This course may count as General Education Humanities credit for non-majors. Please check with your department.

The Beatles' public career lasted less than a decade and yielded an official discography that includes just over 10 hours of music. Yet in remarkably short order, they transformed themselves from a northern English dance band that produced simple, blues-based songs like "Love Me Do" (1962) into the intensely creative, experimental composers of pieces as complex as "Strawberry Fields Forever" (1966). Using their official discography, as well as radio recordings, concert performances (on both audio and video) and studio outtakes, we will examine the techniques the Beatles used to create their extraordinary catalogue. Along the way, we will consider the ways the revolutionized everything from recording techniques and concerts to conceptions of the social role and responsibility of popular musicians.

Every student of recorded music—aspiring performers, producers, songwriters, journalists, and industry professionals alike—needs sharp writing skills in order to communicate clearly and tell compelling stories across all types of media. In this class, we’ll study the art of music writing in a changing media landscape, in order to gain perspective on the greater music media ecosystem as a whole. Music writers today face a number of obstacles similar to those faced by musicians: industries in upheaval, disrupted by the digital ad market and a small handful of algorithmically governed platform monopolies. But as the structures of the music media landscape change, the core values that make music writing valuable remain the same: the significance of putting artists and music scenes in context, telling powerful stories, driving discovery, offering sharp critique, research and reporting, and more. As the media environment grows more complicated, it’s up to us to ask the big questions. How do we use the tools, rather than having the tools use us? How do we continue to stay connected with audiences, tell powerful stories across platforms, communicate clearly and effectively? In this class, we’ll unpack the state of music journalism and the long-standing principles of quality music writing, examine the changing mechanisms of the greater music media industry, and hone in on strategies for upholding those principles in today’s media environment. This class will involve reading, writing, listening, and critical conversations. We’ll learn the timeless skill of writing clearly and effectively about music, what makes for a good piece of criticism, how to develop interviewing skills, and how to tell an engaging story, practicing these forms along the way. We’ll look at the challenges and changes in today’s media landscape that are having an outsized impact on music writing, particularly the rise of streaming services and the evolving platform economy, and think about the challenges and opportunities. We’ll look into ways that we can apply the values of solid music writing in an ever-changing landscape, and practicing writing for podcasts and audio segments, discussing the steady rise of email newsletters, and the importance of crafting your own narrative.

This will be a class exploring some of the major non-musical influencers of hip-hop (Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Richard Pryor, Bruce Lee, etc). Class will look at how these figures shaped the culture of hip-hop as it was in its infancy. Students will also learn how to write about culture at a conceptual level. The central question of the class: how did we arrive at the contemporary state of hip-hop? Who are the icons who were shaping hip-hop before it was born?

This course takes a broad look at the historical development of rock ?n? roll, from its sources in early 20th-century blues, country and rhythm & blues through giants like Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and U2. Drawing on a body of informative work by critics and scholars, we will consider rock music as a reflection of American history and popular culture, tracing its growth and change through a multitude of styles - folk-rock, soft-rock, punk, pop, grunge, metal and indie-rock - and examine issues such as race, gender and celebrity. An emphasis will be placed on developing students? critical writing skills.

Fifty years after 1960s, the tumultuous events of that decade haunt our consciousness. Music is the most obvious example of how the “spirit of the 60s” still fascinates us. But no one can grasp the power of ‘60s music without understanding its political and aesthetic context. The style and substance of rock are intimately related to broader social currents of the time. This course will help you to understand those connections, and the logic that informed the music. We will explore major movements associated with the ‘60s, including the counterculture, the sexual revolution, the New Left, Black Power, Second-Wave Feminism, and Pop Art. We will consider the roots of 60s sensibility, from the Beats, hipsters, and existentialists of the postwar era to the folk revival of the early part of that decade. We will examine the philosophical currents of the ‘60s through some of its leading literary figures, including James Baldwin, Allen Ginsberg, Marshall McLuhan, Herbert Marcuse, Susan Sontag, Ellen Willis, and Tom Wolfe. In addition, we will discuss the aesthetic strategies of Andy Warhol, who influenced everything from rock music to cinema and art. We will discover how the rebellion against distinctions between “highbrow” and “lowbrow” culture produced a new aesthetic sensibility central to the rise of rock. These artifacts will be examined alongside music with a similar spirit, so that they can be experienced contrapuntally. Iconic songs will be presented against material from other media so that their congruencies are evident. I will use my own experiences as a prominent rock critic in the ‘60s, and my personal interactions with important rock creators—such as the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Jim Morrison—to bring the era alive, leaving you with a new perspective on how the music and the values of that generation were related to your life. And hopefully it will be groovy.

This 14-week class introduces students to the history of innovative entrepreneurs and institutions in American recorded music. We recount the stories and make arguments about famous executives, managers, producers, performers, DJs, and journalists/publishers from the dawn of the music business until the present day. We study how and why the fields, fiefdoms, and empires built by these impressive and sometimes controversial icons have transformed the course of popular music. Along the way, students become well versed in the history of 20th and 21st century recorded music, and in various music genres and styles; and we place the art and business of creating and selling recorded music in historical, political, cultural and social context. Throughout, we look at approaches to crafting successful oral and written arguments about popular music with clear, compelling writing about sound.

A broad overview and practical analysis of the music industry, covering a broad spectrum of business areas, including streaming, distribution, licensing/synch publishing, live performance, rad io, marketing, copyright and related fields. This course will also explore emerging technologies accelerating rapid changes and the challenges and opportunities students will face when entering the marketplace. Students will examine different music industry roles and career paths, and the knowledge, skills, and experiences they will need to gain a competitive edge. Students will be introduced to the course topics via readings, lectures, interviews and other media-rich content delivered asynchronously in advance which will allow every class to focus on productive discussions and activities related to business concepts. Face-to-face class meetings will be complemented with smaller group breakouts guided by industry professionals serving as professional mentors. There, students will have the opportunity to grapple with, workshop, and apply business concepts and ideas to advance their own music projects.

A follow-up complement to the first-year required Creative Entrepreneurs in Historical Context course that focused on entrepreneurs and producers, Artists and Audiences in Historical Context considers the history of popular (& semi-popular) music through the lens of iconic performers/recording artists and their audiences and communities, with special attention to issues of space and geography. Here are the central questions this class asks: Why do we have performing musicians and recording artists? What work do they do in the world, and how have our conceptions of the artist changed over time? And why do artists continue to need audiences? What role do fans and listeners play in our culture and politics? As we tackle these questions, we’ll look at how artists and audiences have been impacted over the decades by emerging media and technologies; we’ll look at auteur theory, crowd theory and cultural conceptions of musical genius; we’ll address taste and the rockism/poptimism debates; the pervasive role of stardom/celebrity as it determines what we might call today’s “pop industrial complex;” we’ll talk about issues of freedom of expression and political activism; we’ll think about the artist’s role in and against forces like war, terrorism and various forms of state and religious repression; and the artist’s struggle to reach audiences in, and against, categories of classification like genre and format. Artists and Audiences in Historical Context is an intensive reading and writing course, perhaps the most intensive one you will take at REMU: students read critical and historical writing about a diverse range of performers/recording artists, and then practice critical/creative writing themselves. Working with assistant editors/mentors as well as the instructor, students will be expected to learn how music writing improves through drafting, editing and stylistic refinement. Weekly audio/video playlists will supplement the reading and writing.

Working with an Industry Industry Mentor I is a colloquium-course, taught by experienced music and entertainment professionals, that provides continuing industry Industry mentorship and guidance to first-year Clive Davis students. Offered during students’ second semester in the program, it is the follow-up course to the required first-semester core class “How the Contemporary Music Business Works” and a key part of CDI’s Professional Development Industry Mentorship curriculum that starts in students’ first year and continues through their four-year matriculation in the Institute. Under the guidance of Industry Mentors, students continue building and honing their professional skill sets. Throughout the Spring semester, each student is required to develop and refine their Dossier—an online portfolio in which students evaluate their own creative and entrepreneurial progress, and faculty offer their input as well. Those student Dossiers will be reviewed and assessed at the end of the semester by faculty and invited members of the industry. Students also participate and present in an annual year end juried review that takes place in April. Working with an Industry Mentor carefully matches student with an Industry mentor, whose job it is to (1) help students workshop and update the Dossier (2) succeed in the preparation for their year-end review, and (3) receive feedback and advice from an industry professional about their career plans and creative progress. Students will be required to meet three or more times over the course of a semester with that assigned Industry Mentor. During the first of these meetings, students meet in a small group format to collectively discuss their semester-long objectives.The second meeting is one-on-one between the student and their Industry Mentor where constructive feedback is provided on the Dossier and the presentation for the year-end juried review. The third meeting returns to the small group format: students rehearse their juried review presentation in front of their peers and receive critical feedback. Additional office hour meetings are encouraged if students require further input or assistance from their Industry Mentors. The goal of the course is for industry mentors to serve as role models and to share their professional expertise, helping students to develop the pertinent skills they need to succeed in their desired field(s).

How does a completed recording reach the ears (and wallets) of millions of listeners? How does one bring other music related skills to the attention of potential clients and customers? This course will provide everyone from aspiring record producers and artists to executives with knowledge and instruction in a wide variety of marketing and promotional activities and methodologies. Course topics and discussions include consumer research and demographic analysis; retail sales; budgetary and financial planning; brand and corporate sponsorship; radio promotion; film & TV; touring, digital & mobile platforms; and the global marketplace. Students will be assigned projects based upon their individual career aspirations. Examinations will test knowledge of marketing strategy and protocol and a final personalized marketing plan will be delivered.

Working with an Industry Mentor 2 is a zero-credit colloquium class taught by experienced industry professionals that provides individualized professional development mentorship and guidance to Clive Davis students in their second year in the program. Topics covered—which include professional skills and portfolio development—are tailored to the unique needs and goals of students. By the end, students have a professional-quality Dossier that reflects the full range of their skills and talents; a video presentation for their year-end review and concrete tools and materials to market their skills and accomplishments and attract the interest and attention of followers, fans, current/future employers, clients, and others.

This practicum course is for students to continue the development of projects as well as for live-testing marketing and launch plans and caters equally to aspiring executives, tech and social entrepreneurs, performers, producers, songwriters, and journalists. Utilizing project management techniques, students will be responsible for accomplishing weekly milestones that will move them towards product-market-fit and building an audience. Lessons from Creative Marketing and Incubation & Launch will move student projects from theoretical to applied, with the professor available to reiterate any difficult concepts and provide regular individualized guidance. 

If you want to understand the music industry, you must accept, and lean into, the fact that it is a moving target that never ceases to evolve. Because of this, we can't merely study historical references, and we can't merely look at how things are today. We must familiarize ourselves with where the puck is going. -- Is artificial intelligence bringing a seismic shift to the worlds of songwriting and production? -- Is blockchain technology that allows for direct payments to creators removing the need for legacy industry intermediaries? -- As financial institutions accept music publishing as a nonspeculative investable asset, will creators change how they think about monetizing their work? This class will study the latest constructive and destructive disruptions in our industry through case studies and conversations with guests. We'll examine what's changing and what if any historical references can tell us about how things may shake out.

This course provides a comprehensive overview of the music business as a business, its structure, day-to-day business activities, contemporary trends and developments, deals, key players and companies across different business segments. The application of contemporary business practices in creativity & innovation, leadership, marketing, branding and finance are explored in relation to music business activities and settings. Focus is also given to music industry career paths and opportunities, preparation, and planning. The end imbues you with a foundation of knowledge, practical, real-world understanding and strategic direction to take your career to the next level.

The broad aims of this course are to introduce students to the practical aspects of entrepreneurship in the music industry, the skills and innovative thinking that empower music entrepreneurs, and the processes and strategies that contribute to entrepreneurial success. Strong emphasis is placed on the development and reinforcement of business knowledge and applied skills through group project work, in-class and out-of-class assignments, interactive class discussions, and self and peer assessments. Students engage with successful music entrepreneurs and gain valuable insights and inspiration to help them pursue their entrepreneurial ideas. Key course themes include: learning to forge music-based ideas in to workable business concepts, failure as an essential prerequisite for learning.

This course introduces music marketing concepts, principles and approaches that musicians, songwriters, record producers, executives and music companies use to optimize their visibility, analyze, target and sell directly to customers and fans. Traditional and nontraditional marketing approaches for retail, distribution, radio, touring and publicity will be examined with an emphasis placed on online tools and strategies, including website and mobile optimization, smartphone and desktop apps, seo, crowdsourcing, live streaming and crowd funding, and their applications. Topics covered include customer behavior, segmentation, research design, market strategy, and branding. Through case studies, discussions, research, lectures, guest speakers and individual/group assignments, students develop industry-focused knowledge and skills that will assist them in formulating a winning go-to market plan for tan entrepreneurial music venture of choice.

This course provides students with essential knowledge, a framework, the inspiration, and courage to translate their ideas involving music into new business opportunities and startup ventures. Through case studies, project work, reading, research, self-reflection, and interactions with guest speakers, students learn and experience entrepreneurship as a way of thinking and acting, and as a process that leads to new venture creation. The principal focus of this class is on the start-up process and the creation of new ventures that produce value. Students learn key factors associated with venture success and critically evaluate their own prospects for entrepreneurship. Emphasis is given to design thinking approaches, methodologies and tools that can be used to help accelerate ideas and opportunities that students are most passionate about. The different elements of a business plan are learned in class and through skill-building exercises and writing assignments. Working alone and in collaboration with others, students take their ideas from concept to launch. By the end, students gain the skills and confidence to effectively communicate, present, and defend their ideas, and a solid methodology to put their ideas into action.

Worldmaking refers to the way artists and creative entrepreneurs help us realign, reshape, transform, disrupt and renegotiate our understanding of the present—to dream beyond the limitations of what currently exists, to imagine and then remake what is possible. In this colloquium series, we encourage music students to move beyond introspective, self-focused examination to interrogate their own community and civic engagement. We want students to take a deeper, critical look at industry and cultural values, ideologies, practices, beliefs, and ethics. Students will hear from music industry speakers who have excelled at worldmaking in their impressive contributions to social good, progressive public policy, or applied activism. While the music industry has long been plagued by systemic tensions around issues like gender inequality, racial injustice, and climate un-sustainability, this course encourages students to become socially-responsible creators, to broaden their moral and ethical perspectives, and to explore alternate value systems that prioritize ideals of inclusion, justice and equality. Through discussion, reading and assignments, students will be reminded that they do not always have to be bound by the industry’s requisite profit motives and financial bottom-lines—that they too can play a role in transforming the power relationships that have sometimes made the music industry a less democratic space. As students explore the meaning of civic duty in the context of 21st century creative music entrepreneurship, they will be expected to complete a semester-long collaborative, community-focused project incorporating service learning and volunteering.

Do you aspire to a career as a music performer? To realize your goals, you must imbue yourself with an understanding of the legal and business issues that are likely to impact your career. In addition to demystifying the terms of common contracts, this course offers practical advice and strategies to help you successfully navigate challenges that music performers face. Focus is also given to the changing music landscape and current issues that are impacting music performers such as compensation on digital music services, access to health insurance and the sustainability of the live music industry. By the end, you will empowered with knowledge and tools help you maintain control over your career and maximize your chances for success.

Do you aspire to a career as a music performer? To realize your goals, you must imbue yourself with an understanding of the legal and business issues that are likely to impact your career. In addition to demystifying the terms of common contracts, this course offers practical advice and strategies to help you successfully navigate challenges that music performers face. Focus is also given to the changing music landscape and current issues that are impacting music performers such as compensation on digital music services, access to health insurance and the sustainability of the live music industry. By the end, you will empowered with knowledge and tools help you maintain control over your career and maximize your chances for success.

The course provides a comprehensive and practical overview of the music contracts that you -- and every artist, musician, songwriter, record producer and other music business professionals -- need to launch and grow an entrepreneurial music venture. Learn proven strategies for navigating conflicts when they arise and how to safeguard your rights and interests in music that you create. Practice and apply newly acquired drafting and negotiation skills to current projects you are working on with personalized instructor and peer feedback.

The intention of this course is to expand students’ knowledge about leadership and their leadership skills in preparation for their assumption of music industry leadership roles. It is geared to all students who aspire to lead, whether as musician, performer, critic, fan, influencer, entrepreneur or within an organizational context. This course focuses on the skills and competencies necessary for effective leadership and how they can be developed and applied to the pursuit of students’ personal and professional goals in music. Students will meet successful leaders across the music industry, learn about the complex moral, ethical challenges they face, and distill important lessons that they can be apply to leadership challenges they may confront in the future. By the end, students are equipped with increased self-confidence, and an understanding of their leadership strengths that will better prepare them when presented with the first opportunity to lead.

How am I going to fund my project? What are the funding sources available to me? What type of funding works best for my music venture idea? These are among the range of challenges that every creative entrepreneur faces when planning the start up of a new music venture. The good news is that there is money out there and there are more opportunities than ever for music entrepreneurs to fund their start up music ventures. Having the ability to find and leverage funding opportunities is a skill that every music entrepreneur must have to succeed. This class proposes to demystify the funding process and provides an overview of the main sources of music business funding: Grants, Investments, Crowdfunding, Friends & Family, and Bootstrapping among others. Among the course topics that will be covered are: choosing the right funding option for your needs and understanding the range of music funding sources, and how to access them. The class will culminate through a blend of readings, class discussions, collaborative projects and guest speakers from different parts of the music funding world. Students will, by the end, have the knowledge and a strategic plan they can execute to approach funders and find funding for their music venture ideas.

This course targets all students who are serious about and ready to fund a project. Together, we will learn about different funding types and sources, as well as demystify how the funding process works. Through a blend of readings, class discussions, practical assignments, and guest speakers, you will have the knowledge, practical understanding, and an actionable plan to bring your project to life, now or in the future.

From Concept Album films of the 1960s to the MTV revolution of the 1980s and 1990s to the innovations of YouTube and Virtual Reality, this class will examine how the convergence of visual and auditory mediums has created some of the most impactful art. We’ll extract the great lessons from the pieces we study and utilize our production skills to create videos, on-stage visuals, and songs of our own. We’ll also investigate how the creation of videos alongside songs has disrupted the marketing and sales fates for the music industry multiple times. If you’re interested in the convergence of visual art, music, technology, and business, you’ll have fun in this class.

Historically, the music business has generally relinquished the most significant inventions and innovations to third parties. And while many can recite the contemporary Pavlovian catch phrases of the moment, what about the next wave of science and thinking that will impact music? This class will seek to identify, understand and predict the latest advancements in science that will serve to influence and transform music consumption in the next 20 years.

Students who want a career in music - as an artist, producer, record label executive, new media executive or entrepreneur - need to understand the world of digital media platforms and its impact on the music business and music consumers. This weekly seminar and speaker series will focus on an overview of the practical understanding and applications of digital media and its critical relationship to the music industry, as well as how students can use it for their own future careers and aspirations in the music industry. We will explore the important topics that will affect student’s ‘real-world’ work application - digital music and distribution, mobile, social networking, music discovery, user generated content, video, piracy, gaming, and the international market in mobile and digital sales. From the real-time perspective of current music industry trends, we will discuss the evolution of trends and psychological motivations of music consumers that have led to the rise of internet, apps and mobile technology platforms as a critical force in the future of the music industry. All the guest speakers in the series will be experts in their fields and will help provide students with key insights into how they have integrated digital media into their music industry related world and how you can benefit from their professional knowledge and experiences.

Streaming Economy represents a great paradigm shift in the music industry and its monetization. In 2013, digital streaming of music replaced the CD as the main source of music sales and has provided economic hope to a – commercially speaking - weakening industry. However, with artists such as Thom Yorke, The Black Keys, David Byrne and many others speaking out against the royalty of streaming services like Spotify, streaming, in its current structure, as a permanent replacement for CD and digital download sales remains a controversial subject. Through this course the student will be guided through the history of streaming, the controversies surrounding its business model, and the technology that made it possible. Students will be introduced to the new storefront of online music and be shown how the digital marketplace is changing music marketing and artist development. Streaming offers exciting new opportunities along with serious and complex challenges. This course will examine the pros and cons of the current streaming status quo. The student will practice techniques of releasing music online through a hands-on workshop, which will lead them through the beginning steps of registering, and releasing their own project via Phonofile and WiMP on all major platforms and services.

If you've been to a 3D or Imax movie, if you've tried Google glasses, if you've listened to music on surround sound speakers or noise-canceling headphones, if you’ve explored an interactive website, visual album, pop up store or app, or visited the Burning Man Festival, you are a consumer of immersive experiences. One of the main drivers of culture and technology in the 21st century, immersion is defined as the process by which one or more of the senses become saturated as environmental objects surround envelope or come in closer proximity to us. Virtual or augmented reality, innovative video games, and the idea that consumers area always “plugged in” via mobile devices are just some of the ways we experience immersion in contemporary commercial terms. But the concept is not new: scholars like Benjamin, McLuhan, and Debord have long been concerned with theorizing the “sensorium” and media spectacle. Immersion underwrites so many developments in media and elsewhere: film close-ups, site-specific theater, photography, daguerrotypes and dioramas, haunted houses, house of mirrors and certain forms of installation art. Immersion is also widely considered to be the key to learning new languages or mastering different cultures and tourism, so it plays a key role in 20th and 21st century globalization. This class looks at the global history and culture of immersion in various cultural traditions and how emergent technology has impacted immersion. It also considers how our ongoing demand for proximity has shaped contemporary entertainment and technological needs; immersion is now a multi-billion dollar global business. We especially look at immersion in popular music – spanning everything from Satie to ambient music to surround sound and panoramic sound and Dolby to theme parks to 21st century ‘experience websites,’ spectacular live shows, app culture, brand experiences, pop-up stores, holograms and holophonics. Students should leave the class with greater understanding of immersion as a cultural principle and a better knowledge of how entertainment industries will be meeting consumer need for immersion in the past now and into the future.

This course will introduce students to the basic concepts of 3D design and capture through the use of apps and other tools. Through examination and discussion of the current state of 3D printing technology we will explore current and future implications for music and the music business, including but not limited to, live and recorded music, music publishing, innovative tools, part and instrument fabrication, licensing, management, touring, copyright, distribution and marketing. Extra focus will be given to existing and potential merchandise platforms, as well as how 3D can lead to the growth of new industries and new opportunities for cross-pollination with a variety of sectors. Students will be encouraged to pursue both practical and abstract concepts in the furtherance of dynamic and newly inventive ideas - and will be required to develop and submit a concept and plan for their final project.

This course focuses on the business of music publishing, which has served as a powerful engine fueling the growth of the music business since the first decade of the 20th century. Song copyrights are among the most important and valuable assets that musicians and songwriters have. Knowing how to protect, manage and monetize these rights is more critical than ever. This course is targeted to students who aspire to careers as recording artists, songwriters; record producers, artist managers and music executive, among others Course topics include: roles and responsibilities of music publishers identifying new markets for songs, structure of the music publishing companies, different music publishing deals and their terms, music publishing revenue flow, practical aspects of music publishing administration and licensing, and music publishing as an investment. Students leave with a practical understanding of music publishing as a business; and with tools and strategies for turning songs into sustainable sources of income.

This class is targeted to DIY Music creators, songwriters, recording artists, and music rights owners who want to acquire, develop and manage their songs and act as their own publisher. In this class, students will learn about music publishing ‘s main royalty sources, Mechanical, Performance, Synchronization and Digital, how they are generated, maximized and protected. Topics include: the music publisher’s role and responsibilities which including getting exposure for songs and collecting monies earned from their exploitation. Students learn the different steps involved in starting up and running their own music publishing companies. They are also exposed to effective marketing and business strategies that will best position them for music publishing success.

The explosion of EDM further cemented the influence of electronic and dance music upon modern sounds and culture. But the history of this segment of the music industry extends over many decades, growing from a specialist and social art form to a worldwide movement impacting all sectors of the music economy. This course will look at the sounds, careers and evolution of past and current figures and will examine the driving forces of the economy and culture including DJing, live events, festivals, promotion and music distribution. Whether you’re a budding artist, DJ, manager, producer, music supervisor or journalist, we will study, discuss and analyze the historical and modern factors and skills that can create a career in electronic and dance music. We will also examine current trends and technologies and try to predict what’s next musically and professionally in the future.

On-demand Song Streaming. Streaming Video On-Demand (Netflix, Disney+ etc.). Twitch Gaming & Music Live Streaming. AM/FM and Internet Radio Plays. Alexa/Google Home Smart Speaker Play. Lyric Merchandise. Each music use involves a different set of rights, royalties and licenses which are often obtained from different individuals and groups. The aim of this Basics of Music Licensing course is to demystify the business side of music licensing and expose students to music licensing terminology, deals, revenue streams and opportunities. Students will explore different types of music licenses, why and when they are needed, revenue streams and how they are generated, collected and paid. By the end of the course, students will learn how to place, license and monetize their songs and master recording across different platforms. They will also learn how to locate rights holders and acquire the right to use copyrighted content in their own projects.

This Music Licensing Lab course will explore the financial, legal, and technical sides of music supervision and licensing as well as the nuts and bolts of music clearance. Students will look at the many different facets of a music supervisor’s job, and the services they provide for all types of media projects, including film, television, advertising, video games, online/apps, and more. The work in this course is student-initiated and driven. Acting as music supervisor and clearance company, by the end, students will be expected to develop and carry out a plan to pitch and place music of their own, or of others, in multimedia projects of their choice.

Brands generate loyalty, trust and familiarity with consumers. Those well versed in branding have the ability to successfully capture the attention of their customers or audiences and speak to them in clear and persuasive terms. Creative branding is the key to understanding what makes audiences/consumers tick and to increasing sales performance. Before a brand becomes a household name it is a tried a true product that has been through several critical steps of research and development, consumer segmentation, positioning and distribution. This hands-on course will introduce you to the world of brand development, cross-promotions, endorsements, sponsorships, and more as it relates to today’s ever-evolving music industry. You’ll do exercises in analyzing and developing brands, and you’ll study why some brands succeed where others fail by reading key books and articles, studying branding theory and talking to guest speakers. You'll work to demonstrate your understanding of the course concepts through dialogue with brand professionals, class discussion assignments and a final project and presentation.

Brands generate loyalty, trust and familiarity with consumers. Nearly anyone can release an artist, or an album, or start their own MP3 download site, but those versed in branding have the ability to successfully capture the attention of their audience and speak to them in clear and persuasive terms. Creative branding is becoming the key to understanding what makes audiences tick and to increasing sales performance. Reading key books and articles and talking to guest speakers, students will learn the ins and outs of branding theory and consider why some brands succeed where others fail. We will then narrow the focus to consider branding as it relates to today?s music industry, and for the final assignment, students will write a paper analyzing a brand of choice.

This course is specifically designed for students aspiring to a career in personal artist management, looking for proven strategies for their current management practices, and planning to manage themselves, take control of the creative and business aspects of their career as artists, record producers, musicians and songwriters. A manager?s job is to oversee all aspects of creative careers in music and is charged with the responsibility of furthering that career?from independent, DIY artists to multi-platinum superstars. The students will learn about different career trajectories and gain hands-on experience developing management strategies that can be applied to different creative careers in the music industry. Students will also learn about the timeline and will participate first-hand in the management of a well-known worldwide artist. Through the use of guest speakers, case studies, and artist/manager panels and thinktanks, students will have the opportunity to interact directly with some of the music industry?s most successful advisors.

Artist managers are the central focus of the music business, the dealmakers behind the latest industry developments, and the brokers of power, influence, and revenue streams for not only recording artists, but creative entrepreneurs and technology startups as well. The role of the artist manager is to help creative talent find commercial success. We will study the basics and fundamentals of artist management, and its many different functions. We will learn about the different roles that artist managers play as well as understand how artist managers build and develop their teams, and the different kinds of leadership positions that they assume. We will look at different styles of artist management, and discuss best practices by reviewing case studies, and speaking with special guests. Through a class lab, we will analyze various potential problems and scenarios, and develop techniques and skills for forming solutions, simulating the artist management experience. We will hypothetically take over the management duties for an existing artist and help them re-organize his/her career in a comprehensive final project. Artist managers now serve as the gatekeepers of commercial and brand value in the talent food chain, and they not only help grow careers, they create many new ones along the way. From Troy Carter and Scooter Braun, to Amy Thomson and Kelly Clancy, artist managers are the thought leaders of this business and catalysts for industry change.

This course is specifically designed for students who want to (i) explore artist management as a possible career path; (ii) learn about the day-to- day creative and business sides of artist management ( e.g., what managers do and how they do it) before starting to manage and (iii) manage themselveS as a DIY artist , songwriter , producer and take control of the creative and business aspects of their career. A manager’s job is to nurture, oversee and promote their clients’ careers —from independent, DIY artists to multi-platinum superstars. Through readings, case studies , written assignments and guest, the students will learn about key principles and creative, business, legal and sides of artist management, the training , knowledge, skills and preparation required to step into the role, and the process of artist management that includes developing a vision , finding the right artist to manage or deciding to self-manage and getting business affairs in order. The next course in sequence, Artist Management Lab, REMU-UT 1261 offers students the opportunity to the knowledge and strategies learned into practice.

This introductory course is targeted to all students who have a strong sense of their individual purpose and are motivated to change the world through music. In this course, students learn about social entrepreneurs, how they think, the problems they address, the business tools they leverage and the strategies they employ to create social change. Through readings, participatory class discussion, class activities, self-reflection and occasional guest speakers, students examine current issues, opportunities and challenges that social entrepreneurs and their ventures face. In addition, they acquire skills, actionable tools, and practical approaches to help advance their social change agenda now and in the future. Ultimately, the aim is to inspire and empower students to put their ideas for social change in to action and to start manifesting the change they wish to see in the world.

Are you inspired by the power of music to accelerate change? Are you interested in launching a new business enterprise that unites your passion for music with your commitment to social change? The music industry is committed to social causes and has a passion for philanthropy. Artists, DIY musicians, music executives and others are mobilizing to rebuild communities, create summer camps for dis-advantaged children, fight extreme poverty, sponsor children across the globe, develop programs to empower women, create youth football leagues and more. Some of the music industry figures and organizations who are spearheading solutions to society’s most intractable problems include: Ludacris, Bono, Harry Connick Jr., Mary J. Blige, Mariah Carey, Gary Barlow, Future of Music Coalition, and Russell Simmons. 

The broad objective of the course is to introduce students to the field of social entrepreneurship in music, and hopefully make a contribution to it. Through a judicious mix of assigned readings, case studies, class discussions, team-based activities, on-site visits and special lectures by leaders in the field, students apply the lessons learned to develop a conceptual plan to launch their own social venture in music. The course culminates with students' presentation of their developed plans in front of a panel of industry leaders in the field of social entrepreneurship in music.

This course is designed for students who are interested in future careers as innovative music executives and industry leaders. Topics include: different revenue sources; company operations and management; identification of new opportunities; effective market research techniques and strategies for successful implementation; and new venture formation. Strategies for successful leadership will be discussed as students focus on the career paths and the circumstances behind the success of key music industry leaders and innovators (through reading assignments, in-class presentations and guest lecturers). Effective communication techniques will b learned in a series of collaborative class exercises involving public speaking, business letter writing and deal negotiations.

This course is designed to help accelerate your professional development by creating a business plan for the future. Through study, collaboration and research you will formalize your current endeavor, whether it be as an agent, artist, engineer, executive, manager, in marketing & promotion, a producer, tech start up, grant proposal - or any other music business related venture. In the event of the objective to work for another company, you will complete a plan towards that end. Students will learn the key factors associated with success and critically evaluate their own prospects for entrepreneurship. An array of approaches, methodologies, and tools are utilized to create ideas and opportunities, based upon the key factors of each student’s unique situation.

Working with an Industry Mentor 3 is a zero-credit colloquium class taught by experienced industry professionals that provides individualized professional development mentorship and guidance to Clive Davis students in their third year in the program. Topics covered—which include professional skills and portfolio development—are tailored to the unique needs and goals of students.

Hip-hop is not only a vibrant youth culture; it is also a multi-billion dollar global industry that shows no signs of slowing down, and in fact, may be leading the revolution of the music economy. This course will investigate how the transcendent power of popular culture is helping to reinvigorate and revitalize the American dream and helping to “tan” America and the world. This course will be team-taught with Steve Stoute, one of the most influential voices in entertainment marketing and pop culture. Known as “the commissioner of hip-hop”, he has revolutionized the way blue-chip companies (McDonald’s Tommy Hilfiger, Samsung) and superstar artists (Mary J. Blige, Jay-Z, Beyonce, Justin Timberlake, Gwen Stefani) connect with customers.

Contemporary marketers are increasingly focused on the cultural interests and behaviors of the consumer. Market segments have evolved from census demographics to unifying sub-cultures that transcend ethnicity, geography, age and gender. Technology has accelerated the speed at which a culture evolves and/ or becomes obsolete which in turn requires a new marketing paradigm. This class will focus on these shifts in the industry's culture as it applies to music industry professionals and beyond.

On the most fundamental level, arranging can be referred to as who plays what, and when they do it. The introduction of the modern recording process necessitates changes in the way we approach musical arrangement or orchestration. Often, what works well for a live performance doesn?t necessarily translate into a good recording, and visa-versa. This course will address the development of arranging styles through classic studio recordings, and different approaches the studio arranger can utilize. Our studies will differ from a ?traditional? arranging or orchestration class in that fluency in reading and writing music, although helpful, will not be required, nor emphasized, as the elements of weight, density, range timbre, layers of focus/interest, rhythmic and melodic activity, and dynamics remain the same. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

Performing on the stage and for recordings share many similar attributes and both rely on proficient musicianship and listening skills — but the art of performance in the recording studio requires a unique skill set that at times runs counter to the logic that dictates live performance on stage. In order to create a timeless, memorialized performance that the listener will desire to hear repeatedly requires a specific set of talents. This course addresses those talents and, through practical application, teaches those talents. This course is primarily for two types of students: the performance musician and the studio arranger producer/engineer. Both will develop their craft, in a studio setting, simultaneously. While production courses teach students how to distill and refine a song down to its most functional and aesthetically please rhythmic, harmonic, and melodic construction, this course focuses on developing the performance skills, listening skills, musical and technical vocabulary, as well as the hard-to-define improvisational skill set of musicians in a recording studio setting. Through practice, this course will cultivate instinct and professional etiquette, as well as technique. In a musical production, producers, performers, and engineers have a symbiotic relationship and rely upon each other’s individual talents and artistic contributions. Each is highly dependent upon the other throughout the production process, and positive interaction can insure a project’s success.

This intensive 7-week course will introduce students to the art and alchemy of DJ performance. It will illustrate how a working knowledge of music history, technical DJ skill, psychology and intuition, can all translate to creating unification of community through the power of music. Students will leave with a working development of their inner voice as a DJ and a general comprehension of their personal style and intention when performing, as well as a comprehension of "reading the crowd" responsibilities, and capabilities of the disc jockey profession as a conduit for social change.

Students will be introduced to and participate in a historical and explorative approach to investigate the art of MC’ing. The workshop nature of the course will create an environment where students will investigate the history, dig into the present, and directly apply their findings in creative ways. Students will participate in discussions, be provided feedback on assignments, and directly apply their findings in an intimate and collaborative creative space. By the end of the course, students will have a richer understanding of the craft of MC’ing and will be able to articulate their opinions of the art with a more informed understanding of the nuances and command of the craft while being armed with its historical foundations.

This course addresses essential elements of performance including preparation, presence, song choice, movement and more. It is designed to give you the tools necessary to prepare and effectively deliver your voice in a small- to medium-sized venue. Beyond the practical considerations, this course will also address more abstract skills such as connecting to an audience, fearlessness, and stage presence. Focusing on improving the performer’s connection to music, the course is designed to deepen the performer’s skill set through practical, improvisational, rhythmic, and harmonic in-class exercises and independent assignments. The goal is to attain a deeper understanding of performance and your performative self, and to take away a set of positive routines that can be incorporated into a daily artistic practice. The course is open to original songwriting singers as well as performers of traditional, standard and contemporary repertoire looking to deepen their stagecraft. Participants should prepare two songs for the first class. Classes will culminate in an evening performance at a NYC location TBA.

The art of performing is the place where creativity, spontaneity, artistic vision and excellence are shared with the artists and the audience. The magic that takes place onstage is the result of artistic vision, collaboration with the production team, the musicians, the background singers, the dancers (in some cases) and the crew. In order to have a performance that moves the audience, there must be a follow- through of intention from inception to the very last note. A great performance requires a clear vision and song choices that allow for artistic expression and connection. Dedication to practice and preparation are essential to developing the ability to command the stage whole-heartedly with ease and confidence. The artist must be willing to make room for the performer within so that the audience is left inspired, and emotionally connected. This interchange between artist and audience must be part of the performance, whether it is an arena, a club or an intimate setting. This class is a workshop designed to put you, the artist, front and center in order to individually develop the particular skills that make for a great performance.

As the music industry diversifies, many artists are developing conceptual and layered stage performances to help magnify their work as performers. There is a rich history of collaboration and multi-media incorporation within music performance that has defined many artists and audiences. This intermediate performance class will build on each student’s persona and stage performance ideas through innovative exercises in collaboration, movement, creative instrumentation, and experiments in multimedia design. In addition to focusing on the above elements, the students will gain more comfort in performing their songs within differing applications of music direction. With the above practices, students will grow significantly towards a more comfortable place on the stage, in their own body, and in communication with others. This course was developed in conjunction with CDI x Berlin’s performance course, “Experiments in the Future of Performing & Producing” and exists as an excellent companion course for the performance student.

A&R divisions at record labels were historically responsible for finding, signing, developing and cultivating performing talent (especially singers that did not write or produce for themselves) to become competitive in the music marketplace. The transformative rise of the Internet in the 1990s—as well as the rise of ‘social’ media in the ‘00s, and the resulting changes in music distribution—has meant that artist development is increasingly left up to artists themselves (and sometimes their managers). This class is a practical, “get on your feet and do it” workshop designed to put aspiring performers and recording artists through a compressed development workshop. Students will be performing in and out of the class and brainstorming attention-grabbing musical and visual content as they develop customized and comprehensive ‘public identity’ workbooks. These workbooks are blueprints for how you will craft and construct a transcendent public identity or personal brand. We also take lessons from product development and packaging in corporate branding, and apply them, where and when they fit, to artist development. The ultimate objective of the class is that each student performer fully conceptualizes and inhabits a powerfully compelling audio-visual public image that can command visibility in today’s bustling marketplace. Every student should be able to leave the final week of the course able to confidently answer the following two questions: “who am I?” (what is my dramatic storyline with which my fans/the public can connect) and “what do I have to say?” (how can I position my public image to emerge as different/unique/transcendent/impactful). Students will meet with/network with/ receive constructive criticism from successful A&R executives at top labels and management companies.

As the Recorded Music industry goes through a period of upheaval and transformation, entrepreneurs in the music business must continue to implement strategies to generate revenue and gain exposure for recorded music product. This highly analytical and also highly practical class is designed to introduce students to the live event curation as a profession and will examine the creative and business considerations involved in curating live music events. Those considerations include: talent selection, marketing, promotion, strategic corporate partnerships and logistical elements of producing events. We will utilize the five key marketing principles and apply this knowledge to assess different kinds of music events such as festivals, pop up events, branded events, and beyond. Students will read ? and analyze - selections from key texts, articles and trade publications and write analytical evaluation responses as we evaluate the successes and/ or challenges of events like: CMJ, SXSW, Popkomm, Brooklyn Bodega Hip Hop Festival, Electric Proms, Coachella and more. Finally, students will have hands on experience in ideating, developing, and executing actual music events as the class will culminate with the students producing two live events in conjunction with an active production company. Students will gain critical understanding of the skills and knowledge required to manage, produce and present a live multimedia event. The course work will include written assignments and production of two full-scale live music events. The course will meet once a week for class lecture, discussion. Like event production, this course will move at a fast pace. Key guest speakers will be scheduled throughout the course to discuss their experiences about different aspects of live event production and or findings in their area of expertise. Students will be expected to attend all classes and be prepared with questions and or issues for discussion as a means to assess a portion of student participation.

This course is geared to all students interested in live music event production and the technical and business aspects involved in planning, developing, and producing a live music event. Topics included: talent and venue contracts and negotiations, primary and secondary revenue streams budgeting, marketing, best practices for promotion and more. Course work includes lectures, interactive class discussion, peer and self-assessments, short answer analytical responses and hands-on collaboration on the production of one live music event. By the end, students have the skills and a framework to book and oversee all aspects of a live music event --whether for themselves or for any artists with whom they work.

This course offers new tools for creative vocalists across all music genres who wish to delve into a more spontaneous and innovative approach to live performance. Through weekly guided individual and group exercises, students will experience improvisation and live looping as tools to elevate their vocal performance, enrich their music vocabulary, develop their creative skills and infuse self-confidence to their artistic practice. The instructor will work with her own card system (360 IMPROV), a box set which uses seven different parameters of exploration: rhythm, melody, harmony, sound, activity, text-language and concept. Classroom sessions and assignments will encompass practices like circle singing, live looping, body percussion, and spontaneous composition projects. The goal of this class is to guide students towards the development of a versatile instrument that can make a diverse array of artistic choices The provided training will also aid students in discovering their unique musical identity and refining their capabilities to transform their voices into instruments that faithfully convey their creative vision.

This is an introductory course designed to guide the developing performer through the essential physical elements of singing. Methods taught will include a balance of muscular engagement with a careful study of breath support and release. Students will be introduced to the basics of practice and warm up, along with established methods to achieve vocal health through proper physical maintenance. By observing and listening to others, each student will learn the importance of proper physical placement and adjustment. Each student will develop a daily warm-up, based on the content of each class, and will be expected to practice these warm-up routines between class meetings. Students will also be expected to prepare material to sing for each class, allowing the practical application of techniques to be experienced in class, in real time.

This class introduces the essential skills required for a performing artist to take stage and be effective in a professional setting. For the first five weeks of the semester the instructor will teach rudimentary skills every two weeks to give the student ample opportunity practice and implement the material covered. Week six the class begins to build on the work covered introducing more complex skills and concepts. Each week, every student will be assigned to prepare a song for the following class, and the performances will be discussed as opportunities for learning.

Geared for contemporary artists and popular music, this one-on-one private vocal instruction will help students work to develop their singing voice for both the studio and the stage - to explore the geography of the human voice, the application of the how and why of technical exercises, and the development of the vocal instrument tailored to each individual student. Through various methods and means, tailored to each individual student's needs, the exercises used in the lessons are tried and true ways to develop various aspects of vocalism, enabling a deepened connection to the mind-body relationship within one’s self in regard to the singing voice. Students will delve in to the art of song interpretation from both a performance and production standpoint and will build performance instincts, allowing the student to make a piece of music blossom. The result should be a marked improvement of the overall relationship to the student’s vocal instrument, the understanding of the mechanics and physiology of the voice, the vocal registers and how to negotiate and connect them, an understanding of optimum breath control, body alignment, vocal and physical strength, stamina, timbre, range, general vocal health and overall freedom of vocal expression.

As the music industry diversifies, many artists are developing a conceptual and layered stage performance to help magnify their work as artists and performers. There is a rich history of the collaboration between Music Performance and Fine Art that has defined musicians, visual artists and performance artists alike. This class will build on each student’s persona and conceptual stage performance through lessons related to the history of this indelible relationship between the performance arts and music. Each class will include a discussion based on critical reading and video selections of work that has combined musical performance with conceptual work. The conversation will cultivate an environment to workshop each performer’s conceptual vision for their work, and how to best embody those ideas through performance technique. At moments, the classes will focus on particular historical relationships and texts relating to the physical “body” and the “stage”. We will explore techniques and forms that ask: What is our performance of Politics? Community? Race? Sexuality? - and how can the answer to these questions inform our relationship to our own work and our individual personas? What is a “body” and how can the understanding of using your “body” to discuss your work define what you project to each “audience” and your relationship to a broader cultural experience.

In the music industry, a performer's visual image has always been of great importance; perhaps now more than ever. This practical course is designed to inform students about the art and business of creating visual images in the music business and beyond. Visual image production includes creating album covers, publicity photos, promotional videos as well as the overall personal image and "brand" of the artist. We will discover the players that produce such images, and the means by which they pursue their craft, through analytical case studies of the art historical source material, as well as the cultural and theoretical discourse that they have inspired.

Required for juniors, this colloquium will introduce the senior year Capstone Project through a series of lectures, workshops, and guest visits. The course will highlight the achievements of individuals and companies that drive the fields of music and entertainment forward with their artistic and business vision. At the completion of this course, students will have a well-developed Capstone Project description and an initial plan of action, allowing them to use their spring semester to take additional coursework and begin fleshing out the details, plans, staffing, fundraising, etc, needed for successful completion in their senior Capstone presentation. In the spring semester students will continue to refine their plans under the guidance of the Junior Colloquium Advisors. By the end of the spring semester, students will have a final plan of action, and will be assigned a Capstone Faculty Advisor, who will guide and direct them through their senior year. The plan will be fully realized in the Capstone Senior Colloquium, taken in the fall semester of the senior year. All Recorded Music majors are invited to attend the course on the dates of the guest visits. These will be announced via NYU email. For Majors only.

The mission of the Professional Development Program is to provide professional development training, mentorship and relevant learning experiences for Recorded Music students in their senior year, to prepare them for independent careers as musicians, performers and founders, and to assist them in their pursuit and competition for jobs and leadership roles in the music industry. The PDP curriculum is organized around every student’s creation of a customized music business venture which, defined broadly, could be a start-up, live music event, career launch as a performer or songwriter, or job search. PDP is execution-focused and is meant to publicly convey each student’s personal/intellectual and artistic journey and who they are as an artist/entrepreneur/person at this stage of their career. The focus is on the acquisition of professional skills such as written and verbal communication, personal branding -online, in-person and through communications, and making a powerful first impression, as well as the creation of an e-portfolio website that will enable the student to stand out and more quickly land career -enhancing opportunities and jobs.

Utilizing individualized mentorship, this zero credit course is a continuation of REMU-UT 1401 and is a required final semester course for any senior who took the Professional Development course in their penultimate semester and is designed to provide continued support for students in their Professional Development training. Under the guidance of Professional Development mentors, each student will continue to develop a portfolio of tools such as a 30-second elevator pitch, job interview/networking power statements, resume/CV, personal brand website and pitch deck that will communicate each student’s specific ideas, skills/knowledge and accomplishments to potential employers, partners, early-stage investors, customers and users. The mentors will also help each student create their goals and launch a well-designed roadmap for achieving them post-graduation. Mentors will also advise/counsel students on important professional decisions, building their professional networks, offer constructive feedback on professionalism, time management, planning, writing and presentation skills. 

An Independent Study provides students with the opportunity to work one-on-one with a full-time Recorded Music faculty member who will supervise you on a particular topic or creative project not covered by CDI’s current curriculum and/or coursework.

In recent years, access to affordable audio recording equipment and software has given rise to a new breed of recording engineer and producer. While embracing new technology, this course challenges students to understand and apply the fundamental principles that form the basis of tried and true recording techniques, and to make informed decisions in each stage of the recording process. Through a series of lessons, hands-on exercises, and recording sessions, students will learn about the propagation of sound, microphone design and implementation, signal flow, basic signal processing, and contemporary recording techniques. Emphasis is placed on critical listening, preparation, class participation, and teamwork.

This course builds upon the fundamentals of sound recording established in Studio Recording for the Modern Producer/Engineer I. Through a series of discussions, hands-on exercises, and recording sessions, students will refine their skills in the recording studio from the organizational, technical, and creative/artistic points of view. Students will put their skills to use while collaborating on the summer song project – to be completed in Studio 505 outside of class time. Emphasis will be placed on critical listening, preparation, class participation, and teamwork.

If production had to be summed up in one sentence, it might be: "taking what is unique and special about the artist and using recording technologies to put that uniqueness and specialness in the best possible frame." Sounds simple. But the journey from great singer-good song to a great record is often a circuitous and grueling journey. Acclaimed and award-winning Producer/Mixer/Recordist Bob Power (Erkyah Badu, Common, D'Angelo, A Tribe Called Quest) will present a balance of practical and conceptual information designed to expose students to the various recording and production techniques he uses to create his consistent brand of effective production. During the course of the masterclass, Power and the students will build a production from the ground up: students will participate and observe as Power produces a world-class New York City talent, working in NYU's state-of-the-art studios. Additionally, part of each day will be devoted to a presentation and discussion of both Power's and the students' production work. The course culminates with a networking session/lunch where students will have the opportunity to have their own personal productions critiqued by the instructor.

Commonly referred to as a mystifying 'Dark Art,' mixing records involves composing a final assemblage and balancing of a song’s recorded elements, with the final goal of enabling a recording to deliver a clear and emotional intended message. Not easy. In this week-long, intensive master class, the world-class instructor will provide a complete exposition of his mix methodology and technique in the state of the art facilities of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music. He will expose the very methods he's used on his own professional mixes. Specific topics will include his personal approach to establishing balances, using compression, automation, enhancing dynamics and developing unique coloration through effects. The course aims to demystify some of the intangibles of this frequently misunderstood art. The instructor will discuss how technology, budgets and past experiences have shaped his approach to the ever-evolving challenges of the marketplace. The course culminates with students executing their own mixes, and a networking session/lunch where students will have the opportunity to have their own personal mixes critiqued by the instructor.

Over the last forty years, the Disc Jockey has become a central figure in global popular music, transforming the sound of music and redefining the role of the creative music entrepreneur. From the DJ's role in 'breaking tracks' on commercial radio and dance floors, to supplying sounds for film scores and various recordings, to being the focus of the latest gaming trend (e.g. DJ Hero), the impact of the DJ in popular culture is significant. Many of today's most successful producers, like Dr. Dre and Mark Ronson, came from DJ backgrounds or have cultivated DJ-ing as part of their repertoire of skills. Increasingly, DJing has become a viable way for aspiring entrepreneurs in music to diversify and create success for themselves. In this class students develop fundamental turntable technique and hone practical skills that every DJ needs to succeed in the modern music industry. Each class will be divided into Culture and Technique sections. In the Culture component students will discuss the history, culture and business aspects of DJing through reading and other course materials.  The Technique section will consist of hands-on technical lessons in the DJ practice using fully equipped DJ stations.  The lab component, held at the Dubspot DJ and Production facilities on 14th Street, will focus on beat matching, music programming and turntablist elements (i.e. scratching). 

Remixing involves taking a master recording of a song, and producing a "new" version of that song through creative mixing techniques. By manipulating pitch, tempo, and groove through the addition / subtraction of elements, and the use of sound and time manipulation software, a song?s reinterpretation is born. This unique course, taught by acclaimed international remixer Mocean Worker (U2, Nina Simone, Marvin Gaye, Tenacious D, Charles Wright, Rare Earth, Herb Alpert), offers students a series of creative and entrepreneurial tools they can use to succeed in the contemporary art and business of remixing. Students will get a rare glimpse into Mocean Worker's unique remixing style as the instructor deconstructs his creative process from initial ideas to final mix down, showing students numerous techniques and concepts along the way. Students will work with Propellerheads software products Reason, Recycle, and Record, coupled with Digidesign Pro Tools software, to generate their own remixes. The class will also include discussions about the business aspects and the deal making behind the remixing process and students will discuss licensing. In the end, students will have a much clearer picture of the real life economics involved in the remixing process. Essentially, the goal is to explain as many aspects of the task of remixing as possible and to teach students how to create careers or side careers for themselves as remixers in a changing music business. While students will have several remix projects to complete over the duration of the class, the course will ultimately culminate with students being given the multi tracks to a Mocean Worker original which they will then remix themselves.

This course is designed for anyone interested in how great photographs are taken and in how great photographs can massively impact the success of an artist in the music business. In that sense, the course is perfect for students interested in becoming better music photographers as well as students interested in first-hand observation of great photography in process. Students will consider the best methods of taking professional photographs with a special focus on how photographs can contribute to the branding and image development of recording artists. During the course, legendary photographer Mick Rock will present three invaluable sessions. In the first Mr. Rock presents a lecture about his work and career to students, discussing his role in creating the iconic images for artists like David Bowie and Queen. In the second, selected students present their photography to Mick Rock for in-class constructive criticism ad professional guidance. And in the third, students will get the rare opportunity to observe Mick Rock in an actual photo session wrapped up by a follow-up conversation. These three sessions are anchored in the course's significant lecture component in which students simultaneously learn about the history and visual culture of music photography, imaging and fashion. These lectures, run by visual artist and record label creative director Joe Mama-Nitzberg, are designed to help give students and aspiring photographers the necessary context and theoretical tools to work effectively in the music photography arena. Students will also learn about the art and business of creating visual images in recorded music, not limited to creating album covers, publicity photos, promotional videos as well as the overall personal image and "brand" of the artist. Tisch Photography Department students are particularly encouraged to enroll.

This course is designed for any student with aspiration to become a success story in the contemporary music industry. With the recorded music business in a state of unprecedented flux, aspiring music moguls need more guidance and encouragement around innovative thinking than ever before. Music impresario Kevin Liles - the famous former Executive Vice President of the Def Jam Music Group and the Warner Music Group - will work directly with aspiring music artists (performers, producers, etc.) and aspiring music executives in this class to help mold and shape their ideas into workable strategies for today?s music industry. Mr. Liles will host three sessions during the course. In the first, he'll lecture to students about his work and formidable rise in the music industry and suggest ways students can be successful in today's tumultuous industry. In the second session, he will listen to selected students' demos and consider business plans and strategies and provide constructive criticism to help guide students' professional endeavors. In the third session, Mr. Liles will offer students techniques and skills designed to help them make an impressive and memorable professional impact in the industry. During the rest of the lecture component of the course, taught by distinguished music manager and Clive Davis Department Chair Jeff Rabhan, students will learn about the history and contemporary inner workings of the recorded music industry through lecture and practical exercises.

This essential course offers participants access to a rare and exclusive DIY (do it yourself) artist development and A&R process—the kind that fewer and fewer record labels are able to offer to their signed acts these days. It’s important to remember that A&R divisions at record labels were historically responsible for finding, signing, developing and cultivating performing talent (especially singers that did not write or produce for themselves) to become competitive in the music marketplace. These days, artist development is increasingly left up to artists themselves (or their managers or handlers). In the “Make Your Mark” class, distinguished Clive Davis Institute instructors will work with participants —whether they are performers, producers or songwriters—to help them hone their craft, image, sound, and the direction of their public identity. Participants will get real-time feedback on their work in development, and pointers on how to best present themselves to audiences, and they’ll get to network with a range of carefully selected industry guest speakers. 

Students will acquire an in depth knowledge of Digidesign's Pro Tools. Pro Tools is the recording industries most popular computer based digital recording and editing platform. Low cost versions of this program entitled Pro Tools LE, can be easily and affordably integrated into a schools computer lab, enabling music teachers to use the software as a tool in teaching techniques of recording, arranging and MIDI programing as well as the concepts of basic music theory. In addition, knowledge of the program can enable teachers to develop a music technology curriculum enabling schools to develop podcasts and other audio based media. Class is held in a state-of-the-art lab with each student having their own workstation. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

Professional music software has slowly been making its way in to the middle and high school music and music technology classroom. Music teachers use the software as a tool in teaching techniques of recording, arranging and MIDI programming as well as the concepts of basic music theory. With the help of many of these applications teachers have begun to develop a music technology curriculum enabling schools to develop recording clubs and labels as well as podcasts and other audio based media. This course is designed to provide educators with an overview of the available technology and direct instruction on the industry?s most popular applications, such as Pro Tools LE, Logic, Sibelius, Finale, and Garage Band. Integration into a school?s computer lab or music studio will also be discussed. Class is held in a state-of-the-art lab with each student having their own workstation. Note: There is a lab fee for this class.

Students will acquire knowledge of general audio recording practices in the environment of a professional recording studio. Using gear appropriately affordable for middle and high school budgets, students will learn practical techniques for recording acoustic and electric instruments, microphone usage and technique, and the concept of "signal flow", tracking a sound from its origin through microphone, recording console and eventually to hard disc. The course will cover topics such as compression, reverb, room acoustics, production techniques and mixing for presentation. The software used in the course will include Pro Tools LE, Logic, and Garage Band. Class is held in a recording studio with each student having a set amount of supplemental access to the facilities outside class hours. Note: There is a lab fee for this class

Music supervision and music licensing are two of the hottest topics in the music business. This class will introduce you to the creative, financial, legal, and technical sides of music supervision as well as teach you the nuts and bolts of music clearance and licensing. We will look at the many different facets of a music supervisor’s job, and the services they provide for all types of media projects, including film, television, advertising, video games, online/apps, and more. If you aspire to have a career as a music supervisor, licensor, publisher, artist, songwriter, composer, producer, and/or creative entrepreneur, this course is for you. Some of the topics include: breaking into the field, opportunities for music placement, how to pitch and get your music placed, different parties involved in all sides of the licensing transaction. You will be exposed to complex business challenges that music supervisors face and learn the mindset and strategies needed to successfully overcome. Through readings, discussions, lab assignments, and case studies like Straight Outta Compton and Broad City, as well interactions with special guests, you will gain a real-world understanding of the music supervision field as well as the many opportunities that music creators, and rights owners can leverage to take their career to the next level by understanding music licensing.

The course defines the role of the motion picture music supervisor, who draws upon the combined resources of the film and music communities to marry music and moving images. This course is intended to lead students to a better understanding and appreciation of the use of music in the filming process. Lectures, assignments, presentations and present the principles and procedures of music supervision and their role in the filmmaking process.

With sales of more than 1.3 billion, the German recorded music market is the third largest in the world: it is larger than the UK music market and behind only the USA and Japan. Beyond just numbers, the Berlin music business is unique: it’s home to hundreds of powerful independent and D.I.Y. record labels; it’s historically been ground zero for innovative electronic and dance music; and it’s a burgeoning tech hub for innovative software/hardware companies like Native Instruments, Ableton and Soundcloud. In this colloquium series, students will meet and hear each week from key creative entrepreneurial figures and innovators in the German and European music business. This course has several purposes. First, students will consider how ongoing economic and technological changes might be impacting the worldwide music business, as speakers discuss controversial trends like the rise of cryptocurrency, block chain and cashless systems, customization technologies like 3D printing and developments in robotics, and radical, disruptive approaches to copyright. Second, students will develop a greater understanding of the chief similarities and differences between the traditional European and US music business operations, particularly with regard to label operations, publishing and copyright, touring and festivals, and nightlife promotion. Third, students will become more informed about the D.I.Y. music business in Berlin itself, as they hear from speakers about the promises and challenges one faces in launching innovative music start ups in Germany. And finally, students will get to meet and network with key movers and shakers in the Berlin scene, past and present. In anticipation for a guest class visit, students may be required to investigate websites, read biographical or contextual material, or attend events outside of class time. Students will be expected to ask informed questions of the guests and to develop responses throughout the course of the class. Students should leave the class with a greater understanding of how the European and German music businesses work and how they themselves might make a business or sales impact on a global scale.

From Karlheinz Stockhausen and Kraftwerk to D.A.F. and the Euro disco of Snap! – the first seven weeks of class considers the history of German electronic music prior to the Fall of the Wall. We will particularly look at how electronic music developed in Germany before the advent of house and techno in the late 1980s. One focus will be on regional scenes such as the Düsseldorf school of electronic in the 1970s with music groups such as Cluster, Neu! And Can, the Berlin school of synthesizer pioneers like Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze and Manuel Göttsching or Giorgio Moroder's Sound of Munich. Visits will be made to experience Oskar Sala's Trautonium - an early proto-synthesizer with which he created the sounds for Hitchcock's The Birds - at the Musikinstrumenten Museum and the location of the Zodiak Free Arts Lab, an experimental club founded by Conrad Schnitzler and Hans-Joachim Roedelius. Students will be expected to competently identify key musicians and recordings of this creative period. The second half of the course looks more specifically at the arrival of Techno, a new musical movement, and new technology in Berlin and Germany in the turbulent years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall, up to the contemporary moment. Indeed, Post-Wall East Berlin, full of abandoned spaces and buildings and deserted office blocks, was the perfect breeding ground for the youth culture that would dominate the 90s and led Techno pioneers and artists from the East and the West to take over and set up shop. Within a short space of time Berlin became the focal point of a new culture, attracting enthusiastic followers from all over the world to clubs such as ‘Tresor’ and ‘E-Werk’. Among those early techno aficionados were writers, artists, photographers, musicians and fashion designers. Techno quickly developed into a lifestyle and mass movement, finding its most exhilarating expression in the Love Parade and, recently, the club/movement Berghain. As students consider Berlin’s slow transformation from divided city in those anarchic and pioneering days of the early 90s into the bustling, world-class nightlife capital it is today, they will also consider the changing and controversial cultural and socio-economic landscape of the city, and how Berlin continues to retain its uncompromising, avant-garde ethos. Students will be expected to write final research paper drawing on issues discussed in class and in the readings.

Every serious music aspirant — including performers, producers, songwriters, executives, journalists, tech entrepreneurs — needs tools and a plan for navigating the music business on a global scale, beyond just a national or local one. Breaking into an international market as an artist or creative music entrepreneur is rarely a simple thing to do, however. Working independently and in small teams, students will learn how to internationally launch and scale any competitive music venture. Toward this objective, students are matched with a Berlin-based music business mentor and instructor who will help guide them through the development of their capstone project and/or real life business ventures. Workshop activities may include: refinement of business plans, marketing plans and decks; delving into applicable music business case studies; discussion of critical global issues and imperatives; researching international markets and competition; practical exercises in intercultural marketing and branding to global consumers. This class is targeted to any junior or senior level student who needs assistance, mentorship and guidance with graduation or Capstone projects, or those who need practical help in developing or launching a real-life, extra-curricular music or entertainment venture. Enrollment is at the discretion of the instructor.

After its reunification, Berlin gained a well-deserved reputation as an ‘anything-goes’ cultural playground. But just as radical cultural experimentation was leading to the city’s techno Renaissance, the same urban frontier was quietly transforming into a hotbed for new business ideas around tech. Companies like Ableton, Native Instruments, and SoundCloud started in the city and grew from headquarters there into leaders in the field of music technology. They join other world leaders in music tech around Europe, like Spotify, Deezer, Mixcloud, Focusrite/Novation, and Propellerhead. Berlin is quickly becoming known as a world-class hub for innovative tech start-ups and progressive developments in emergent media. This class, open to all students, shines a light on key Berlin-based entrepreneurial figures and innovators in music technology, with a focus on those successful individuals who have launched recognized or profitable music-focused startups. The idea is for students, many of whom are aspiring entrepreneurs, to hear directly from, and ask questions directly to, established Berlin based tech entrepreneurs, in moderated conversation. In anticipation for a guest class visit, students may be required to investigate websites, read biographical or contextual material, or attend events outside of class time. Students will be expected to ask informed questions of the guests and to develop responses throughout the course of the class. All events and speakers are subject to change.

Contemporary sound production is often based on pre-designed workflows in virtual software environments that merely provide standardized results. Moreover, while aiming for the perfect acoustic image, many commercial producers tend to treat sound as if it were a stable art form. The purpose of this advanced production course is to deconstruct the art of record producing and to expose students to radical musical and studio experimentation, especially given Germany’s role in radicalizing music and sound in the 20th century. Students will get a glimpse into the history and present of experimental composing, recording and performance. Students will learn how accidents can be the foundation of new musical genres. They will learn about the history of renaissance experiments in spatial music (which, in a way, mark the beginnings of modern artistic play on perspective). If time permits, students will be given an introduction to experimental approaches to hacking, instrument building and software abuse, as well as learn how everyday experimentation can be essential to their recording and performance routines. An array of analogue gear and microphones will be incorporated into in-class sessions, and the class will collectively jam using electronic and other sound devices to understand how individual expression can be essential to the creativity of the group as a whole. As the idea of recorded musical products must be much more flexible and fluid in the age of streaming and other dephysicalized technologies, we will work toward the aforementioned idea that sound is an unstable art form. The product is the merchandise, but the idea is the original — this has held true for the history of recorded music in the 20th and 21st centuries. Throughout the course, students will have to continually ask themselves the following questions: Where does my music fit in? What is its context? Which ecosystem do I want to be a part of and how can I contribute to its discourse?

This unique course introduces students to innovative and cutting-edge technologies sound, video, and interfaces that are changing the way music is performed, produced and received. Music and creative technologies have shifted in the last years from preset-focused black-box devices to open and hackable hard- and software. Examples are MaxMSP (Ableton), the Kinect Motion sensor, VR Platforms or open source music instruments like Korg’s Mono series, little bits or bastl. This shift enables artists today to understand the inner workings of instruments better and engage a very different working process: these days, devices can more easily be created and manipulated, forming future tools and creating a rich variety of different media. The course consists of both a theoretical and a hands-on part, and has a workshop component. No special knowledge like programming or electronic skills is presupposed. As this course is intended for students from different disciplines, the content will flexibly be adapted to the level of knowledge of the students, especially for students with little or no technical background.

A classic album is one that has been deemed by many —or even just a select influential few — as a standard bearer within or without its genre. In this class—a companion to the Classic Albums class offered in New York—we will look and listen at a selection of classic albums recorded in Berlin, or recorded in Germany more broadly, and how the city/country shaped them – from David Bowie's famous Berlin trilogy from 1977 – 79 to Ricardo Villalobos' minimal house masterpiece Alcachofa. We will deconstruct the music, the production and the marketing of these albums, putting them in full social and political context and exploring the range of reasons why they have garnered classic status. Artists, producers and engineers involved in the making of these albums will be invited to discuss their seminal works with the students. We will particularly look at how electronic music developed in Germany before the advent of house and techno in the late 1980s as well as the arrival of Techno, a new musical movement, and new technology in Berlin and Germany in the turbulent years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, up to the present.

The purpose of this workshop is to expose students to forward-thinking ways to conceive of creative approaches to performing. As the traditional global recorded music economy has diminished over the last two decades, live performance and touring has become an increasingly important and primary source of income for recording artists. As a result, the twenty-first century finds us on a new horizon with regard to the vanguard of contemporary performance. This course will allow participants the opportunity to explore the cannon of cutting-edge contemporary performance, from the avant garde foundations of the twentieth century expressions in theatre, performance, and music, to the latest advances in current popular performance presentation. The class focuses on building new forms for live music performance: students will work with their instructor to take creative risks and experiment toward developing new techniques for presenting original music. Accompanied by lectures that weave together performance history, somatic awareness, contemporary music politics, and new technologies, students will be required to present in-class "works in progress" presentations that challenge the conventions of live music performance. In-class performances will be followed by group dialogue and critique, evaluating each students ability to take risks, challenge themselves, and incorporate new ideas into their practice. Students will consider the value of incorporating somatic tools and emergent technology into their performances, as they conceptualize and contextualize their work in larger narrative arcs that create cohesive story for their songs, exploring visual elements through live video manipulation of appropriate found imagery. The course will conclude with a final concert performance for the general public that demonstrates creative growth and risk-taking that has been investigated throughout the course of the semester. The semester will end with this final concert and a concluding session to review final projects and assess the results of the final concert. This course is appropriate for students who already have some studio production experience, as well as performers at various levels of experience.