ID:
502082
Duration (hours):
36
CFU:
6
SSD:
MUSICOLOGIA E STORIA DELLA MUSICA
Located in:
CREMONA
Year:
2025
Overview
Date/time interval
Primo Semestre (29/09/2025 - 23/01/2026)
Syllabus
Course Objectives
Main aim of this introductory course is to exemplify and codify the formal and expressive interaction between music and poetry in various repertories of both the so called ‘Classical’ and ‘Popular’ traditions, from the Troubadours’ era to modern-day. To such aim, it develops and deepens basic elements of metrics, linguistics, poetic and dramaturgic theory, musical theory and analysis; it also proposes a method of poetic-musical analysis and interpretation, whose specific goal is to shed light on the formal and expressive reality generated by the encounter between the two systems.
Course Prerequisites
Basic knowledge of music theory (with particular reference to harmony, rhythm, modality in classical, jazz and popular areas), music history, Italian and foreign literatures, linguistics, romance philology.
Teaching Methods
The course is structured in regular classes, whose character is at first theoretical, historical and aesthetic, then rather practically analytical and performative. During the analytical sessions, large space will be given to the listening (or video-listening) of historical recordings as well as of live performances by the teacher with the participation of the students. In this sense the teaching method can be defined as performative and multimedial, such as to involve also complementary seminar activities.
Assessment Methods
Seminar presentation (for attending students) or discussion of a written analytical essay as part of the oral exam (for non-attending students); the essay should be delivered to the teacher at least a week before the exam date. Oral exam aimed at testing not only the specific theoretical, historical and analytical competences acquired by the student, but also his critical ability in expressing his personal point of view on the main conceptual issues focussed during the course and/or in the reference texts (starting with the basic definitions of “poetry” vs. “poetry for music”, and of “poetry for music” vs. “music for poetry”).
Texts
– S. LA VIA, Poesia per musica e musica per poesia. Dai trovatori a Paolo Conte, Roma, Carocci, 2006, part one (volume); parte two (CD-ROM): Introduzione and at least one chapter.
– S. LA VIA, Il passacaglio tetracordale come tòpos poetico-musicale transculturale. Usi antichi e moderni a confronto (secc. XVI-XVII e XX-XXI), «Rivista di Analisi e Teoria musicale», XX/1-2 (2014), pp. 27-95.
– Handouts and further bibliographic – documentary material that will be distributed during the course.
– S. LA VIA, Il passacaglio tetracordale come tòpos poetico-musicale transculturale. Usi antichi e moderni a confronto (secc. XVI-XVII e XX-XXI), «Rivista di Analisi e Teoria musicale», XX/1-2 (2014), pp. 27-95.
– Handouts and further bibliographic – documentary material that will be distributed during the course.
Contents
Preliminary definitions, theoretical principles and basic elements concerning the relationship between poetry and music in various repertoires of the ‘Classical’ and ‘Popular’ traditions. Comparative poetic-musical analysis of vocal compositions belonging to the following repertoires: Medieval Troubadour Song (Bernart de Ventadorn), polyphonic and monodic 16th/17th-century Italian Madrigal (Cipriano de Rore, Claudio Monteverdi), 17th/18th-century Cantata (Georg Friederich Händel), German Classic-Romantic Lied (Franz Schubert), 20th-century and contemporary Song (with particular reference to French “Chanson”, Italian “Canzone d’autore”, British and North-American “Popular Song”, Brasilian “Canção”). At the end of the course, the student will be asked to apply the analytical method to a freely chosen composition (taken from any of the repertoires listed above), and to show the main results of her/his study in the form of either a seminar presentation or a written essay (see also below under “Procedures for learning verification”).
Course Language
Italian
More information
Most of the analytical material (with the exception of audio and audio-visual recordings) will be gradually uploaded on the platform KIRO, accessible to all the enrolled students. Anyone who is interested in attending regularly each class is required to get such KIRO-material at the preventive behest of the teacher. Non-attending students are required to get in touch with the teacher in order to define the program, the composition to be analyzed and the additional bibliography.
Degrees
Degrees
MUSICOLOGY
Bachelor’s Degree
3 years
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