The subjects that this course addresses are manifold. For example, you will get to know the ideas of relevant musicians and listeners about the ways music works such as those of Laurie Anderson (‘We are so much smarter than the words we use’), John Cage (‘I just LOVE the activity of sounds), or Björk (who says to composer Arvo Pärt: ‘I admire your music very much. You can live there’).
Moreover, you will understand complex thinking about music and listening. Susanne Langer, for example, explains how emotions and music corroborate. We will ‘meet’ Gilles Deleuze, who positions artworks as shedding light on the chaos that the world is. As well as Peter Kivy, who deconstructs concepts such as ‘authenticity’. Or Christopher Small, who suggest to replace the noun ‘music’ with the verb ’to music’, because music sounds, is active, makes active. To name just a few.
In addition to this, you will acquire a deeper understanding of how the tools you listen with affect and guide your perception. What can loudspeakers actually do? Would you think that listening to a recording on a set of EarPods and then on a high-end sound system produces the same music? And the same knowledge?
You will also understand better how sound works (what actually is frequency, loudness, sound color?) and get an idea of music history and music theory.
Last but not least, you will learn about more ways of engaging in research than just the academic one, such as artistic research. It stands in this course for investigating the world not by thinking and reasoning in the first place but by listening, experiencing, making art in the first place.