Theory and Analysis of Popular Music

4.0 credits

In this course we will study the theory and analysis of popular music. Our main focus will be on rock music, defined broadly to include a wide spectrum of late-20th-century American popular styles (e.g. early rock’n’roll, soul, heavy metal, disco, grunge); we will also give some attention to more recent and non-Western popular music. We will read selections from the theoretical literature on popular music (covering topics such as tonality, scale, harmony, melody, rhythm/meter, phrase structure, form, instrumentation, and timbre), and apply our knowledge of these topics to in-depth analysis of specific songs.