Listening report
About Concert Reports
Concerts must be college level or above. No elementary school, middle school, or high school concerts.
Concert reports must be written about performances that you attended this semester, Spring 2019.
These must be concerts, not a single short piece that you listened to on YouTube while walking to school. For an idea of how long a concert should be, at minimum, a short concert is usually at least 45 minutes long. Below are are 2 documents that describe what you need to include in each concert report.
The Concert Report Checklist describes what to include and how points are awarded. I will use it to evaluate your concert reports. The Soundscapes document describes #4, #5, #6, and #7 in the Concert Report Form in detail. Read both documents before you select the concerts you will attend and before you write the report.
Because this is a virtual class, attaching the program or ticket from the concert you attended is impossible. Instead, please take a picture of/scan the program or the ticket (just one picture/scan, I don’t need the entire booklet!) and attach the file at the assignment submission site. For virtual concerts, attach the web address for the concert.
Concert Report Checklist
MUS 161 (Shepard) Concert Report Form (Spring 2019)
Music type: Classical___/Opera____/Jazz_x___/Concert Band_____/World_____
Each item below is worth up to 10 points.
Musical event is of collegiate level or above. (No events of high school age or below).
Concert report includes the concert program or ticket.
Concert report includes scholarly commentary on ALL of the pieces performed.
Concert report includes the three components of a soundscape: 1) Sound
2) Setting
3) Significance (See Soundscape document below for more details on these 3 components.)
Concert report includes musical terms studied in class.
Concert report contains an Introductory Paragraph and a Closing Paragraph.
Concert report uses size 12 font, one inch margins, is at least 2 pages in length, double spaced.
Concert report is written in past tense, has been proofread for content AND grammar, and uses collegiate level writing.
Soundscape
Your concert report should include the discussion of the three components of a soundscape: sound, setting, and significance.
1) Sound: What you learn from the textbook will help you with this section. This is not an all-inclusive list, but some things to think about are: Rhythm: Is the beat emphasized or hard to hear? Is the tempo fast or slow?
Are any tempo indications in the program or in the titles of the movements (i.e. allegro, adagio, etc.)? Any remarkable and specific changes in tempo during a piece? Any specific sections that featured syncopation?
What was the meter of the selections (duple, triple, quadruple, or other)? Did performers use rubato? Do you hear syncopations in the music? Timbre: If an orchestra or a large ensemble piece, is there any one instrument or instrument family that is featured (strings, woodwinds, brass, percussion)?
If vocal, is there any one voice or voice part that is featured (soprano, alto, tenor, bass)? Any remarkable solo sections? Tutti sections? Dynamics: Any specific remarkable forte/loud or piano/soft parts? Combinations of both? Noticeable accents?
Specific crescendos or diminuendos? Pitch: Any part(s) strike you as particularly high or low in pitch? Can you tell whether the music is major, minor, both or neither? Do you hear chromaticism?
Melody: Any specific staccato parts? Any specific legato parts? Any remarkable melodic contours (mon0tone, conjunct, disjunct)? Any recognizable motives that repeat? Any memorable cadences? Were these memorable cadences open or closed?
Any tuneful melodies? Harmony: Mostly consonant or mostly dissonant? A mixture of both? Chromaticism? Texture: Any remarkable and/or specific sections of … Monophony? Imitative polyphony (round or canon-like)? Homorhythmic or Hymn-like Textures?
Homophony (Melody with accompaniment)? Heterophony? Pedal point (drone)? Style: Can you identify the music style through the musical style characteristics? If this piece or movement sounds like any of the music that we studied in class, tell me which one(s)?
Basically show me that you listen to the music actively by describing what you heard to the best of your ability using concepts and vocabulary you have learned from the class. Sometimes when you are stuck it is helpful to describe the music using analogy.
For example, “The quick repeated rhythm played by the trumpet section sounded like horses galloping into battle.” This shows me that you know what trumpets sound like, that your recognize tempo and musical repetition, and that most importantly you were engaged enough with the music to imagine horses galloping to the music.
I would much rather read something like that than a sentence littered with incorrectly used terms from the book. Also, especially with descriptions of texture (which are tricky for everyone), explain why you picked the texture you did.
For me, it is more important for you to have a good solid reason for picking the texture you did than for you to get the texture exactly right all of the time. Especially in longer classical works, the texture changes often, and it is tricky to know how to describe it.
2) Setting: Describe where you are as you listen to the performance. What is the venue? What does it look like? Is the setting a secular or sacred space? How are people behaving? Is this a casual or formal environment?
3) Significance: What is the music’s meaning to you as an individual? What does the music mean to a larger group of people? Does the music have meaning to the performers?
Here’s the video that needs to be listened too:
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