Listening to Music (MUSI 112)This lecture addresses the history of the modern piano and its music. Undertaking a detailed discussion of the different forms of the piano from the early eighteenth through twentieth centuries, Professor Wright also shows how the instrument evolved through a variety of photographs and paintings. He further supplements the lecture by playing recordings that were made on the pianos actually owned by such composers as Mozart and Beethoven. The lecture ends with a guest piano performance by Yale undergraduate Daniel Schlossberg, Jr.00:00 - Chapter 1. The History of the Piano -- The Harpsichord 02:25 - Chapter 2. Mozart's Exploration of the Pianoforte 13:31 - Chapter 3. Beethoven's Music for his Broadwood Piano 23:43 - Chapter 4. Increasing Range and Power -- The Graf Piano, Liszt, and Wagner 35:30 - Chapter 5. Guest Piano Performance by Daniel Scholssberg, Jr. This course was recorded in Fall 2008.

1. Introduction
2. Introduction to Instruments and Musical Genres
3. Rhythm: Fundamentals
4. Rhythm: Jazz, Pop and Classical
5. Melody: Notes, Scales, Nuts and Bolts
6. Melody: Mozart and Wagner
7. Harmony: Chords and How to Build Them
8. Bass Patterns: Blues and Rock
9. Sonata-Allegro Form: Mozart and Beethoven
10. Sonata-Allegro and Theme and Variations
11. Form: Rondo, Sonata-Allegro and Theme and Variations (cont.)
12. Guest Conductor: Saybrook Orchestra
13. Fugue: Bach, Bizet and Bernstein
14. Ostinato Form in the Music of Purcell, Pachelbel, Elton John and Vitamin C
15. Gregorian Chant and Music in the Sistine Chapel
16. Baroque Music: The Vocal Music of Johann Sebastian Bach
17. Mozart and His Operas
18. Piano Music of Mozart and Beethoven
19. Romantic Opera: Verdi's La Traviata, Bocelli, Pavarotti and Domingo
20. The Colossal Symphony: Beethoven, Berlioz, Mahler and Shostakovich
21. Musical Impressionism and Exoticism: Debussy, Ravel and Monet
22. Modernism and Mahler
23. Review of Musical Style

This course fosters the development of aural skills that lead to an understanding of Western music. The musical novice is introduced to the ways in which music is put together and is taught how to listen to a wide variety of musical styles, from Bach and Mozart, to Gregorian chant, to the blues.