Catalog Search Results
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Let's start by playing some music! From minute one of this course, you will be at the piano, fingering keys and playing tunes. In this opening lesson, you'll familiarize yourself with the piano, perform a few basic exercises to warm up, and explore some introductory rhythm patterns. By the end of the lesson, you'll know how to play the theme from Beethoven's Ode to Joy.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2017.
Language
English
Description
Learn to play the beautiful, chiming guitar tones called harmonics. First, explore the lives of some great players who featured them. Then play harmonics on all six strings, and see how they're notated. Practice four-note diatonic seventh chords, and investigate modes, permutations of the major scale. Use your new chords and harmonics in the tune "Harmonic Landscapes".
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2020.
Language
English
Description
Bring your vocal skills to the areas of expression and performance. Grasp the importance of aligning your intention with the message your listeners are receiving. Explore how factors such as posture, facial expressions, physical gestures, vocal resonance, and articulation all communicate. Sing "Auld Lang Syne," and practice communicating different attitudes and expressive intentions.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2017.
Language
English
Description
Explore the work of composer John Cage, as it points to the value of musical "silence" - the space between notes. Then learn to read musical "rests" (silences in the music). Study how to use the capo, a device used to shorten the guitar's string length. Continue your work with "movable" pentatonic and major scales, and revive your "Travis picking" skills for today's tune.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Find out about a practice technique called "blocking," which will help you recognize chord patterns more easily - a major step toward sight-reading. Practice three types of accompaniment patterns: the broken-chord pattern, the waltz (3/4 time) pattern, and the Alberti bass pattern.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2015.
Language
English
Description
Probe the ongoing research into the effects of musical training on the microstructure of the brain, which points to cognitive benefits in areas such as speech processing. Focus on how learning to play a musical instrument influences language acquisition and reading ability in children..
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2015.
Language
English
Description
What brain processes lead people to hear certain intervals as more consonant and others as more dissonant? Evaluate the major theories, one of which traces the phenomenon to the acoustic quality of the human voice. Then examine the structure of musical scales..
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Playing the piano is as much art as science, so here you will consider several techniques to boost the artistry of your playing. The way you articulate or play notes (also known as staccato and legato) will add personality to your playing. Practice with two new pieces: Gurlitt's At School and Diabelli's Waltz.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
This lesson will enrich your musical life by building the technical foundation upon which piano music is based. Inverted chords (moving the lowest note of a triad up an octave) is a complex musical detail that will open your ears for future lessons. Learn to recognize how inversions look on the staff and the correct fingerings to play them.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2017.
Language
English
Description
Trace the remarkable life of Merle Travis, who pioneered a distinctive and highly influential fingerpicking style. Refine your descending legato technique ("pull-offs"), a great exercise for strength and finger independence. Study the "Travis picking" style, practice some melodic licks using pull-offs, and try Travis picking in the blues tune "Dusty Blue".
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Delve into the singular aesthetic philosophy behind Stravinsky's neoclassic music, in which he describes his compositional process as purely formal and objective. Learn about Stravinsky's relocation to the United States, and how in his seventies he turned to writing 12-tone music. Grasp how his last major work, Requiem Canticles, functions as a musical retrospective of his career.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Over the past few lessons, you have moved from very basic off-staff rhythms and pitches to much more complicated rhythmic patterns. Today's lesson takes your knowledge of the minor keys to a whole new level as you examine the natural, harmonic, and melodic forms of the minor scale. Also, witness "syncopation" in action in Swing Low.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
In 1925, Schoenberg developed a compositional system that would dominate Western concert music for 50 years. Study the elements of his "12-Tone Method," based in the use of a "tone row" where all 12 musical pitches are used in a pre-determined sequence. Observe how this system allowed composers to write large-form, non-tonal music. Grasp its enormous influence, and its challenges for listeners.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2020.
Language
English
Description
Take a deep dive into the classification of consonants and how they function in singing. Work with eight categories of consonants and discover both where they are formed within the vocal tract and how they are formed by the articulators. Explore voiced and unvoiced consonants, as they relate to sustained tone, and apply your knowledge to the poetic text of a song.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Transposition - moving a melody from one key to another - is an important skill often under-used in traditional piano lessons for beginners. It provides an opportunity to get to know the different musical keys and can help you jazz around with an old piece of repertoire. Practice transposition with a few melodies, including "Woodland Jaunt."
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2017.
Language
English
Description
Consider important principles of musical learning, the essence of practice, and the importance of performance. Investigate how to tune your guitar, and learn a useful warmup. Observe how pitch and rhythm are notated (written), practice E and A minor chords, and work with a musical number using the chords you've learned so far.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Learning to play the piano is about more than acquiring, perfecting, and practicing techniques. Understanding the time periods of music history help inform your understanding of practice. Here, start with the Classical period and learn how the piano developed as an instrument. Play Mozart's theme from the Sonata in C.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2020.
Language
English
Description
With regular practice and solid technique, you can develop and maximize your natural range. Start by further exercising your range. Then explore self-massage of the muscles and joints around the larynx, and work with exercises to develop flexibility in these muscles to expand and unite your range. Using "The Star-Spangled Banner," experiment with breath, phrasing, and range.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Examine historical and social factors that influenced 20th-century composers' abandonment of tradition and obsession with originality. Then learn about the influence of 19th-century German art on the French, and the new French nationalism in music that followed the Franco-Prussian War. Take a first look at Claude Debussy, whose revolutionary music created a new musical syntax.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2018.
Language
English
Description
Shift your attention from the Classical period to the Romantic era, roughly 1800 to 1910. After surveying some of the major historical and intellectual developments of the period, you'll begin work on seventh-chord arpeggios. You'll also learn rules for beginning pieces at the appropriate tempo.
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