Course Description

 This course surveys the music of the Medieval and Renaissance periods through in-class performance and primary source readings. The class will sing its way through music between 900 AD and 1600.  Most of the repertory will be in modern editions, but we will also sing plainchant from medieval notation and Renaissance madrigals and motets from part-books.  We will read documents by musicians of the period, transcribe some early notation, and decipher musical iconography in works of Medieval and Renaissance art. Because of the prominence of vocal music in these periods, all students will sing in class; however, technical proficiency is not expected, and instrumentalists are welcome..