Description

Rice and Wilson’s Gateways to Understanding Music(PDF) explores music in all the categories that constitute contemporary musical experience: European classical music, jazz, popular music, and world music. Covering the oldest forms of human music-making to the newest, the chronological narrative considers music from a global rather than a Eurocentric perspective. Each of 60 modular “gateways” covers a particular genre, style, or period of music. Every gateway opens with a guided listening example that unlocks a world of music through careful study of its structural elements. Based on their listening experience, students are asked to consider how the piece came to be composed or performed, how the piece or performance responded to the social and cultural issues at the time and place of its creation, and what that music means today. Music and college students learn to listen to, explain, understand, and ultimately value all the music they may encounter anywhere in their world.