Syllabus for MUS 151, Twentieth-Century Harmony

Semester: Spring 2016

Course Control Number: 60609
Time/Location: 12:40pm-2:00pm, 128 Morrison
Instructor: Robert Yamasato
Email: yamasato@berkeley.edu
Office Hours: Thursdays, 2-3pm or by appointment. Office hours will most likely be held in one
of the practice rooms or in my office (234 Morrison).
Prerequisite:
Music 60 (Music 61 recommended, but not required), or the equivalent
Textbook, Assignments, and Class notes:
No textbooks are required. Notes from lectures, various published texts, as well as assignment
prompts, score excerpts, and sound files are available on bcourses. It is highly recommended that you
print out hard copies of the score excerpts, collate them in a three-ring binder, and bring them to each
class. Each score excerpt is numbered and will be studied during a specific unit (see below). It is also
highly recommended that you spend time after each class reviewing the class notes on bcourses.
Course Topics:
Unit I (7-8 weeks): Cycles and Synthetic Scales. Score excerpts 1-34
Origins of the Whole-tone Collection: Schubert and Late Liszt
Whole-tone and Whole-tone / Tonal Interaction: Bartok, Debussy and Scriabin
Modal Resurgence: Bartok
Pentatonic / Whole-tone / Diatonic Interaction: Debussy and Bartok
Octatonicism and Octatonic / Whole-tone / Diatonic Interaction: RimskyKosakov, Stravinsky, Scriabin, Debussy
Unit II (3-4 weeks): Set Theory and Free Atonality. Score excerpts 35-41
Operations Tn and TnI, Pitch Class Sets, Normal Form, Set Classes, Symmetry
Developing Variation: Schoenberg
Two Webern Analyses: Transformational Stance
Unit III (2-3 weeks): Tonality Revisited. Score excerpts 42-51
The Wrong Note Music of Prokofiev
Quartal Harmonies and 12-Tone Tonality: Hindemith
Polytonality: Milhaud
Contextually Transformed Tonality: Britten/Copland (time permitting)
Unit IV (2 weeks): Introduction to Twelve-Tone Music. Score excerpts 52-56
Origins of the Row: Early Schoenberg
Hexachordal Inversional Combinatoriality, Isomorphic Partitioning, Combinatorial
Complexes: Schoenbergs Mature 12-tone Works

The Derived Row: Webern

The Grand Synthesis All-Combinatorial Hexachords and Derivation: Babbitt
Grading and grading policies:
Assignments: See below
Listening Quiz 1 (Unit I): 5%
Project 1 (Unit I): 10%
Midterm Exam 1 (Unit I): 20%
Midterm Exam 2 (Unit II): 20%
Listening Quiz 2 (Unit II): 5%
Project 2 (Units III and IV): 15%
Final Exam, Thurs., May 12, 3-6pm (includes listening Quiz 3, Units III and IV): 25%
Assignments:
Analysis and/or written assignments will be due most classes. Include the due date and
assignment number(s) on each submission. It is highly recommended that you review the notes from
the previous class before working on the next assignment(s). Expect about 3 hours of work per week
outside of class. Each assignment will be graded with one of the following marks:
+1 = excellent / good
0 = satisfactory
-1 = needs significant improvement
-2 = incomplete
-3 = not submitted
At the end of the semester, all pluses and negative numbers on assignments will be totaled.
Your final grade will be raised a whole letter grade (ex: B+ to A-) if your assignment total is
significantly greater than zero, or lowered a whole letter grade if it is significantly less than zero. If
your total is about zero, your final grade will stand as is. In the scenario of a total much greater than or
much less than zero at the end of the semester, I may raise or lower your final grade by two or even
three letters (ex: B+ to A). Class attendance (including tardiness) and participation may also influence,
for better or for worse, your final homework grade.
Late Assignments, Attendance, Plagiarism:
Assignments (hard copies) will be due at the beginning of each class. Pdfs and/or late
assignments will not be accepted unless under unusual circumstances (illness, family emergency, etc.).
If possible, please let me know in person or via email beforehand, if you will be turning in an
assignment late.
Plagiarism is unacceptable and will result in an automatic F. Assignments, projects, and tests
should be your work, and only your work.

MORRISON HALL EMERGENCY PROCEDURES

Your emergency evacuation assembly area is the lawn just south of Hertz Hall.
In the event of an emergency please follow instructions from your instructor and Music Department
staff.
Take note of emergency procedures posted in your classroom. If the fire alarm is sounding, exit the
building immediately. In the event of an earthquake, duck when possible and hold in place, covering
your head with your arms, a binder or your laptop. Then exit the building when the shaking stops.
If you are in a wheelchair and on the second floor of Morrison, proceed to the Designated Waiting
Area for evacuation. A Disabled Evacuation Chair is located in the first floor classroom hallway.
If you are in a wheelchair and in the basement area, exit through the long locker hallway and through
the service area out the door to your right at the end of the hall. You may need assistance to open the
outside door.
EMERGENCY SERVICES:
UC Police and all emergencies number from campus phones: 911
UC Police and all emergencies number from cell phones: (510) 642-3333
UC Police non-emergency number: (510) 642-6760

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION
Federal copyright laws protect all original works of authorship fixed in a tangible medium. When using
material that has been written, recorded, or designed by someone else, it is important to make sure that
you are not violating copyright law by improperly using someone else's intellectual property.
The Department of Music is committed to upholding copyright law. As a student enrolled in this music
class, you may be provided with access to copyrighted music which is directly related to the content of
this course. It is our expectation that you will utilize these digital recordings during the course of the
semester that you are enrolled in this class, and will delete these recordings after the close of the
course. The purpose and character under which these recordings are being provided to you is for
nonprofit educational purposes only.
To read more about UC's Policy and Guidelines on the Reproduction of Copyrighted Materials for
Teaching and Research, visit http://copyright.universityofcalifornia.edu/index.html