Diverse Cultures and their Musics Fall 2024

 As we've been work our way across the globe, we've often observed music created for various  rituals . Weddings, funerals, religious ceremonies, holidays, and various other gatherings almost always include specific kinds of musics. This, of course, is hardly surprising to most of us--we've been to weddings and funerals and other gatherings ourselves, and those rituals have almost always included specific music. For this blog, you're going to explore this relationship between ritual and music by telling us about some of your own experiences. Here are your guidelines: Your blog should be at least 400 words long. Your blog should include a minimum of two media selections--videos, pictures, sound files, links, etc. More is better. Please embed your videos, rather than just link to them. At least one of these selections must be music that we can hear. As always, keep your language respectful. Keep this blog centered around your own experiences and observations. All writing ...

Most of us have our first musical experiences with our families, and you can often give credit for some of your personal musical taste to those experiences--whether you share those opinions or rebel against them. Too, one of the Big Points of this class is to explore how music and culture are interrelated, and cultures are built out of families. So for this blog, you're going to find out more about how someone in your family relates to music. Specifically, I want you to pick someone that's at least one generation older than you and interview them about their relationship with music. You might talk with them about the music of their childhood, or as teenagers, or what they listen to today, or all three. We'll talk about potential questions in class and question lists will be available on Canvas. If possible, resist the urge to email your mom a bunch of questions and have her send the answers back to you--I'd like for this to be a conversation between you and your intervi...