AP/MUSIC THEORY Syllabus 2017-2018 Course Overview AP Music Theory meets 8 th period every day, thru the entire school year. This course is designed to prepare students for the annual AP Music Theory exam. Students in this course will become familiar with elements of music notation and terminology, chord construction, harmonic analysis utilizing Roman and Arabic numbers and figured bass, musical form and melodic construct, bass motion, simple melodic and bass composition and common practice voice leading. In addition, students will practice rhythmic, melodic and harmonic dictation as well as aural melodic and form analysis. Students will become familiar with Solfege, number and pitch name performance of melodic material for sight singing and analysis of musical examples. Students will also use their knowledge of music theory to create and perform their own musical examples. Course Objectives At the completion of this course, students will be able to: -identify and write notes in a variety of clefs. -read and write musical notation and interpret rhythms in a variety of time signatures. -apply an understanding of key signatures to read and construct major, all forms of minor, chromatic, pentatonic, whole tone and modal scales. -analyze and construct perfect, major, minor, augmented and diminished intervals. -analyze and construct major, minor, augmented and diminished triads and seventh chords in all inversions. -notate from an aural prompt; simple rhythmic and melodic material. -sing at sight a variety of simple melodies using simple and compound rhythms. -recognize small forms and phrase structures. -analyze a variety of musical examples describing melodic and harmonic content. -write a bass line for a melody and harmonize a simple melody in four parts using common practice. -realize a figured bass using Roman and Arabic numerals. -analyze and predict common simple harmonic progression and non-chord tones.
Course Outline (Semester #1 18 week semesters during the school year) Ear Training Activity s Chapter 1 Notation 1-3 Introduce and or review the following concepts: Introduction to Solfege Music Staff, Treble/Bass/Alto/Tenor Clefs, Pitch Notation, Rhythm-Pitch Duration and Division and Counting System, Meter Signatures, Dot and Tie Valuations and Basic Dynamic Markings, Syncopation Tempo, Triplet, Duplet, etc. Quiz #1 s Chapter 2 Scales, Tonality, Key, Modes Sing Major Scales with 4-6 Diatonic motion, Key Signatures, Major Scales, Numbers and Solfege Minor Scales, Pitch Class, Relating Major to Minor Scales, Chromatic Scales, Pentatonic Scales, and Whole Tone Scales. Quiz #2 s Chapter 3 Intervals and Transposition Major Scale Intervals 7-9 Intervalic relationships between notes, Perfect, Rhythmic Dictation Major, Minor, Augmented and Diminished Intervals, Inversion of Intervals, Consonance & Dissonance Quiz # 3 s Chapter 4 Chords Outline Triads 10-14 Building a Triad, Root, Third and Fifth, Basic Melodic Dictation Major, Minor, Diminished and Augmented Triad, First and Second Inversion, Relating Triads to Major and Minors Scales Quiz # 4 s Chapter 5 Cadences and Noharmonic Tones Sight Sing Simple 15-16 Phrase, Harmonic Cadence, Rhythmic Cadence, Melodic Lines Perfect Authentic, Imperfect Authentic, Plagal, Half and Deceptive Cadence, Unaccented and Accented Nonharmonic tones, Identify specific Nonharmonic tones using basic Diatonic Chord
Analysis (Roman Numeral) 17 18 Review for Final Semester #1 Final Course Outline (Semester #2 18 week semesters during the school year) s Chapter 6 Melodic Organization Sight Reading (Major/Simple 19 Motive, Phrase, Period, Sequence sing Solfege and Numbers) Melodic Structure; Range, Intervals, Aural Analysis of Melodic Ex. Direction of line Create an Melodic Ex. Chapter 7 Texture and Textural Reduction Continue Sight Reading 20 Texture, Monophonic, Homophonic, Polyphonic Homorhythmic, Textural reduction Quiz # 5 Chapter 8 Species Counterpoint Sight Reading (Major/Compound) 21 Introduction to Cantus Firmus, first species, Modal Scales Chapter 9 Voice Leading in Four Part Chorale Solfege and Numbers Minor Keys 22 Common practice period. Doubling, Crossed Voices Four Voice Texture, Four part Chorale Analysis, Spacing, Common Tone, Parallel voices Quiz # 6 Chapter 10 Harmonic Progression and Harmonic Aural Analysis Melodic Content 23-24 Rhythm (Melodic Material/Form) Circle Progression, Root Relationships, Standard Harmonic Progression, Harmonic Rhythm, Root Relationships Koska/Payne Harmonic Outline Chapter 11 The Dominant Seventh Chord Outline 7 th chords 25 Seventh Chord, Dominant 7 th Chord, Major-Minor Triad Inversions Major-Major, 1 st, 2 nd and 3 rd Inversions Quiz # 7 Chapter 12 Leading-Tone Seventh Chords Harmonic Progression Listen 26 Leading Tone Seventh Chord, Half Diminished Fully Diminished Chord, Tri-tone Resolution Voice Leading Half Diminished and Diminished
27 Chapter 13 Nondominant Seventh Chords Sight Sing/ Review Roman Numeral Symbols, Non-Dominant Analysis of Music with 7 th Chords in Major and Minor Keys, Resolution chords Of Non-Dominant Seventh Chords Quiz # 8 s Chapter 14 Secondary Dominants and Leading Bass Line Motion 28-29 Tone Chords Sight Sing/ Minor Characteristics of Secondary Dominant Chords, Resolution of Secondary Dominants, Popular Music Symbols and Roman Analysis Symbols Quiz # 9 Chapter 15 Modulation Soprano Line Motion 30 Pivot Chords, Phrase Modulation, Key Relation Sight Sing/Compound Rhythm Common Chord Modulation, Chromatic Modulaion Chapter 16 - Two Part (Binary) Form Soprano & Bass Motion 31 Chapter 17- Three-Part (Ternary) Form Form Analysis Relationship Simple Forms, Compound Forms, Bridge, Rounded Binary Form, Refrain Review 1 st Semester Harmonic Dictation Practice 32 s 33 Review 2 nd Semester 34 35-36 Ap Exam Review Final Review Semester #2 Final
Teaching Strategies Each 49 minutes in length and requires a variety of activities to maintain interest and keep students moving forward. The classes are organized to include some lecture and a large portion of practice over concepts utilizing a combination of the student workbook, examples from their text, additional resource material and teacher provided worksheets. Additionally, students will spend a significant amount of time practicing aural skills. The aural skills will include; 1. Singing with both solfege and numbers over scales, chords, arpeggios and increasingly difficult melodic material. 2. Listening and analyzing recorded performance of related works for melodic and harmonic content. 3. Practice dictation of rhythms, melodies and harmonic progression. 4. Compose simple melodies and harmonize those melodies in 4 part common practice. 5. Improvise melodies from a given bass line. Aural Skills 1. Sight Singing Students will develop skills to read at sight melodic lines using numbers, solfege and mono syllabic skills. The development of this skill will begin with an understanding of key signatures relating both major and minor keys. Students will then utilize their understanding of rhythms and pitch relationship to develop their individual music reading skills to interpret provided material. Sight Singing skills will be developed in conjunction with dictation and aural analysis skills to develop a comprehensive approach to reading and relating to musical excerpts. Students will be challenged with an increasing level of difficulty in keys, clefs and melodic intervals to develop these skills. Two Sight Singing texts will be used to provide examples and practice. 2. Dictation Students will begin working on rhythmic dictation and establishing a common counting system and listening skill to interpret provided examples. Students will continue dictation study with teacher provided examples that require students to fill in deleted portions of a simple listening example and later to identify more challenging rhythmic and melodic material with less and less provided material. Students will learn to listen simultaneously to rhythm, melody, harmony, bass line and form. The larger goal is to link the written and theoretical portion of the class to an auditory experience that may include them as the performer. Students will spend some time with electronic keyboards to help relate all of the material provided in class. Additional time will also be spent on school provided computers working with Finale Notepad for basic composition skills and available electronic ear training software. 3. Aural Analysis Student skills will be developed as they relate to the source book topics being covered in class. Most of this will take place during the second semester as we relate melody to harmony and form of music to melodic material.
Materials Needed: Staff paper Can be purchased at bookstores or online. You can also print custom staff paper @ blanksheetmusic.net Folder/Binder You will receive many resources through the course of the year, and you should keep them all in the same place for easy reference. Pencils Always have something to write/erase with. Smart Device (recommended) Throughout the course I will encourage you to use smartphone or tablet apps that will help in your understanding of more complex theory subjects, and aid in sight singing/ear training drills outside of class. Student Evaluation Classroom participation..40% Homework Assignments.25% Quizzes 20% Final Exams.15% Instructor Mr. Robert Beavers MacArthur High School AP Theory - 8 th Period Rm. E803 Email Address- rbeave@neisd.net