The Modern Scholar: Understanding the Fundamentals of Classical Music
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The Modern Scholar: Understanding the Fundamentals of Classical Music
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Narrated by:
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Richard Freedman
About this listen
Music is a performative art. It stresses movement through time and engages our suggestive sense of its passing. Music has tendency, it normally invokes goals of various sorts, both near and far. Music has closure, a sensation not just of ending, but of expecting no more. Music also has accent. It is a dynamic process of stresses and nuance that often varies in dimension from one performance to the next.
This course is not designed as a chronological survey of musical history and its many stylistic periods or moments, nor an exploration of the lives and output of individual composers. Instead, these lectures focus on the development of listening skills. Through this course you will develop new levels of aural awareness that will allow you to better appreciate the richness, complexity, and excitement at the heart of all great concert music.
Download the accompanying reference guide.©2003 Richard Freedman (P)2003 Recorded BooksPeople who viewed this also viewed...
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- By: Professor Ellen Schrecker
- Narrated by: Ellen Schrecker
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 28
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 21
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 21
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A real disapointment :-((
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- By: Bill Messenger, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Bill Messenger
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 714
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 622
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 617
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A Disappointingly Distorted, Myopic View Of Jazz
- By Parallax View on 08-18-13
By: Bill Messenger, and others
-
The Modern Scholar: Masterpieces of Western Music
- By: Professor Jeffrey Lependorf
- Narrated by: Jeffrey Lependorf
- Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 100
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 71
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 66
This lecture series focuses on the very best of Western music, and as we progress through these lectures, the following are two important questions that we will seek to answer as we examine the various musical selections: What makes these works masterpieces? Why highlight these works?
-
5 out of 5 stars
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Excellent and solid listen
- By ESK on 04-14-13
-
The Modern Scholar
- Shakespeare: The Seven Major Tragedies
- By: Professor Harold Bloom
- Narrated by: Professor Harold Bloom
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 128
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 98
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 97
Shakespeare's seven great tragedies contain unmistakable elements that set them apart from any other plays ever written. In Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare embodied in the character of Juliet the world's most impressive representation ever of a woman in love. With Julius Caesar, the great playwright produced a drama of astonishing and perpetual relevance.
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Lowest WPM Ever
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What listeners say about The Modern Scholar: Understanding the Fundamentals of Classical Music
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
- DrandomTubas
- 03-22-11
Somewhat dull...
Note: I'm a classically trained musician.
While I was able to follow this with no problem, I had difficulty keeping myself engaged, even with the supplemental materials.
Part of the problem was in the Audible format: it was somewhat difficult to rewind and repeat recordings, which meant I lost patience and stopped bothering after a few sections. Thus, his point was lost, and when he later elaborated, I just didn't care.
I will try this another day, however, and see if I like it better then.
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8 people found this helpful
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
- Vinicius
- 08-30-10
Quick overview of classical music
It may be me, but a bunch of it was a bit above my head. It is probably good listen for those with more than basic musical understanding.
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7 people found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- COBRA
- 10-02-18
Educational
Will have to rewind several times and listen to it over and over in order to get a good grasp of the author's extraordinary knowledge on the subject
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 12-23-20
Awful
This book was a shattering disappointment to me. Like, I suspect, many of my generation, I grew up loving pop/rock music. However, I feel like I’ve heard anything worth listening to already. Ninety-nine new releases in every hundred sound stale and derivative. So, to keep my love of music alive, I keep trying to get into classical music.
Paul McCartney suggested once that Mozart had a profile similar to a Beatle in 18th Century Vienna. No, he didn’t. The equivalent of the typists at the Cavern Club were not going to see the Magic Flute in the evening. They listened to folk music, Austrian or Bohemian or Hungarian as they found it. Everyone gets pop music straight away; classical music is something that requires a bit of homework.
I hoped this would be a book to help in that process of learning how to appreciate classical music. It’s not. It’s rubbish, a hopeless, mixed-up mess. The book is about the fundamentals of classical music. The very first chapter is concerned with the difference in timbre and playing style between modern instruments and instruments that were contemporary with the composer. That distinction is fundamental to classical music in the same way that learning how to operate the radio is fundamental to learning how to drive a car.
Reader, I hated this book. Avoid, avoid, avoid.
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance2 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Gil Kerbashian
- 05-02-18
exhausting mess
author is pretentious and uses words inefficiently. I wouldn't categorize this as a fundamental to classics
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