The study of historically-informed Classic era performance practice (i.e. the varying conventions of performance that appear to have been prevalent among knowledgeable performers from the early 1700s to the 1820s) is an essential key to our understanding the incomplete record represented by Classic era musical notation. The course is designed for graduate music students who, within the context of Classic era repertoire, wish to mediate in a richly contextualised way (either in performance, or within the sole context of musicological research) between an historic past documented in the musical score of a work and its correlative aesthetic present.

The course will include an examination of issues arising from historically-informed Classic era performance practice, such as for example, accentuation, articulation, tempo, ornamentation, rubato, technique, notation, affect, and resultant conceptual, interpretative and aesthetic implications.

This will almost certainly lead to a reassessment of both received and personal interpretative responses to Classic era repertoire.

A historically informed performance edition of a Classic era work: 50%.

And one of the following:

One 3000 word essay: 50%;

OR

One class lecture-demonstration of 40 minutes duration: 50%

24 hours of lectures (please contact course coordinator for class schedule)

Required reading.:

Brown, C. (1999). Classical & Romantic Performing Practice 1750-1900. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Harrison, B. (1997). Haydn?s Keyboard Music: Studies in Performance Practice. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Hudson, R. (1994). Stolen Time: The History of Tempo Rubato. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Rosenblum, S. (1991). Performance Practices in Classic Piano Music. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.