Mail from the professor
Hello–I’ve had a couple of requests for clarification of the assignment.
This is what I’m thinking: wherever you may go from Wesleyan, you’ll be
dealing with musicologists and music theorists who have strong opinions
about composers. Larry Kramer is very smart, well informed, very well
known and respected, and a fine writer, and he and the others you’ll be
reading have points to make about composition and composers. So the
idea is to have you take them on, one way or another, as you see fit, but
with cogent arguments and well-chosen examples. Of course, you may
think they’re fine observers and can just extend their thinking with your
own experience. But even though it might look like one short article for a
whole week’s work, take your time with the assignment and don’t just toss
something off Tuesday night. If you get interested in Kramer, check out his
other books. I almost gave you his cultural studies reading of Ravel’s
“Daphnis and Chloe,” which is quite entertaining, but he’s really a
nineteenth-century specialist (which might show).
Um, so i guess i need to do a rewrite….