Postgraduate Course: Music and Image (ELCC11023)
Course Outline
| School | School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Not available to visiting students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | The purpose of this MSc course is to encourage in-depth understanding of the relationship between visual representations and cinematographic techniques in diverse film traditions, operas, dance on the one hand and their accompanying musical soundtracks and scores on the other. With respect to cinema, the transition from 'silent' cinema to quite a wide range of sound/talking film approaches to the cinematographic art will be studied; traditionally many western film score composers had background training in European classical music but as the years on influences on film music have been more diverse to include popular and electronic music. This will be preceded and in places accompanied by consideration of the myriad ways in which music and visual representations intersect and interact with each other in opera and dance. The course will include study of both western and non-western artworks. |
| Course description |
Intermedial approaches to cinema have tended to focus on the ways in which imagery relates to and expresses narrative elements (narrative development, characterisation, literary style and so on). Even opera - one of the most quintessentially intermedial artforms - is not uncommonly discussed as if the musical score was principally an accompaniment facilitating rather than being constitutive of the narrative exposition. Yet everyone can think of numerous films where the replacement of the existing soundtrack with another very contrasting in musical style, instrumentation, and textural qualities would radically transform the way in which we understand and interpret the given artworks as aesthetic wholes. This is arguably even more the case when it comes to opera and dance.
The vital role played by soundtracks has hence tended to be overlooked when compared with narrative and visual aspects. Without overlooking the narrative dimension, this course will focus on this understudied area. Both diachronic and synchronic approaches will be employed so as to highlight and take account of the historical developments in art forms whilst at the same time focusing on artworks as aesthetic statements as opposed to reflections of their socio-historical era or indeed merely of the stage of technological development the genre had reached at any given time (notably in the case of cinema). We will also look at artworks from a range of traditions: diverse western traditions (eg. Anglo-American but also French, Italian etc) but also far-east Asian and south Asian works, for instance.
Works studied will include (but be by no means limited to):-
- Mozart's Don Giovanni and Verdi's La Traviata
- Emile Raynaud's Pantomimes lumineuses (1892) [silent cinema]
- Crosland's The Jazz Singer with Al Jolson (1927) [the first sound film]
- Fellini's La Strada (1954) [Italian cinema] and Resnais's Hiroshima mon amour (1959) [French 'new wave']
- Ozu's Tokyo Story (1953)
- Mehboob's Mother India (1957)
- Alvin Ailey's Revelations (1960 ) [African-American dance theatre]
- Schlesinger's Billy Liar (1963) [British cinema]
- Cattaneo's The Full Monty (1997)
The course will also familiarise students with the principles and debates of intermedial research, develop their analytical skills, and prepare them for the requirements of specific assignments, within respective intellectual frameworks.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | Students on LLC MSc programmes get first priority to this programme. If you are not on an LLC programme, please let your administrator or the course administrator know you are interested in the course. Unauthorised enrolments will be removed. No auditors are permitted. |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2025/26, Not available to visiting students (SS1)
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Quota: 0 |
| Course Start |
Semester 1 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Lecture Hours 20,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
176 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
100% Coursework
30% - Individual in-class presentation
70% - End of semester essay |
| Feedback |
Students will receive individual feedback for their coursework submission. Hence there will be written feedback to students' end of semester essays, but also formative assessment accompanied by verbal feedback in the course of the semester. Each student will prepare and deliver a presentation to the whole group in the course of semester, an exercise which will offer the opportunity to give him or her verbal feedback on progress made. Students are welcome to discuss their essay plans with the Course Organiser and will have the possibility of coming to their office hour to speak in private regarding their work. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Use a number of research technologies, including online resources and databases.
- Identify and formulate research problems in Intermediality, drawing upon peer-reviewed secondary resources.
- Develop skills in literary, film and visual analysis.
- Develop the ability to approach analysis of multimedia artforms.
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Reading List
Essential Reading
Abbate, Carolyn Unsung Voices: Opera and Musical Narrative in the Nineteenth Century Princeton University Press, 1991
Abel, Richard and Altman, Rick The Sounds of Early Cinema Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2001
Booth, Wayne The Craft of Research Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2016
Desjardins, Christian Inside Film Music Composers Speak Los Angeles: Silman-James Press, 2006
Inglis, Ian, ed. Popular Music and Film London: Wallflower Press, 2003
Mera, Miguel and Burnand, David eds. European Film Music Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006
Swynnoe, Jan G. The Best Years of British Film Music, 1936-58 Woodbridge, the Boydell Press, 2002
Tambling, Jeremy Opera, Ideology and Film Manchester University Press: 1987
Recommended
Bordwell, David. Film Art: An Introduction, New York: McGraw-Hill Education, 2020.
Cottrell, S. Critical thinking Skills: Developing Effective Analysis and Argument. Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.
Davis, Darrell Picturing Japaneseness: Monumental Style, National Identity, Japanese Film New York: Columbia University Press, 1996
Gibbs, John. Mise-En-Scene: Film Style and Interpretation. New York: Wallflower Press, 2002.
Glyn Davis, Kay Dickinson, Lisa Patti, and Amy Villarejo, eds. Film Studies: A Global Introduction. New York: Routledge, 2015.
Godfrey, Jeanne. How to Use Your Reading in Your Essays, London: Macmillan Education, 2018.
Lampl, Kenneth Film Music the basics (Routledge, 2024)
Ryan Michael. A Complete Guide to Literary Analysis and Theory. Abindon Oxon: Routledge, 2023.
Silverman, Jonathan, and Dean Rader. The World Is a Text: Writing About Visual and Popular Culture, Ontario, Canada: Broadview Press, 2018.
Soles, Derek. 2003. Writing an Academic Essay: How to Plan, Draft, Revise and Write Essays. Taunton: Studymates.
Wennekes and Audissino (eds) Cinema Changes: Incorporations of Jazz in the Film Soundtrack Brepols, 2019
Further
Egorova, Tatiana Soviet Film Music: An Historical Survey Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1997
Eyman, Scott The Speed of Sound: Hollywood and the Talkie Revolution 1926-30 The John Hopkins University Press, 1997
Flinn, Caryl Strains of Utopia: Gender, Nostalgia and Hollywood Film Music Princeton University Press, 1992 |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
research and enquiry
creative problem solving
critical and reflective thinking
articulate communication
personal and intellectual autonomy
self-organization and effectiveness |
| Keywords | Intermediality,Film techniques,Musical scoring,Narrative exposition |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Samuel Coombes
Tel:
Email: Sam.Coombes@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Hope Hamilton
Tel: (0131 6)50 4167
Email: hope.hamilton@ed.ac.uk |
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