MUSIC 2306

Borrowed Sounds: Musical Sampling from The Concert Hall to the Dance Floor

Course Description

Course information provided by the 2015-2016 Catalog.

Is musical sampling a form of creativity or theft? Who defines the boundaries of musical ownership? How should laws protect a composer's, songwriter's, or performer's rights? These issues flared up after the advent of the musical sampler in the early 80's and have only become more complicated today. Yet, the apparent newness of sampling technology is deceptive: the act of musical borrowing has formed a central part of musical practice throughout history and across genres. This course focuses on the debates surrounding musical sampling in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, seeking to understand why, in the last century in particular, sampling has been so controversial, yet politically and aesthetically powerful. We will investigate how music exploits and is exploited through sampling, as well as how some of music history's famous musical borrowers, from Charles Ives to Kanye West, have upset notions of musical creativity and redefined who 'owns' sound.

Distribution Category (LA-AS)

When Offered Fall.

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