MUSIC PROJECT A - 2024/5

Module Overview

This module is one of six project based learning modules within the Music degree programme. Project based modules focus on learning in the context of musical practice, based on a professional model of project implementation to realise concerts, compositions and arrangements, conference events, recordings and publications.  Project modules will develop a coordinated and managed group activity based on the project theme, such as a large scale performance or musical outcome, a music creation project with associated conference/performance/material outcomes and documentation. 

This module is a cross year, group project in which students can pursue their own specialism by agreement with the module convener, in the context of a large, coordinated group enterprise. 

Two project module themes will be available in each academic year, each theme will only occur once for each student cohort. Themes have included and will be drawn from:

• Live! – a large scale popular music performance project featuring student performers, coordinators, sound and lighting technicians, composers and arrangers.


• Experimental Music – research, creation and performance of 20th century repertoire and techniques from minimalism to indeterminacy.


• Reworking Music – investigations and realisations of the ways in which music has been recycled across a wide range of genres.


• The Music of Data - studying and experimenting with music based on all sorts of non-musical data from numbers, to patterns, to the natural world.


• In C – from Terry Riley's minimalist classic to explorations of the continued attraction of C major for composers.


• Film Music - uncovering and learning to utilise techniques of combining music, image and narrative.


• The Musical - the study and realisation of musicals from vintage classics to the present day.


• Musical Games after John Zorn's 'Cobra' – starting from Zorn's directed improvisation and exploring a range of generative musical procedures.


• Medieval Music – exploring medieval music in its own time and ours.


• Historical Listening – listening to music through history, for different functions, in different spaces and places.


• Meta Music - music about, and made from, other music.


• Dido and Aeneas – contextual and analytical study of Purcell's opera, including performances and the creation of new works based on associated themes.


• Women in Music - female musicians through the ages in popular and classical music.  


• Mahler and Musical Meaning - studying the music of Gustav Mahler, the ways it may be understood and what it can tell us about music's meaning-making potential.

Module provider

Music & Media

Module Leader

MCGRATH John (Music & Med)

Number of Credits: 15

ECTS Credits: 7.5

Framework: FHEQ Level 7

Module cap (Maximum number of students): N/A

Module Availability

Semester 1

Prerequisites / Co-requisites

None for Music/CMT/Tonmeister students

Module content

Indicative content includes:

• Contextual academic study of the music theme, e.g. the study of related repertoire, historical contexts, the study of pertinent analytical methods, composition or performance techniques.


• Management workshops and team-working implementation


• Performance-practice related to the annual theme


• Technical implementation, presentation and management of a large scale music event or outcome

Assessment pattern

Alternative Assessment

Assessment replaced with written coursework of 3000 words

Assessment Strategy

The assessment strategy is designed to provide students with the opportunity to demonstrate and to develop knowledge and understanding related to the project theme and to the implementation of large-scale, collaborative music outcomes. The strategy is designed to accommodate a personal assessment profile and their ability to apply their knowledge and understanding of the topic.

Individual assessment weighting profiles will be agreed up to one week before the final project outcome. Weightings may range from 0-100% for each of the following assessment options:

Performance specialism
Composition/arrangement specialism
Discursive written specialism
Management and coordination specialism

Thus, the summative assessment for this module consists of:

• Music Project Portfolio - Practical-based assessment of composition, performance, written discursive work or managerial contributions to the project, weighted in line with individual student assessment profile, agreed with the each student. (Addresses learning outcomes 1-6)

Module aims

• Critically engage with and apply group working practices
• Implement music project development in a professional context
• Facilitate composition, scholarship and performance
• Present a large-scale event or similar music outcome
• Enable scholarly study based on an annual theme
• Critically engage with an understanding of the relationships between theory and practice in music
• Support scholarly study and sub-disciplinary knowledge acquisition through a first-hand engagement with practice related to a music theme.

Learning outcomes

Methods of Teaching / Learning

The learning and teaching strategy is designed to:

Develop knowledge and experience in the realisation and coordination of a large-scale musical outcome. This will include the acquisition of detailed musical knowledge relating to the annual topic, and of the practical and managerial concerns required to implement a large-scale project.  The mixed learning and teaching strategies allow students to draw on their own specialist interests within the field, and to collaborate with fellow students to identify and apply collective skills to best effect.  The strategy will also introduce techniques and styles of academic writing, analysis or composition including correct procedures for citation, research and event implementation which will be critical to student success in FHEQ Level 7.

The learning and teaching methods include:

• Lectures


• Group work


• Workshops

Indicated Lecture Hours (which may also include seminars, tutorials, workshops and other contact time) are approximate and may include in-class tests where one or more of these are an assessment on the module. In-class tests are scheduled/organised separately to taught content and will be published on to student personal timetables, where they apply to taken modules, as soon as they are finalised by central administration. This will usually be after the initial publication of the teaching timetable for the relevant semester.

Reading list

https://readinglists.surrey.ac.uk
Upon accessing the reading list, please search for the module using the module code: MUSM074

Other information

The Department of Music and Media is committed to developing graduates with attributes encompassing employability, digital skills, global and culture awareness, sustainability as it relates to music and the wider arts and, finally, resourcefulness and resilience.

This module provides opportunities to engage with these attributes in myriad ways including:

Cultural and global capabilities: developing an appreciation of different artistic cultures and traditions internationally, encompassing a range of practices as performer, creator, consumer and/or researcher of music as a cultural and global phenomenon.

Digital capabilities: these may include conducting research using digital resources (text, score-based and audio), preparation of digital documents (e.g. word processing, images) and specialist music software (e.g. notation software; applications used in the creation of music) to create digital artefacts.

Resourcefulness and resilience: independence of practice, developing skills and work for assessment, maximising available resources, finding creative ways to address assessments and exercising resilience in doing so, overcoming difficulties and other challenges in undertaking a wider range of pursuits, organisation and management.

Sustainability: depending on the topics studied during the modules and the students’ pursuit of independent study for assessment, issues of sustainability may also be addressed.

Employability: developing a general awareness of music, culture and society suited to many careers in the diverse arts industries, as well as transferrable skills appropriate to all graduate destinations, particularly in relation to collaborative work to realise large-scale musical outcomes.

These values are embedded within the module's learning outcomes and educational aims, and throughout the programme.

Programmes this module appears in

Please note that the information detailed within this record is accurate at the time of publishing and may be subject to change. This record contains information for the most up to date version of the programme / module for the 2024/5 academic year.