The Stuyvesant High School Online Course Guide

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Who Should take this course?
Songwriting is a one credit course open to all students interested in writing and performing songs.

What will we be studying?
The course will focus on the creative process of songwriting and will include the various structures of songs. A history of contemporary songwriting, dating back to the twenties and thirties, with Jimmy Rodgers and Robert Johnson, to the present, will be studied as will the drama that served as backdrop for the seminal pieces of our times (the Great Depression, wars, various movements for political and economic justice, etc.).

More than the models that the above writers provide, the course will be a workshop on how to write and perform songs. Basic musicianship such as simple notation, what constitutes a key, playing in at least one key, transposition of keys, melody, harmony and circles of chords will be studied. Ideas and techniques aimed at releasing imagination will be employed.

What will be expected of me?
Reading will include poetry, especially ballads, and articles on the writing of songs, as well as some biographical material on various writers. Students will examine song structure, arrangement and execution. Ideas and techniques aimed at releasing imagination will be employed.

How is the course taught?
Most of the time, this course will function as a workshop. At othertimes, seminars oin writer's techniques will be prevail.

What are the completion requirements?
Students will develop a portfolio of at least two songs and will be required to write essays on the process pursued in the writing of those songs.

Are there any special demands, costs,
Extra expense is negligible. A few blank cassettes, etc.