Competences developed in the course

Transversal Competences

CT12: Adapt, under competitive conditions, to cultural, social and artistic changes and to advances in the professional field, selecting appropriate pathways for continuing education.

Specific Competences

SO3: Apply technologies to the creation, performance and public dissemination of music, and use technical resources that enable sound production and organisation, as well as the different approaches, applications and functionalities that underpin musical creation.

SO4: Develop creative and cooperative attitudes that complement and enhance the activities of other music and arts professionals with whom one interacts.

Learning outcomes (general objectives)

1. Achieve control over the main techniques and procedures of music for audiovisual media.
2. Develop criteria and strategies to understand the image as the starting point of the compositional process.
3. Develop associative and formal relational capacities between image, text and sound.
4. Understand music as part of cinematic narrative.
5. Introduce the main techniques and procedures used in operatic, theatrical and cinematic scenes.
6. Initiate understanding of the mechanics specific to each visual or scenic medium and comprehend how these determine and condition musicalisation.
7. Develop the ability to formalise aspects of sound and musical organisation based on symbolic description of parameters and their structural interrelation.
8. Understand the artistic, human and production constraints of the audiovisual world and how they may affect and condition the musical composition process.
9. Contextualise music for image from aesthetic, musical, technological and social perspectives.
10. Gain an overall understanding of the possibilities of technology in music and learn to use various computer tools of musical interest.
11. Understand the production timeline of an audiovisual work and how it may condition musical writing.

Contents

Constitutive and identifying characteristics of sound quality. Sound structure and musical structure. Frequency and dynamic dependence of timbre. Formal implications of timbre. Virtual instruments and parametric scores. Symbolic representation and graphic notation. Musical implications of the electroacoustic medium. Use of timbral and spatial characteristics of sound and of main techniques of digital sound synthesis and processing. Sound recording and editing. Spectral analysis of sounds. Listening to electroacoustic works and analysis of techniques employed. Composition of musical fragments using different techniques and sound materials. Script, text and narrative. Associations, leitmotifs, contrasts, tensions and releases. Visual and sonic narrative parallels. Technical foundations of synchronisation and editing. Operatic, scenic and cinematic symbolism and historical-musical references. Soundtracks. Programmatic music. Formal resources for the relationship between music, image and narrative. Commentary on visualisations and listening sessions of operas, musical theatre, films and videos. Reasoned musicalisation of audiovisual fragments or sequences with or without text. Examples of different situations and options and the effects obtained through their application. Analysis of the relationship between image, text and sound. Analysis of the most relevant musical literature for audiovisual media. Study of the basic mechanics of staging, film editing and video editing.

Teaching methodology

Teaching–learning methodology includes lectures (topic presentations), debate and discussion sessions, group work sessions, and student-led presentations. Autonomous work includes compositions, study of works and written assignments, individually or in groups.

Assessment systems

Assessment is continuous, based on diagnostic evaluation and formalised through summative assessment leading to the final grade. Continuous assessment is carried out through various evaluation records derived from specific assessment activities such as participation and work in class, presentation of assignments, completion of compositions, analyses and/or readings outside class, submission of written work, or written, oral or listening tests.