Music & The Core

At the center of the Columbia College education is the Core Curriculum. It aims to widen Columbia’s students’ perspectives by teaching them critical thinking and history through the study of science, philosophy, literature, art, and music.  When the University launched their first general education course, Contemporary Civilization, in 1919, it became the first college general education program in the United States. Rather than just transmitting knowledge or developing expertise in its students, Contemporary Civilization helped them develop their own ideas and create knowledge as a class by mixing historical knowledge with the self-awareness of the present.

In the century that followed, Columbia expanded the offering of Core Curriculum courses. In 1937, Humanities A (Literature) and Humanities B (Visual Arts and Music) were added to the collection of courses. By 1941, Humanities B split into Humanities B1 and B2, which would later become known as Music Humanities and Art Humanities. These used to be electives, but both courses were made mandatory in 1947 to signal a commitment to giving music and visual arts the same attention that literature received. The Department of Music oversees the Music Humanities Core Curriculum course:

HUMA1123UN Music Humanities

This course explores forms of the Western musical imagination through compositions and performances studied in their historical contexts. The goals of the course are to awaken and encourage active comparative listening practices, to provide tools to respond critically to a variety of musical idioms, and to engage with significant debates about the character, purpose and value of music that have occupied music-makers and musical thinkers over the past several centuries.