Performance and Recording with Foundation Year BMus (Hons)

Performance for Recording will help students develop the required skills needed to perform in a studio recording environment to a high standard. The module will help students to develop the playing skills specific to the studio environment and increase student’s understanding to different recording and musical approaches. Performance for Recording runs in Semester 1 and is an introduction to the performance strand in the learning journey. It covers a comprehensive overview of contemporary studio practice and the specific concepts relevant to performing for the recording process.

The module will extend listening, playing, and organisational techniques required to operate as an effective session musician. The module is also s fun introduction to the recording studio facilities at UWL. This module is also supported by extra instrumental lessons so that students can continue to develop their musical skills in their chosen instrument.

Recording theory is a broad module introducing a variety of topics vital to the field of music technology. It also serves as a base for the more practical and technically orientated modules in the music technology degree courses at LCM/UWL. It is a key module designed to equip students with a grounding in the core knowledge and techniques germane to the disciplinary nature of the music technology courses.

The module aims to provide the student with a solid grounding in the theory, techniques and terminology associated with contemporary acoustic and digital recording practice, as well as ensuring a fundamental grasp of the basic physics of sound and sound propagation.

Understanding Creative Industries is designed to give you an appreciation and knowledge of the development of the fundamental structures of the global creative industry structures. In doing this, you will obtain a comprehensive grounding in the key skills and knowledge appropriate to building, developing and maintaining a career in your chosen area of the industry. You will also receive a grounding in key figures within the industry and support organisations available to you to help in developing your professional careers.

After the performance for studio module, students are encouraged to explore a range of different performance styles. Situated Performance runs in Semester 2 and is designed to enhance student’s interaction with different performance environments as well as different types of audience. The module will extend listening, playing, and organisational techniques required to operate as an effective performer while considering the limitations of different performance situations. Performance for Audience will help students develop the required skills needed to perform as an ensemble no matter where they are.

Songwriting and Arranging is an introductory subject designed to give students advanced knowledge of music writing principles. The module covers three main areas relating to songwriting and arranging. These areas are lyric construction and form, arrangement fundamentals, and essential orchestration skills.

The module is broken into parts that assess both the construction of songs, as well as the digital tools that can be incorporated to enhance arrangements. During the first half of the module, students learn the skills required to understand great lyric writing and song structure, narrative themes and writer perspectives. The second half of the module is concerned with understanding fundamental instrumental arrangement. During the latter half of the module, students are introduced to skills and digital tools that can enhance the musical and textural content of their songs.

Recording Practice will help you develop the required skills needed to operate studio recording technology to a high standard. The module will further the listening skills covered in Recording Theory and will increase your sensitivity to different recording and musical contexts. It covers a comprehensive overview of contemporary studio technology and the recording process.

The module will also extend ear-training techniques and examine each component of studio technology in detail. In addition, it will address how the techniques of recording are coupled to the technology, providing each student with a backbone of knowledge designed to help the recording demands of the second year.

Having completed the level 4 performance subjects, students move from the practical aspects of performing in a variety of settings to the more artistic exploration of what it means to be a performer. Performance Artistry is an advanced performance subject designed to develop students' understanding of their role as a content creator and a performer. As such, the module functions in a similar manner to a record label artist development (A&R) department. This module gives performance students a deeper understanding of their relationship to the music industry.

'Recording music' is an advanced-recording subject designed to develop the required skills to operate both physical and virtual recording technology to a higher standard. Students will engage in a combination of practical and theoretical workshops aimed at developing a fluency in recording planning and practice. The module aims to further develop students’ abilities to critically evaluate, and confidently produce musical recordings in a chosen style.

This module is designed to develop the students’ understanding of music publishing, and the surrounding infrastructure that supports this important music revenue stream. Such associated infrastructure includes, collection societies, advertising agencies, and other musical trade bodies. It will investigate their membership, their roles, and their primary function within the industry of licensing songs and recordings, as well as, distributing income to intellectual property rights holders. At the end of this module, students will have a fundamental understanding of this often-invisible income stream.

At this point in the performance journey, students have learned to adapt to various settings and investigated their own artistic voice. Having learned these skills, the students now need to learn how to lead other musicians to achieve their artistic vision. Leading in Performance is a workshop-based module designed to assist students in achieving their musical leadership goals using a combination of group management and musical literacy skills.

This module will culminate in a scenario where students will lead a performance of two songs with only one rehearsal to prepare for the concert. The aim of this module is for students to assume leadership roles and drive a small team of musicians in an experience similar to that of a late-night TV show house band.

The module offers you the opportunity to:

• engage with applied research methods using ethnographic, autoethnographic and theoretical approaches

• critically reflect on your own creative practice through a process of data collection and stimulated recall

• assimilate and reflect upon the creative practice and research activity of staff and postgraduate research students

• use these research techniques in conjunction with academic reading to develop a research question that will form the basis for your level 6 major project module

• effectively communicate ideas through a combination of verbal and multimedia presentation formats.

This module looks at the key skills and abilities required for entrepreneurs to develop new business ideas in the creative industries. As new technologies and media converge, the need to understand how new concepts are generated is one of the key tools for contemporary and future creative industry practitioners. Generating successful business ideas is a process of creative thinking and a critical awareness of the business landscape.

This module will focus on both the theoretical and practical aspects of initiating and developing a creative enterprise in the modern marketplace. A study of entrepreneurial traits provides the framework for the module, which includes the development of a credible business idea and the presentation of a formulated and considered business plan.

Through weekly lectures and breakout workshop groups, this module focuses on the area of instrumental and vocal teaching - an important skillset, and income stream, for the portfolio musician. Underpinned by an understanding of generic and music-specific pedagogic principles, each of the weekly sessions will focus on a particular topic or issue relevant to building a career as an instrumental or vocal tutor, including: constructing lesson and study plans; understanding and executing appropriate teaching methods to foster technical, creative and expressive skills in your pupils; developing effective communication skills; as well as acquiring an insight into establishing and running a successful teaching practice.

The performance and recording project is a self-directed module that allows students to showcase the skills and abilities developed during the previous years of study. The module spans the whole academic year and provides students with the opportunity to develop a recording and performance based on a particular stylistic interest. It is expected that the recording and performance is clearly related to the content of the course, and displays an understanding of how to record, perform, and launch music to a wider audience.

Performance for audience is a collaborative module that encourages students to stretch their musical boundaries and develop longer thematically connected musical performances. In this module students must generate 25-minute performances that both sustain performance energy and deliver a well curated musical experience for audiences. In this module students demonstrate a mastery of performance logistics, musical organisation, and audience engagement.

Recording tools is an advanced Performance and Recording subject that focuses on implementing learned recording skills in the live performance environment. The aim of this module is to encourage students to develop technological additions to their performance in order to enhance the audio and visual spectacle of their established musical performance practice.

Students will engage in a combination of practical and theoretical workshops that assist them to develop performance augmentation skills that are suitable to their musical style. The module aims to enhance student performances and develop their ability to critically evaluate the tools and techniques available to create performances that extend beyond reciting the music to an audience.

Performance for industry is the culminating performance experience where level 6 students have the opportunity to demonstrate their mastery of performance to a panel of industry experts. Students will propose and design a performance event in consultation with the module tutor that represents their aesthetic journey as an artist and performer.

Comprising of weekly lectures and breakout workshop groups, this module is designed to develop the level of personal entrepreneurial skills needed by a current day portfolio career musician. By examining and investigating current social and consumer trends of the creative industries, and how the commercial and entrepreneurial skills of a musician need to reflect and interact with this, each lecture will focus on a key element of the administration of artist management