“Elite Syncopations” and “Euphonic Sounds”

Abstract

This chapter presents suggestions for how to incorporate the music of Scott Joplin into the aural skills classroom. The chapter is divided into six sections, which correspond to six common aural skills activities: singing, rhythm, dictation/transcription, improvisation, contextual listening, and error detection. In each section, a number of possibilities for incorporating Joplin’s music at various stages of the undergraduate aural skills curriculum is offered. This chapter focuses on Joplin’s music for several reasons, including that students usually have basic familiarity with it (most have at the very least heard “The Entertainer” and “Maple Leaf Rag”), and that the texture of the ragtime accompaniment can be helpful to students because of the way the bass line and chords are staggered. Moreover, Joplin’s blending of classical harmonies and forms with ragtime and blues elements makes his music approachable to students yet also useful for expanding their musical horizons beyond the narrow confines of the White, European, common-practice canon. With the use of ragtime music throughout the curriculum, the genre and its norms become a foundation upon which students can build newer, more complex material as they move from basic diatonic harmony to advanced chromatic topics.