A tribute to Dolly Parton by Dr. Ethan Hein through a close listen to her recordings across five decades Read on Substack
Author Archives: Ethan
Podcast episode about AI and musical creativity
It’s a companion piece to this post about AI in education. AI slop and musical creativity by Dr. Ethan Hein are not the same thing Read on Substack
AI is harmful for learning which is why I’m banning it in my classes
I put up my course web site for History of 20th Century American Popular Music, which includes an assignment due the first day of class: read about Stephen Foster and “Old Folks at Home”, listen to recordings of the song by Al Jolson and Ray Charles, and write a one paragraph response. Within 24 hours of emailing the students that …
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My 20th Century American Pop History syllabus
See also a discussion of our kickoff song. The course will have two components: weekly listening, reading and discussion assignments, and an ongoing public-facing writing project.
I decided what song I’m going to start my History of 20th Century American Popular Music class with
Content warning: this post includes offensive imagery. Way down upon the Swanee River by Dr. Ethan Hein It’s racist down there Read on Substack One of my tasks for the next two weeks is to put together my syllabus for NYU’s new music history class on 20th century American popular music. To start the semester off, I …
My Favorite Things update
Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens by Dr. Ethan Hein Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens Read on Substack Last week I was at the International Society for Music Education conference, which is by a wide margin the biggest academic conference I have ever been to. I presented about teaching pop music theory …
Seven and Nine
I did two more podcast episodes about odd meter, about septuple and nonuple respectively, enjoy. Seven mysteries by Dr. Ethan Hein Read on Substack Nine he gave to mortal men, proud and great, and so ensnared them by Dr. Ethan Hein Read on Substack This is going to be it for odd meters, unless there’s …
Take Five
Even before I posted this one, I started getting suggestions for songs in 5/4, and a few in 10/4. I’m sorry if I didn’t mention your favorite, this isn’t meant to be exhaustive, it’s just some representative examples that I find interesting or personally significant. Take Five by Dr. Ethan Hein The meanings of quintuple …
Teaching Pop Music Analysis for Non-Majors
I am teaching two new NYU classes this fall. One of them is History of 20th Century American Popular Music, which I wrote about recently. The other is Pop Music Analysis for Non-Majors. I enjoy teaching new classes, even though they require a lot more work than teaching an existing class. The history class takes …
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The Night Has a Thousand Eyes
The album Coltrane’s Sound begins explosively. There’s a single-note saxophone pickup, and then bang, straight into the full band playing a big, bright latin tune. A few seconds in, the feel changes to swing, then back to latin. Sometimes the chords are pedaled, floating and modal; other times they seem like regular functional circle-of-fifths changes, …