There are no required materials that must be purchased for this course.  

• MUS 121 makes use of Open Educational Resources (OER) that are available free of charge online.  Links to required readings and listening assignments can be accessed from links in the modules and/or sources posted in the Announcements section of the course. Use this link to access an online resource.

• Key reading sources:

   Music: An Appreciation 1.1.  You may download the entire work in PDF. 

   Reading Music: Common Notation by Catherine Schmidt.

• You will be frequently asked to use Youtube, the NAXOS Music Library and electronic sources available through the NVCC library.  Please note that, if you are off campus, you may be asked to log in using your NOVA credentials (the same user name and password you use to log into Canvas) to access NAXOS and reading materials.

The reading and listening assignments are the foundation of this course's content delivery.  New concepts, information, and themes will be presented in these readings, as well as in some supplemental videos.  Although the reading assignments may seem numerous at first, many of the assignments are short, consisting of only a paragraph or two.  Listening assignments (such as on Youtube and NAXOS) provide examples of real pieces of music that demonstrate concepts covered in the readings; because this is a course about music, listening to musical examples is an indispensable part of the learning process.  Please be sure to thoroughly familiarize yourself with each listening assignment, as you will be asked to 1) recognize instruments by sound in module 1, and 2) identify the time period, title, and composer of assigned pieces in modules 2, 3, and 4.