Poetry within Destruction and Re-creation : from Saba, Montale, Ungaretti to the Present [ LROM2852 ]

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Opera has been the most important of the arts for centuries. From its inception to the Novecento, it has influenced poetic and esthetic thought, as well as influenced the culture and the politics of Italy. In this course, we will proceed to show how a libretto can influence musical composition, how a librettist, thanks to formal techniques which are extraneous to theatrical or narrative composition, conditions the composition and can draw-up new maps of meaning. We will also show how the workmanship of the libretto takes in consideration the spectator's condition, whilst integrating it in the textual construction and in the creation of meaning. Approaches : pragmatic and linguistic, semiotic and post-semiotic, cultural analysis.

To be able to analyse an italian libretto.

To learn how a libretto functions.

To learn the characteristics of the libretto and of italian operas.

To know how to write-up an analysis.

To have read the fundamental libretti.

Students are required to analyse a concept album and hand in a first draft of a written assignment by 20 November. In the light of the lecturers' comments, the final version is to be handed in before the official revision period.

There is a formal oral examination at which students are required to defend their assignment.

Students will learn how to use the necessary tools to explore the poetic texts of songs and introduce musical aspects into their analysis: the musical aspect does not require any previous musical training.

An important aspect of the course is studying the concept album as a new form of collected poetry.

This course introduces the cantautori, a phenomenon in Italian pop music, whose literary and poetic importance has often been stressed. We will mainly examine the concept albums (that is CDs built around a precise political, poetic or existential theme), at their height in the 60s and 70s.

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All the necessary information can be found on iCampus together with a more detailed description of all the course requirements.