If you are considering taking this class as a GE please DO NOT. Professor Taylor's lectures are not easy to follow and he projects slides with nearly nothing but pictures so it's nearly impossible to decipher what information is relevant. Your class grade is determined by four assignments: the midterm, final, and two papers (discussion attendance and participation also plays a minor role). The midterm and final were both extremely harshly graded (unfairly in my opinion), and the midterm consisted of a "listening exam" where you have to memorize over 30 songs (which all sound nearly identical) and be able to identify the year released, artist, and name of the song from a 15 second snippet. The course material is slightly interesting if you are able to follow along the lectures but the class is overall extremely poorly structured.

Professor Taylor's lectures are always an interesting mix of musicology and Marxist theory, which I really enjoy. I wish the lecture slides followed the direction of the lecture more closely.

This class is ok for a GE (which is what I took it as). The readings are very dull I will say and you will be tempted not to read them. I did the readings personally but I don't think it would hurt you too bad if you don't. The lectures are 2 hours and it was feel like it. The midterm was honestly pretty intense and had a lot to do with the lectures but the finals were essays. I think you have to write three essays total for the class that are like 3.5-5 pages.

Taylor is a really sweet, funny professor, and I liked having him for this class. He's clearly super passionate about the subject, and talks a lot about the research he's done on the topic. the information itself was pretty interesting for me, and I'm not a music major or anything. The biggest drawbacks for me were the assignments and the reading. There is SO MUCH reading for this class. Im talking easily a hundred pages a week, and most of it super academic in tone, so it's not exactly fun. There is not a ton of work asides from that, (two 5 page essays, a midterm and a final) but the grading is super hard to understand because he REFUSES to show you the rubric. My TA told us that we were docked points for not referencing specific readings, but couldn't tell us which reading ahead of time. Similarly, you could get ten points (!!) off of your essay if you didn't define all of the terms in the prompt, which was never mentioned beforehand. That definitely makes the class sound bad, but honestly I would take it again and just do more of the reading. All in all was very interesting and a good break if you're a STEM major.