Notes on the class - needs edit

Notes on the class

CLASS ORGANIZATION.  Basic plan: bring your projects at 6pm to pin up in 170. Arrange the room with down lights, cleared floor, tables in place for campfire lamp. I provide pushpins and basic tools from my cart. Pin up projects. Discuss: I may ask you to pin up a comment sheet so that you can respond directly to each others work (6:10-6:30). Then some songs. Followed by Tony's introduction (visuals, music, videos) to current week. At 8pm or a little before we take a short break, then return to look at your work as a group. Remind me about this! Also--I'll want everyone to join in on discussion, both during my presentation, and also during the review of new work.  We end with some more songs...  We'll try to get done by 10pm, but if class runs over, I expect you to stay on.

MONITORS. I'll need some help from you on (1) arranging room with lights, tables and lamp (2) getting my cart setup working (3) returning computer monitor screen(s) to Jeff (Room 103)  at end of evening and (4) help getting everything back to my own office. Volunteers?

NOTE-PAD. Important! You'll want to have/bring a small notebook to write down names and terms as they come up. The world of American roots music and its cultural sources is vast--like a big weaving, all inter-connected. So picking up on names and places and related ideas--and beginning to make sense of them as they're mentioned--is an important part what the class is about. I want you to know this stuff! SEEMS CASUAL--BUT A KEY PART OF THE COURSE! I may quiz you as to who's who. If I mention a new name--write it down and look up.

READER. I will have readers available in class. The reader fee & xerox fee will be $30. Please bring $30 cash to class--no checks. CASH. Next week!

FIRST DOWNLOADS.  As discussed in  class--Go to Box post for Week I and download song sets corresponding to TAN songbook (main 30 plus supplements, in italic) and GRAY songbook. Three downloads in all. Be sure to include .xml file for track info. The links are in Downloads folder, but for convenience I'll give them to you here as well:

Songs and Places CD (tan songbook)
https://berkeley.box.com/s/znpnbyxgb80hd08i1q3k

S&P Extra Songs on Main List (tan songbook, titles in italics)
https://berkeley.box.com/s/9bjw6fhsbb4qjfnp98b8

S&P Supplement Songs (gray songbook)
https://berkeley.box.com/s/t8e31fcez6jtvll14vps

LISTEN to the SONGS and LEARN THEM!!!


DIGITAL NOTEBOOK. IMPORTANT!  I expect each of you to make  a personal blog for the class. This will be a week-by-week record of your work, with notes on songs, readings and visual discoveries. Use blogger (blogspot.com) format, not tumblr. This will allow me (and your classmates) to make comments on your posts. And yes, you need to make a new blog for this class...
Have your name in the title or description. The class is Songs & Places (Visual Studies 185X).   Go to google's www.blogspot.com   Use a simple template so that your work stands out. (Some of the blogger template formats are much too busy.) Your first post should be a kind of self portrait--based on FIRST SONG / EARLY SONG, OLD SONG (I leave this open to interpretation) and something written about your reasons for joining Songs & Places (you can include ideas that come to you after the first night's class). When your blog is up, send me an ACTIVE LINK with the URL to your Digital Notebook homepage. Get me this BEFORE next the class. The night before--not last minute!  When I have full set, I will share list of URL's with class as a whole. I'll expect you to keep your blog notebook up to date for each week of the class. It really is a notebook--showing your work and your thoughts & responses as they develop! And remember that attendance remains primary. Your notebook posts are not a substitute for being in class.

CECs. These I provide in class next week, after reader purchase. You should be taking this class for the full 4 units. Most seem to have 3 units on Cal list. Check on this individually. If not you need to discuss with me.I consider this a 4-unit class.

GRADES. You can ask me to discuss in class. I'm fair, and I expect good attendance and good work. However, I'm also encouraging as to the leaps you take--where you grow...

FIRST PROJECT. See post for Week 1.

READING. We'll start the reader next week. For now, do some online explorations about the background (musical, cultural, historical) about your Down in the Valley.

CREATIVE WORK & EVIDENCE. We'll talk more about these two modes. Creative work--a painting drawing, collage, montage (music, film...)--something you've made from your own creative being. However, since I want you to base your work on the songs and their geo-cultural surround--Songs & Places after all--you need to show these traces and trails--some kind of visual evidence of your exploration which you pin up together with your creative project. (And post on your Digital Notebook.) I have no idea what form this should take, but I want to see it on the wall--we'll see what you come up with... Layers and overlaps are good. Ask in class...

OPENNESS. Finally, let me encourage you to do work that's open. Where your discovery of the form and the meaning is part of the way a work develops. We'll be talking a lot about this!