The Music Department helps students build a strong foundation in the areas of singing, instrument playing, reading, writing, listening, and evaluating music. Students also develop an understanding of the fundamentals of music including theory, structure, and aesthetics, as well as an appreciation for music’s relationship to history and culture. In the Upper School, students may take elective courses and participate in a variety of choruses, orchestra, and ensembles.

Theory and Composition

This course is designed to encourage and develop student creativity. Students will do extensive composing using the Synthesizer MIDI Workstations. Students will study various compositional styles and techniques, learn the rules of harmony, and discover more about expressing their musical ideas through the use of sequencing.

Upper School Chorus

The Upper School Chorus is open to all students in grades 9 through 12 without audition. The Chorus sings repertoire from medieval to modern and everything in between in both classical and popular idioms. The ensemble performs regularly throughout the school year at both IVY Road and extracurricular events. In addition to preparing music for performance, students learn healthy vocal technique, musicianship skills, and appropriate performance practice and style. The Upper School Chorus is a full year commitment requiring attendance at all rehearsals and performances.

Applied Music

Students who are taking private instrumental lessons or voice instruction from a qualified teacher can receive one academic credit for their work. There is a required performance during exam week for all registered students.  Students may also receive an additional credit for performances at IVY Road, subject to faculty approval.  Students should also be aware that credit for outside work does not count towards the completion of graduation requirements.

History of Musical Theater

In this course we will explore the American musical theater. After examining the origins and history of the musical as a distinctive American art form, we will study several groundbreaking musicals including Show Boat, West Side Story, and Rent, and we will dig into the most successful shows currently on Broadway: Hamilton, Wicked and The Book of Mormon. We will also learn about the business side of the industry and the day-to-day lives of musical theater artists from people who have produced and performed on Broadway.

Intro to Music

This is a general, introductory course designed to enhance listening enjoyment and appreciation. Topics will include:  the elements of music, the characteristic styles of major historical periods, and the lives and works of key composers within the Western musical tradition. After exploring the language and concepts of historical musical styles, the course continues with an exploration of Popular Music including Jazz, Rhythm and Blues, and Rock. The Course will include live musicians for in-class performances, guest lecturers, and concert trips.  Students will try their hand at music making, song writing, and writing music reviews. No previous musical study is required. 

Music Analysis and History

We will study ten musical works that challenged long-held assumptions about what music was supposed to sound like and what it was supposed to stand for. The pieces that we will look at and listen to were revolutionary, either consciously or unconsciously. To find out what made them so, we will examine their musical structure, harmonic ideas, orchestration, notation, and primary sources relating to their creation and critical reception.        

New York: Music Capital of the World

We live in the most vibrant musical era in the world, with almost every genre and style of music represented at its highest level. America is an incubator of musical innovation; Hip hop, punk rock, and modern jazz were all invented in the streets and stages of America and many of the most innovative artists working today cut their teeth in the City's clubs. This class will take a deep look at the history of music in America and the influence this city has had on the musical landscape of our nation and world. 

Theory and Composition

This course is designed to encourage and develop student creativity.  Students will do extensive composing using the Synthesizer MIDI Workstations.  Students will study various compositional styles and techniques, learn the rules of harmony, and discover more about expressing their musical ideas through the use of sequencing.   Registration is limited to 6 students.

Upper School Orchestra

The Upper School Orchestra is open to all Upper School students who play stringed instruments regardless of their technical level.  Students who play wind and brass instruments should consult with Dr. Jelinek prior to registration.  The group will study and perform repertoire from the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods, as well as popular and newly-composed classical music.  Emphasis will be placed on elements of style and performance practice as well as the critical listening skills necessary to produce excellent ensemble playing.  Performances will be scheduled within and outside of the IVY Road community when the orchestra is ready to perform.  The Upper School Orchestra is a full year commitment requiring attendance at all rehearsals.  

World Music

In this course, we will study the music of various cultures including Africa, Japan, China, the Middle East and India.  When possible, students will have opportunities to play instruments from these cultures.  Want to learn to play African drums?  Know what it's like to strum the Koto?  Take out your inhibitions on the Taiko drum?  Who knows, you might even get to play the Sitar.

The Physical Education Department provides a balanced and varied curriculum that addresses health-related fitness and motor skill development. The program provides each student with the opportunity to develop and maintain a level of physical fitness commensurate with his individual ability. Students may select a variety of activities according to their interest such as basketball, weight training, floor hockey, volleyball, paddleball, and badminton.

The Religion Department addresses the human experience through a wide range of courses aimed at developing academic skills, nurturing intellectual and personal engagement, and encouraging independent thought. Both the Middle School and the Upper School have religion requirements. To meet the Upper School requirement, students must take two fall semester courses or one spring semester course.

The Death of Socrates

In 399 B.C. jurors of the Athenian democracy voted to convict their fellow-citizen Socrates on charges of “corrupting the youth” and “worshipping strange gods.”  After a few days in jail, during which he refused friends’ offers to help with an escape, choosing instead to discuss the immortality of the soul, Socrates took his punishment, a drink of hemlock, and died.  In this course we shall read and discuss a number of short works by Plato, a student of Socrates, including Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, and Phaedo.  These texts deal with the moral, philosophical, and political issues raised by the trial of Socrates.  The Apology is in fact a version of the defense speech given by Socrates himself.

Gods Laws in Herodotus’ Inquiries

The Greek writer Herodotus has been called both the “Father of History” and the “Father of Lies.”  His one work, often translated as the Histories but more accurately rendered as Inquiries, places the Persian Wars and the growth of the victorious Greek city-states Athens and Sparta against the backdrop of the Mediterranean world of the preceding centuries.  This work offers the most comprehensive glimpse of the broader world from which Greece, Greek literature, and Greek philosophy first sprang.  In part a conscious response to Homer, in part a precursor to Platonic philosophy, Herodotus is the first Greek writer to explore at length the contrast between nurture and nature—between human customs and the humanity on which they are imposed.  This course offers a close reading of his work, which is filled with many of the most famous of ancient stories (true and false), stories that are treated by the tragedians and the philosophers (particularly Plato) as well.  Through this reading we will explore what the Greeks knew about the cultures and religions that preceded and surrounded them.  The Inquiries, which may be thought of as the first work of anthropology and comparative religion, proves to be a work of considerable philosophical weight as well since Herodotus was keen to understand what were the universal impulses that characterize humankind and its varying civilizations.

Gods of the Greeks

What the ancient Greeks knew of their own gods, says the Greek historian Herodotus, came to them from the poets Homer and Hesiod. In this course we shall consider the implications of this statement for Greek religion while reading some of the earliest texts about the generations of gods that led to the perfectly just reign of Zeus and the other Olympians.

We shall discover what is known about the cults of the major gods and study their exploits in myths as recounted by the tragic poets. In addition to one secondary source (Greek Religion by Walter Burkert) the following primary sources will be read: Hesiod, Theogony; the Homeric Hymns, Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound and the Oresteia; Euripides, Hippolytus and the Bacchae. (It will be assumed that all students have read either the Iliad or the Odyssey or both.) Topics for study will include polytheism, anthropomorphism, sacrifice, divine possession, and the relation between religion and philosophy. Students will write two short papers, lead class discussions, and take a mid-term and a final exam.

Gods of the Poets

Eros and Hades are the two figures in the Greek pantheon who are distinguished by the lack of conventional ritual devotion to them.  To call them the “gods of the poets” is to draw attention to how much any understanding of them depends upon poetic and philosophic description and reflection.  This course brings together diverse readings from a number of ancient writers in order to explore the complex of ideas associated with Eros and Hades in the Greek and, to a lesser extent, the Roman worlds.

Homer and Tolstoy

The ancient epics of Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey, influenced and inspired the great Russian novelist, Leo Tolstoy. The works of both raise the questions most important to us all: Can the life of a man have meaning and value? Why strive to lead a good life if all life ends in death and oblivion? Is courage inborn, or can it be learned? Can terrible crimes be redeemed? Is there a morality of war?
 

The first 10 weeks of the term will be devoted to a careful reading of the Iliad. Epic style, themes, and values will be identified and discussed. After spring break several short works of Tolstoy (Sebastopol Sketches, Hadji Murad, The Cossacks, The Death of Ivan Ilych) will be read along with selected works of literary criticism by Harold Bloom, George Steiner, and others.
 

Students taking this course will be expected to keep current with all reading assignments, give several class reports, write two papers, and take a mid-term and a final exam. This course may not be dropped after spring break.

Introduction to Ethics

The course will begin with an introduction to the concept of ethics.  Students will explore definitions of ethical behavior through different lenses.  Units of study will focus on topics including law and authority, environmental issues, social equality, human rights, global responsibility.  Students will read seminal texts as well as case studies.  Attention will be given to current events.  Students will be expected to read, complete a variety of written assignments, take tests as well as an exam, and participate actively in all class discussions.  Class activities will include a variety of formats such as discussion, debate and student presentations. 

Islam

Where once there was little attention given to Islam, it is now a daily topic in our media and a dominant theme in international relations. However, the increased attention has not always resulted in a fair representation of Islam. To correct misconceptions and develop an accurate understanding, this course will offer an overview of Islam from its inception to contemporary expressions. By knowing the commonalities and varieties of Islamic thought and culture, students will be better able to understand the ways Muslims are engaging topics ranging from shariah, jihad, and religious pluralism to gender equality, democracy, and foreign relations.   

Spiritual Thought in Traditional China

In the monotheistic West the spiritual thought of China has sometimes been characterized as either mainly Confucian, or alternately as Buddhist.  The historical reality for centuries has been that one could be both, or neither, or something else entirely: China has always been the home of coexisting multiple systems of spiritual and philosophical concepts, with limited friction between them and many examples of rich interaction and blending. In this course we will survey a wide range of classical philosophical traditions and schools, from practices of shamanism, conceptions of a non-deistic Heaven, and the arguments of the logicians and Legalists of ancient times, to the complex and expansive currents of the millennia-old traditions of Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism.  Some attention will be given to the philosophical background of lyric poetry, stories and riddles of Chan (“Zen”) monks, works of military strategists such as Sunzi, the arts, and the broader Chinese culture.  

The Good Man

What is a good man?  What does it take to make a man good?  What is a fulfilled life?  How can you build a life you will be proud of and that will fulfill you?  This course is an exploration of answers to these questions.  The goal is for each student to define for himself what a good life will be and identify what he can do now to create that.