Composition, Arrangement, and Orchestration for the Music Teacher
Introduction to teaching musical composition, arrangement, and orchestration, emphasizing music technologies' interaction with these concepts and their implications for music learning.
Summary
Past student reviews · Brian Hyer
Assignments included opinionated papers, but a former student reported that work was marked wrong if it did not match the professor's specific opinions.
What you’ll be able to do
Discuss critical perspectives on contemporary and historical issues in music learning and teaching.
Identify values and meanings of music education and how they shape music learning and teaching.
Critically interrogate issues, power, identity, and difference (including, but not limited to race, ethnicity, gender, LGBTQ+ identities, class, and disability) in music education inside and outside of schools.
Design and teach lesson plans/units/projects for a variety of learners in a variety of contexts.
Develop context- and learner-specific pedagogies that foster mindful, inclusive, respectful, empathetic, relevant, responsive, and sustaining learning.
Curate and critique appropriate texts, repertoire, and other materials to support learners in and out of schools.
Develop competency to use and critically examine instruments, technologies, and tools to support learning in and out of schools.
Improve knowledge and skills as a reflective practitioner.
Source: UW Guide 1· UW Guide 2
Grade history
↗All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors
Prerequisites
Course mapMUS PERF 104
This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.
Prerequisite text tree
Professors
Spring 2027No instructors recorded for this selection.
Historical instructors & teaching patterns
Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.
Calendar & sections
Spring 2027Schedule loads here as you scroll.
| Section | Mode | Enrolled / capacity | Waitlist |
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Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections.
Meeting source records
Student experience
the class
Past student reviews · Brian Hyer
A past student described the course experience as highly negative, citing rigid expectations for opinionated papers that required alignment with the professor's views.
Recent recorded grades — Fall 2022: 3.71 GPA, 85.7% A/AB (n=7 letter grades); Fall 2024: 4.00 GPA, 100.0% A/AB (n=9 letter grades); Fall 2025: 4.00 GPA, 100.0% A/AB (n=12 letter grades).
difficulty & workload
Past student reviews · Brian Hyer
Assignments included opinionated papers, but a former student reported that work was marked wrong if it did not match the professor's specific opinions.
Past student reviews · Brian Hyer
One student found the teaching style frustrating and stated that the experience contributed to their decision to drop their music major.
Topics
- Pedagogy of musical composition, arrangement, and orchestration
- Music technologies and their impact on composition and teaching
- Critical perspectives on issues in music learning and teaching
- Using and examining instruments and technologies for learning
Skills
- Teaching musical composition, arrangement, and orchestration
- Analyzing interactions between music technologies and composition concepts
- Designing and teaching lesson plans, units, and projects
- Developing context- and learner-specific inclusive pedagogies
Grades
Latest available · Fall 2025— not enough history to project Spring 2027.
Grade distribution · % of letter grades
Grades over time
Through Fall 2025
More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data
Not enough comparable courses for Spring 2027 in UW–Madison.
Sources & history
Catalog & offerings
Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.
Catalog observation history
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Selected offering source records
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Raw records
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Student reviews
Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.
Read original reviews
Grade history
Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.
Explore recorded gradesRecorded 2026-10-14
Model outputs & technical records
LLM outputs across runs
Full model traces
Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.
Model & dataset provenance
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"model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
"task_version": "17",
"output_id": "1607f9f55fcbfb9d24dbf93aaf4263d9c14f0b9f8cb781f983bdb7c5a2edf5d9",
"requirements_status": "valid",
"dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
"observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}