Music History Courses in London and Online
City Lit offers an extensive programme of online music history and music appreciation courses with a focus on Western classical music, Folk, Jazz, Rock and Pop. There are new topics each year across a growing range of music styles and traditions.
To find out more about music history classes and to read our year-long selection of courses, please see the blog post Music history: your guide to our programme which lists our full programme of classes ordered by term, and by day of the week. You may then click on each title to read the full course outline.
Our staff are all professional musicians who teach, write, broadcast, lecture and perform widely. In recent years they have worked with BBC Radio 3, Gramophone magazine, Birkbeck (University of London), The Open University, Oxford and Cambridge University Press, Early Music, The Orchestra of the age of Enlightenment, The Wigmore Hall and the Aldeburgh Festival.
Many of our students learn for pleasure but some also come to enhance their careers: recent examples include board members of music charities, marketing and administration professionals from orchestras and gap-year students considering university entrance.
Feel free to browse our programme and do email us at music@citylit.ac.uk with any questions.
- Beethoven: an introduction to his music
Course start date: Tue 3 Jun 2025Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Edward HendersonLudwig van Beethoven is one of the most important composers in the Western classical canon. Come and discover more about this most famous of Austro-German composers on a short introductory course.Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £149.00 Concession £149.00 - Classical music: an introductionCourse start date: Mon 21 Jul 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Pauline GreeneAre you interested in finding out more about classical music but not sure where to start? This taster course will introduce you to the history of music through a careful choice of works. - Opera appreciation: an introductionCourse start date: Thu 24 Jul 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Pauline GreeneWhat is opera? And how do you approach watching and listening to it? Explore the ostentatious, sometimes overwhelming, world of opera through study of two major works and styles.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £69.00 Concession £69.00 - Great works: Beethoven's Symphony No 9 "Choral" Course start date: Tue 5 Aug 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Katy Hamilton, Trish ShawBeethoven’s monumental ninth symphony, first performed in 1824, has had an enormous impact on western classical music and on wider European culture. How did Beethoven come to write this work, and what does this symphony still mean to us two centuries after its first performance?Full fee £39.00 Senior fee £39.00 Concession £39.00 - Great composers: Gilbert and SullivanCourse start date: Tue 5 Aug 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Katy HomdenCreators of arguably the most popular and enduring opera in the English language from the 19th century, this course will introduce you to Gilbert & Sullivan’s musical legacy via biographical study and operatic highlights. tutor: Katy HomdenFull fee £59.00 Senior fee £59.00 Concession £59.00 - Exploring classical music 1Course start date: Mon 15 Sep 2025 (and 2 other dates)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Edward BreenDo you want to know more about Western classical music? Explore selected topics and key works in Medieval to (early) Baroque music on this informative 10-week course. Ideal for people with no specialist knowledge. NB: Break week: 27 Oct 2025.Full fee £219.00 Senior fee £175.00 Concession £153.00 - Exploring the music of Richard StraussCourse start date: Tue 16 Sep 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Katy HamiltonFrom the heady waltzes of Der Rosenkavalier to the awe-inspiring opening of Also sprach Zarathrustra, come and delve into the life and works of the brilliant – and controversial – composer and conductor, Richard Strauss.
Full fee £269.00 Senior fee £215.00 Concession £188.00 - Exploring opera 1Course start date: Tue 16 Sep 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Pauline GreeneJoin us to explore the history of opera over three enjoyable terms. In this first term we’ll explore the ideas that fuelled origins of opera and the wonderful world of Baroque opera seria. NB Break week: 29 Oct 2025. - Listening to the 20th century 1Course start date: Tue 16 Sep 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Edward HendersonUsing Alex Ross’s 'The Rest is Noise' as a guide, we'll investigate art music in the first half of the 20th century. This module covers Mahler’s last symphonies, fin de siècle Paris and the Ballet Russes, and Expressionism and the Second Viennese School. Break week: 28 October 2025.Full fee £269.00 Senior fee £215.00 Concession £188.00 - Mozart's ViennaCourse start date: Wed 24 Sep 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Pauline GreeneMozart’s music has come to stand for the greatest and most beautiful aspects of the Western classical tradition. But who was he? And what exactly did he do? Come and discover more about this famous Vienese composer. break week 29 Oct 2025.Full fee £269.00 Senior fee £215.00 Concession £188.00 - Exploring classical music 2Course start date: Mon 12 Jan 2026 (and 3 other dates)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Neil LuckDo you want to know more about classical music history? Explore selected topics and key works in Baroque, Classical and early Romantic music on this highly informative 10-week course. Ideal for people with no specialist knowledge. Break week: 16 Feb 2026.Full fee £219.00 Senior fee £175.00 Concession £153.00 - Writing about musicCourse start date: Thu 25 Sep 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Edward Breen, Katy HamiltonExperience the enjoyment of writing about music. Share your musical opinions in several formats and be inspired to develop your own longer-term writing project. Break week: 30 Oct 2025.Full fee £269.00 Senior fee £215.00 Concession £188.00 - Jazz today Course start date: Wed 5 Nov 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Albi GravenerAn exploration of jazz music as we find it today and as it has developed over the past forty years.Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £119.00 Concession £104.00 - Great works: Mendelssohn's OctetCourse start date: Tue 2 Dec 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Katy HamiltonStudy the history and form of this famous work in a short, enjoyable music history class.Full fee £29.00 Senior fee £29.00 Concession £29.00 - Great musicians: Berio and BerberianCourse start date: Tue 2 Dec 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Trish ShawComposer Luciano Berio and singer-composer Cathy Berberian were the power couple of contemporary music in the 1950s and 1960s, collaborating to discover new sounds and musical techniques and structures in works from Tema: Omaggio a Joyce and Sequenza III to Stripsody.Full fee £59.00 Senior fee £59.00 Concession £59.00
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