Seward County Community College has hit a new high note this year with a brand new humanities course: Film Music Appreciation. The class, created by second-year instrumental music instructor Claire Thompson, offers the class on Tuesdays and Thursdays exploring the scores from their favorite movies, television shows and even video games.<\/p>\n
Replacing the former Jazz Appreciation course, the class goes through the history of film music from the early 20th century\u2019s Silent Era to today\u2019s blockbusters. Throughout the class, students analyze how music shapes storytelling, study legendary composers, and discover the roots of modern soundtracks.<\/p>\n
\u201cI truly feel like students today get their classical music experience from going to the movies,\u201d said Thompson, \u201cIt\u2019s a more modern take on music and how the classical realm really shaped film music as we listen to it today.\u201d<\/p>\n
The class in particular teaches students to listen critically.<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes when we watch a scene, I\u2019ll ask about the music and the kids will be like, \u2018Oh, we weren\u2019t listening,\u2019\u201d Thompson explained. \u201cWe\u2019re trying to learn how to separate the two and really listen to what\u2019s going on musically. It\u2019s a lightbulb moment.\u201d<\/p>\n That new approach resonated with some students. Kai Howery, a student in the class, compared it to the music appreciation course he previously tried.<\/p>\n \u201cThe music appreciation class \u2013 the standard one \u2013 I actually tried it, and I ended up dropping out of it because I just was not quite as interested in music as a whole from years and years ago,\u201d Howery said. \u201cWhereas film music is a lot more modern. If you\u2019re looking for an appreciation class related to your own interests and you do like movies, I cannot recommend it enough.\u201d<\/p>\n The class also goes into music that is often overlooked.<\/p>\n \u201cVideo game music is huge,\u201d Thompson noted. \u201cA lot of effort and work go into creating it, same thing with television. The music for \u2018Game of Thrones\u2019 is incredible. That is not what TV music used to be like.\u201d<\/p>\n Magda Silva, SCCC\u2019s vocal music instructor, sees the class as a valuable new option that connects music history to modern culture.<\/p>\n \u201cIt really aligns with music history because composers are inspired by classical masters,\u201d she said. \u201cBut it hones in on how that affects film. It\u2019s a neat class, I\u2019ve sat in on it, and I\u2019m kind of jealous I\u2019m not taking it.\u201d<\/p>\n For Thompson, the core of the class lies in connecting with students and their passions.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s been great, a different way of seeing my students just kind of opening up with what they like,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019re talking about music that\u2019s coming out currently today.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source crusadernews.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Seward County Community College has hit a new high note this year with a brand new humanities course: Film Music Appreciation. The class, created by second-year instrumental music instructor Claire Thompson, offers the class on Tuesdays and Thursdays exploring the scores from their favorite movies, television shows and even video games. Replacing the former Jazz […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2236918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2236917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/New-music-class-shines-light-on-film-music-\u2013-Crusader.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2236917"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236917\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2236919,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236917\/revisions\/2236919"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2236918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2236917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2236917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2236917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}