If you’re a Drake or The Weeknd fan and also an undergraduate student at a university in Canada, you’re in luck!
Students at The Creative School at Toronto’s Ryerson University can now enrol themselves in classes based on the lives and musical careers of the Toronto-born superstars, Drake and the Weeknd, reported CNN.
According to Ryerson Professor-In-Residence Dalton Higgin, the course, titled “Deconstructing Drake & The Weeknd” will be offered in the upcoming Winter semester at the school beginning January 2022.
Higgins, who will also be teaching the class, said, “It’s time to get our Canadian rap and R&B icons recognized and canonized academically or otherwise.”
“It is critical for scholars and historians to examine the Toronto music scene that birthed Drake/Weeknd and helped create the conditions for them to become mega-successful,” he
added.
Talking to CNN, The Creative School Dean Charles Falzon shared that the enthusiasm for the class is “quite significant” even before registration for it opens up. “I have a feeling it’ll pack up very quickly,” he said.
According to the university, the class will be one of the flagship courses for the school’s Professional Music BA program.
Higgins says he will focus on dissecting Drake and the Weeknd lyrics in his class to highlight their “monumental” impact on the music industry.
“What people tend to forget about Drake is that he’s actually a great writer. In his rhymes, he employs all kinds of literary devices like metaphors, iambic pentameter, similes, so we’re going to deconstruct his lyrics and examine how he puts his songs together,” explained Higgins.
Higgins also shared his philosophy behind the importance of the course: “When you have these two Black Canadian artists from Toronto who are performing rap, R&B and pop, and are arguably on their way to becoming billionaires at some point in the future, there is a lot to learn from them”
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