The Music Department offers course work and performing opportunities in music from around the world at undergraduate and graduate levels. Students considering a music major should come to the department office where they will be given an in-house concentration form and assigned a major advisor. Students design their own individualized program of study and complete the concentration form in consultation with their advisor, listing all music courses previously taken and those planned for the future. Because the program proposal must be approved by the director of undergraduate affairs and ratified by the entire music faculty, prospective majors are urged to complete this form two weeks before the deadline for declaration to allow for music faculty action.

Major requirements. Music majors take four courses in each of three capabilities: theory/composition, history/culture, and performance. Two additional courses from the 300-level Seminars for Music Majors bring the total number of music credits to 14. The required senior project or senior honor's project (thesis) may increase the allowable Music Department credits applied toward graduation to 15 or 16, respectively. Prerequisites to the major are one year of music theory (MUSC103, MUSC201) or passing the equivalent by exam, one course in the history/culture capability, and one performance course (excluding private lessons.) (Occasional courses taught by visiting faculty need to be approved by a departmental advising expert.) Diversity of musical experience is a core value of the Music Department and is expected of all music majors. To move toward this goal, at least two of the 14 music credits must be outside the student's main area of interest.

The Music Department expects its majors to continue to refine and extend their performance skills throughout their undergraduate careers, which may mean accumulating more than 32 courses for the BA. Students are reminded that a load of six or more courses in one semester (not unusual for music majors taking full advantage of department offerings) requires the permission of the dean. Private lessons taken before the junior year are not counted toward the major.

All music majors are required to complete a senior project by the end of their final year. The purpose of the project is to give focus to the major by means of independent creative work and to encourage independent study with the close advice and support of a faculty member. Students who choose to undertake an honors thesis may count this as their senior project.

Special activities. The department supports a number of unusual activities, many of which are available to the student body in general as well as to music majors. Among them are ensembles in various Asian, African, American, and European traditions, as well as a variety of chamber ensembles.

The possible foci of study include Western classical music; new music with an emphasis on acoustical explorations; African American, Indonesian, Indian, and African musics; and European and American music outside the art tradition. These and other possibilities are not mutually exclusive but can be studied in combinations that reflect the interests of individual students. The music profession is international. In many areas of music study, at least one foreign language is essential.

Private-lessons program. Private lessons are available for all instruments and voice in Western art music, African American music, and a variety of other musics from around the world. Lessons are considered one-credit-per-semester courses. An additional fee, $735.00 per semester, is charged for these private lessons (financial aid is available to students eligible for university financial aid). Approved music majors in their junior and senior years are eligible for partial subsidy when taking one (1) private lesson, per semester, with a private-lessons teacher.

Departmental colloquium. An ongoing departmental colloquium is intended for the entire music community. It includes presentations by Wesleyan faculty, students, and outside speakers and encourages general discussion of broad issues in the world of music.

The study facilities include a working collection of musical instruments from many different cultures; a music-instrument manufacturing workshop; a 45-piece Javanese gamelan orchestra; a large formal concert hall and a small, multipurpose concert hall; an electronic music studio coupled to a professional recording studio; a computer-arts studio capable of producing electronic music, video art, and environmental simulations; a music and record library; and an archive of world music.

The following is a listing according to capabilities of courses offered by the department:

Theory Prerequisites

• MUSC103 Materials and Design
• MUSC201 Tonal Harmony

History/Culture Gateways

• MUSC106 History of European Art Music
• MUSC107 History of African American Music
• MUSC108 History of Rock and R&B
• MUSC109 Introduction to Experimental Music
• MUSC110 Introduction to South Indian Music
• MUSC111 Music and Theater of Indonesia
• MUSC112 Introduction to East Asian Music
• MUSC113 The Study of Film Music

FYI Courses

• MUSC120 Orpheus and Eurydice: The Power of Music
• MUSC121 Haydn and Mozart as Cultural Constructs
• MUSC122 Introduction to Folk Music Studies
• MUSC123 Escaping Purgatory: Music and Devotion in Medieval Europe
• MUSC124 Music, Math, and Language
• MUSC125 Music and Downtown New York, 1950--1970
• MUSC126 Poetry and Song

Theory/Composition

• MUSC202 Theory and Analysis
• MUSC203 Chromatic Harmony
• MUSC204 20th-Century Compositional Techniques
• MUSC205 Sonata Form
• MUSC210 Theory of Jazz Improvisation
• MUSC212 South Indian Music--solkattu
• MUSC220 Composing, Performing, and Listening to Experimental Music
• MUSC221 Electroacoustic Music
• MUSC222 Computers in Music
• MUSC223 Music, Recording, and Sound Design
• MUSC224 Computer Arts

History/Culture

• MUSC241 Medieval and Renaissance Music
• MUSC242 Baroque and Classical Music
• MUSC243 Music of the 19th Century
• MUSC244 Music of the 20th Century
• MUSC246 Opera
• MUSC247 Representation of Reality in Sound
• MUSC250 Film and Folk Music of India
• MUSC261 Music and Modernity in China, Japan, and Korea
• MUSC265 African Presences I: Music in Africa
• MUSC266 African Presences II: Music in the Americas
• MUSC269 Sacred and Secular African American Musics
• MUSC270 Music of Coltrane, Mingus, and Coleman
• MUSC271 Music of Lennie Tristano, Miles Davis, and Max Roach
• MUSC272 Women in Creative Music
• MUSC273 Music of Duke Ellington
• MUSC274 Hymnody in the United States Before the Civil War
• MUSC280 Sociology of Music in Social Movements
• MUSC285 Wagner and Modernism
• MUSC290 How Ethnomusicology Works
• MUSC291 The Gendering of Music in Cross-Cultural Perspective
• MUSC293 Music of Sun Ra and Karleinz Stockhausen
• MUSC294 Recording Culture
• MUSC298 Jewish Musical Worlds
• MUSC299 Music Analysis, Interpretation, and Creativity

Major Seminars

• MUSC300 Seminar for Music Majors
• MUSC304 Arranging and Composing for Jazz Orchestra
• MUSC308 Composition in the Arts
• MUSC312 Tala: Rhythmic Form and Procession
• MUSC316 Special Topic in Contemporary Pop Music

Performance/Study Groups

• MUSC405 Private Music Lessons (nonmajors)
• MUSC406 Private Music Lessons (majors)
• MUSC424 Taiko Drumming--Beginning
• MUSC425 Taiko Drumming--Advance
• MUSC426 Korean Drumming Ensemble--Beginning
• MUSC427 Yiddish Music/Klezmer Band
• MUSC428 Chinese Music Ensemble
• MUSC429 Korean Drumming Ensemble Advanced
• MUSC430 South Indian Voice--Beginning
• MUSC431 South Indian Voice--Intermediate
• MUSC432 South Indian Voice--Advanced
• MUSC433 South Indian Music Percussion
• MUSC434 Improvisational Techniques in South Indian Music
• MUSC435 Choral Singing: Wesleyan Concert Choir
• MUSC438 Wesleyan University Collegium Musicum
• MUSC439 Wesleyan University Orchestra
• MUSC440 Conducting: Instrumental and Vocal
• MUSC441 Pipe Organ in Theory and Practice
• MUSC442 Chamber Music Ensemble
• MUSC443 Wesleyan Wind Ensemble
• MUSC444 Opera and Oratorio Ensembles
• MUSC445 West African Music and Culture Beginners
• MUSC446 West African Music and Culture Intermediate
• MUSC447 West African Music and Culture Advanced
• MUSC448 Ebony Singers: Gospel Music
• MUSC449 Mande Music Ensemble
• MUSC450 Steel Band
• MUSC451 Javanese Gamelan--Beginners
• MUSC452 Javanese Gamelan--Advanced
• MUSC453 Cello Ensemble
• MUSC454 Classical Guitar Ensemble
• MUSC455 Jazz Ensemble
• MUSC456 Jazz Improvisation Performance
• MUSC457 Jazz Orchestra I
• MUSC458 Jazz Orchestra II
• MUSC459 Materials and Principles of Jazz Improvisation I
• MUSC460 Materials and Principles of Jazz Improvisation II

Graduate Courses

• MUSC500 Graduate Pedagogy
• MUSC505 Graduate Seminar in Music
• MUSC506 Reading Ethnomusicology
• MUSC507 Practicing Ethnomusicology
• MUSC508 Graduate Seminar in Composition
• MUSC509 Special Studies in Contemporary Music
• MUSC510 Graduate Proseminar in World Music Studies
• MUSC513 Improvisation in Cross-Cultural Perspective
• MUSC514 Graduate Seminar in South Indian Music
• MUSC516 Seminar in Indonesian Music
• MUSC519 Current Issues in Ethnomusicology
• MUSC520 Explorations in Musicology
• MUSC521 Seminar in Interdisciplinary Studies
• MUSC522 Seminar in Comparative Music Theory
• MUSC530 Colloquium