Undergraduate students in the department study, create, and perform music and sound arts in an environment that combines the benefits of a well-rounded liberal arts education with the resources of a major research university. Students may major or minor in Music and may opt for a departmental honors program.
Many of our courses take advantage of our location in the heart of New York City, one of the world’s great cultural centers, and are structured around live performances at venues ranging from the city's top concert halls to its most obscure performance spaces. Students also take advantage of our location by pursuing internships with NYC-based recording companies, music magazines, or major performing arts organizations.
Our undergraduate program encourages students to find intersections between research, performance, and creative work, amidst an intensive academic calendar that features leading scholars and performers. Music majors and minors also have department supported opportunities to take private lessons with New York’s most outstanding teachers, receive recital preparation, and perform in a variety of ensembles.
The Kimmel Center offers rehearsal and practice rooms; the department and Waverly Labs provides access to performance and studio spaces and studio equipment for composition and research. In addition to our own ensembles, our students can also join ensembles sponsored by the Steinhardt School of Education, such as the NYU Symphony Orchestra.
The Undergraduate Program
Students pursuing a major or minor in music gain proficiency in theory, history, criticism, and interpretation of music traditions throughout the world. At the same time, our students develop skills in analysis, critical thinking, composition,sound technologies, and writing that are valuable across disciplines. As a result, the major and minor in music constitute excellent preparation for graduate study in music and related fields in the Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; for careers in music, media, and culture industries; or for any occupation demanding clear and original thinking, command of the written word, analytical and listening skills, and creativity.
In addition to a curriculum designed for majors and minors, we offer a wide range of innovative courses—in historical musicology, ethnomusicology, popular music, music theory, composition, historical performance, jazz, experimental music, music technology, and sound studies—that are addressed to the general student. Recent and upcoming undergraduate courses include:
Music Theory I and II
History of European Music
Sounds of the Cold War
Music, War and Memory
Principles of Composition
Computer Music Theory and Techniques: Programming in Pure Data
Handmade Electronic Music
Introduction to Celtic Music
African Music
The Art of Listening: Jazz in New York
The Art of Listening: Why Do We Like What We Like?
Rock and Roll from the 1950s to the 1980s
Musical 'Complexities'/Theoretical Perplexity
Constructing Race, Gender, and Sexuality in Popular Music
Alternate Canons: The Black Rock Coalition
Native American Music and Poetics
The Search for Authenticity
Spectral Music: A Chord or and Attitude?
Women Composing in a Gendered World
Contemporary Opera
Soundscapes of Contemporary War
Music, Sound and Technology
Performance and Analysis
Studies in Musical Analysis
The Sound Spectrum: Its Features, Uses, and History
History of Electroacoustic Music
Principles of Sonification