Department Website
Program Description
The NYU Graduate Program in Music is designed for the professionally minded student who plans a career combining college-level teaching with continuing research and/or composition. We feature three degree tracks: Ethnomusicology, Historical Musicology, and Composition and Theory, but student research and interests are not expected to conform to narrow interpretations of these tracks. Indeed, our students work on a wide variety of topics including jazz, popular music, film music, world musical traditions, western art music, and musical theater. Recent graduates hold academic appointments in some of the most prestigious universities in the United States and Canada, and are making distinguished contributions to scholarship and musical composition on both the national and international levels.
The Graduate Program in Music is deliberately small, admitting six to eight students each year. The curriculum is research oriented; most courses are concerned with extending the boundaries of current knowledge.
Dual Degree
The Music Department offers a dual degree with the NYU School of Law: Music PhD/Law JD.
See Music for admission requirements and instructions specific to this program.
Admissions
All applicants to the Graduate School of Arts and Science (GSAS) are required to submit the general application requirements, which include:
See Music for admission requirements and instructions specific to this program.
Program Requirements
The program requires the completion of 72 credits, and offers three specializations: Historical Musicology, Ethnomusicology, and Composition and Theory. See Doctor of Philosophy in Music for specialization details.
Course List
| Course |
Title |
Credits |
| 72 |
| Total Credits | 72 |
Additional Program Requirements
Language Examinations
Students must demonstrate reading competency in one modern language by passing a written examination administered by the department before taking the comprehensive examination. Between the comprehensive examination and the dissertation proposal defense, students must demonstrate reading knowledge in a second language (students in composition are exempted from this requirement). Students are expected to select a second language appropriate to their research topic. Ordinarily, students will have passed the second language examination by no later than the third year of study. No student in musicology or ethnomusicology may advance to candidacy without having passed the second language exam.
Comprehensive Examination
The comprehensive examination tests the student’s knowledge of all major aspects of the field. Students are expected to display sophisticated skills in dealing with intellectual problems and should be able to create and support thoughtful lines of argument from a wide range of evidence. Those specializing in historical musicology should demonstrate a thorough general knowledge of Western musical history, of Western music’s changing styles, and of current issues in the discipline. Students are expected to cite and discuss recent musicological writing and to advance and support coherent arguments about major issues in response to the questions posed on the examination. Those specializing in ethnomusicology should demonstrate an understanding of the history of the discipline, its theories and principal ethnographies, and major musical cultures. Students specializing in composition and theory are expected to be familiar with the principal composers and compositional models of the last century and to be able to handle problems of practical analysis. Whatever their field of specialization, students are also expected to have a basic knowledge of the other fields of music scholarship and to incorporate this knowledge into their examination responses. Preparation for the examination should therefore include independent study of both repertoire (with extensive listening and analysis as appropriate) and scholarly writing about music.
Dissertation Proposal, and Advancement to Candidacy
During the third or fourth year of study, students should select a principal adviser for the dissertation and, in consultation with their adviser, should select two other faculty to form a dissertation committee. One member of the committee may come from outside the department, or, more rarely, from outside the University. Students should develop a dissertation project in close consultation with the committee they have chosen. Ordinarily, this work should be sufficiently developed to allow students to defend their dissertation proposal by sometime in their fourth year of study.
Students develop a dissertation proposal in consultation with their committee and present it to that committee during their oral examination. Lasting from one to two hours, this examination will probe the student’s competence in the planned field of research, in related fields, and in current methodological and theoretical approaches to the dissertation topic. Students should expect that the committee may require substantial revisions of their proposal and/or additional work. Students who pass this oral examination on their dissertation proposal will be approved to begin work immediately on the dissertation.
The dissertation proposal should succinctly state:
- the research question to be studied;
- how the question relates to existing scholarship;
- the methods to be used (e.g., approaches to fieldwork, analytical techniques, theoretical framework);
- how the dissertation will contribute to knowledge of the field; and
- the main elements of a working bibliography.
In some cases, chapter outlines will be required.
For students specializing in composition, the dissertation will be one or more compositions of significant proportions accompanied by a thesis. In their dissertation proposal, composers must include a brief description of the intended composition(s), and they should discuss scoring, any texts to be set, and the planned structure and size. Additionally, they should discuss the thesis as described above.
Dissertation Defense
The completed dissertation will be defended in a public oral examination to be administered by a committee of five faculty. This defense will follow rules established by the Graduate School of Arts and Science. Ordinarily, the examining committee will consist of the three-member committee that advised the dissertation and two additional faculty who are appointed by the director of graduate studies in consultation with the student and principal adviser. The examining committee must include at least three members of the Arts and Science faculty. At least three committee members must approve the dissertation prior to the scheduling of the defense. The dissertation must be distributed to all members of the committee at least a month before the scheduled defense. At least four of the five members of the examining committee must vote to approve the dissertation’s oral defense.
Departmental Approval
All Graduate School of Arts & Science doctoral candidates must be approved for graduation by their department for the degree to be awarded.
Sample Plan of Study
Plan of Study Grid
| 1st Semester/Term |
|---|
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| | Credits | 12 |
| 2nd Semester/Term |
|---|
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| | Credits | 12 |
| 3rd Semester/Term |
|---|
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| | Credits | 12 |
| 4th Semester/Term |
|---|
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| | Credits | 12 |
| 5th Semester/Term |
|---|
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| | Credits | 12 |
| 6th Semester/Term |
|---|
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| |
4 |
| | Credits | 12 |
| | Total Credits | 72 |
Following completion of the required coursework for the PhD, students are expected to maintain active status at New York University by enrolling in a research/writing course or a Maintain Matriculation (MAINT-GA 4747) course. All non-course requirements must be fulfilled prior to degree conferral, although the specific timing of completion may vary from student-to-student.
Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of the program, graduates will have learned:
- Foundational premises, intellectual and discursive geneaologies, and most recent trends of the principal disciplinary approaches to scholarship about music (and sound) that have developed over the past 150 years.
- How to engage critically and creatively with a wide range of the most current work in music and sound scholarship and composition while simultaneously defining areas of narrower focus which constitute their evolving interest foci.
- How to define and execute research and/or creative projects that illuminate the role of music and sound in human experience from a variety of perspectives.
- How to define and execute major research and/or creative projects that constitute original contributions to the discourse of and about music and sound in human experience, including cultural and political history, and about music as a form of knowledge.
Policies
NYU Policies
University-wide policies can be found on the New York University Policy pages.
Graduate School of Arts and Science Policies
Academic Policies for the Graduate School of Arts and Science can be found on the Academic Policies page.