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Music

When you choose to study music at The Hartt School, our tight-knit community of artists will ignite your creativity and set you on a path meant only for you.

The Audition

All Bachelor of Music programs require an audition for admission.  Audition guidelines/requirements vary per instrument and by area.

Music Majors & Minors

Degrees Offered
  • Acoustical Engineering and Music, BSE
The mission of the acoustical engineering and music program is to provide excellent educational experience for its students, with an emphasis on preparing graduates for professional practice in engineering and/or graduate school.
Degrees Offered
  • Bachelor of Music
  • Composition Minor
  • Master of Music
  • Graduate Professional Diploma
  • Doctor of Musical Arts
  • Artist Diploma

Through the study of traditional concert works, film music, music theatre, improvisation, and advanced modern techniques, you gain the tools needed to present your musical ideas clearly and imaginatively. Hartt’s balanced curriculum emphasizes traditional skills, classical practice, and contemporary techniques. In addition to study in our challenging and stimulating core music program, you receive hands-on experience with new and emerging musical technologies and take part in classes that include orchestration, analysis, and conducting.

Degrees Offered
  • Bachelor of Music
  • Undergraduate Diploma
  • Master of Music
  • Graduate Professional Diploma
  • Doctor of Musical Arts
  • Artist Diploma

Strong musical training and versatility are needed to make a career as a performer. As an instrumentalist at Hartt, you receive training in performance, pedagogy, and career development. Solo, chamber, and large ensemble opportunities provide experience in standard repertoire and new works. We also offer many opportunities to perform in collaborative environments such as playing in the pit orchestras for an opera, dance concert, or a musical theatre production.

Degrees Offered
  • Bachelor of Music
  • Master of Music

The mission of the Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz is to develop your aspiration and skills in the art form known as jazz.  You will be exposed to historical analysis, perspective, narratives on improvisation, and dialogue concerning the expression of jazz music.

The Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree with a music major is a rigorous academic program that prepares you for graduate study in music or other disciplines. Students in the program receive a broad overview of musical study with a heavy concentration in music history and music theory.

In addition, our music majors in the BA program take courses from a variety of disciplines that introduce you to other fields and ways of thinking. As a final project, you have the choice of completing a thesis project or performing a recital.

Degrees Offered
  • Bachelor of Music
  • Master of Music Education
  • Doctor of Philosophy

Students who graduate from Hartt with a degree in music education are highly sought-after professionals and teach in schools across the country. One reason for our students’ success is the time spent practicing to be a music educator. Our students start working in area music programs during their first year and end up student teaching in their fourth year. As our students grow into educators, they are supported by an internationally recognized group of music education faculty, experienced graduate students, and in-service music teachers. Completing the music education degree leads to teacher certification in the state of Connecticut, which is also accepted through reciprocity agreements throughout the United States.

Degrees Offered
  • Bachelor of Music, Performance Practices or Scholarship and Research
  • Master of Music, Performance Practices or Scholarship and Research

Here at Hartt, we believe that a thorough grounding in music history is not only a valuable educational pursuit in and of itself, but it also provides much-needed context for, and enhances the study of, theory, performance, and other musical endeavors. Our history faculty specializes in everything from medieval music theory to opera and film music, Handel, CPE Bach, and Max Reger, video game music, critical editing, and cognitive musicology.

When you decide to major in music management, you have the desire to pursue a strong musical and business course of study. Playing a musical instrument or being a vocalist is required for entrance to the program. This can include classical instruments or classical voice, jazz instruments or voice, or commercial instruments (bass, drums, guitar, keyboard, or voice.)

 

Music production & technology at Hartt trains musicians to become music production professionals (i.e. recording, mixing, and mastering engineers). Musicianship training has played an essential role for many, if not most, successful producers. Through study in music, electronics and acoustics, you will develop the skills and knowledge necessary to work in the professional audio industry.

 

Degrees Offered
  • Bachelor of Music
  • Music Theory Minor
  • Master of Music
  • Doctoral Minor

Music theory at Hartt is designed to prepare you for graduate studies in music theory. Our students study tonal harmony, tonal analysis, modern techniques, tonal counterpoint, modal counterpoint, keyboard harmony, score reading, orchestration, and music theory pedagogy.

As a performing arts management major, you will learn the skills to have a career in the performing arts of the commercial music business. You are given the opportunity to concentrate in many different areas of management and business including the recording industry, touring, arts marketing, fundraising, for and non-profit management and entrepreneurial studies. Not only will you explore a variety of current problems inherent to the industry through classroom discussions, guest speakers, case studies and assignments, but also attend conferences and go on field trips to Connecticut arts institutions, as well as those in Boston and New York.

 

Degrees Offered
  • Bachelor of Music
  • Undergraduate Diploma
  • Master of Music in Vocal Performance
  • Master of Music in Choral Conducting
  • Graduate Professional Diploma
  • Doctor of Musical Arts in Vocal Performance
  • Doctor of Musical Arts in Choral Conducting
  • Artist Diploma

At Hartt, growth in technique and musicianship, guided by distinguished faculty, is the focus of vocal study. Our rich undergraduate and graduate course of study includes private voice lessons, coachings, vocal pedagogy, language and diction study, opera stagecraft, and our invigorating core music curriculum.

Five-Year Double Majors

The five-year double major programs are designed to satisfy the intellectual and training needs of those students who demonstrate interests across two fields of study. Most programs take 5 years to complete and cover all requirements of both programs.

Students who apply to and are accepted into one of our double major programs will receive a five year scholarship for undergraduate study.  Current Hartt students who declare a second major prior to the third year of study will receive a one-year extension on their scholarship.

  • Classical Guitar Performance and Music Production & Technology
  • Composition and Music Production & Technology
  • Instrumental Performance and Composition
  • Instrumental Performance and Music Education
  • Instrumental Performance and Music Management
  • Jazz Studies and Composition
  • Jazz Studies and Music Education-Instrumental Emphasis
  • Vocal Performance and Music Education
  • Vocal Performance and Music Management

Music Minor

The Minor in Music program is open to all non-Hartt students who wish to broaden their experience in music in a formal program. Applicants must have a rudimentary understanding of music and an area of performance experience (instrument or voice).

To complete the minor in music, the student must register for a letter grade for all music courses and must receive a grade no lower than a C in each course. Hartt will notify the student’s home college when requirements for the minor have been completed.