College of Visual and Performing Arts | Music | Music Degrees and Programs | Areas of Study | Composition

Composition

We recognize that systematic racism, misogyny, and white privilege have shaped the field of music composition in American academia and cultural life. The UNCG Music Composition program has a long-standing commitment to welcoming women, people of color, members of the LGBTQ community, and other under-represented groups, to study music composition. By promoting a wide range of musical thought and backgrounds in our student composers, guest artists, and musical models for study, we continue to work for change in the world of music composition.

The UNCG Composition program currently has a robust class of about 25 majors (undergraduate and graduate) who avidly support and challenge one another. We focus on helping our students to build an outstanding portfolio of composed, performed, and recorded work, all with exceptional production values. There are many performance and reading opportunities each semester, and regular collaborations with film, dance, music performance, large and small ensembles, guest artists, and other artistic areas. Every year over forty student compositions are premiered at UNCG. It’s a lively, engaging, active, dynamic, supportive, and exciting place to make new music.

The composition area features the state-of-the-art Alice Virginia Poe Williams Electronic Music Studios: a Mac-based 8.1 surround studio and a PC-based 5.1 surround studio, with speaker configurations that can be replicated in our school’s Recital Hall. Typical software being used includes Max/MSP, Logic, ProTools, Ableton Live, Cubase, Reason, and Absynth. Studio equipment is available both for creating cutting-edge electronic music and making professional-quality studio and concert recordings.

Graduates from our programs typically go on to continue their studies at prestigious Masters and Doctoral programs, often earning generous scholarships. Recent graduates have received offers from schools such as Princeton University, Juilliard School, Curtis Institute, Peabody Conservatory at Johns Hopkins University, Florida State University, University of North Texas, University of Iowa, University of Florida, Mills College, Bowling Green University, University of Texas at Austin, University of South Carolina, Louisiana State University, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, and University of Memphis.