Program Overview

Music Ph.D. with a concentration in Composition

Program Overview

The graduate Composition program at the University of North Texas is one of the largest and most diverse in the nation, with 70 composition students and six faculty composers representing a wide range of compositional aesthetics and approaches. The program integrates state-of-the-art music technology with acoustic composition within the curriculum, providing both artistic flexibility and academic rigor.

Program Details

• Degree Type: Doctoral Degree
• Format: On Campus
• Estimated Time to Complete: 2-3 years
• Credit Hours: 60 (with prior M.S.), 90 (with prior B.S.)

Program Highlights

• The weekly Music Now forum encourages the exchange of ideas and information about the creation, performance, and understanding of recent music.
• The Composers Forum student organization brings new student works to the public's attention, coordinating performances of UNT composers' works on and off campus.
• The division has access to a national network of professional composers through the Society of Composers, Inc. and an institutional membership to the American Composers Forum.
• The Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia (CEMI) provides a unique environment to explore time-based arts and is internationally renowned for its long history of innovation, particularly in electroacoustic music.

Marketable Skills

• Pedagogical practices
• Music editing, copying, transcribing, and arranging
• Public event management
• Book/journal editing, creating, and promoting
• Advanced data collection, analysis, and interpretation

Career Opportunities

Alumni of the program have achieved national and international success, enjoying careers as university professors, commercial and media composers, arrangers, and arts administrators.

Courses

• Topics in Computer Music (3 hrs)
• Contemporary Notation and Performance Practices (3 hrs)
• Topics in Composition (3 hrs)
• Topics in Contemporary Music (3 hrs)
• Intermedia Performance Arts (2 hrs)
• Composition Seminar (3 hrs)