Bachelor of Music
A performance-intensive professional music degree.
The BMus, which requires an audition for admission, is a performance-intensive degree that prepares students for professional careers in music performance or education. It shares core courses with the BA program in aural skills, theory, music history, and ensembles. In addition to the common core, BMus students take courses in piano, conducting, and applied music, and complete one of four concentration area.
The Jazz & African-American music studies (JAAMS) concentration includes courses in jazz history, theory, arranging and composition, improvisation, and African American music, as well as instrument-related classes and applied lessons. Music education students prepare to teach music in grades Pre-K–12 and complete courses in music education methods and instrumental techniques, as well as a student teaching experience. Music performance students focus on private study and prepare to enter the performance arena. Graduates may also teach privately or prepare for college-level teaching. Composition is primarily concerned with theoretical foundations and analysis and composition techniques of Western classical music, and prepares students for graduate work in theory or composition.
Featured faculty
Matthew Westgate
Director of Wind Studies
Associate Professor
Conductor Matthew Westgate leads with a combination of expressivity and crispness. His performances are praised as dramatic, incisive, and passionate.
In the spotlight
“It was a gut feeling. At the end of the day, I was like, ‘Yeah, this is it. I’m going to UMass.’ I just fell in love and knew this was where I was going to be.”
Music
Amplify your love of music and intensify your technical skill as you pursue performance, composition, or music education.