Music

专业详情

Music is everywhere in the world around us; it is part of all of our lives, whether we play it, actively listen to it, or hear it in passing. At Oxford, we study music by reading, listening, performing and composing. We create music in all its aspects – acoustic, electronic, individually and communally, working with world-class professionals and with local communities. We analyse the relationships within a piece of music, and between that piece and its genre and context. Throughout the course, you will be exposed to music of all kinds and in all contexts: Western classical, popular music, musics of other cultures, community music, seeing these musics in terms of their social and cultural contexts (and how those contexts have been shaped over time).

Music has been part of the life of Oxford for more than 800 years. There are around 30 academic staff, of whom 15 give lectures regularly – scholars with distinguished reputations as musicologists, performers and composers. Oxford welcomes visits from numerous speakers and professional performing ensembles. Students enjoy performance and composition workshops, and play an active part in the life of the faculty and their colleges – in chapels, orchestras, ensembles, bands and stage performances, and in musical outreach to the broader community.

The faculty building incorporates practice rooms, electronic music and recording studios, and one of the best music libraries in any British university. The world-famous Bate Collection of Musical Instruments, housed in the faculty, lends historical instruments to students. The faculty also has a gamelan orchestra.

The course is broadly based but allows increasing specialisation and choice as you proceed. Whether you’re a performer, a composer, a budding scholar of music history, sociology, psychology or education, the Music course offers something for you. Students graduate as mature and well-rounded musicians with an informed and lively sense of the contemporary study and practice of the subject, and the ways in which music contributes to society more broadly.