Middle East Music Ensemble
Wanees Zarour, director
The Middle East Music Ensemble explores a variety of classical, neoclassical, and popular musical forms from throughout the Middle East and embraces compositional and improvisational techniques unique to non-Western musical cultures. Members perform on traditional instruments, often in the company of noted guest artists. No previous experience in the genre is required, but the ability to read music is necessary.
Jazz Ensemble
Michael Allemana, director
Known for its boldness in showcasing cutting-edge works, the UChicago Jazz Ensemble is a versatile collection of musicians, frequently joined in performance by noted Chicago-area professionals. The Ensemble's three-concert season offers a variety of music ranging from jazz standards to hip-hop, often in custom arrangements by the ensemble’s own members.
Early Music Ensemble
Liza Malamut, director
The Early Music Ensemble, under the direction of Liza Malamut, is a historically-oriented performance group encompassing vocalists and instrumentalists. Ensemble repertoire is drawn from 15th- to 17th-century sources, emphasizing historically-informed performance practices, including reading from original notation, improvisation, and ornamentation.
Chamber Music Program
Heather Wittels, director
The wide-ranging and inclusive Chamber Music Program provides numerous performance opportunities for undergraduate and graduate student musicians and University of Chicago community members. Chamber music groups are organized at the beginning of the year, guided in repertoire selection, and coached regularly by the Chamber Music Program Director and the Department's artists-in-residence, with opportunities for workshops and master classes with visiting guest artists and other Chicago-area musicians.
Performance Opportunities
The Performance Program encompasses a wide range of musical opportunities for talented musicians throughout the campus and community. The program is open to undergraduate and graduate students from all majors and areas of study, as well as faculty, staff, and community members. The Performance Program involves hundreds of musicians across campus in a full schedule of concerts, master classes, and workshops each year. Performances regularly include special guest soloists, multi-arts collaborations, and world premieres, along with both masterworks and unusual treasures of the repertoire.
Music History and Theory
The Music History and Theory program emphasizes a wide range of methodologies and musical repertories, preparing students for careers as leading music scholars. Studies in music history may encompass cultural history, textual criticism, institutional history, hermeneutics, anthropology, race and gender studies, critical theory as well as film and media, and they often reflect a dynamic interplay between these disciplines.
Ethnomusicology
The Ethnomusicology program prepares students to evaluate and study the place of music in various cultural contexts. Students are trained in cultural theory, anthropology, ethnographic methods, problems in cross-cultural musical analysis, and world music and vernacular musical traditions. The University has particular strengths in Middle Eastern, Latin American and Caribbean, and South Asian studies. Chicago ethnomusicology students have undertaken fieldwork in North America, North Africa, Europe, East Asia, the Caribbean, and the Middle East.
Composition and Sound Practices
The Composition and Sound Practices program focuses on facilitating the making of creative, critical, experimental, and socially engaged music, sound, and intermedia work in the context of the humanities. In this program, students compose, design, perform, and produce based on the methodological study of music and sound through research, analysis, and reflection, and by learning a broad range of composition techniques and creative technologies.