Research

I am currently working on research relating to composition pedagogy and the composing process. My focus right now is composition private lesson teaching in higher education. The research involves surveys, interviews, observations, and engaging with existing sources from music, education, psychology, neuroscience, and other fields. More detailed info about the qualitative research aspects can be found below.

If you are able to help out by participating in any of the active surveys listed here and/o by sharing them with people who think might be eligible and interested, that is greatly appreciated!

Background

Despite abundant academic literature on teaching composition in K-12 settings, very little has been published on teaching composition to undergraduate and graduate students. There are also few venues for sharing such research, and little to no training offered in composition pedagogy. In sharp contrast, a music theory pedagogy journal has existed since 1987, a second online journal began publishing in 2013, a biennial conference first met in 2017, various summer workshops are offered, and most graduate programs in music theory (and many in composition including ours) include at least one theory pedagogy course. The dearth of academic discourse on teaching music composition in higher education has implications ranging from the quality of our students’ educations to the future of our artistic medium. It also impedes efforts to make our field more diverse, equitable, and inclusive. This study will build on music education research, the limited sources relating to composition pedagogy in higher education, and a recently published study on music theory pedagogy to contribute to this critical but still developing academic field. 

The field of “music education” typically refers to teaching general music and ensembles in K-12 institutions. Music educators have many published articles and books on teaching composition to young students. These cover topics such as: the processes used by students of different ages when composing (Kratus 1989), student-teacher interactions during composing activities (Kupers and van Dijk 2020), and many others. Most of this work is based on experimental research, though some sources such as Randles and Sullivan 2013 look to practicing composers for advice on teaching composition. Kaschub and Smith 2013 explores ways collegiate music education programs can train future educators to teach music composition. 

While sources focused on teaching composition to pre-college students can provide some insight into teaching composition to collegiate students, there are enough unique aspects of higher education to necessitate research specifically focused on teaching undergraduate and graduate students. First, the goal of composition instruction in K-12 education is to support students’ music learning in general, reinforcing concepts learned in performance ensembles and general music classes. In collegiate programs, personal creativity and pre-professional development are the focus. In other words, composition is the goal, not a means to a different goal as in K-12 programs. Second, composition in K-12 programs takes place in group settings such as ensembles or general music classes, and students frequently co-compose. College composers work individually on compositions and are taught primarily in one-on-one private lessons. 

Third, most of the K-12 teachers who incorporate music composition into their classes are not composers by training nor are they actively working as professional composers. College composition instructors typically have a terminal degree in composition and are working in the field while also teaching. This gives them a very different perspective from K-12 music educators. Studying how composition is taught in higher education by instructors who are experts in composition will complement the existing music education literature on teaching composition and offer insights that can benefit collegiate instructors as well as K-12 educators. 

Brief Literature Review

There is a small but growing body of research focused on composition pedagogy in higher education. Some sources have explored historical topics (Johnson 2010, Williams 2010). There are published interviews with composers about how they teach (Shrude 2008) or essays written by composers about their views on teaching composition (Shatin 2009/10, Simon 2019). “Pedagogical Praxis and Curricular Infrastructure in Graduate Music Composition,” a special issue of Contemporary Music Review, includes the proceedings from a symposium held at Stanford University in 2012: nine essays by composition faculty from acclaimed graduate institutions who were invited to present at the symposium. 

That one-off event was later succeeded by “Teaching Composition: a Symposium on Music Composition Pedagogy” held in 2022 and 2023. Many of the peer-selected presentations at that conference focused on higher education, and one—Green and Hannon 2022—is unique in being a quantitative study. The authors conducted an online survey of collegiate composition instructors focused on what topics and experiences are prioritized in the curricula of the instructors’ home institutions.

Limited examples of qualitative studies can also be found in the literature on teaching composition in higher education, and these have influenced my approach. Barrett 2006 is a case study exploring the relationship between a collegiate professor in Australia and one of their private students via analyzing recorded lessons and interviewing both parties. Barrett cataloged twelve strategies the instructor used, and three central topics: models, innovation and imagination, and voice. Barrett and Gromko 2007 simplified that model and reframed it to focus on problem-finding and -solving.  

Edwards 2022 takes a narrative approach to studying composition pedagogy in higher education. The author selected six composition professors with whom they had studied during the course of their undergraduate and graduate education. They distributed written interview questions and then conducted real-time follow up interviews to explore themes from the written responses. Highlights from the written and verbal interviews form the bulk of the dissertation, and Edwards builds on the interview data to propose an undergraduate and graduate composition curricula. 

Vasinda 2023 synthesizes elements similar to Barrett’s and Edwards’s work: here, the author completes a multiple-case study from an ethnographic perspective. They recruited five composition instructors from different institutions to observe and interview. They also interviewed students taking private lessons with those teachers. Vasinda’s research focused on the goals teachers explicitly or implicitly set in their teaching and how they approached achieving those goals. 

Lörch and Huovinen 2025 interviewed 8 composition faculty members at universities in Germany and Sweden. They focused on the teachers’ views on private lessons, particularly in relation to their approaches to nurturing students’ individual artistic voices.  

2024 Pilot Study

In 2024, I ran a regional pilot study that built on on Barrett’s, Edwards’s, and Vasinda’s methodology by drawing on Snodgrass 2020, a book on effective practices for teaching music theory. For that project, the author completed a large-scale multiple-case study over multiple years. They first sent an online survey to instructors they believed to be effective (as demonstrated by awards, publications, etc.) They then used the survey data to select participants for observation and traveled across the US observing instructors at their institutions. 

My pilot study included a written survey like Snodgrass and Edwards, remote interviews like Edwards, and observations of both group classes and private lessons like Barrett, Vasinda, and Snodgrass. My experiences with the pilot study have led me to refine my approach for the proposed national study and to focus my attention on private lessons. 

2026 National Study

The present study will include 2 tracks. The first track involves 3 surveys which may be followed up by remote interviews and limited observations of single lessons. The first survey will focus on teaching composition private lessons from the instructor’s perspective and will include questions from the pilot study survey and interview script. The second survey will focus on students’ experiences of private composition lessons, as the student perspective will enrich the data from the pilot study and from the teacher surveys in the present study. Third, I will run a survey open to any composers (regardless of teacher or student status) that will explore their creative process, as that is a central element taught in higher education composition lessons as seen in the pilot study. Survey participants will be given a choice to opt-in for a potential follow-up interview. Observations of interviewees may be done in-person or via video recording if the teacher and their student choose to participate. 

The second track involves semester-long observations of teacher-student pairs (similar to Barrett 2006 and Barrett and Gromko 2007). I will recruit a small number of teachers (1-3) and interested students who are working with them (up to 6 per teacher). I will interview them prior to the first lesson. The teacher will video-record the lessons and upload them to a secure server. Once I confirm receipt of the files, the teacher will delete the recordings. After the semester is done, I will do a concluding interview with each teacher and student. This long-term view will contextualize and complement the data from one-off observations of lessons conducted in the pilot study and in the first track of the present study. 

Works Cite

Barrett, M. (2006). “Creative Collaboration”: an “eminence” study of teaching and learning in music composition. Psychology of Music, 34(2), 195–218. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735606061852 

Barrett, Margaret S., and Joyce Eastlund Gromko. (2007). “Provoking the Muse: A Case Study of Teaching and Learning in Music Composition.” Psychology of Music, vol. 35, no. 2, 213–30. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735607070305.

Devaney, K., Fautley, M., Grow, J., & Ziegenmeyer, A. (Eds.). (2023). The Routledge Companion to Teaching Music Composition in Schools. Taylor & Francis.

Edwards, J. W. (2022). A Synthesis of Contemporary Music Composition Pedagogy Practices for the Undergraduate and Graduate Level Sequences, and An Exploration of Time, Sound, and Space: An Aleatoric Event Score in Collaboration with the LSU Museum of Art [Dissertation]. https://repository.lsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6891&context=gradschool_dissertations

Green, B. & Hannon, A. (2022). Pedagogical Trends in the Undergraduate Composition Curriculum [Presentation]. Teaching Composition: a Symposium on Music Composition Pedagogy, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Baltimore, MD.

Johnson, B. (2010) Training the Composer: A Comparative Study Between the Pedagogical Methodologies of Arnold Schoenberg and Nadia Boulanger. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Kaschub, M. (Ed.). (2023). The Oxford Handbook of Music Composition Pedagogy. Oxford Handbooks.

Kaschub, M. & Smith, J. (Eds.). Composing Our Future: Preparing Music Educators to Teach Composition. Oxford University Press, 2013.

Kratus, J. (1989). A Time Analysis of the Compositional Processes Used by Children Ages 7 to 11. Journal of Research in Music Education, 37(1), 5. https://doi.org/10.2307/3344949

Kupers, E., & van Dijk, M. (2020). Creativity in interaction: the dynamics of teacher-student interactions during a musical composition task. Thinking Skills and Creativity, 36, 100648. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tsc.2020.100648

Lörch, Lucas, and Erkki Huovinen. (2025) “Fostering Composer Voice in Tertiary Teaching of Contemporary Music Composition.” Journal of Research in Music Education, vol. 73, no. 1, 87–108. https://doi.org/10.1177/00224294241255579.

Lupton, Mandy, and Christine Bruce. (2010). “Craft, Process and Art: Teaching and Learning Music Composition in Higher Education.” British Journal of Music Education, vol. 27, no. 3, 271–87. DOI.org (Crossref), https://doi.org/10.1017/S0265051710000239.

Pedagogical Praxis and Curricular Infrastructure in Graduate Music Composition [Special Issue]. (2012). Contemporary Music Review, 31(4). https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/gcmr20/31/4

Randles, C. & Sullivan, M. V. (2013). “How Composers Approach Teaching Composition Strategies for Music Teachers.” Music Educators Journal 99, no. 3: 51-57.

Shatin, Judith (2009/10). “The Ins and Outs of Teaching Composition: 1957-2007.” College Music Symposium 49/50: 186-97.

Shrude, Marilyn. (2008). “Teaching Composition in Twenty-First-Century America: A Conversation with Samuel Adler.” American Music 26, no. 2: 223-245.

Simon, G. (2019). Tell Me A Story: Teaching Music Composition Through Narrative Design. College Music Symposium, 59(2). https://doi.org/10.18177/sym.2019.59.sr.11443

Snodgrass, J. (2020). Teaching music theory: new voices and approaches. Oxford University Press.

Vasinda, J. (2023). Going for the Goals: How Teachers and Students Set and Meet Goals in Music Composition [Dissertation]. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6z30r013

Williams, Benjamin John. (2010). Music Composition Pedagogy: A History, Philosophy, and Guide. [Dissertation]. https://etd.ohiolink.edu/acprod/odb_etd/ws/send_file/send?accession=osu1274787048&disposition=inline