• What type of music programs are offered at HBU?
• What opportunities are available?
• What is a “typical” year like in the life of a music major?
• What about life after graduation?

What type of music programs are offered at HBU?
Music students at HBU are able to choose one of several paths, tailoring their course of study to match their special talents and specific interests. Our programs range from one emphasizing liberal arts studies (with a second major in an area other than music) to intensely professional studies in performance, teaching, church music, and theory or composition.

Students with a strong interest in music and also in another field may choose the liberal arts degree. Approximately 35% of course work in that degree is in music, with the remainder in another major and in the liberal arts core. Students choosing a professional degree in music enroll in approximately 70% music courses with the remainder in the liberal arts.

Since we are a university and not a conservatory program, there is an emphasis on course work in the liberal arts, offering a broad experience for our students. Additionally, music majors do not officially declare an intention to pursue a specific degree until the end of their second year of study, giving ample time and experience in course work to make a wise choice.

What opportunities are available?
Being located in the fourth largest city in the USA offers many opportunities to our students! Performances by the world-class performing organizations in the city, the Houston Symphony, Houston Grand Opera, and the Houston Ballet, are all included in several course requirements, and solo and chamber performances from Da Camera, Nexus, Society for the Performing Arts, and the Friends of Music are readily available.

There are two other large Schools of Music in Houston, and we freely share programs with them at no cost to our students. Additionally, the School of Music presents between fifty and seventy programs each year, including student recitals, faculty concerts, major ensemble concerts and invited guest performances. The Choral program usually hosts a week-long residency each year by a well-known choral composer (recently having Alice Parker and Morten Lauridsen in residence), and the Opera Workshop presents two operas involving interaction with personnel from the professional companies in Houston.

What is a “typical” year like in the life of a music major?
When students first come to HBU, they see a convenient, well-cared-for, very attractive campus populated with lots of friendly people. We currently have between 2,300 and 2,400 students, about 600 of whom are graduate students. There are over 110 music majors and 11 full-time and 14 part-time music faculty members. As a result, our classes average between 10-20 in the core music classes and 6-10 in the upperclass cognate classes. By the end of the first year, all music majors know each other and most of the 25 faculty members!

Students who are taking hour-long private lessons should expect to spend at least two hours each day practicing. We encourage students to establish good practice habits from the first day on campus, and to make practice a priority. The four shorts years as an undergraduate pass all too quickly, and this is the time most musicians have to prepare themselves for a lifetime of music-making. So the preparation, practice, and foundations for performance practice take place during these years.

The year is full of rehearsals, performances, demanding coursework, concerts, and beginning to live the life of a musician. Courses in music theory dominate the first year – learning to speak that language through composition and performance and to understand the language through listening and analysis are necessary and invaluable tools which are presented and developed from the first day of classes. No matter what specialized area of music one chooses, the language must be understood!

New students are constantly surrounded by older students and faculty who are practicing their craft at the highest levels of achievement in performance, composition, and scholarship. HBU is a small, private school, but we continue to have a very large presence in the musical fabric of Houston, the USA, and the world! During the years 2001-2003, students and/or faculty have presented concerts at Carnegie Hall four times and had new works premiered in Houston, Dallas, and Bucharest (Romania). We have had alums and faculty performing with the Metropolitan Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Opera in the Heights, Houston Symphony Orchestra, Houston Ballet Orchestra, and Houston Grand Opera Orchestra, as well as presenting solo recitals and performances all over the United States and in Europe! And all of those experiences inform and enhance the educational experience for our students.

What about life after graduation?
What in the world can be done with a degree in music? How can my son or daughter make a living and support a family with a music degree? These questions are some of the most frequently asked when a student states an intention to become a musician. And certainly there are well-known stories of students gradating and ending up working in jobs having nothing to do with music.

There are no guarantees that can be offered regarding the ultimate employment of a music student. That is true in all fields, not only in music. But from the first contact with the HBU School of Music through graduation, your son or daughter is identified as a person with a special talent and with the capability of being a successful musician for the remainder of their life. The initial audition process helps the School of Music faculty to identify innate talent and a potential for success. The degree programs are designed to challenge and develop that talent and potential to the fullest extent possible during undergraduate studies. There are several evaluations all students pass through during their studies – the Freshman Diagnostics at the end of the first year, the Upper Divisional Exams at the end of the second year, and then, if the chosen degree plan requires them, the Junior Recital and Senior Recital.

One thing is certain, and that is that the education received through Houston Baptist University and the School of Music will provide fundamental and excellent training needed for success in a chosen musical discipline. Our recent graduates have all found jobs in their chosen fields or have gone on to graduate studies at some of the finest schools of music around the United States. We have alums singing solo roles at the Metropolitan Opera and Houston Grand Opera, some are conducting large performing ensembles, teaching at universities and colleges, and many are teaching in public school districts and directing church music programs all over the country or maintaining their own private studios. All are playing a part in continuing the important and necessary role of the arts in the future of our country and world!