Music
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Music

The goal of Hamilton's Music Department is to help students explore and build proficiency in the many dimensions of musical experience through performance and/or studying historical and theoretical concepts behind a variety of styles and forms.

Overview

Music is a fundamental form of human art, communication and pleasure – celebratory, sacred, exploratory and communal. Music is typically one of our earliest and simplest childhood experiences, yet it also can achieve the dizzying complexity of a great symphony. It can be as structured as a string quartet or as fluid and improvisational as a jazz solo. It inspires and informs a remarkable range of human movements and activities, from dance crazes to military marches, from medieval prayer to modern choreography. More ...

Academic Program

Opportunities

A performer's "research" is usually the development of performance skills through rehearsal, guidance and commitment. Hamilton's eight ensembles offer a breadth of opportunity exceptional for a college of our size. Students are encouraged to participate in more than one ensemble, and participation earns partial course credit. Solo performance options are also provided.

  • Choir. This group of about 60 singers produces a musical or operetta each year and undertakes an annual spring concert tour.
  • Orchestra. The Orchestra includes more than 50 students and has recently performed the works of Bartók, Beethoven, Copland, Mozart, Sibelius, and Stravinsky. The Orchestra frequently commissions and premieres new works for orchestra.
  • Jazz Ensemble. Focusing on the big band sound, the Jazz Ensemble also provides opportunities for improvisation. It has toured New England and performed at Carnegie Hall.
  • Masterworks Chorale. The Hamilton College Masterworks Chorale, numbering about 135 singers, brings together students, faculty, staff and neighbors to sing oratorios and other large choral works.
  • Brass Ensemble. The Brass Ensemble provides music for various College functions and performs concerts off campus. The campus enjoys the Brass Ensemble's "guerrilla caroling" on the last day of classes each fall semester.
  • Woodwind ensembles. These ensembles encourage the study and performance of music for various combinations of wind instruments. The repertory has included works by Mozart, Richard Strauss, Jacques Ibert and Irving Fine.
  • Chamber music groups. These groups give instrumentalists the opportunity to participate in small ensembles made up of a variety of string and wind instruments and piano.
  • Solo performance. Vocal and instrumental soloists have a range of performing opportunities, including departmental concerts, recitals and featured appearances with ensembles. The department offers courses in vocal and instrumental solo performance by a faculty of private instructors. A fee is charged for such instruction; students receiving financial aid are eligible for assistance In meeting the cost.


The Senior Program

The Senior Program is a culminating experience in which senior music majors integrate and build on their first three years of study through a one-semester, in-depth study of a topic with a faculty advisor. The Honors Senior Project, open by invitation only, is a two-semester creative and intellectual effort carried out under the close supervision of at least one faculty member.  These honors projects may be either performance- or research-based. More ...


Resources

The Hans H. Schambach Center for Music and the Performing Arts houses the 630-seat Carol Woodhouse Wellin Performance Hall, two large rehearsal halls, 15 practice rooms, faculty offices, and classrooms. Facilities for music also include a well-equipped studio for electronic music; a music library that contains more than 28,000 compact discs and other recordings; state-of-the-art listening and video equipment.

Instruments of various kinds are available for student use without charge. The College possesses several Steinway grand pianos, a variety of wind, brass and string instruments, a two-manual Noack organ in the College Chapel, a Steinmeyer one-manual Positif organ, a two-manual Dowd harpsichord, a Fudge clavichord, a kora and a Javanese gamelan.