Music PhD

Our Music MPhil and PhD programmes enable you to pursue advanced research in the areas of classical, popular, world, contemporary, early, folk and traditional music through a range of approaches. These include practice-based research, and musicological and theoretical inquiry.<br/><br/>Practice-based research focuses on composition, performance and improvisation.<br/> Areas of musicological and theoretical inquiry can include the following approaches:<br/>•cultural and critical<br/>•historiographic<br/>•ethnomusicological<br/>•music analytical<br/>•philosophical and aesthetic.<br/><br/>If you choose to engage in academic research you are normally assessed by a thesis of no more than 100,000 words for PhD and 50,000 words for MPhil, inclusive of notes, bibliography and appendices. If you choose to undertake practice-base research you will normally submit a portfolio (eg of scores, sound files, video files, other forms of documentation or some combination of these), supplemented by a related dissertation to explain the larger, practice-based component.<br/><br/>Applications are welcome from students with academic or practice-based research interests in any field of expertise among our staff. To view the areas that we are able to supervise please see the ICMuS Research Website, as well as individual staff pages.<br/><br/>You will join a wider community of fellow postgraduate students working in the International Centre for Music Studies (ICMuS), and more widely in the School of Arts and Cultures and Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences. ICMuS also holds regular PhD/MPhil forums for students to discuss their research.<br/><br/>All PhD students are given the opportunity to undertake some undergraduate teaching, with appropriate mentoring, at a suitable point in their study.<br/><br/>Delivery:<br/>These programmes are delivered on the Newcastle campus (with options for a period of study abroad). You will be assigned a principal supervisor, supported by a wider supervisory team of one or more additional supervisors. In the first year, you will complete the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences’ Doctoral Research Training Programme. Beyond this, study is based on one to one tutorials with your supervisors, which can be flexibly scheduled. A blended approach of in-person and web-based supervision can also be negotiated for students studying remotely.<br/><br/>Facilities:<br/>We have outstanding specialist music facilities, including our £4.5m purpose built Music Studios, designed with performance, multimedia and studio-based work in mind.<br/><br/>Additional facilities include:<br/>•two professional grade recording studios<br/>•a large student common room, including a work area with PCs featuring specialist music software<br/>•a range of recently refurbished rehearsal spaces<br/>•a full range of recently refurbished teaching facilities, including a 100-seat lecture theatre, two 50 seat lecture theatres and three 25-seater seminar rooms<br/>•12 practice rooms with integrated recording facilities<br/>•a dedicated postgraduate workspace<br/>•a project room equipped with 5.1 mixing system.<br/><br/>The University Library also has extensive music collections (including a number of important manuscript and microfilm collections), subscribes to many specialist Music journals, has access to a significant body of online resources, and is widely recognised for the supportive service it offers students and staff.