Spring Break
New program focuses on performance
Bryan Shettig
Staff Writer
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The College of Music is in the process of attracting students for a new program: the Graduate Artist Certificate.
The program only boasts one student currently, Yuri Gye, Seoul, South Korea, senior.
Gye said she enjoys continuing her education in the program at the College of Music.
"I like working with the ensemble best, because I am a percussionist," she said.
"I think [the program] is more practical because it requires more concentration on performing."
John Scott, associate dean for admission and scholarship services in the College of Music, said the program is designed for the highest level of musical performers.
"It's unique here because [the program] is the first of its kind in Texas," Scott said.
Several other music schools offer the program in the country, including the Juilliard School, Eastman School of Music and the University of Michigan.
Scott said he is hoping to see 25 to 50 students in the program by next year.
The program was proposed last fall and approved this summer by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.
"The program did not cost us anything because it is made entirely of existing courses," Scott said.
The program requires students to participate in solo performances, chamber music performances and large ensemble performances.
Singers also take opera sections, he said.
Scott said students would be in four recitals a semester as well as lab sections.
"This program is strictly for post-graduates who already have a bachelor's or master's degree," he said.
Mark Ford of the music faculty said foreign exchange students are interested in the program because it has no language requirements.
There is less of a focus on academics and more on pure performance quality.
Ford said Gye's case was interesting because she already received her master's degree at NT and then joined the graduate artist certificate program.
"It's basically two years of study and performance," Ford said.
