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Creative Music Practice

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PhD Creative Music Practice - 3 Years (Full-time)

PhD Creative Music Practice - 6 Years (Part-time)

Information on fees & costs

Individual programme fees are linked above. For detailed information on fee status, policies, payment and funding opportunities see:

Contact information: ECA Graduate School
Phone: +44(0)131 651 5739
Email: ecaresearchdegrees@ed.ac.uk; Dr. Michael Edwards (Programme Director)
Phone: +44 (0) 131 650 2431
Email: michael.edwards@ed.ac.uk; Address: Graduate School Edinburgh College of Art
University of Edinburgh
Evolution House, Grassmarket
Edinburgh
EH1 2LE

The PhD in Creative Music Practice provides an opportunity for candidates to pursue practice-led research in the field of music at the highest level. The degree will involve research that combines textual and musical outputs.

The programme will attract, for example:

composer-theorists who wish to carry out research into and practice of particular compositional models;
performers who wish to deepen their practice through musicological research;
computer music composers who wish to develop documented hard/software systems for their music;
performers with a need to study the techniques and organology of period instruments;
instrument builders/researchers needing historical techniques found from evidence on the original instruments.

Entry requirements

International students

All applicants must meet our general entry and language requirements. Detailed advice for international students is available here:

Research profile

The PhD in Creative Music Practice involves research that combines textual and musical outputs, e.g. composition, performance (either of original or pre-existing repertoire), installation, sound design and interactive music software.

The outputs will take the form of a portfolio, performance, and/or recording, as well as theoretical work and documentation of the processes by which the music was made (e.g. video, photographs, recordings, sketches, studies, web pages).

The musical outputs will be explicitly linked to the textual material. This linkage may take various forms: musical material might exemplify, contextualize, and/or expand an idea elaborated in the text, and vice versa.

The programme requires candidates to critically evaluate and articulate the relationship of textual to extra-textual media in the formation of musical knowledge.

The format of the PhD thesis would consist of a text of not more than 50,000 words and a comprehensive record of the musical material (recordings, scores, software etc.) contained in a coherent and archive-able format (bound thesis and/or CD/DVD). In the case of theses relating to live musical performances, documentation in the form of high quality audio and video recordings is central to the submitted materials.

Training and support

All research students undertake a research-methods training course at the beginning of their programme.

Regular individual meetings with the supervisor provide guidance and focus for the course of research undertaken.

All students also have access to the University's Postgraduate Skills Training courses.

Facilities

The University offers one of Britain's largest and oldest-established music centres, with two international collections of historical instruments, state-of-the-art electronic and computer studios, and a special commitment to composition at an advanced level.

Funding

Edinburgh College of Art are offering scholarships to applicants for postgraduate programmes in our five schools:

Edinburgh College of Art PhD and PG Scholarships (Session 2013-14)

Please see Scholarships and Student Funding Services for other funding opportunities:

Scholarships and Student Funding Services

Further Information

This article was published on Apr 25, 2013