Here, you?ll work one-on-one with faculty who have active careers as composers, performers, and researchers?and who are dedicated to fostering every student?s unique talents. In small classes, you?ll study of diverse styles and traditions?from early music to electronic sound art, opera to African drumming?examining its global, historical, and cultural contexts. Your professors will help you chart an individualized course of study, choosing from course work that explores performance and improvisation, cultural studies, composition, and sound technology. They?ll encourage you to explore interdisciplinary interests through course work in other departments. If you major in music, your program will culminate with a festival of works by graduating Mills musicians.

You?ll also enjoy opportunities to collaborate with other students and with world-renowned composers and performers in the studio and on stage, gaining exposure to the highest levels of professional excellence. The Music Department is especially committed to empowering women for roles in music technology, recording engineering, and composition. All students have 24/7 access to the department?s?Center for Contemporary Music, an internationally recognized facility for electronic and computer music that has influenced innovation in contemporary music for more than 50 years.