With excellence as the standard, our program reflects a conviction that music is a living art informed by the culture of our time as well as by a rich history of musical expression. Willamette students create and share music through a comprehensive program of performance, composition, improvisation, along with historical, and theoretical studies. Our students also engage with a broad spectrum of courses in other liberal arts disciplines through the general education program or in concert with a second major. The result is a well-rounded graduate with an excellent foundation in musical expression, technique, and creative vision.

The Faculty in Music at Willamette University is one of the strongest in the Northwest, anchored by professional musicians who model creativity through performance, composition, and scholarship at the highest levels. Faculty work closely with students and the local arts community, fostering a diverse educational environment centered on world-class studio instruction, vibrant and engaging classrooms, collaborative performance, and independent study. We make music live!

Opportunities to participate in music-making abound on campus and in the region, from solo performances to chamber music, from small jazz groups and string quartets to our larger student ensembles. These include Chamber Choir, University Chamber Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, Willamette Jazz Collective, Willamette Singers, and Dramatic Vocal Arts Ensemble. Students also create electronic music, multimedia, sound scores, and audio recordings in our state of the art studios, which offering desktop production and audio production studios.?? But we don?t stop there. Willamette music students and faculty engage the world, performing, composing, conducting research, and peer mentoring across the globe in such places as Mexico, China, Japan, Hong Kong, Nepal, Thailand, Switzerland, Germany, Spain, Austria, Ireland, and South Africa.

Willamette Music graduates go on to music careers in academia, studio teaching, professional performance, the recording industry, and film/multi-media scoring. Some of our finest performers, well-rounded graduates with a liberal arts education, have also gone on to medical school, business school, law school, and other professions, all while remaining engaged as musical creators. We make music live, for a lifetime.