Composition

Course description

This programme seeks curious, open-minded, adaptable and highly creative individuals who are keen to acquire new skills and consolidate their existing knowledge across all areas of new music creation.

You may have been making music in your bedroom with experimental sound software or have three string quartets under your belt. You could be a trained performer looking to develop a new musical voice by creating new sounds, systems and music for your instrument, or you could be hoping to skill up so that you are attractive to the film and game music industries.

Whatever your compositional background and whatever your compositional ambitions, if you have been composing and creating music at university level or producing work and sharing it with your community, this programme will help you learn a great deal more about your craft and to expand your potential as a creative musician.

This Composition Masters Programme offers its students broad skills training aiming to prepare the most imaginative and versatile musical minds for a future in music-making across the creative industries.

This is a strongly interdisciplinary programme of study during which you will have the opportunity to create:

* acoustic and instrumental music
* screen/film/animation music

* interactive game audio
* sound installations and sonic art

Graduates of the programme will be armed with professional, practical, analytical and intellectual skills to take into music-related industries or on towards further academic study, such as a PhD.

**Facilities**

The Reid School has access to a range of fabulous venues for creating, rehearsing and performing new music. The Reid Concert hall is a 19th Century 250-seat concert space with professional recording facilities attached. The West Court is a large public art and performance venue ideal for experimental and new musical work. The Wee Red Bar is a perfect venue for Jazz, electronic and other forms of amplified music. St Cecilia’s Hall is Scotland’s oldest concert hall and features an extraordinary collection of rare musical instruments and a unique acoustic. These spaces are augmented by five production studios in stereo or 5.1 configurations currently based in Alison House, the home of the Reid School of Music.

There are numerous labs and maker-spaces across the campus and various spaces available to be booked for recording experiments and installations. There is also a bank of music practice rooms available in the basement of Alison House.

We have developed two 360-degree audio mixing spaces which are available for experiments in VR, AR, Dolby Atmos and ambisonics.

Our studio cupboard is stocked with a wealth of microphones, location recorders, cameras, speakers, cables and VR equipment available to be booked and used flexibly.

We also run an annual festival of experimental electronic music called Dialogues.

Since 2019, the Reid School of music has enjoyed the benefits of being an All Steinway School with 28 pianos available for performance and rehearsal across the campus.

Subjects

• Arts and crafts