Masters Programmes in Performance and Composition
Masters Options
According to the number of elements within your Principal Study Area – and depending on which Masters programme you are following – you will be asked to choose a number of options from the following list:
Please note that numbers of places on some modules may be restricted and certain modules may not be available in a given academic year.
Ensemble Performance
As a performer at the RCM, you will have numerous chances to participate in our full and varied concert programme. In addition to that, these options offer you the chance to enrich your skills as a musical team-player at the highest level.
Chamber Music
Through preparing and performing significant works from the repertoire of your chosen ensemble, you will learn to perform with a high level of rapport with your group, creating a unified, well blended, balanced, and nuanced performance, as well as developing good interpersonal skills and the beginnings of the organisational and entrepreneurial initiative required to secure external engagements.
Concerto Competition
You will prepare and perform a concerto in a faculty concerto competition, in which you will show the potential to deliver a performance with the conviction, authority, and other special performing qualities required of a concert soloist.
Conducting
You will develop your knowledge of the techniques of conducting through learning to develop strategies for directing rehearsals and performances, and refining your skills in the
communication of musical ideas, extending your knowledge of orchestral and large ensemble repertoire. You will also have the opportunity to observe other conductors in rehearsal and performance.
Continuo Accompaniment
You will develop the ability to complement the performance of a soloist colleague, playing a continuo realisation from a realised continuo part as a starting point, in a stylistically informed manner appropriate to the national style and period of the work, and will practise figured bass reading using historical source material.
Duo Performance
You will receive coaching on issues of duo playing (balance, intonation, ensemble, interaction, rehearsal protocols), developing a high level of rapport with your duo partner, creating unified, well-balanced performances in which the personal convictions of the two partners are successfully blended. You will explore the repertoire and its contexts, and
develop the organisational and entrepreneurial initiative required to secure external engagements.
Keyboard Improvisation
You will enhance your improvising and performing skills on your Principal Study, and broaden your knowledge of different styles associated with this skill, not only through performance but through self-directed exploration of both live and recorded music.
Recital Accompaniment
You will develop your skills as an accompanist, enhancing your ability to complement the performance of a soloist colleague, adopting a prominence appropriate to the nature of the repertoire, and demonstrating the reliability, sensitivity, and musical awareness essential to a fine accompanist.
Music in Context
The treasures in the RCM Library and RCM Museum of Music offer world-class resources for training in different research techniques, and for the investigation of performance histories. So you can discover how the musical past informs the present and the future.
Historical Performance
You will take classes and engage in project work exploring early music repertoire, including discussion of sources, editions and performance treatises, thereby enhancing your skills and confidence as an ensemble performer of early music.
Programme Notes
Acknowledging the relevance of a performer’s own knowledge about the music they present, this unit helps you to develop skills in writing engaging and authoritative programme notes. You will learn and employ strategies for communicative writing, and interrogate pre-existing models. Lectures and individual tutorial guidance helps you as you work towards producing a set of notes for your Principal Study specialism, of a professional standard.
Recordings in Context: Style, History, Interpretation
You will draw on the recorded history of music as a valuable and often-overlooked source of interpretative inspiration. This course is both about the practices of recording and performing live, and the performing styles that recordings capture. You will develop research skills through learning how to listen to and discuss recorded performances as against live concerts, and will enrich your practice by linking interpretation to the contextual and theoretical
knowledge you can derive from recordings (particularly in cases where composers have recorded their own works). You will be expected to engage critically with the self-directed and self-reflective examination of your own performance style and interpretative decisions, as well as with your place in the history of performance. There will also be the opportunities to attend a field-trip to consider current concert practices, to attend a lecture about the recording process, and to observe a recording session.
Spoken Presentation
This unit will enable you to develop skills and confidence in delivering a short spoken
presentation about an aspect of music of your choosing, e.g. a work you are performing. You will learn methods of combining printed, visual, recorded and live performance materials into a coherent and engaging presentation. You will also develop strategies for communication with and without a script, the ability to work flexibly across areas of performance and scholarship, and strategies for dealing with questions effectively and succinctly.
Repertoire Project
In making a direct link with your priorities as a performer, this unit involves a detailed study of a piece of music of your choosing, composed for performance on your Principal Study. You will be engaged in investigating and detailing the story of this work in detail. This process will enable you to gain knowledge and confidence in research skills and enrich your
published editions and recordings. You will be able further to refine your ability to make interpretational judgements based on this knowledge and understanding. You will also be able to benefit from the impact of this approach upon your own subsequent performances of the work.
Sources in Performance History
This module offers an introduction to aspects of the history of music performance from 1700, and to some of the unique items in the collections (the RCM Museum of Music and the Portraits and Performance History Collection) that provide evidence of that history. Lectures cover two of the following areas in each year (on a rotating basis): organology, iconography, concert programmes and sound recordings. This will be followed by a specialised project in a chosen area. Both theoretical and practical issues surrounding the interpretation of such objects and documents are explored, and you will have opportunities to use them on your own work. Students develop written presentational skills, and gain experience in self-directed individual research.
Contemporary Cultures
Many of these options are based around collaborations between performers and composers, and many make use of our excellent studio facilities, equipped with the latest creative technologies. Within this rich, creative, experimental environment, you will be encouraged to find new ways of making music, and of communicating with audiences.
Concert Craft
You will develop the creative and entrepreneurial skills necessary for your portfolio-style careers. The need for innovative ideas, creative approaches to repertoire and venue choice, and the organisational ability to transform them into musical events cannot be
underestimated. This will provide a practice-based, self-reflective environment in which to hone your independence of thought and creativity in relation to crafting concerts.
Contemporary Music in Action
You will explore the possibilities of collaboration and develop your skills in the collaborative process of the creating of new repertoire, and will gain experience in articulating the detailed process involved in performing on your instrument.
Composition for Screen
You will gain an enhanced understanding of the art and craft of screen music, and develop your skills in composing, arranging, orchestration, and technology, as specifically applied to screen composition.
Electro-acoustic Music
You will familiarise yourself with some advanced hardware and software tools and their use for the production of electro-acoustic compositions, and will in addition apply project-management skills to the completion of compositions projects (one involving collaboration with an instrumentalist).
Experimental Music
You will develop an understanding of historical, practical, and aesthetic issues relating to contemporary music composition and practice, while also refining your skills as a solo and ensemble performer in contemporary music that encompasses theatrical, multimedia and collaborative dimensions.
Orchestration
You will undertake detailed exploration and analysis of relevant repertoire, studying appropriate models and analysing the approaches they represent. Through this you will practise and enhance your knowledge of orchestration and instrumentation, developing your awareness of instrumental techniques as well as the creative, aesthetic and practical issues of orchestration.
Pop Song Writing
This module offers a practice-led approach to learning and exploring the craft of pop song writing and production. It will extend your practical and creative writing skills in relation to: idiomatic melody and harmony; lyric writing; instrumentation, production and production value; considerations of style and target audience.
Studio Experience
Through the introductory sessions, your time spent in the studio and independent preparation, you will learn to look critically at the concepts, issues, and processes relating to recording, gain practical experience of performing and producing in a studio environment, and produce your own high-quality recording.
Applied Skills
These options will help you to prepare for a lifelong career in music, drawing on the unrivalled resources of the RCM Centre for Performance Science, the Woodhouse Professional
Development Centre, and RCM Sparks – the RCM’s outreach and education programme.
Alexander Technique
You will learn to recognise performance anxiety and know how to deal with it, how to apply the Alexander Technique to playing your instrument, to identify habitual emotional responses to everyday stimuli through awareness of language and body language, and will thereby gain an understanding of how to achieve real spontaneity in performance.
Participatory Music Education
New for 2014 – details to follow.
New Media
You will be introduced to practical ways of using emerging digital technology, will construct a website, and gain awareness of the possibilities these offer for engaging people online and enhancing your career.
Musical Development
This module provides insight into fundamental principles of musical development, education and expertise, as elucidated through current scientific research and educational practice. Drawing on your own experience, seminars and tutorials explore music perception and production throughout the lifespan and engage directly with implications for learning and teaching. Particular emphasis is placed on enhancing your ability to develop and critique related practice and research, informed by relevant educational, professional and policy issues.
Musicians’ Health and Wellbeing
This module considers how physical and mental health can shape how musicians pursue their art and the pleasure they take from it. Seminars and tutorials examine results from recent research into the physical and mental demands of music making, and you are encouraged to explore critically and systematically the ways in which musicians meet those demands, both through their own personal means and via support mechanisms available within educational and professional settings. You also gain practical experience of administering applied psychological and physiological measurement tools.
Professional Skills
You will enhance your understanding of the structures, management and financing of the professional world of music, identifying ways in which your own career can be enhanced by entrepreneurial skills. Lecture topics will include: promotional material, public relations and marketing; changing patterns in the recording industry; internet and digital opportunities; professional decision making; introduction to business plans and an entrepreneur’s toolbox.
Psychology of Performance
performance psychology, elucidating principles derived from interdisciplinary research. It aims to enable you to develop critical and analytical resourcefulness and to gain broad awareness of the mental skills that facilitate effective practice and successful performance.
