School of Creative Arts

Music and Sonic Arts at Queen’s University Belfast offers a range of MA programmes which reflect all critical and practice-based aspects of Music and Sonic Arts. The programmes are designed around key areas of expertise in the School and provide an environment for the development of methodological, critical and creative skills at Masters level within a 12 month period. Taught Masters in the School are grouped into three programmes (composition, music and sonic arts), within which various specialist areas can be pursued. The School performed extremely well in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, ranking 4th in the UK in terms of research power, making it one of the most research intensive departments in the UK. Music and Sonic Arts at Queen’s has established a reputation for delivering high quality taught postgraduate programmes which attract students from various backgrounds and from all over the world.

• The School offers a number of funding opportunities for MA study.  
• Applications can be submitted online - click here 

 

	MA in Music The MA in Music programme provides a solid basis for independent research in a number of areas of research excellence in the School: Eighteenth-Century Studies, Opera Studies, Source Studies, Nineteenth or Twentieth-Century Music and Irish Music. The programme combines core research methodologies, ranging from source studies to critical musicology, with a choice of historical topics and related areas such as collection development and arts administration.
	MA in Composition This modular one-year (full-time) or two-year (part-time) course combines free composition opportunities with the study of modern repertoire and aesthetic issues, composers’ writings and recent works. The emphasis is on training for composition as practice, and there are opportunities to present work to professional performers. Our busy international concert schedule and seminar series provide an important study environment for the MA in Composition.
	MA in Sonic Arts The MA in Sonic Arts is based on establishing a foundation in digital audio and offers four specialist routes that culminate in a portfolio or dissertation. The programme is focused on links with research activities at the Sonic Arts Research Centre and provides students with unique opportunities to develop Masters level research in the context of larger research projects. The programme addresses the synergy between technology and creativity and prepares students with technical, critical and creative skills for future professional practice or further research in the areas of audio, music technology and new media.