CAMPUS PREVIEW EVENTS
CONNECT
Questions regarding Music or Theater performance? Reach out to us at performance@mit.edu
Questions regarding course offerings, degree requirements and major and minor opportunities? Reach out to Alexa Torres at alexat@mit.edu
FACEBOOK: @MITMusicandTheater
INSTAGRAM: @MITMTA
MUSIC PROGRAM
The music program welcomes all enrolled MIT students, regardless of major, who wish to take subjects in music history/culture, composition/theory, music technology, and performance in the areas of classical, jazz, popular, and world music. At MIT it is possible to major (full, joint, or double), minor, or concentrate in Music. Our curriculum is known for its fantastic variety of quality offerings to undergraduates at all levels of preparation and talent. Our faculty and teaching staff is comprised of distinguished award-winning composers, musicologists and performers and include two Institute Professors, the highest honor awarded to only about a dozen members of the entire MIT Faculty.
THEATER PROGRAM
The program in Theater Arts at MIT invites students to explore theater as a contemporary artistic practice within an intellectually rich continuum of traditions in the performing arts. We teach theater arts as a mode of inquiry into self and society with the conviction that such inquiries become the vehicle for a transformation of one or both. Interdisciplinary in its philosophy and humanist at its core, the program in theater arts is committed to a rigorous and innovative course of study across a diverse spectrum of creative forms.
Performance and Design Exhibition
MUSIC PERFORMANCE OPPORTUNITIES
RESOURCES
While the MIT Music & Theater Arts Events Office has a small inventory of instruments available for rental to students who participate in our performance ensembles, it is highly recommended that you bring your own instrument to MIT. Our instrument collection includes mostly small wind and brass instruments and double basses.
A limited number of Instrument lockers are available to students in our performance ensembles. They are available on a first-come, first served basis
PERFORMANCE ENSEMBLES
CHAMBER CHOURUS
The MIT Chamber Chorus is a small student group that performs two concerts each year under the direction of Dr. William Cutter. Designed for the more vocally and musically advanced singer, this select ensemble is challenged with a wide variety of repertoire including music for a cappella chorus as well as choral works accompanied by small ensembles, or piano. Chamber Chorus has collaborated with the MIT Symphony, the MIT Wind Ensemble and with Theater faculty mounting chamber opera productions and opera scene programs.
CONCERT CHOIR
The MIT Concert Choir, directed by Dr. William Cutter, is a large choral group open by audition to both graduate and undergraduate students, and to members of the MIT community. The Concert Choir is a social, academic and musical ensemble in which students learn and perform major works from the standard repertoire, as well as selected shorter and lesser-known pieces.
FaMLE
The MIT Laptop Ensemble (MLE) is a living laboratory examining how new digital technologies are shaping musical performance. Using laptop computers as our /primary/ canvas, we look into how our digital lives suggest new opportunities for musical collaboration and exploration.
FJE- FESTIVAL JAZZ ENSEMBLE
Founded in 1963 by Boston jazz icon Herb Pomeroy, this advanced 18 to 20-member big band/jazz ensemble performs traditional and contemporary jazz ensemble literature, including student compositions and new works written for the MIT FJE by major jazz composers.
MIT BALINESE GAMELAN
Gamelan consists of gongs, metallophones, hand drums, and bamboo flutes, creating shimmering layers of rhythmically intricate, lyrical patterns. Students will learn the basics of this unique musical practice by playing and performing on traditional instruments, culminating in an end-of-semester performance. Students will also learn how gamelan fits into Bali’s rich, multifaceted culture. No prior experience is necessary.
RAMBAX
Senegalese Drum Ensemble is an ensemble dedicated to learning the art of sabar, a vibrant drum and dance tradition of the Wolof people of Senegal, West Africa.
MITSO - MIT SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
The central mission of the MIT Symphony Orchestra is the cultural enhancement of education at MIT by promoting music performance at the highest level of artistic excellence among MIT students, by nurturing new works and young artists, by developing and sustaining the widest possible audience. The orchestra’s repertoire consists of works from the entire symphonic canon, spanning works of the early Baroque era to contemporary compositions, and including music for film and theatre.
MITWE - MIT WIND ENSEMBLE
Founded by Dr. Frederick Harris, Jr. in the fall of 1999, the MIT Wind Ensemble is comprised of advanced undergraduate & graduate MIT students from a wide range of disciplines. MITWE performs four concerts per year on the MIT campus and one off-campus.
EMERSON PROGRAM
Funded by the late Mr. Cherry L. Emerson, Jr. (SM, 1941) the Emerson Program offers merit-based financial assistance for private lessons to MIT students of outstanding achievement on their instrument or voice in classical, jazz or world music via competitive auditions.
MIT CHAMBER MUSIC SOCIETY
The MIT Chamber Music Society, coordinated by Marcus Thompson, is comprised of students selected by audition to form small groups, study and perform classical chamber music repertoire, or arrangements for Jazz Combos or Vocal Jazz Ensemble.
THEATER ARTS PERFORMANCE OPPORTUNITIES
SPRING PRODUCTION
COLLISION SHOP
aka THE POSSIBILITY OF JOY
aka PEOPLE CAN BE F***ING MAGICAL
Directed and Choreographed by Dan Safer in collaboration with designer Sara Brown, co-deviser Wil Petre, video installation by Josh Higgason, Production Coordinator Miguel Flores, Sound Designer / Composer Christian Frederickson, Test Composer Sxip Shirey, and more
5 minute video portraits of human beings right now on the planet. Compared, contrasted, and commingled.
With dances, poses, problems, possibly revealing intimate moments, and music
ANNUAL PLAYWRIGHTS WORKSHOP FESTIVAL
The MTA Playwrights Lab is a collaboration between MIT students and professional theatre artists. The Lab is a festival of staged readings featuring the work of the writers in the Playwrights Lab workshop (21M.785) taught by Senior Lecturer Ken Urban.
COMMITMENT TO DIVERSITY
MIT Music and Theater Arts is united in our pursuit of artistic, intellectual, creative and technical excellence; this requires intense focus and dedication by all members of our community. We value diversity and practice inclusion with regard to identities, backgrounds, opinions and beliefs. Because we see our students as whole people, we prioritize their mental, emotional and physical health above the quality of their work. This ethos extends to both our advisory and pedagogical relationships. Diversity, wellness and inclusion are likewise central to our curriculum and hiring; we are therefore committed to recruiting a diverse faculty and staff to enhance the educational experience of the students we serve.
