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Performance is a fundamental part of Cornell’s cultural life. The Department of Music encourages music-making through a wide array of chamber and large ensembles, as well as its offerings in private lessons and directed coaching by members of the music faculty. Master classes, degree and non-degree recitals, contemporary music concerts, and an annual concerto competition supplement the music department’s concert offerings.
Click here for the latest information on auditions for ensembles and individual lessons.
The program includes Bach’s uplifting Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, Dvořák’s triumphant Te Deum—featuring soloists Rachel Schutz, soprano, and Jean Bernard Cerin, baritone—Brahms’ lyrical Schicksalslied. Performed by the Cornell Glee Club and Chorus, and the Cornell Symphony Orchestra, led by Joe Lerangis and Gabriela Gomez Estevez.
Seare Farhat, DMA candidate in Composition, has been selected for the 2026–27 “Creator Corps” program—a competitive one-year appointment as composer-in-residence with the Louisville Orchestra.
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Based on poems by A&S alumna Tsitsi Ella Jaji, M.A. ’06, Ph.D. ’08, the songs by Shawn Okpebholo bring to life individual stories preserved by the Cornell-based Freedom on the Move project.
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Salvant, a 2020 MacArthur Fellow and three-time Grammy Award winner, is an artist celebrated for bringing historical depth, dramatic flair, and exceptional musical insight to jazz standards and original works.
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An interdisciplinary project is sparking collaborations among those interested in digital approaches to the study of history, languages and culture.
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The two-day event features performances of Farrenc’s chamber music on historical instruments, a reimagining of the salon culture in collaboration with the Johnson Museum of Art, and scholarly presentations.
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A new work by Cornell alum Zachary Wadsworth DMA ’12, will premiere this weekend in three concerts, including one at Cornell’s Bailey Hall.
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Orpheus Chamber Orchestra with violin soloist James Ehnes will perform a program entitled “Postcards from Paris” in the next Dallas Morse Coors Concert Series (DMCCS) production of the 2025-26 season.
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Cornell faculty and graduate students unleash a genre-bending program across seventeen keyboard instruments, from the delicate whisper of the clavichord to the analog punch of the Roland Juno-60.
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