<p>My DD has been plagued with medical problems for the past 2 years. She is finally able to return to her college, but is now not sure she wants to stay in her major, Accounting. She loves music and would switch to that if she thought she could make a decent living. I have to say, I know nothing about the music world. Is there a way she could support herself with a music major? She does not want to be a teacher. She was thinking more along the lines of working in the music industry or concert promotion. Hr current college has a music degree with concentration in music industry. It looks like a combo music and business degree. If anyone has any insight, i would appreciate it.</p>
<p>My son is currently majoring in music business. At his school, this degree is located in the music school, and he had to audition on his instrument in order to be accepted. His school has another degree that does not have the performance component that is called arts management. </p>
<p>I think that it is difficult nowadays to say if any kid can support themselves in any major, except maybe some of the engineering degrees. My son just took an entertainment law class, which he enjoyed and my husband asked him if he wanted to be a lawyer now. I am a lawyer, and I would be horrified if my son wanted to go to law school. I think he’ll have a better chance of getting a job as a musician, given how bad the market for lawyers is right now.</p>
<p>With her accounting skills and some more business-y courses, it sounds like she’d have some real world skills that would serve her well in the music industry or any other industry.</p>
<p>What does she envision a music major entailing? Does she want to focus on performance (often a BM), and if so, what instrument? Or does she want a general music major (usually a BA) with theory, music history, composition, ethnomusicology, technology and so on? Or does she want a program that specifically focuses on music business, industry, production, management etc? (In that case she would still probably do some theory and other music classes.)</p>
<p>She can also intern or volunteer for arts organizations and gain skills, many of which are transferable to any non-profit. Donor management, fundraising, grant-writing, publications and social media use are all useful skills that can be developed in a variety of ways.</p>
<p>A music degree opens up any job that requires a bachelor’s, just like any other bachelor’s. Often jobs and majors don’t even match. She would also have access to grad school, med or law or business school. Again, practical experience and connections from interning or volunteering will help a lot.</p>
<p>I am a big fan of kids studying what interests them in college, but at the same time, we also need to worry about their ability to eat. For us combining studies in an area they love and interning has made things a lot less worrisome.</p>
<p>p.s. I hope your daughter’s health is better. One of mine has had some health obstacles. She describes herself as a tortoise not a hare (and you know who won that race!).</p>
<p>One of the things with music, whether in the non profit or commercial sectors, is that it can be very difficult to establish a career. Arts administration normally was involved with the non profit area (orchestras, operas, choral societies, etc) or perhaps artists management of soloists and singers, and that is lot tougher than even it was in the past, during the cold war arts become a priority, and there were all these non profits and such, often backed by government funds, that has dried up. In the commercial sector, the music business has changed, recording and performing are done very differently than they once were, a lot of recording is bypassing traditional record companies and management and so forth…</p>
<p>No field is immune from change, accounting has become more difficult, in part, because companies have offshored accounting jobs to places like India where they can get CPA certified accountants for a fraction of what they would pay in the US, same in tech fields, so nothing is truly easy, but music to quote the chief music critic of the times, always seems to be difficult.</p>
<p>The good news is that she could get a music degree, and then if music turns out not to work out, be able to get a job in other fields. There was an article not long ago that Goldman Sachs, who believe me is one of the most uptight firms when it comes to hiring, used to be all ivy league Finance and Business degree central, was looking for non traditional majors, specifically mentioning music, and Google that likewise in many ways was just as stuffy as Goldman in a different way, same thing. A music degree as someone else pointed out is still a college degree, and if you did music business, you would already have skills across a number of areas that could apply elsewhere… more importantly, taking a degree program you don’t like or have any interest in simply to get a good job IMO is the wrong thing to do; even if she did music and decided to do something else, she has the music background she liked, and it very well could allow her to do things in unique ways and succeed. In a sense, I kind of did that, I was a CS major many decades ago, but didn’t want to program, got into software testing which was in its infancy as its own discipline, gained a lot of business domain knowledge and skills and put together a pretty unique career with it, and uniqueness is important, in my field a lot of the work is being done by offshore or H1B visa holders, who do most of the routine work, to make it you have to do things they cannot do…</p>
<p>Thank you for all the replies. She originally went into accounting because she wanted to be able to get a good job. Fast forward 2 years later and her (and my) priorities have changed. I just want her to be happy and healthy. Music sustained her during these past 2 years and when we saw that her school actually has a Music Industry major, we both felt it was a good fit. She plays guitar and piano, not nearly good enough to make a living though. </p>
<p>We figured with this major she could get a job in concert promotion, at a radio station or recoding studio or at a concert venue. She will always have a home in my house for as long as she wants it and at this pint I want her to follow her passion. Interestingly, she is now excited to go back to school!</p>
<p>There are schools where she could major in Arts Management- that could land a job in classical or contemporary areas or directly in agencies who represent performers. There are a few undergrad programs as well as masters.</p>