I’ll be in my second year of music school but first year as a performance major this fall (switching from music education). I’ve been thinking seriously about having a backup or at least something to enhance my degree and make it more marketable. I want to take a history minor to have a more scholarly approach in case I end up at a University. I’m also really interested in photography and could see myself possibly doing it to supplement income later on down the road. Both minors are 18 credits minimum and if I plan it out right by taking Gen ed classes in summer I wouldn’t kill myself with too many credits. The question is. …is pursuing these two minors going to take away from music and would the time I spend with them be better spent doing as many ensembles as I can to prepare me for graduate school/professional auditions?
I can’t talk about photography, but in terms of minoring in history as a backup, to be honest, a BM degree would be considered just as rigorous by an employer by itself as it would with history as a minor. Without getting into the long discussions on here, a liberal arts degree isn’t necessarily going to carry any more weight in the workplace or grad school admissions than a performance one would, and I could argue a music performance degree might carry more weight (and I am speaking as a hiring manager). People have this concept that music performance is all about simply playhing music, and it isn’t, the courses in theory, ear training, music history, and the advanced electives are often quite intellectually and academically challenging, just ask music students about music theory, many of them dread it like organic chemistry or something.
If photography interests you, then maybe you could do that as a minor and get the BM? The one thing I can tell you is that music performance looks deceptively easy from the outside, looks like “okay, I have my lesson, I have orchestra, I have ensembles, doesn’t look too bad…”…what that leaves out is the music courses can be very demanding, and then you will be rehearsing with orchestra and ensembles, and finding time for practice, both individual stuff and orchestral and chamber and so forth…so time is pretty limited. You didn’t say what instrument you are playing, or if you are voice, but you are going to be spending quite a few hours practicing, depending on physical limits (piano and violin, live in the practice room, other instruments, until your lips fall off, your vocal chords call OSHA for violations, etc…:). The one thing they all seem to have in common is they are extremely busy even with just a BM degree, my son finds he is running from noon to night most of the time.
I think you should follow your interests, and not worry about backup plans. You can get a BM and do photography later, or get a master’s in history in grad school. There is nothing wrong with being multi-faceted at all, but don’t be scattered 
Are you in a school where you could do a BA instead of a BM? Also there are students who get into grad performance programs who don’t even major in music, let alone in a BM program.
But if a BM in performance is your “passion” and focus, then by all means stick with that- it’s a demanding path. You could do photography at adult ed classes in the summer or some other resource.
If you truly want to do history and photography along with music, though, by all means do it. There are grad programs that would welcome you. (Check out UCSD’s Integrative Studies, Bard’s MFA, Art Institute of Chicago for starters).
But don’t do them as backups!! Things will work out if you “just” do music for the BM.
Thanks guys. I’ve been thinking more about this and I’m just going to do the BM by itself for now. However I do have an open spot in one of my later semesters where I can take up to 4 credits of anything I want and am going to take a 3 credit Intro to Digital Photography class plus a small ensemble or orchestra. I also have a really light semester where I’ll only take 12 credits or so and may take a history course just for the fun of it. And of course there’s that one movie quote “why spend thousands on what you can get in $1.50 in late fees at the public library?”.
You are on to something with the quote you just mentioned. While I was at a music school out in CA many years ago I realized that i was missing a traditional college education. I went to a the local library, found a sympathetic librarian, and asked her to write down the books I would need to read for certain subjects like French Lit, etc… The next week she handed me a list and for the next few years, actually for the rest of my life, when I couldn’t practice anymore I read. Education is a lifestyle, not four years at a college.
As far as photos go, one year I went to my local library and checked out every single book of photos they had and it was pleasurable and a great education. You have to go the one step further and read critical discussions of what you are seeing, but after that I can’t see why you would spend the money on a “formal” education, at least when it comes to photography. Society currently is placing no monetary value on real photography anyway.