This is going to be kind of a shot in the dark, but does anyone have the ability to answer any of the following questions about doctoral piano pedagogy programs? After much deliberation, I’ve decided this is going to be the best route for me after I finish my Professional Artist Certificate (what my school calls its Artist Diploma).
First of all, my undergrad was piano performance with a pedagogy emphasis and my master’s is in instrumental music education. Next year I’m doing my PAC and I’m going to have work experience, either in a community music school or a public school. Most piano pedagogy programs either don’t specify or they say on their websites that you need “a master’s degree or equivalent” in piano pedagogy for admission. I suppose I can find this out by emailing each program, but does anyone know if my background would disqualify me from any doctoral programs since my master’s isn’t in the specific field? The only info I have is that I emailed the professor at the University of Wisconsin and she didn’t say anything about it, which I took to mean for her program it was an acceptable equivalent.
Secondly, can anybody speak to the differences in value between the PhD and DMA routes? Most programs are DMA and I’m leaning in that direction because I want to continue to work on my playing and while I value research, it’s not my favorite thing in the world. Basically, I’m wondering if the PhD increases likelihood of landing a professorship or if there’s anything it allows me to do that a DMA wouldn’t. As far as I see it, the DMA doesn’t give you any more qualifications than the PhD other than continued artistic development, which is just plain more interesting to me than an extensive dissertation.
Thirdly, I’ve spend a lot of time researching this and I’ve been surprised how few doctoral programs there are in piano pedagogy. This is the list of programs I’ve been able to compile; does anyone know of any that I’m missing? (I’ve also found from this search process that it seems like a few schools used to have doctoral pedagogy programs and don’t anymore.)
PhD: Louisiana State University; University of Oklahoma; University of Nebraska
DMA: Catholic University of America; Northwestern University; Texas Christian University; Texas Tech University; University of Iowa; University of Miami; University of Michigan; University of Oklahoma; University of Oregon; University of South Carolina; University of Texas; University of Toronto; University of Wisconsin
Additionally, there is a DMA in music education at Eastman. From the website, it looks like you can create a graduate minor in pedagogy and having met and talked extensively with the department chair, I think it could basically be used as a piano pedagogy doctorate.