College music majors?

[musicluvr49]

Hi. I'm a 16 year old girl, and I'm looking into being a music major in college. So help me understand this please. If I want to go into General music, I would get a Bachelor of Arts in music. But if I wanted to go into piano performance, that would a Bachelor of Music??
 

[Bob]

For teaching general music?  Bachelor of Music Education.

For piano performance, I would think it's a Bachelor of Piano Performance.  Which doesn't mean much... You'd probably still need a masters in performance (maybe with piano pedagogy?) just to start out.  If not going for a doctorate in performance too.

The others are more general.  I've heard of a Bachelor of Music.  It lets you take music courses.  And I've heard of a Bachelor of Arts, but not a BA in Music.  It's probably the same as a Bachelor of Music.  A plain BA would just be coursework on the arts side.  Both of those are a bachelors degree with an emphasis in arts or music but won't be as specific as the ed or performance degree.  Or possibly as marketable.  With education, you could get job.  With performance, it would just show that you focused on that.  I don't quite see the point of a BA or BM -- What do you really do with it after the degree?  It's not quite something you can count on.  For performance it's just a paper degree, but with a masters at least and some teaching coursework, that looks good and sets some kind of base for being a piano teacher.   All that's just academic paperwork though.  Someone could still be a genius on piano and have a BA or BM, but I'd wonder why they didn't just get the performance degree.  Some do both -- music ed and performance.  Music ed eats up a lot of practice time though.

You'd really need to ask the colleges you're looking at attending.  They have differences in the requirements and expectations for those degrees.

Hmm... I'm assuming you meant music education when you wrote general music.  If you want to study music more casually, then it's probably a BA most generally, then a BM, and there are also music minors.  Performance is usually it's own degree.

[musicluvr49]

Ok thanks for the advice. And sorry, I should have been more specific when I said general music, I meant just majoring in music, but not music performance. The reason I'm asking is because I don't think Majoring in music performance would be a reasonable career choice, since there are only so many music performers that actually make it out there, and while I'm a good piano player, I don't think I could make a career out of it. And about the Music education, I'm not the best teacher... Though I think piano pedagogy might be a good possibility.

[fleetfingers]

while I'm a good piano player, I don't think I could make a career out of it. And about the Music education, I'm not the best teacher...

I'm curious...what are your goals? Why do you want to major in music if you don't plan to perform or teach? Or do you? Maybe I'm not understanding correctly...

[musicluvr49]

I'm curious...what are your goals? Why do you want to major in music if you don't plan to perform or teach? Or do you? Maybe I'm not understanding correctly...

Well I'm really interested in music, and not just piano playing. I've been taking music theory lessons for a long time now, and I have a really good teacher, who has opened my eyes to a lot of things about music. So I'm actually kind of dappling in music composition right now, though I'm not very good at it yet. So I kind of want to keep my options open right now. But yes, as I said, I do think piano pedagogy is a good possibility.

[omar_roy]

By general music I'm assuming you want to teach music in public educations systems.  That means you need to be a jack of all trades, and if that's what you're looking to do, then you're going to want to do a BM in Music Education, and piano won't be a big part of your life aside from teaching parts to kids in choir.

If you're looking at performance, you have either option of the BM in Piano Performance or the BA.  The written requirements are less demanding for the BA but that's just what's on the page.  I'm in a BA program because it's more convenient for me schedule wise (long story, i won't bore you with it), and I can tell you that I'm treated as though I'm doing the BM-Performance program, and I intend to go to graduate school for performance.

In the long run, it all depends on what you want to do.  If you're looking at a more performance oriented career or you want to teach piano at the university level, then the BA or the BM in Performance will grant you more practice time.  If you want to teach in high schools or elementary schools, then the BM in Music Education is what you're looking for.

Each degree has its advantages.  Figure out exactly what it is you want to do first, and then go from there.  And it's okay if you don't know that right now.  You might get through your first year and realize that maybe music wasn't what you expected and change your major, that's okay.  Or you might start in Music Ed and decide you'd rather do performance.  Hell, you might even realize that, above all else, you prefer the academic side of music versus the performance or pedagogical aspects and switch to a BA to study music theory and other things more intensely.

[musicluvr49]

Thanks omar_roy, that's really helpful ! 
Yeah, thats not really what I meant by general music, sorry I dont know the correct terms for these things. I just meant a music major that's is not as focused on performance as the BM, but still focused on music. The BA actually sounds pretty good, so thank you for this.