Bachelor of Music in Composition

The Bachelor of Music in Composition offers students the opportunity to pursue a degree while honing their skills in music writing. As in the case of every major, Composition has a strong Biblical, academic, and theoretical foundation. The Bachelor of Music degree represents the highest standards of professional studies, including the history, theory, pedagogy and practice of many genres of music.

Why Study Composition at Nyack?

• Students who study Composition will have access to some of the finest venues and artists in the world, including current faculty.
• Students will enjoy a valuable academic program which will give them versatility and opportunity in their future graduate program or career choices.
• Students will be nurtured in a Christian atmosphere in which they will find encouragement on their way to fulfillment.
• Students will have an opportunity to explore and perform many types of music and to study with top scholars within the context of a State-accredited private institution.
• Students will be inspired by the commissioned works of a world-famous Artist-in-Residence in Composition, Dr. Victoria Bond.
• Students will make lifelong friends and important interconnections in the world of music in general and composition in particular.

At a Glance

• Credits: 120 Standard
• Completion Time: 4 years
• Accreditation: New York State Board of Regents, Middle States Commission on Higher Education, National Association of Schools of Music

What Will I Study as a Composition Major?

As a Composition Major, you will learn to write for voice, instruments, and keyboard. Together with your Nyack Core Curriculum, you will also study the history, methods, and practice of Composition, including:

• Literature and Materials of Music (an integrated Music History, Theory Mathematics, Science, and cultural sequence)
• Jazz/Gospel Harmony
• Conducting
• Arranging
• Songwriting
• Composition
• Private lessons in Voice, Guitar, Piano, Recorder, or another instrument
• Music Technology and Electro-Acoustical Composition
• Music Ensembles

Additionally, you will have the opportunity to do a Senior Recital of your own compositions, of approximately one hour in length

Our Mission

Nyack College, a Christian and Missionary Alliance educational institution, through its undergraduate, graduate and seminary programs, pursues its historic mission of preparing men and women to “take the whole Gospel to the whole world.”

Core Values

Nyack seeks to exalt Jesus Christ and fulfill its mission by being:

Academically Excellent The academic excellence of Nyack has been recognized by the Middle States Commission on Accreditation, The New York State Department of Education, and The Association of Theological Schools.

Globally Engaged We live in a world that demands engagement from all of its citizens. Nyack will meet these 21st-century challenges with a commitment that for us dates back to the 19th century.

Intentionally Diverse Nyack is the most ethnically diverse Christian College in the history of American higher education. We celebrate this as an important part of both our effectiveness and our identity.

Personally Transforming This transformation is what occurs when students encounter Jesus Himself on our campus and abandon their citizenship of a self-centered, materialistic world in favor of becoming citizens of the Kingdom of heaven.

Socially Relevant Nyack graduates do more than take the words of Jesus to those who have never heard. Our graduates take the love of Jesus to those who have not known love.

A Little History

Over one hundred and thirty years ago, God ignited an overwhelming love for people of every race and tongue in the heart of a Canadian named A.B. Simpson. In those days, Simpson was pastor of a large and affluent church in Manhattan. In response to what God was doing in his own life, Simpson urged his congregants to reach out to the immigrants who were pouring into the city. He even went so far as to bring the poor and the downtrodden into his church. When he began to do this, many in the church were less than pleased.

So in a Sunday morning sermon in 1882, Simpson declared, “I am not interested in being a respectable Christian.” He left the church and began a new venture in which his burning desire to serve all people could be satisfied. He left his church to start a school in which people would be trained to take the Good News of God’s love wherever this news needed to be heard.

That school today is known as Nyack College.

Since its inception on the back of a Broadway stage in 1882, Nyack College has grown to become an institution of over 2,500 students pursuing a wide variety of graduate and undergraduate degrees on multiple campuses. At the heart of it all, is a burning commitment to bring the good news of God’s love wherever this news needed to be heard.

A.B. Simpson described this commitment as taking “the whole gospel” to “the whole world.” Today, as Nyack College serves students who represent “the whole world,” the result is a diverse and vibrant community unlike any other in higher education.