Kansas State University’s Department of Music is committed to the highest ideals of music education, performance, scholarship, and service to the arts. Our human resources are among the best anywhere. Our faculty and staff engage students with integrity, dedication, and collective wisdom based on experience gained through productive work in our respective fields of expertise. Everyone who comes to McCain Auditorium will feel the combination of warmth and confidence we have in our ability to educate and motivate our students.

This is an exciting time in the life of our department. During my 23 years at K-State the number of music majors and minors has grown dramatically. Our department is committed to serving the needs of the state of Kansas through our dedication to providing quality teacher education and through our firm belief that a great university must make the arts accessible to ALL of its various constituencies. In this regard, more than 15% of our 23,000 students participate in music offerings during the course of an academic year. We are extremely proud of this tradition and of this level of service to the general student population. We bring the resources of a large comprehensive university and the personal attention found in the small liberal arts setting together to offer something unique and very special in Manhattan. “Music for Life” truly resonates all across the width and breadth of what we represent to the university, community, state, and nation.

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The arts are thriving at K-State through the support of our higher administration and through the support of major donors who have come through for us in recent years. We have a state-of-the-art music technology laboratory that was updated with new hardware and software during the summer of 2011. The Wilson Chamber Music Room was dedicated in the fall of 2010 with the gift of a Steinway 7’ concert grand piano. The Judge Terry Bullock and Chandler Family Practice Wings were dedicated during 2011 and contain brand new Kawai upright pianos. The Joleen Hill Faculty Development Fund was started through the K-State Foundation in 2010 and is helping our faculty stay current in their respective fields. Our higher administration has helped us upgrade virtually all of our faculty offices, overhaul the organ in All Faiths Chapel, install new acoustic treatments in our main instrumental rehearsal room, renovate space in Fairchild for our large percussion studio, and to install a new piano keyboard lab. Anderson Hall has allowed us to fill all vacancies in our department and to even add new tenure track lines over the past several years. In short, everyone is working together to make music at K-State a vibrant entity on our campus.

In the world today there is a sense of increased internationalism. We recognize the need for our students to understand this trend, and seek opportunities to interact with cultures far beyond the Flint Hills of Kansas. In recent years our students and faculty have performed and/or made presentations in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Cuba, Ecuador, England, Fiji, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Korea, Lithuania, New Zealand, Paraguay, Poland, Scotland, and Thailand. We are part of a global community of the arts, and we are fully vested in experiencing all that the larger world has to offer. There has never been a more exciting time to participate in music at K-State, so we encourage prospective students to come to Manhattan and enjoy the easy living of our growing community but still experience the world in all of its creative diversity and intensity.

The Music Department at K-State wants to get to know you better. Don’t hesitate to contact us with your questions, ideas, comments, and concerns. The more we know about you, the better we can serve your unique needs and aspirations. I hope to see you around McCain Auditorium…a GREAT place to make music and friends!

Musically Yours,
Dr. Gary Mortenson, Head
Department of Music
Kansas State University
garym@k-state.edu

Mission Statement

The mission of the Kansas State University Department of Music is

• to nurture the artistic, educational, scholarly, and creative development of students pursuing studies in music.

• to enhance liberal education of all students by offering performance and academic courses to the university constituency.

• to contribute to the greater musical community through research, creative, and educational activities.

• to provide an environment that encourages the professional development of its faculty.

In fulfilling its mission, the department is dedicated to upholding a standard of excellence in all endeavors, attracting the best students, hiring and retaining the most qualified faculty, and taking an active role in the intellectual and cultural life of the university, the state, and the nation.