MEIEA Summit 2025

                  Jeremy Polley, Moderator
3:15 - Creating a Music Industry Program In the Early Years; An Investigation of the Music Industry Studies Program at Appalachian State University and Its Relationship to the Development of This Degree Option Across the Country
3:45 - Popular Music Career Preparedness: An Analysis of Programs and Approaches

Creating a Music Industry Program In the Early Years; An Investigation of the Music Industry Studies Program at Appalachian State University and Its Relationship to the Development of This Degree Option Across the Country
  Kim L. Wangler, Appalachian State University
  Rebecca Shaw, Appalachian State University
  Veronica A. Wells, Appalachian State University
This paper researches the early adoption of music business (industry) programs and investigate the early creation of a degree at Appalachian State University and how that fit into the development of programs across the country. Research into this specific university, believed to be one of the first in the nation, will be conducted as well as music business degree acceptance in NASM and the College Music Society. A brief history and early participation in MEIEA will also be investigated. The intent of this research is to spur other schools into codifying their own unique chronicles in hopes that it might be the beginnings of a larger project to tell the stories of how this degree program option developed across the nation and in our university settings.

Popular Music Career Preparedness: An Analysis of Programs and Approaches
  Holly Riley, Middle Tennessee State University
This paper explores a diverging set of institutional approaches to college degree programs offering preparation for careers as performers in popular music. Over the past two decades, higher education degree programs in schools or conservatories offering degrees in music performance have been often criticized for their often narrowly focused curriculum centered mainly around traditions of Western Art, or “classical”, music. In these programs, many degree requirements—such as theory, history, ensembles, and individual performance instruction—are largely content-focused within the scope of classical music traditions. Although this type of specialized instruction offers value to students seeking to build careers as classical music performers, a significant downside is the identified lack of comparable training for students pursuing careers in popular or traditional/folk genres.
Some accredited music schools have addressed this issue by offering an expanding set of “non-classical” courses, instructors, and ensembles; this is most realized in jazz departments, but has grown in recent years to a growing number of programs featuring popular and/or traditional performance degree “tracks.” Alternatively, many colleges and universities have begun offering programs in various music or entertainment industry and technology areas that are departmentally housed outside of schools and colleges of music. These programs are often geared towards a more diverse body of students and offer training for a variety of careers within the entertainment industry, including performance; however, few focus exclusively on career training as a popular music performer, and many largely favor technical development and/or industry training over performance.
From an entertainment industry educational standpoint, I discuss examples and trends among these two paths to collegiate training for the aspiring performer within a broad set of popular music genres. How have entertainment industry degree programs emerged as a response to the lack of popular music performance training in “traditional” schools or colleges of music, and how have they diverged from performance studies entirely? What opportunities and requirements are afforded in either setting? These questions and analysis offer insight into the possibilities for ongoing growth and potential collaboration between both types of programs into today’s area of industry studies.