Study programme

Within the Global Musics Bachelor, you may choose to specialise in Caribbean and South American musical traditions. 

From your first year, you receive a weekly one-to-one lesson on your principal instrument, ensuring focused artistic and technical development. In addition, you perform in two ensembles each week, working practically with repertoire, stylistic interpretation, improvisation and ensemble communication within the traditions you study. 

Alongside your principal study, you follow side subject lessons and improvisation classes in genre specific and diverse stylistic approaches connected to the specialisation. 

Traditions and Repertoires 

The core focus of this pathway includes: 

• Cuban musical traditions 

• Brazilian traditions 

• The River Plate region, including Argentine Tango 

In addition to this core study, project-based modules introduce you to: 

• Colombian traditions 

• Musical practices from Suriname 

• The Dutch Caribbean islands (Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao) 

These projects allow you to explore repertoire, genera diversity and historical context beyond the central focus areas, broadening your understanding of the region’s interconnected musical practices. 

You also explore dialogues between these traditions and related practices such as flamenco, tracing shared rhythmic, harmonic and historical connections. 

Embodied Lineage: Rhythm, Dance, Language and Context 

A distinctive feature of this specialisation is the integration of Dance, Rhythm, Language, Music Appreciation and Music Lineage as one interconnected strand. 

These areas are designed to function together. 

Rhythm and Dance develop embodied understanding. In many Caribbean and South American traditions, groove and phrasing are inseparable from movement. Through rhythmic training and dance, you internalise timing, articulation and musical language physically. 

Language study offers the choice between Brazilian Portuguese or Spanish as spoken in Caribbean and South American musical contexts. Language study deepens your access to lyrics, rehearsal processes and cultural nuance. 

Music Appreciation and Music Lineage situate repertoire within its historical and social development. You study transmission, migration, continuity and transformation, understanding how these musical practices have evolved and continue to evolve. 

Together, these components ensure that musical learning is not limited to repertoire, but grounded in context, embodiment and awareness. 

Artistic Formation and Personal Voice 

Through this specialisation, you develop artistic fluency grounded in embodiment, contextual awareness and ethical engagement. You graduate not only with highly skilled muisician, but with a deeper understanding of lineage, responsibility and creative continuity. 

At the same time, you are supported in becoming an artist in your own right shaping a personal voice that is informed by tradition yet responsive to the present. 

Who This Specialisation is For? 

This pathway is particularly suited to students interested in: 

• Tango and River Plate traditions 

• Flamenco and its transatlantic dialogues 

• Cuban traditions 

• Brazilian traditions 

• Colombian traditions 

• Musical practices from Suriname and the Dutch Caribbean 

Students specialising in Tango or Flamenco will find this programme especially enriching, as it provides broader rhythmic and historical understanding connected to the development of these traditions. 

All Instruments Welcome 

We welcome all instrument types and artistic profiles. Whether you are a vocalist, percussionist, drummer, guitarist, bass and other string instruments, bandoneon player, pianist, or wind players, this specialisation supports diverse artistic entry points. 

What matters is not the instrument you play, but your commitment to engage deeply, respectfully and creatively with the traditions you study. 

Within the Global Musics Bachelor, you may choose to specialise in Maqam and Modal Cultures along the Silk Roads. 

From your first year, you receive a weekly one-to-one lesson on your principal instrument, ensuring focused artistic and technical development within modal traditions. In addition, you perform in two ensembles each week, working practically with repertoire, modal development, rhythmic cycles and stylistic interpretation. 

Alongside your principal study, you engage in improvisation, repertoire studies and ensemble practice that together build deep familiarity with modal systems and their performance languages. 

Students also work through the meşk system: an oral and relational method of transmission based on attentive listening, repetition, memorisation and embodied learning. Through meşk, repertoire and nuance are passed directly from teacher to student, strengthening continuity of lineage and depth of musical expression. 

Core Subjects and Their Interconnection 

The core subjects of this specialisation are: 

• Maqam Theory 

• Maqam Transcription 

• Taksim Improvisation 

• Maqam Ensemble 

• Music History and Lineage 

• Usul Rhythm and Tala Rhythm 

These subjects form an integrated framework. 

Maqam Theory develops structural understanding of modal systems and melodic pathways.

Maqam Transcription sharpens analytical listening and sensitivity to ornamentation and microtonal nuance.

Taksim Improvisation cultivates creative fluency within the language of the Maqam, transforming theory into musical expression.

Maqam Ensemble brings modal understanding into collective performance practice.

Music History and Lineage, reveals the living lineage of the maqam tradition, connection poetic heritage, social history, and musical transmission across generations.

Usul and Tala rhythm cultivates an understanding of the relationship between melody and cyclical rhythmic form across modal traditions.

Together, these elements ensure that theory informs practice, transcription deepens improvisation, rhythm shapes melodic movement, and historical awareness guides artistic responsibility. Modal knowledge, embodied listening and creative interpretation evolve simultaneously rather than separately. 

Traditions and Areas of Concentration 

We offer concentration within: 

• Maqam and modal influenced urban music of Greece 

• Ottoman Classical Music 

• Anatolian and Mesopotamian Musical Traditions 
   

We also offer a Flamenco ensemble, recognising Flamenco as a modal and rhythmically complex tradition rooted in Andalusia and shaped through centuries of interaction among Romani, Andalusian, North African and Mediterranean communities. While Flamenco developed in the Iberian Peninsula, its modal inflections, microtonal colourings, improvisational aesthetics and cyclical rhythmic structures resonate strongly with Eastern Mediterranean modal practices. 

Students entering with a Flamenco background can explore: 

• The modal foundations of cante, toque and baile 

• Connections between Flamenco melodic structures and Maqam systems 

• Rhythmic relationships between compás and usul 

• Historical dialogues between Andalusian music and broader Mediterranean traditions 

Projects, Workshops and Masterclasses  

In addition to these concentrations, we offer projects and masterclasses engagement with: 

• Persian music 

• Arabic musical traditions 

• Northern Indian classical music 

• Andalusian music traditions 

Ensembles 
Students will follow 2 ensembles each year, the ensemble offerings include: 

• Anatolian - Mesopotamian Ensemble  

• Ottoman repertoire 

• Rebetiko 

• Indian ensemble 

• Persian ensemble 

• Modal Fusion Ensembles  

• Flamenco ensemble 

• Bağlama Ensemble  

• And many more 

This structure allows students to develop depth within a chosen concentration while understanding modal relationships across regions historically linked through artistic exchange and layered cultural histories. 

Oral Tradition and Storytelling 

Oral transmission forms a central pillar of this pathway. Beyond the meşk system, students explore oral pedagogy more broadly; understanding how repertoire, poetry and performance practices are transmitted across generations. 

Storytelling traditions, including the Aşık practice, are studied as part of this framework. Through these traditions, students encounter the relationship between poetry, narrative, improvisation and community memory. Modal music is approached as a living cultural practice embedded in language, story and collective identity. 

Artistic Formation and Personal Voice 

Through this specialisation, you develop strong modal fluency grounded in listening, embodiment and lineage awareness. You gain a deep understanding of modal systems, rhythmic cycles and improvisational structures while cultivating your own artistic voice. 

Students graduate as strong artists in their own right, capable of contributing meaningfully to modal traditions with sensitivity, depth and creativity. The programme prepares you for the professional field and provides a solid foundation for progression to Master’s-level study. 

All Instruments Welcome 

We welcome all instrument types and artistic profiles. Students may enter with a wide range of instrumental backgrounds. 

While we do not offer a specialist teacher for every individual instrument, we concentrate on the modal genres and stylistic frameworks we teach. Our focus is on developing your ability to perform, interpret and create within these modal traditions, regardless of instrumental starting point. 

Commitment to listening, stylistic awareness and artistic depth is essential. The modal framework becomes the shared ground on which diverse instruments and artistic approaches can engage. 

The curriculum is organised into five thematic blocks each academic year. Each block centres on a clearly defined artistic and cultural theme, allowing you to engage deeply with specific questions, repertoire and creative directions over an intensive period of study. 

Rather than treating subjects as isolated modules, the block structure connects artistic choices with cultural context. Repertoire, improvisation, theory, history, rhythm and performance are designed to inform one another. This approach allows for focused immersion while maintaining coherence across the year. 

Projects play an important role in the structure. A project may introduce the theme of a block or conclude it. These projects allow students to synthesise what they have explored and create a performance, presentation or artistic outcome that reflects the block’s focus. 

Projects are not separate from the curriculum but integral to it. They create clear moments of integration between principal study, ensemble work, theory, contextual subjects and artistic experimentation. 

Students are active participants in shaping their learning. You are supported in identifying connections between subjects and in understanding how one area of study feeds another. Transcription may inform improvisation, historical study may shape interpretation, and ensemble work may influence artistic decisions in your principal lessons. 

Throughout each year, you build a portfolio documenting your artistic development, discoveries and reflections. This portfolio supports both assessment and the development of your artistic identity. 

Assessment reflects this integrated approach. 

In Years 1 and 2, students complete block assignments at the end of each block. These assignments relate directly to the theme explored during that period and may take performance-based, analytical, written or creative forms. They are assessed using clear rubrics that outline expectations and criteria. 

For principal instrument development, ensemble participation and professional skills, students build an ongoing portfolio throughout the year. Performances, recordings and documentation of artistic growth are included. These components are assessed holistically at the end of the academic year on a pass or fail basis. 

There are no numerical grades in Years 1 and 2. The emphasis is on qualitative development rather than competition. Feedback is central to the learning process. Students receive regular formative feedback from teachers and peers, supporting reflection, self-awareness and artistic growth. 

Years 3 and 4 are currently being further developed, but the intention is to continue in the same direction of thematic integration, portfolio-based development and project-driven learning. 

The programme culminates in a large-scale collaborative final performance project in Year 4. In this project, students collectively design, organise and present a public production that integrates artistic practice, contextual understanding and professional skills developed throughout the degree. 

Assessment within the programme is therefore not a series of disconnected examinations, but part of a coherent learning journey that supports artistic maturity, independence and responsibility.