Masters in Popular Music Performance Guitar, Bass, Drums, Vocal

Institute of Contemporary Music Performance

The Masters in Music Performance postgraduate course encourages you to develop the highest levels of instrumental expertise, performance abilities, academic research and critical reasoning skills. You’ll also explore your leadership and musical management skills via the role of musical director of an ensemble, culminating in a performance of challenging original and existing repertoire.

This one-year course is aimed at individuals who wish to continue their studies after having already successfully completed their undergraduate degree-level music course. The course is also open to those who already have a vast amount of industry experience and are keen to accomplish an even greater mastery of their instrument.

Across your year of learning, you’ll further develop your instrumental and musicianship skills, focusing on your personal relationship with your instrument and the extension of your technical ability, while exploring your role as a performer in both live and studio environments. This is delivered using a variety of modes of study, including one-to-one lessons, small-group ensemble classes and lectures, and private and group tutorials.

As a masters in music performance student, you’ll enhance your professional development by operating autonomously and engaging in self-directed study, but with guidance and support from members of ICMP’s experienced professional faculty.

The Masters in Music Performance course encourages you to identify your own personal learning requirements, select your essential resources, and then design and implement a plan for achieving them. You can choose from one of three optional modules, which include an investigation of a performance tradition, the use of music in health and wellbeing, and the cultural and philosophical aspects of music.

All MMus students are required to undertake a significant research project which leads to the production of a significant body of work for recital and a dissertation. You’ll receive highly personalised instrumental and dissertation supervision from a mentor of your choice within our faculty, which comprises a number of celebrated PhD recipients and music academics.

Over the duration of the course, there will be many opportunities to work alongside like-minded creative musicians across all ICMP disciplines and you’ll be encouraged to collaborate both inside and outside of the MMus curriculum. You’ll also benefit from a regular schedule of visiting lecturers who’ll discuss their different approaches, philosophies and ideas with you, including musicians, academics and guests from the wider creative industries.

The Masters in music performance course will take you on a journey that will change the way you think about yourself as a musician and, ultimately, as a person. You’ll graduate with the skills, self-reliance and motivation needed to build and sustain a successful portfolio career as a talented music professional - whichever path you decide to take.

Successful completion of programme MMus Popular Music Performance at ICMP London school of music leads to the award of Master of Music by the University of East London.

TEACHING, LEARNING AND ASSESSMENT

You will be taught at our campus in Kilburn, utilising our live rooms, tech suites and in-house music studio facilities as well as classrooms and lecture rooms. You will have access to use these facilities outside of class time while you are a student at ICMP in order to rehearse and record your music.

PROGRESSION

This course will prepare you for a career in the music industry in areas such as se