The Cambridge University Course
The Cambridge University Tripos in Music is a three-year course leading to the conferment of the degree of B.A. The Tripos consists of three parts taken in successive years, each concluding with examinations taken at the end of the academical year. Students embarking upon this course come from very diverse backgrounds and training, and in Part IA of the Tripos, undertaken in the first year of undergraduate study, the compulsory nature of all six individual subject courses helps to ensure the attainment of a standard of achievement and range of competences common to all.
In Part IA, separate courses in Harmony and in Counterpoint cover techniques in, respectively, the late Baroque and Classical, and the Renaissance and Baroque idioms. Two courses in the History of Music cover three historical topics (from any period of Music History) and one in Ethnomusicology. Analysis of Music from the period 1700 to 1830 is examined partly through the prescription of Set Works. Finally, all students follow courses in Aural skills and Keyboard techniques.
Following Part IA the course is designed to allow students to pursue general progress in music scholarship in combination, if desired, with a degree of specialisation in areas such as Composition, Musicology (historical and analytical), and – to a smaller degree -Performance.
Part IB of the Tripos, undertaken in the second year of undergraduate study, consists of five papers, of which two (Tonal Composition Portfolio and Analysis) are compulsory. Of the three pieces constituting the Composition Portfolio, all are in a tonal idiom; one is a fugue, while the other two observe standard compositional forms of the nineteenth century. Analysis of Music from the period between 1830 and the present day is examined partly through the prescription of a Set Work or Works. Each student also offers at least one from a selection of Additional Papers on Historical topics. To make up the total of five, each chooses any two papers from a menu of options which includes the following: the remaining Additional Papers on Historical topics; further Additional Papers on miscellaneous topics; Portfolio of Free Compositions; Advanced Keyboard Skills; and Dissertation (5,000 to 7,000 words in length) on a musical subject of the student’s own choice.
Part II of the Tripos, undertaken in the third year of undergraduate study, extends to six papers. No individual paper is compulsory. Each student offers either one, two or three of the following: Dissertation on a musical topic (7,000 to 10,000 words in length); Fugue; Portfolio of Advanced Tonal Compositions; Portfolio of Free Compositions (except that no-one may offer all of those last three). The full tally of six is then made up by choice from among the following: Analysis Portfolio; Notation Portfolio (i.e., study of and transcription from notations earlier than c.1650); Test of Performance (a twenty-minute recital on voice or instrument); and up to ten Additional Papers, on a wide variety of topics, including historical and technical.