The Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music, The University of Texas at Austin, College of Fine Arts.
The Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music in The University of Texas at Austin is a very exciting place where talented students study with an excellent faculty of outstanding performers, scholars, pedagogues, and composers. Ours is a community where every day is exciting and every evening is filled with multiple musical opportunities. We offer a comprehensive array of degree programs ranging from the bachelor’s through the doctorate in performance, composition, music teacher training, jazz, theory, musicology, ethnomusicology, pedagogy, and liberal studies in music. The Butler School of Music is fully accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM). Just as Texas is a place where anything is possible, the Butler School of Music is also a place where anything is possible.
The Butler School of Music has approximately 100 music faculty who serves some 700 music students. With a student-to-teacher ratio of seven to one, our students receive valuable personal attention. Housed in one of the country’s major universities, the Butler School provides our students with opportunities unavailable to students in many smaller institutions. These enrichment opportunities include the Texas Performing Arts, the Blanton Museum, the Harry Ransom Center, the LBJ Library and many other centers and special programs. These organizations regularly bring outstanding guests to campus, and provide research materials unmatched on most campuses. Furthermore, the Butler School presents some 500 concerts, recitals, operas and other special musical events annually.
In March 2008 Sarah and Ernest Butler announced their generous gift to the UT School of Music, the largest gift ever given to any public university school of music in America (see press release). Their magnanimous gift of $55 million is designated to support student scholarships, faculty research and various programs throughout the Butler School. In appreciation for their generosity we are proud to now bear their name. We are deeply grateful to Dr. and Mrs. Butler for their generosity.
Through professional education of the highest caliber, the Butler School of Music of The University of Texas at Austin prepares students for productive careers as performers, teachers, composers, and scholars and for satisfying lives as informed and responsible members of a democratic society. In accordance with the University’s mission, the School also seeks to extend the boundaries of knowledge and human experience through research and the creation of new music.
While preserving the best of traditional education in music, the School seeks to prepare students for the changing realities of the modern world through engagement with diverse musical traditions, community outreach, and new technologies that can be used creatively to further the art of music. The School promotes the interdependence of performance and scholarship, innovative relationships between music and other disciplines within and outside the arts, and a wider appreciation throughout society of music and its significance.
