The Rowland Dunham Administration (1927-1951)
The next Dean of the College, Rowland Dunham, was an organist/choirmaster from Youngstown, Ohio. During his term of twenty-four years (1927-1951), the College grew dramatically and assumed many of the features it has today. Dunham held the single professorship, teaching organ and theory, and two instructors were hired, one for voice and the other for piano instruction. Additional positions were created in the late 1930s and the1940s in band, orchestra, violin, piano, voice, organ, composition, and theory, bringing the permanent faculty up to approximately ten. Additional instructors were hired as needed on a fee basis. The College was now large enough to have divisions in Organ and Church Music, Piano, Voice/Choral music/Opera, Strings/Orchestra, Winds/Band, and Theory/Composition. Faculty instruction was supplemented by visiting composers, performers and educators such as Percy Grainger, Rosina Lhevinne, Sergei Prokofiev, Rudolph Ganz, Albert Spalding, Ruggieri Ricci, Thor Johnson, Ellis Snyder, Margaret Hood, Clarence Sawhill, and Misha Mishakoff Student enrollment had grown from fifty-seven to eighty-four during 1927-37 alone. During World War II, student enrollment held at slightly over 100 but doubled rapidly in the immediate post-war years.
The faculty was strongly performance-oriented, and the degree programs (the Master of Music degree was begun in 1937) emphasized both performance and a thorough grounding in music theory. Many students, however, sought teacher training. This need was met with adjunct instructors drawn from music teachers and supervisors in the surrounding area and an occasional nationally known music educator who taught as a visiting professor during the summer term. A two-year certificate was offered for public school teachers or a four-year Bachelor of Music Education degree (beginning in 1931) with performance requirements the same as the Bachelor of Music degree and education courses substituted for some theoretical and liberal arts courses. A Master of Music Education degree was offered beginning in 1937. During Dunham’s administration the College’s national reputation had blossomed to the extent that it received permanent membership in the National Association of Schools of Music in 1941, and all of its programs were accredited by that organization by 1944.
1920-1926 << 1927-1951 >> 1951-1978 | 
