Musicology, Ethnomusicology, and Sound Studies

The Foundation will consider proposals from scholars working in examining and interpreting Musicology, Ethnomusicology, and Sound Studies from a critical point of view in any genre, place, language, time period, or format (manuscript, print, digital, or audio), including philological, historical, theoretical, cultural, and comparative perspectives.  

Subcategories include:

New musicology

Ethnomusicology or Comparative Musicology 

Manuscript Studies 

Systematic Musicology, including the fields of

Music Philosophy, Music Psychology, Cognitive Music Psychology including Neuroscience, Robotics and AI.

Music history or historical musicology, history of the notated music

Musical biography or Biographical studies of composers

Study of Performance Practice

Musical semiotics  

Music theory and Music analysis

Sociological studies focusing on the function of music in society as well as its meaning for individuals and society as a whole

Organology and the evolution of musical instruments, including listening and recording technologies

Sonic environments and ecologies

These fellowships do not support creative work (see fellowship opportunity in Music For Performance), or scholarship primarily focused on Drama (see fellowship opportunity in Theater Studies). This Fellowship does not support music education programs.

In accordance with the fellowship program's overall goal of supporting early mid-career artists and scholars, applicants should have a promising record of scholarly accomplishment that includes one major project. Note that the fellowship funds are intended mainly to support time for scholarly work; they do not underwrite publication, advertising, or promotional costs.