The difference between a BA and a BMus Music course??

Hi,

Am slightly confused in the difference that this makes to the course that you're studying...if you come out with a BA are you seen as less music-y than someone with a BMus and does anyone know why there are 2 different degree types for Music??

Thanks :biggrin:

Reply 1

The_Lonely_Goatherd

Hi there!

This is a question that has come up many times on this forum. Certainly whilst I've been on TSR, we've not actually come up with a conclusive answer :biggrin:

Reply 2

ExTraP

I hoestly think they are the same in terms of the level of qualifiaction you get out of it. I study fine art and there are BA or MA for Fine Art and there are BFA or MAF for Fine Art. Both of which basically mean the same thing. With the BFA or MFA, they tend to be more practical and perhaps a little bit less writing involved, but that about the only difference really. And if you tell people you have a BA, then you would have to also indicate which subject you have it on, whereas if you say you have a BMus or BFA, then instantly, people would know which suject these titles respresent.

After all, I don't really think it matters too much, I always thing what matters is the actual context of the course and the experience, be that BA or BMus, as long as you gain something out of it, it really doesn't matter what the titles say. Well, this is true for many areas in creatice arts anyway.

Reply 3

ChopinNocturne

As far as I can tell, very little! I've applied for BA at Oxford, York, Nottingham and Newcastle and BMus at Birmingham (because that's what the course is, not a choice of one or the other) and I couldn't see any fundamental differences between them :smile:

Reply 4

katynoface

I was talking about this just last night! I've applied for a mixture of BA and BMus courses and was wondering of they were any different or better etc. My mum did a BA and she thought that it was the same - just a different name. Which I suppose makes sense as It's called a BA in music. And the courses don't seem to have anything that suggests theres a difference from what I've seen! :smile:

Reply 5

cassiethestranger

From what some friends who study music have said the BMus is made up of purely music based modules where as in a BA you have the chance to do free electives....

Reply 6

The_Lonely_Goatherd

I didn't have the chance to do free electives :no:

Then again, I was in a uni that considered me a humanities student :p:

Reply 7

ExTraP

Original post by cassiethestranger

From what some friends who study music have said the BMus is made up of purely music based modules where as in a BA you have the chance to do free electives....

That really depends on what each university offers.

Reply 8

Shazzie202

The difference between the two is simply BA stands for Bachelor of Arts, and BMus stands for Bachelor of Music.

A BMus tends to be more specialized and performance-oriented; it's probably better if you seriously intend to be a concert musician, and a BA in Music usually requires fewer musical technique courses and more liberal arts courses unrelated to music; it's good if you want a broader education.

In a nutshell, BA Music tends to be more highly academically biased (so if you want flexibility to look at another subject go for this), whereas a BMus is biased towards the practical performance aspects (so go for this if you want to purely focus on music)

Hope this helps :biggrin: