Title/Position: Associate Professor and Chair, Musicology

Profile:

 
What would you say are the outstanding highlights of your professional life?

  1. Having my article on Alberto Ginastera included in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians

  2. Receiving a Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities for my work on Ginastera’s film music

  3. Signing a book contract with Oxford University Press to publish my Ginastera film music research

  4. Seeing the chapter I wrote on Argentina included in textbook on Latin American music to be published by W. W. Norton

  5. Being named Chair, Robert M. Stevenson Award Committee of the American Musicological Society

What music do you listen to in your car?

Ginastera, Piazzolla, bossa nova, Bartók, Celia Cruz, nueva canción/nueva trova, any music from Latin America

How were you influenced by your teachers? What do you hope to pass on to your students?

My main mentor, the late Gerard Béhague, challenged my thoughts on music at every turn. I would like to pass along his unfailing spirit of intellectual inquiry.

Career Highlights:

Deborah Schwartz-Kates’ has recently been awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel, Switzerland.

Her research focuses on contemporary Latin American music, ethnomusicology, national identity, and film music. She is under contract for two books—Revealing Screens: The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera (Oxford University Press) and Alberto Ginastera: A Guide to Research (Routledge Press).

Prof. Schwartz-Kates authored the article on Alberto Ginastera for the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians and contributed the chapter on Argentina for a textbook on Latin American music published by W. W. Norton.

Her work has appeared in the

  * Musical Quarterly

  * Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart

  * New Grove Dictionary of Opera

  * Yearbook for Traditional Music

  * Latin American Music Review

  * ECHO: A Music-Centered Journal

Short Biography:

Deborah Schwartz-Kates is associate professor and chair of the Department of Musicology at the University of Miami Frost School of Music. Her research focuses on contemporary Latin American music, ethnomusicology, national identity, and film music. Professor Schwartz-Kates has recently been awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel, Switzerland. Professor Schwartz-Kates is under contract for two books—Revealing Screens: The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera (Oxford University Press) and Alberto Ginastera: A Guide to Research (Routledge Press). She authored the article on Alberto Ginastera for the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians and contributed the chapter on Argentina for a textbook on Latin American music published by W. W. Norton. Her work has appeared in the Musical Quarterly, Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, New Grove Dictionary of Opera, Yearbook for Traditional Music, Latin American Music Review and ECHO: A Music-Centered Journal.

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"Deborah Schwartz-Kates’ book promises to set a new standard for film music as a marker of cultural identity and ideological discourse. This area of study, one that bridges so many areas—the serious composer writing commercial music, commercial music as a cultural utterance, the “secret language” of film scores—is of great interest, and not only in music but also in anthropology and performance studies. Moreover, this position permeates the current and diverse discourses in history: it is seen, albeit slowly, as a previously overlooked historical lightening rod for socio-critical opinion." —Oxford University Press