DePaul University School of Music records

DePaul's School of Music was launched as the College of Music in 1912 by Walter Keller. By 1913, DePaul's program expanded to emphasize teacher training that met the Chicago Board of Education requirements and began to offer a summer program designed to enable women to qualify for a baccalaureate degree. In 1922 an organist from St. Vincent DePaul Church, Arthur Becker, became Dean. He changed the name to the School of Music and enlarged the programs and staff. As a result, DePaul was the first Catholic music school to gain membership to the National Association of Schools of Music in the early 1930s. Leon Stein, a student of Becker, would spend forty-seven years as a faculty member and then as Dean (1966-1976) during a time of tremendous growth for the school. In 1957 DePaul attained affiliation with the Pontifical Institute in Rome for the Sacred Music Program. In the 1960s, courses were offered in the study of jazz and an electronic music studio was added. By 1986, numerous students from DePaul had performed nationally and internationally. Four members of the popular band Chicago were graduates of the School of Music. The fourth Dean, Fred Miller, (1975-1995) reached out to the local community through the Community Music Division and continued to establish the school's national reputation by recruiting renowned professional musicians and academics for its faculty. In 1986 alumnus George Perle was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Music. Dean Don Casey (1995-2014) expanded services as part of the Community Music Division to include instruction to underprivileged children in Lawndale and initiated the annual “Christmas at DePaul” community holiday concert. In 2008, the School of Music had a faculty of 110 professional musicians, ensembles for orchestra, jazz, and choral, and offers programs in Performance, Composition, Jazz Studies, Music Education, Performing Arts Management, and Sound Recording Technology.