Composing the perfect graduate experience

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By Paul Mayne
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Kevin Morse wanted to be a lawyer when he grew up. So why then is the Thai-born graduate student going into his third year as a PhD student in the Faculty of Music?
Call it luck or fate, but Morse inadvertently played his way into his current career path.
 
 
For Kevin Morse, an impromptu musical interlude turned into what is beginning to look like a successful and promising career in music.
 
During his first week at Mount Allison University, the English and History student was wandering through the Faculty of Music one day.
 
Having taken music lessons as a child, he decided to pass the time at one of the pianos. A music professor happened to stroll by on the way to a photocopier and asked Morse if he was a student in the faculty.
 
“I told her I’m not actually in music and she said ‘well, you should be’,” says the 28-year-old Morse.
 
A mere 48 hours later he had an audition, took Music for credit in his first year and switched to the faculty in his second year. Morse hasn’t looked back since: completing an undergraduate degree in New Brunswick, coming to Western to earn his master’s, and remaining here for his PhD.
 
“The doctoral program here has been great,” he says. “The program here at Western is incredibly flexible, perhaps even more than anticipated in terms of allowing me to explore the things I want.”
 
Morse is primarily interested in two aspects of music, contemporary opera and world music in a cultural context. His research examines ways in which the arts of Thailand interpret the country’s national epic legend, the Ramakien, to articulate unique social, cultural and philosophical values.
 
He wants to combine these and look particularly at the music of Thailand, as well as Canadian contemporary opera, blending these together into compositions.
 
“There has been exploration with Thai culture and contemporary opera, but not in this way,” he says.
 
Contemporary opera is not like the image people have of opera, he says. First exposure to the music was in a summer program in 2006 when he was part of Tapestry New Opera Works, a gathering of top musical minds from around the world to learn about the process of operatic collaboration.
 
“It’s incredibly rewarding to be working with other people,” says Morse, who was commissioned by Tapestry to write two pieces for their 2008 season.
 
“You are not just by yourself writing music. As much as I love that, I really like working creatively in a collaborative context. The different skill sets may not match, but it ends up improving your own skills.”
 
While he could have gone anywhere for graduate work, Morse says Western had a strong reputation, composers on faculty with strong standing nationally and internationally, and the opportunity to teach.
 
“Especially the ability to teach,” he says. “Doctoral students at Western, at least in Music, have more opportunities than most of their counterparts at other Canadian universities in terms of classroom teaching.
 
“I figured out early in my master’s that I loved teaching and I wanted to be able to teach at the university level, but also keep doing the creative things such as writing music and being involved in the professional music context.”
 
Morse’s talents were recognized this year with the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship which seeks to attract and retain world-class doctoral students. Recipents are eligible for up to $50,000 per year for three years.
 
Does this acknowledgment validate music composition in an academic setting?
 
“It’s sometimes hard to explain, in an academic context, how this is research and important to the great picture of the university,” admits Morse. “We articulate cultural and social values through our music, and so it involves an assessment of some sort of what is happening around you and then a response to it. The difference for me is that the response is a musical one.”
 
While the future seems bright, Morse is not about to pigeon-hole himself into a particular career.
 
“I’m interested in so many other things and opportunities outside the traditional composer box, but music is my focus for now,” he says. “The investment is completely valid regardless of where you go in your next step. I love to teach and can see myself teaching straight out of finishing my PHD, but I’m not limiting myself to that."

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