Tracy Doyle's Musical Mission

Faculty, Arches

The new director of the School of Music on diversifying music education, new career paths for graduates, and her own inauspicious start with the flute.

When most people think of a music composer, Tracy Doyle knows they usually think of a European white male. But she also understands how limiting that presumption can be. So, since starting as director of the School of Music last July, she has helped expand the school’s efforts to improve diversity, equity, and inclusion. “Historically speaking, it’s been hard for people to step away from the European art-music canon,” says Doyle, 51, an accomplished flutist who came to her position from Adams State University in Colorado. “But we’ve been taking a closer look at who is missing from music history, and whose voices are not heard.”

Q: What trend in music education excites you the most?
A: K-12 educators are recognizing that not all students take part in band, choir, and orchestra. In fact, the vast majority don’t. And yet there are so many people who still want to create music. As opposed to the ivory tower approach, where classical music is in this silo and popular music is in this other silo, we recognize there are multiple entryways to music.

Q: Which trends concern you the most?
A: In higher education, we’re dealing with a conservatory style of education that hasn’t changed in centuries. And the history of European classical music is full of systemic racism; it’s been exclusionary. Now we’re looking at our curriculum through the lens of diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Q: Got an example of that exclusionism?
A: If you can’t afford an instrument or private lessons, it might be hard for you to study music in college. Representation also matters: Children grow up not seeing representation in the people who are creating and performing music, and it’s not because those people aren’t there. We need to amplify those voices. There’s so much incredible music by women and composers of color. That needs to become the norm, instead of doing one concert for Black History Month.

Not all music majors become musicians or teachers, so Doyle encourages them to think about entertainment law, performing arts medicine, and other “music-adjacent” fields.

Q: Have you made specific changes to the curriculum to address that?
A: Many were underway when I started. The music faculty at Puget Sound has been asking questions: How has our teaching of music, as well as our concert programming, centered some while excluding others? As a result, we’ve replaced our chronological music history sequence with one centering women and people of color, and removing the assumption that highbrow classical music is superior to other kinds of music. So instead of memorizing names and dates of mostly white male composers from Europe, music is studied through the lens of culture.

Q: Any specific courses addressing that?
A: We’re offering two core classes, Intro to Musicology and Intro to Ethnomusicology, where students are given the tools to look at music from a variety of perspectives. And then they can choose electives, such as Performing Asian America, Music of South Asia, Dance in World Cultures, and Women in Music, as well as two that are in the pipeline for approval: African American Music Scholarship and Music of the Vietnamese Diaspora.

Q: How did the Sphinx Virtuosi concerts in February fit into that vision?
A: The Sphinx organization is based in Detroit, and its message is transforming lives through diversity in the arts. They do a lot of engagement with school-age children, and have competitions for young Black and Latinx artists in high school and college. Then they have different ensembles. We did virtual events with Sphinx Virtuosi, a chamber orchestra, and Exigence, a vocal group. We partnered with Tacoma Public Schools, the Tacoma Youth Chorus, and the Tacoma Youth Symphony. Those young people got to experience a concert of Black and Latinx performers and composers, and had an opportunity to have a Q&A session with the artists.

Q: How are you addressing the reality that many postgrad music majors often never become professional musicians?
A: We’re fostering creativity and entrepreneurship in our students, thinking beyond the standard performer-educator route. There are music-adjacent careers: entertainment law, performing arts medicine, composing video game soundtracks, engineering instruments. A music degree is a foundation to any career that calls for creativity, innovation, collaboration, flexibility, attention to detail, or leadership.

Q: As a player, how did you settle on the flute?
A: I was 10 and went to “band night” to try all the instruments. I knew I wanted to play flute, but I tried it and nothing came out. I tried the clarinet and that worked, so I went home that night with a clarinet. But I cried because I really wanted to play the flute. So my mom called the band director and switched the clarinet for a flute. But I did not get a sound out of the flute for a solid three months. My mom often wonders how I was able to persevere.

Q: Does running the university’s music program impact your playing career?
A: One of the things that attracted me to this position is that my creative activity is still valued. I started this job during the pandemic, so my typical outlets of playing in an orchestra or giving recitals has not been possible. But just recently my percussionist husband, James, and I recorded a work of chamber music for the San Juan Symphony in our living room. It was an opportunity to learn how to produce and share music in an innovative way.

Explore More Stories