Welcome to the website for the Composition Program at Bilkent University.
Here, you can find information about our program and composition activities. You can also listen to our music and watch recordings of our past concerts.
For the prospective students, there’s also detailed information about the application procedures to our undergraduate and graduate programs.
About Us
While maintaining a solid foundation in the Western Musical canon, our program takes on the principle of keeping up with the times and embracing many different musical aesthetics. We guide our students to pursue the potentials of their creativity and imagination without any artistic and aesthetic boundaries. Here at the Composition Program, we believe in an environment where knowledge is acquired through research and questioning rather than dogmatic ways. In this sense, we encourage our students to adopt an uncircumscribed, up-to-date artistic freedom and create music that is both personal and vital.
One of the most important tenets of our faculty is the existence of a vibrant musical environment. Our annual new music festival includes a concert with student works and their final projects are performed by the Bilkent Symphony Orchestra. Additionally, our composition students find many opportunities to interact and collaborate with performers and actors on campus. Our school offers an excellent environment in which our students will gain the experience and the craft that a contemporary composer needs.
Composition is taught through weekly seminars and independent studies with the faculty composers. Our students also find many opportunities to study with the composers who visit our department during the new music festival and our composition colloquia.
Composition at Bilkent 