Dr. Derek Stauff is a music historian and an organist. As both historian and performer, he focuses on music from early-modern Germany into the age of J.S. Bach. He wrote his dissertation on Lutheran music and politics during the Thirty Years’ War, focusing particularly on composers working in Leipzig. As part of my work, he also edits music from the 17th century.
At Hillsdale, he teaches the full gamut of music history from ancient times up to the present, focusing especially on European music. He teaches The Understanding of Music (MUS 204 & 206) core classes, which focus on basic listening while surveying music from throughout history. In addition, he teaches the three-semester music history sequence taken by majors and minors in music. These classes focus on listening but also involve score reading and writing research papers. Finally, he offers an advanced seminar where students focus on special topics. By studying a narrowly defined topic in great detail in a small class, we better learn to apply higher-level thinking skills through research, writing, and presentations. Seminar topics over the past years have included the keyboard music of J.S. Bach, Handel’s Messiah, the polyphonic mass in the Renaissance, and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring.
