Doctoral music theory students in the College of Music were recently singled out for a unique opportunity to make their voices heard.
Graduate students Aaron D’Zurilla, Isabel Milbourn, Zachary Simonds, Brandon Scribner, Luis Matos-Tovar and their primary professor, Rachel Lumsden, were chosen by SMT-Pod, the podcast of the Society for Music Theory, to script their own podcasts for broadcast in SMT-Pod’s first-ever “Student Seminar Series.”
The series was the direct result of a Spring 2025 doctoral seminar in music theory, designed and taught by Lumsden.
Moving away from the traditional final term paper, Lumsden challenged her students to engage in public-facing music theory. Through a structured, semester-long collaboration with the SMT-Pod editorial board, students navigated an open peer-review process—consisting of proposals, outlines, and script drafts—to transform their academic research into accessible, 100% aural scholarship.
The students each wrote their own podcast episode analyzing gender in a contemporary opera written by a female composer. The five featured mini-episodes include:
Episode 5.1 (April 23, 2026) – Rachel Lumsden, “SMT-Pod Student Seminar Series: Gender and Contemporary Opera (Introduction)” [https://smt-pod.org/episodes/season05/e5.1]
Episode 5.2 (April 30, 2026) – Aaron D’Zurilla, “Trauma and Vocal Utterances in Ellen Reid’s p r i s m (2018)” [https://smt-pod.org/episodes/season05/e5.2]
Episode 5.3 (May 7, 2026) – Isabel Milbourn, “The Two Harriets in Thea Musgrave’s Harriet, The Woman Called Moses” [https://smt-pod.org/episodes/season05/e5.3]
Episode 5.4 (May 14, 2026) – Zachary Simonds, “Power and Captivity in Thea Musgrave’s Mary, Queen of Scots” [https://smt-pod.org/episodes/season05/e5.4]
Episode 5.5 (May 21, 2026) – Brandon D. Scribner, “Texture, Timbre, and Instrumentation in Laura Kaminsky’s As One: A Trans Narrative”[https://smt-pod.org/episodes/season05/e5.5]
Episode 5.6 (May 28, 2026) – Luis Matos-Tovar, “Gender and the Death Trope in Judith Weir’s The Black Spider” [https://smt-pod.org/episodes/season05/e5.6]
Congratulations to Dr. Lumsden and these exceptional students for their bravery, hard work, and innovative scholarship. The series is now available for streaming on all major podcast platforms via SMT-Pod at smt-pod.org/episodes.
