Rachel Lumsden

Rachel Lumsden is Associate Professor of Music Theory. Her research interests are wide-ranging, and include experimental music, music by women composers, and issues of gender, race, and sexuality in contemporary British and American concert music. She is co-editor of The Norton Guide to Teaching Music Theory (2018). Her peer-reviewed articles have been published in American Music, Black Music Research Journal, Feminist Studies, Music Theory Online (2017 and 2020), and Studies in American Humor. She has also contributed chapters to several edited collections, including the Oxford Handbook of Public Music Theory and Analytical Essays on Music by Women Composers: Concert Music, 1900–1960, and has chapters forthcoming in the Oxford Handbook of Musical Variation and Thematic Techniques and From Hammerstein to Hamilton: Analyzing Musicals.

She has served on the Society for Music Theory’s Committee on the Status of Women, Committee on Race and Ethnicity, Student Presentation Award Committee, and is co-chair of the Work and Family Interest Group.

She earned a PhD in music theory and a doctoral certificate in women’s studies from the CUNY Graduate Center, and MM degrees in music theory and flute performance from Queens College. She previously taught at Brooklyn College and the University of Oklahoma.