BIO

Andrew Gades joined The College of Idaho faculty in 2014. In the Music Department he taught a wide range of courses including standard music theory and aural skills courses, courses on film and game soundtracks, sacred music, counterpoint, musical form, music technology, classes exploring the intersection of music and gender, and applied lessons in composition and organ. Influenced by liberal arts ideals and the unique needs of music departments at liberal arts colleges, Dr. Gades redesigned the music theory curriculum at the College of Idaho. His innovative approach has become a model for several institutions, both public and private, across the country.

Dr. Gades began work in the Dean’s Office in 2019 as an associate dean and then stepped into the Interim Dean position in 2024. He is also an active member of regional and national music theory societies having served as president of the Rocky Mountain Society for Music Theory and is currently the chair of the Society for Music Theory’s IT committee.

EDUCATION

Ph.D., Music Theory, Florida State University, 2013

M.M., Music Theory, University of Nebraska, 2009

B.M., Organ Performance with Highest Distinction, 2007

SCHOLARSHIP & RESEARCH

“Desequencing the Music Theory Core: A Liberal Arts Model,” Engaging Students: Essays in Music Theory Pedagogy 7 (September 2020). https://doi.org/10.18061/es.v7i0.7360.

“Motivic Coherence in Joan Tower’s Purple Rhapsody.” In Analyzing the Music of Living Composers, edited by Jack Boss, Brad Osborn, Tim Page, and Stephen Rodgers, 27–50. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013.

“What’s in a Title? Setting, Narrator, and Mimesis in Del Tredici’s ‘A Memory of the Players in a Mirror at Midnight.’” Mosaic: Journal of Music Research 1, 2011.

SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS

Houston, Seth and Andrew Gades. “Essential Metrics—and a Framework—for Strategic Benchmarking” (Association for Institutional Research Forum, May 22, 2025).

Gades, Andrew and Sara Bakker. “Does Music Theory Matter?”, Public Music Theory Poster Exhibit, Society for Music Theory Annual Meeting, November 8, 2024).

Gades, Andrew and Sara Bakker. “Is Music Theory Useful? Discussing Data-Informed Decisions for Music Theory Curricula” (discussion session, Pedagogy into Practice, May 30, 2024).

Moffett, Berint and Andrew Gades. “A Tangled Web: A Classic Tale of Narrative Function and Agency in the Music of The Princess Bride” (paper presentation, Music and the Moving Image XVII, May 30, 2021).

Gades, Andrew, Megan Lavengood, and Crystal Peebles. “Diversifying the Theory Curriculum: How to Open Multiple Pathways through the Theory Core” (panel presentation, Pedagogy into Practice, May 23, 2019).

“Narrative Reliability and Dynamic Diegesis in Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” (paper presentation, 49th Annual Meeting of the Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association, April 20, 2019).

“Postmodern Pastorals in Bolcom’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience” (paper presentation, Rocky Mountain Society for Music Theory, March 28, 2015; West Coast Conference of Music Theory and Analysis, February 28, 2015).

“The Flowers of Experience: Musical Narrative and Emergent Meaning in Bolcom’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience” (paper presentation, Music Theory Southeast, March 21, 2014).

“A Multi-Domain Approach to Musical Narrative in Bolcom’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience” (paper presentation, Frederick Loewe Symposium in American Music, University of Redlands, March 10, 2012).

“What’s in a Title? Setting, Narrator, and Mimesis in Del Tredici’s ‘A Memory of the Players in a Mirror at Midnight’” (paper presentation, Buffalo Graduate Student Symposium on Music, The State University of New York at Buffalo, March 5, 2011).

“Coherence and Comprehensibility in Joan Tower’s Purple Rhapsody” (paper presentation, West Coast Conference of Music Theory and Analysis, March 5, 2010).

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Interim Dean, The College of Idaho, 2024-current Associate Dean, The College of Idaho, 2019-2024