Melissa Cummins

Melissa Cummins, PhD
Adjunct Professor, Musicology

School of Music, 224 | mdc071@shsu.edu

Division | Musicology

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Melissa Cummins is an Adjunct Instructor of Musicology at Sam Houston State University. Her specialties include French Opera, Women composers in Opera and Musical Theater, and Twentieth-Century music. She has written articles and read papers on Ethel Smyth, Francesca Caccini, and Germaine Tailleferre. In February 2016 she directed the American premiere staging of Tailleferre’s Monsieur Petitpois achète un Château, which was also broadcast on Kansas Public Radio.

After completing a 22-year career as a public school band director in Missouri, Melissa has taught music history courses at Southeast Missouri State University, Western Iowa Tech Community College, the University of South Dakota, and has assisted with online classes at the University of Kansas. She is active as a woodwind doubler in pit orchestras and as a woodwind judge in Missouri and Kansas.

Melissa holds a BS in music education from Northwest Missouri State University, a ME in instrumental music education from Southeast Missouri State University, a MM in musicology from the University of South Dakota, and a PhD in musicology from the University of Kansas.

BS Northwest Missouri State University 1989 ME Southeast Missouri Sate University 1994 MM University of South Dakota 2014 PhD University of Kansas 2017