This dissertation explores how music came to be accepted in late-nineteenth-century American university curricula as an element of what historian Laurence Veysey has called the liberal culture reform movement. Proponents of liberal culture focused on advancing the classically derived studies of language, philosophy, literature, and the arts in order to nurture students' sense of refined culture. Using research processes from intellectual history, I place music in the constantly shifting discourse surrounding university arts curricula. I show how proponents for music in higher education borrowed not only rhetoric from the liberal culture reform movement, but from a number of competing reform movements in an effort to legitimize music as an academic subject. I use sociological theories of institutionalism to show how this discourse influenced the architects of prestigious music programs. Furthermore, I examine the importance of women and gender on the establishment of music in American universities.

I argue that it was ultimately the collaboration between sympathetic administrators and composers-turned-professors that shaped the foundation of music in the modern American university. To this end, I use three case studies that chronicle the development of music programs at three influential American universities. The first of these is centered on Harvard professor John Knowles Paine, who worked closely with President Charles W. Eliot to build a program that emphasized the role of music in a cultural education within the new elective system. The second case study revolves around composer Horatio Parker. The Yale professor prioritized the study of music composition while establishing a School of Music that offered applied instruction and a number of general education opportunities. The final case study is a culminating moment in the acceptance of music as a university discipline. Composer and Columbia professor Edward MacDowell envisioned music as part of an interdisciplinary department of fine arts that would include literature, sculpture, painting, and architecture. After MacDowell's controversial resignation due to disagreements with President Nicholas Murray Butler, discourse about music in higher education was reinvigorated. This time, however, it figured in a larger debate concerning idealism and materialism in the university and reached beyond the confines of the humanities.