Philip M. Gentry
Assistant Professor of Music History and Literature
University of Delaware
University of Delaware
Philip Gentry is a musicologist specializing in the history of music in the United States during the twentieth century, both popular and classical. He is particularly interested in theoretical questions of history, identity, and politics. His book What Will I Be: American Music and Cold War Identity (Oxford University Press, 2017) traces the relationship between music and identity in four diverse musical scenes: the R&B world of doo-wop pioneers the Orioles, the early film musicals of Doris Day, Asian American cabaret in San Francisco, and John Cage's infamous 4'33". He has also published articles on Leonard Bernstein's second symphony in American Music and on John Cage's for the French journal Tacet, and regularly presents at meetings of the American Musicological Society, the Society for American Music and the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, U.S. chapter.
Originally from the San Francisco Bay area, Professor Gentry taught at the College of William & Mary before coming to the University of Delaware. At Delaware he teaches the music history sequence for undergraduates; graduate seminars in research methods and special topics; and literature surveys on symphonic, chamber and contemporary repertoires. He has also served a term as an at-large member of the national council of the American Musicological Society, and two terms as president of the society’s mid-Atlantic chapter. He lives in Philadelphia.
Originally from the San Francisco Bay area, Professor Gentry taught at the College of William & Mary before coming to the University of Delaware. At Delaware he teaches the music history sequence for undergraduates; graduate seminars in research methods and special topics; and literature surveys on symphonic, chamber and contemporary repertoires. He has also served a term as an at-large member of the national council of the American Musicological Society, and two terms as president of the society’s mid-Atlantic chapter. He lives in Philadelphia.