Skip to main content

Dr. Gretchen Peters

Gretchen Peters
  • Professor of Music History
  • Professor of American Indian studies
  • Music and Theatre Arts
  • American Indian Studies

Dr. Peters' research interests are wide-ranging. She has done extensive work on urban musical culture in France during the late Middle Ages. In addition to authoring numerous articles on the subject, her book entitled The Musical Sounds of Medieval French Cities: Players, Patrons and Politics was published by Cambridge University Press in 2012. Her interest in issues of diversity and inclusivity in music curriculum is reflected in her article, entitled "Do Students See Themselves in the Music Curriculum?: A Project to Identify Exclusionary Practices and to Create Greater Inclusion," which appeared in an issue of the Music Educators Journal (2016). Her interest in American Indian Studies is reflected in her recent publication entitled, "Unlocking the Songs: Marcie Rendon's Indigenous Critique of Frances Densmore's Native Music Collecting," American Indian Culture and Research Journal (2015). Currently, she is exploring the early twentieth-century opera by Alberto Bimboni, entitled Winona, which is based on Native American legend surrounding Maiden Rock on Lake Pepin. She has advised numerous faculty-student research projects ranging from issues of change in traditional music of the Hmong in Eau Claire to problems of race in Bizet's Carmen to issues of gender in the history of the music program at UW-EC.


Teaching Interests
  • Music History
  • Global Traditions in Music
  • Gender and Music
  • American Indian Studies
Research and Creative Activities

 

  • Music of urban medieval society
  • Issues of diversity in curriculum
  • Issues of appropriation of American Indian culture in music
  • American music in the early twentieth century

 

Education

 

  • Ph.D., University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  • M.M., University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  • B.M., University of Wisconsin-Madison