Peter Schmelz
Assistant Professor, Musicology
pschmelz@wustl.edu

Professor Schmelz earned his Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley. His primary area of interest is twentieth-century music (and especially music after 1945), with a focus on the music produced in Russia and the Soviet Union, including that by Shostakovich and Schnittke. Secondary areas of research include American popular music and popular culture, music and the cold war, and music and politics more broadly. Professor Schmelz is currently completing a book forthcoming from Oxford University Press entitled Such Freedom, If Only Musical: Unofficial Soviet Music and Society During the Thaw, for which he received a 2004 National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend. He is also Chair and founder of the American Musicological Society's Cold War and Music study group.

Professor Schmelz has published in leading musicology journals including the Journal of the American Musicological Society and the Journal of Musicology, and his essays have appeared in edited volumes such as Shostakovich and His World and Music in the Post-9/11 World. His current research involves jazz, rock, and "art" music in the Soviet 1970s.

Before coming to Washington University, Professor Schmelz taught at the University at Buffalo (State University of New York).     Click for a bibliography.