Jazz and Cabaret Performance

Jazz and cabaret performance is a programme for musicians who want to develop professional-level performance skills within two of the twentieth century's most vital and enduring popular art forms. Jazz is one of the great improvisational traditions, demanding deep harmonic knowledge, rhythmic fluency, an understanding of an extensive repertoire, and the ability to listen and respond creatively within an ensemble. Cabaret is broader and more theatrical, drawing on the traditions of intimate performance, storytelling through song, character, and a direct relationship with an audience that has its roots in the clubs of Paris and Berlin, the Weimar Republic, and the Manhattan supper clubs of mid-century America.

At the University of Chichester, this three-year full-time programme develops your technical skills on your principal instrument or voice alongside your understanding of jazz harmony, arranging, improvisation, and the history and aesthetics of both traditions. You will develop your abilities as a performer through regular performance opportunities, masterclasses, ensemble work, and study of repertoire that spans the full history of jazz and cabaret. The programme is designed to produce versatile musicians who can work across different performance contexts and who understand the business and professional realities of working as a performer in contemporary Britain.

Chichester has a strong tradition in performing arts, and the music department benefits from good facilities and teaching from practising musicians. The programme's combination of jazz and cabaret is distinctive and reflects a genuine understanding of the professional landscape in which its graduates will work, where versatility, stagecraft, and entrepreneurial thinking are as important as technical mastery.

Graduates work as performers, session musicians, bandleaders, music educators, vocal coaches, and in music direction for theatre. Many combine performance with teaching, and the skills developed on the programme are also relevant to roles in musical theatre, cruise liner entertainment, and the broader live performance industry.