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Dr. Michael Thaut
Co-Director School of the Arts, Chair
(970) 491-5529 | michael.thaut@colostate.edu
Dr. Michael Thaut Receives International Honors. Click here for more information
Dr. Michael Thaut Elected to Prestigious Posts. Click here for more information
Michael H Thaut received his masters and PhD in music from Michigan State University. He is also a graduate of the Mozarteum Music Conservatory in Salzburg/Austria. At Colorado State University he is a Professor of Music and a Professor of Neuroscience and serves as CoDirector of the School of the Arts and Chairman of the Department of Music, Theater, and Dance since 2001. He has also directed the Center for Biomedical Research in Music for 10 years. He was a Visiting Professor of Music at the Mozarteum in 1985, and a Visiting Professor of Kinesiology at the University of Michigan/Ann Arbor in 1993. He has also been a Visiting Scientist in Neurology at Duesseldorf University Medical School since 1995 and was recently appointed as Visiting Professor at Heidelberg University of Applied Sciences in the Department of Music Therapy.
Dr. Thaut’s internationally recognized research focuses on brain function in music, especially time information processing in the brain related to rhythmicity and biomedical applications of music to neurologic rehabilitation of cognitive and motor function. He received the National Research Award in 1993 and the National Service Award in 2001from the American Music Therapy Association. He has over 120 scientific publications and has authored and coauthored 3 books. His works have appeared in German, Japanese, Korean, Italian, and Spanish language. Popular TV media and numerous print media have featured his research nationally and internationally.
As a former professional violinist in the classic and folk genre he has recorded several recordings of chamber and folk music in the US and Germany and has toured in Europe extensively with folk bands and chamber groups. He is also the author of a landmark anthology of Northern European and American fiddle music. In 1995 his group ‘Folk Chamber Ensemble ‘ played 3 invited concerts at the Northwest German Summer Music Festival entitled ‘Folk Meets Classic’. He continues to perform in small chamber and folk ensembles as time permits.