Elizabeth Wells

Elizabeth Wells has been with the Mount Allison Music Department since 2001. She earned her Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Toronto with a concentration in History and Literature of Music, studying viola with Rivka Golani and Andrew Dawes. She then pursued a career in public broadcasting, working as a music programmer and producer of a variety of classical music programs for CJRT-FM in Toronto. In 1993, she was accepted to the Doctoral program in musicology at the Eastman School of Music. Her dissertation, entitled "West Side Story(s): Perspectives on a Great American Musical," was supported by the Presser Foundation, the Elsa T. Johnson Dissertation Fellowship, two grants from the Susan B. Anthony Institute for Gender and Women’s Studies, and the AMS-50 Dissertation Fellowship.

In addition to her work as a musicologist, Elizabeth served as an assistant to Rare Books and Special Collections in the Sibley Music Library. From 1997-2001 she was Production Stage Manager for Eastman Opera Theatre, and Assistant Director for their 2001 production of Kirk Mechem’s opera Tartuffe. She won the "Best Student Paper" twice from the New York State/St. Lawrence Chapter of the AMS. Before coming to Mount Allison University, she taught music history at Mansfield University in Pennsylvania, the State University of New York at Geneseo, and the Eastman School of Music. She was awarded Eastman’s Teaching Assistant prize in 1996-97.

Dr. Wells has presented papers at conferences of the American Musicological Society and Feminist Theory and Music 5 and 6 conferences and at the Congress of the International Musicological Society meeting in Leeuven, Belgium and in Melbourne, Australia. She has also presented at the Association of Atlantic Universities Teaching Showcase as well as at National Conferences of the Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education.

Dr. Wells has given guest lectures at Roberts Wesleyan College, Nazareth College, and for Eastman’s Freshman Colloquium Series. Her most recent publication, on Shostakovich’s opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk appeared in Cambridge Opera Journal, and she is working on a book on West Side Story for publication in the near future.

In 2007 Dr. Wells was awarded Mount Allison's Crake Teaching Award in Arts, and in 2008 was the recipient of the University's Herbert and Leota Tucker Teaching Award. She began a term as Head of the Department of Music in July 2008.