Skip Taylor

Dr. Skip Taylor currently serves as Head for the Department of Dance. He is an Associate Professor of Music in Music Education at the University of Georgia. He earned his Masters and Ph.D in Music Education from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and holds a Bachelors degree in Music Education from Winthrop University in Rock Hill South Carolina. Prior to his appointment at UGA, he taught middle school and high school orchestra in the Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools and Forsyth County Schools in North Carolina. He was the conductor and director of the Winston-Salem Youth Symphony from 1997-2001 and was the founding Director and conductor of the Greensboro Symphony Junior Strings from 2000-2001. 

At the University of Georgia he teaches undergraduate and graduate music education classes and administrates the Summer Educational Advancement for Teachers (SEAT) Program for graduate students. He also serves as director of the UGA Summer Music Camps, UGA String Project, and the 21st Century Grant Program for Strings and Band Education in the Boys and Girls Clubs in Athens Clarke County.

An active clinician and adjudicator throughout the United States and Abroad, Dr. Taylor has presented workshops and performed extensively in the Folk and Bluegrass medium. He has conducted numerous All-State and All-County Orchestras and recently was invited to conduct the Inaugural International High School Orchestra in Almaty Kazahkstan. His research interests include the Physics of Bowed String Instruments and the Pedagogy of Instrumental Improvisation. He has performed and presented workshops and nationally and internationally related to his research interests.

Taylor has contributed articles to The Journal of String Research, Teaching Music Through Performance in Orchestra, The Instrumentalist, and Georgia Music News. His compositions and arrangements for string orchestra and percussion ensemble are distributed by C. Alan Publications, Greensboro, NC.

He is a member of ATA, NSOA, MENC, GMEA, and Phi Mu Alpha.