Esther Morgan-Ellis, Ph.D.

Dr. Esther Morgan-Ellis studies and writes about participatory music-making practices of the past and present. Her historical work on the US community singing movement is represented in the monograph Everybody Sing! Community Singing in the American Picture Palace (2018), the edited collection Musical Meaning and Interpretation (2025), and journal articles for Musical Quarterly, Music & Letters, American Music, Journal of the Society for American Music, and Journal of Historical Research in Music Education. She has also published studies of contemporary participatory practices including old-time revivalism (Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, Journal of Music, Technology and Education), hymn singing (Journal of Music, Health, and Well-being), and Sacred Harp singing (Frontiers in Psychology, International Journal of Community Music, Choral Journal). She recently coedited the Oxford Handbook of Community Singing (2024).

Dr. Morgan-Ellis is also active in the field of music history pedagogy. She is editor/lead author of Resonances: Engaging Music in Its Cultural Context (2020), an open-access music appreciation textbook used around the world, and author of three chapters on Appalachian music for Accessible Appalachia: An Open-Access, Introductory Textbook in Appalachian Studies (2024). Her writing appears frequently in Journal of Music History Pedagogy, and she edited the volume Navigating Stylistic Boundaries in the Music History Classroom: Crossover, Exchange, Appropriation (2024) for Routledge.

Dr. Morgan-Ellis has been Assistant Director of Academic Engagement since 2022. She also serves on the Advisory Boards for UNG Press, the Appalachian Studies Center, and LEAP, and she edits the CTLL Blog, Teaching Academic.

Dr. Morgan-Ellis is a professional cellist and appears regularly with regional orchestras. She is also active as a fiddler and fiddle teacher. She is President of the Georgia Pick & Bow Traditional Music School and teaches with Pick & Bow, the Alabama Folk School, and the John C. Campbell Folk School. At UNG she teaches music history, world music, music in Appalachia, music appreciation, and old-time string band, and she previously directed the orchestra in Dahlonega.

Oxford Handbook of Community Singing. Co-edited with Kay Norton. New York City: Oxford University Press, 2024.

Navigating Stylistic Boundaries in the Music History Classroom: Crossover, Exchange, Appropriation. Edited collection. New York City: Routledge, 2024.

Resonances: Engaging Music in Its Cultural Context. Editor and lead author. Dahlonega, GA: University of North Georgia Press, 2020.

“Meditated Community Singing.” In Oxford Handbook of Community Singing, ed. Esther M. Morgan-Ellis and Kay Norton. New York City: Oxford University Press, 2024.

“Community Singing in Flint and Baltimore, 1917-1920.” Co-authored with Alan L. Spurgeon. In The Oxford Handbook of Community Singing, ed. Esther M. Morgan-Ellis and Kay Norton. New York City: Oxford University Press, 2024.

“A Century of Singing Along to Stephen Foster.” In Musical Meaning and Interpretation: Perspectives, Reflections, Critique, ed. Jason Geary, Seth Monahan, and Michael Puri. New York City: Oxford University Press, 2024.

“Examining Folk Borrowings to Denaturalize Western Art Music: The Case of ‘Hoe-Down’.” In Navigating Stylistic Boundaries in the Music History Classroom: Crossover, Exchange, Appropriation, ed. Esther M. Morgan-Ellis. New York City: Routledge, 2024.

“Mediated Community and Participatory Blackface in Gillette Original Community Sing (CBS, 1936-1937).” Music & Letters. Volume 104. Issue 1. Pages 59-89. 2023.

“Learning Advantages of Online Old-Time Jams.” Journal of Music, Technology and Education. Volume 15. Issue 2. 2023.

“Appalachian After-School Music Programs as Cultural Intervention.” Co-authored with Abigail Marvel and Andrew Malphurs. Journal of Popular Music Education. 2023.

“Musicking in Lumpkin County, Georgia, 1909–1928.” Co-authored with Abigail Cannon, Neva Garrett, and Grey Smith. American Music. 2023.

“Leslie Uggams, Sing Along with Mitch (1961-1964), and the Reverberations of Minstrelsy.” Journal of the Society for American Music. 2022.

“Non-participation in online Sacred Harp singing during the COVID-19 pandemic.” International Journal of Community Music. Volume 14, Number 2-3. 2021. Pages 223-244.

“Virtual Hymn Singing and the Imagination of Community.” Journal of Music, Health, and Wellbeing. Autumn. 2021.

“‘Like Pieces in a Puzzle’: Online Sacred Harp Singing During the COVID-19 Pandemic.” Frontiers in Psychology. 2021. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.627038

“‘Making the many-minded one’: Community Singing at the Peabody Prep in 1915. Musical Quarterly. Volume 102, Number 4. 2019. Pages 361–401.

“Learning Habits and Attitudes in the Revivalist Old-Time Community of Practice.” Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education. Number 221. 2019. Pages 29-57.

“A Faculty Learning Community for Contingent Music Appreciation Instructors: Purpose, Structure, Outcomes.” Journal of Music History Pedagogy. Volume 9, Number 2. 2019. Pages 173-193.

“Undergraduate Research and Affective Learning: Examining a Contemporary Music Research Project.” Journal of Music History Pedagogy. Volume 8, Number 2. 2018. Pages 174-187.

“Warren Kimsey and Community Singing at Camp Gordon, 1917-1918.” Journal of Historical Research in Music Education. Volume 39, Number 2. 2018. Pages 171-194.

“Edward Meikel and Community Singing in a Neighborhood Picture Palace, 1925–1929.” American Music. Volume 32, Number 2. 2014. Pages 172-200.