List of famous people who majored in music, including photos when available. This list of famous music majors is ordered loosely by relevance, meaning the most well-known people are at the top. This list includes popular actors, musicians, athletes and more that majored or minored in music. You can find various bits of information below, such as what year the person was born and what their profession is. If you're looking for a particular celebrity who majored in music you can use the "search" bar to find a specific name.
Lady Gaga and Nicole Scherzinger are a great starting point for your to rank your favorites on this list
This list answers the questions, "Which celebrities were music majors?" and "Which famous people studied music?"
Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter and actress. She is known for her unconventionality, provocative work and visual experimentation. Gaga began performing as a teenager, singing at open mic nights and acting in school plays. She studied at Collaborative Arts Project 21, through New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, before dropping out to pursue a music career. When Def Jam Recordings canceled her contract, she worked as a songwriter for Sony/ATV Music Publishing, where Akon helped her sign a joint deal with Interscope Records and his own label KonLive Distribution in 2007. She rose to prominence the following year with her debut album, the electropop record The Fame, and its chart-topping singles "Just Dance" and "Poker Face". A follow-up EP, The Fame Monster (2009), featuring the singles "Bad Romance", "Telephone" and "Alejandro", was also successful.
Gaga's second full-length album, Born This Way (2011), explored electronic rock and techno-pop. It peaked atop the US Billboard 200 and sold more than one million copies in the country in its first week. Its title track became the fastest selling song on the iTunes Store with over a million downloads in less than a week. Gaga experimented with EDM on her third studio album, Artpop (2013), which reached number one in the US and included the single "Applause". Her collaborative jazz album with Tony Bennett, Cheek to Cheek (2014), and her soft rock-influenced fifth studio album, Joanne (2016), also topped the US charts. During this period, Gaga ventured into acting, playing leading roles in the miniseries American Horror Story: Hotel (2015–2016), for which she received a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress, and the critically acclaimed musical drama A Star Is Born (2018). She also contributed to the latter's soundtrack, which received the BAFTA Award for Best Film Music and made her the only woman to achieve five US number one albums in the 2010s. Its lead single, "Shallow", earned Gaga the Academy Award and the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song.
Having sold 27 million albums and 146 million singles as of January 2016, Gaga is one of the world's best-selling music artists. Her achievements include several Guinness world records, nine Grammy Awards, and awards from the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Council of Fashion Designers of America. She has been declared Billboard's Artist of the Year and Woman of the Year, and included among Forbes's power and earnings rankings. She was ranked number four on VH1's Greatest Women in Music in 2012 and second on Time's 2011 readers' poll of the most influential people of the past ten years. She is known for her philanthropy and social activism, including her work related to LGBT rights, and for her nonprofit organization, the Born This Way Foundation, which focuses on empowering youth and preventing bullying.
Brad Douglas Paisley (born October 28, 1972) is an American country music singer and songwriter. Starting with his 1999 debut album Who Needs Pictures, he has released eleven studio albums and a Christmas compilation on the Arista Nashville label, with all of his albums certified Gold or higher by the RIAA. He has scored 32 Top 10 singles on the US Billboard Country Airplay chart, 19 of which have reached number 1. He set a new record in 2009 for the most consecutive singles (10) reaching the top spot on that chart.
Paisley has sold over 11 million albums and has won three Grammy Awards, 14 Academy of Country Music Awards, 14 Country Music Association Awards, and two American Music Awards. He has also earned country music's crowning achievement, becoming a member of the Grand Ole Opry. Paisley also wrote songs for Pixar's Cars franchise ("Behind the Clouds", "Find Yourself", "Collision of Worlds" (along with Robbie Williams), "Nobody's Fool", etc.).
Randolph Severn "Trey" Parker III (born October 19, 1969) is an American animator, director, producer, screenwriter, actor, and composer. He is known for co-creating South Park (1997–) and co-developing the Tony Award-winning musical The Book of Mormon (2011) with his creative partner Matt Stone. Parker was interested in film and music as a child and at high school, and attended the University of Colorado, Boulder, where he met Stone. The two collaborated on various short films, and starred in the feature-length musical Cannibal! The Musical (1993).
Parker and Stone moved to Los Angeles and wrote their second film, Orgazmo (1997). Before the premiere of the film, South Park premiered on Comedy Central in August 1997. The duo possess full creative control of the show, and have produced music and video games based on it. A film based on South Park, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999), received good reviews from both critics and fans. Parker went on to direct the satirical action film Team America: World Police (2004), and, after several years of development, The Book of Mormon premiered on Broadway to good reviews. In 2013, Parker and Stone established their own production studio, Important Studios.
Parker has been the recipient of various awards over the course of his career, including five Primetime Emmy Awards for his work on South Park, as well as four Tony Awards and a Grammy Award for The Book of Mormon.
Kathryn Felicia Day (born June 28, 1979) is an American actress, writer, and web series creator. She is the creator, star, writer, and producer of the original web series The Guild (2007–2013), a show loosely based on her life as a gamer. She also wrote and starred in the Dragon Age web series Dragon Age: Redemption (2011). Day was a member of the board of directors of the International Academy of Web Television beginning December 2009 until the end of July 2012.On television, she has played Vi in the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2003) and Dr. Holly Marten in Eureka (2011), and had a recurring role as Charlie Bradbury on Supernatural (2012–2015, 2018). She has also acted in movies such as Bring It On Again (2004), as well as the Internet musical Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog (2008). In April 2017, she began appearing as Kinga Forrester in Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Lauren Ambrose (born Lauren Anne D'Ambruoso, February 20, 1978) is an American actress and singer.
Ambrose is most known for her television roles as Claire Fisher in Six Feet Under (2001–2005), for which she won two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and as Jilly Kitzinger in Torchwood: Miracle Day (2011). Her film credits include Can't Hardly Wait (1998), Psycho Beach Party (2000) and Where the Wild Things Are (2009). She is the lead singer of the ragtime band Lauren Ambrose and the Leisure Class.Ambrose portrayed the lead role of Eliza Doolittle in the Lincoln Center Theater revival of My Fair Lady on Broadway, a performance for which she was nominated for the 2018 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical and won the 2018 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Actress in a Musical.
Robert Taylor (born Spangler Arlington Brugh; August 5, 1911 – June 8, 1969) was an American film and television actor who was one of the most popular leading men of his time.
Taylor began his career in films in 1934 when he signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. He won his first leading role the following year in Magnificent Obsession. His popularity increased during the late 1930s and 1940s with appearances in A Yank at Oxford (1938), Waterloo Bridge (1940), and Bataan (1943). During World War II, he served in the United States Naval Air Corps, where he worked as a flight instructor and appeared in instructional films. From 1959 to 1962, he starred in the series The Detectives Starring Robert Taylor. In 1966, he took over hosting duties from his friend Ronald Reagan on the series Death Valley Days.
Taylor was married to actress Barbara Stanwyck from 1939 to 1951. He married actress Ursula Thiess in 1954, and they had two children. A chain smoker, Taylor was diagnosed with lung cancer in October 1968. He died of the disease on June 8, 1969 at the age of 57.
