The Catholic University of America has long been committed to educating musicians, scholars, and composers. Music instruction has been a part of campus life since the early 20th century.

A music department was established at Catholic University in 1950, with John Paul as its chairman. Under his leadership, the department became the School of Music in 1965, and Paul became its Dean. The school was named the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music in the spring of 1984, in honor of alumnus, trustee emeritus, and longtime friend and benefactor, Benjamin T. Rome.

Dean Paul and his successors Thomas Mastroianni and Elaine Walter shaped a school where performance and scholarship received equal attention to benefit undergraduate and graduate students who continue to come from throughout the United States and many foreign countries. From 2001 onwards, Deans Marilyn Neeley, Murry Sidlin, Grayson Wagstaff, and Jacqueline Leary-Warsaw continued the development of the school as the centerpiece of cultural life on campus, and as an artistic hub in Northeast Washington, D.C.

On June 5, 2018, the Board of Trustees of The Catholic University of America voted to create a new Benjamin T. Rome School of Music, Drama, and Art, which included the Department of Music Performance; the Department of Music Theory, History, and Composition; the Department of Drama; and the Department of Art.  The structure of the current school was finalized in 2025, with the College of Arts and Sciences welcoming the Department of Drama and the Department of Music as the College's Rome School of Performing Arts.

The Department of Music is fully accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM). Students are encouraged to take advantage of all the resources, cultural and intellectual, that Washington, D.C., and the surrounding area offer.

Today, music students are admitted to programs leading to the degrees of Bachelor of Arts, Master of Music, Master of Music in Sacred Music, Doctor of Musical Arts, and Doctor of Musical Arts in Sacred Music. They work with an impressive faculty of artists and scholars and participate in master classes offered by some of the world’s most respected performers and composers. The department houses the program in Sacred Music and the international Center for Ward Method Studies in Gregorian chant, and also maintains a three-decade long emphasis on Latin American culture through the Latin American Center for Graduate Studies in Music.

The Department of Music produces numerous concerts, recitals, and special events throughout each academic year. One of the highlights of each year is the annual Christmas Concert for Charity, performed by the Symphony Orchestra and combined choruses in the Great Upper Church of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, and broadcast worldwide throughout the Christmas season on the Eternal Word Television Network. Starting in 2010, students and faculty performed a series of concerts in Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall co-sponsored by the la Gesse Foundation. In 1987, 1993, and 1999, student musicians traveled to Rome for a series of concerts, including performances for Pope John Paul II. Students and alumni have performed for presidents, heads of states, and all the American cardinals.

Our music alumni, now more than 3000 in number, have won many competitions and awards and maintain high professional visibility on six continents as performers, music educators, composers, liturgical musicians, conductors, and scholars. Among those who have received national and international recognition are tenor John Aler, who won Grammy awards for recordings of Handel's Semele (best opera recording) and Bartok's Cantata Profana (best classical album), and Berlioz's Requiem (best vocal soloist); and soprano Harolyn Blackwell, who received critical acclaim for her Metropolitan Opera debut performances in Donizetti's opera La Fille du Regiment opposite Luciano Pavarotti. Recent graduates include Patrick Guetti, winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Audition, and Issachah Savage, winner of the top prize, Orchestra's Choice, and Audience's Choice in the International Wagner Competition. Our graduates perform with the Metropolitan Opera, Vienna Opera, Dresden Semperoper, Glyndebourne Festival, New York City Opera, and Lyric Opera of Chicago, and with many major symphony orchestras and in Broadway productions and professional theatres across the United States. Composers have premiered works with United States symphonies and opera companies, and musicologists have published influential books, articles, and musical editions.

The Department of Music in the Benjamin T. Rome School of Performing Arts remains the preeminent Catholic center for music study in the United States, and is internationally recognized for perpetuating the Church’s historical role in uplifting the human spirit through the study and performance of music. It welcomes applications from students of character, intelligence, motivation, and talent, regardless of race, creed, nationality, ethnic background, or disability.