Barrett Hipes

Barrett Hipes serves as Dean of Student Development, a division which encompasses the offices of Student Affairs, Residence Life, International Advisement & Diversity Initiatives, Community Engagement, Academic Support and Disability Services, and the Alan D. Marks Center for Career Services and Entrepreneurship. Dr. Hipes created and currently instructsEssentials of Entrepreneurship in the Arts and co-facilitates the first-year Colloquium. He has also served on the music and fine arts faculties of Rutgers University and St. John’s University, and has presented lectures and workshops at The Cooper Union, the Jewish Theological Seminary, and the University of Arkansas. Dr. Hipes has curated interdisciplinary performances and festivals around the United States as well as Costa Rica and the Cayman Islands. As a percussion soloist and founding member of Spindrift Percussion Group, Dr. Hipes has commissioned original works by renowned composers including Alejandro Vinao, David Skidmore, Russell Hartenberger, John Serry, Blake Tyson, Steven Bryant, and others. His own compositions include Opener for RH, co-composed with Aaron Ragsdale; Broadside, for the South Dakota State University Percussion Ensemble; Dzengi, premiered by the University of Arkansas Percussion Ensemble; and Prelude: On the Pulse of Morning for concert band, premiered in Washington, D.C., for the National Anthem Project.

Dr. Hipes received his undergraduate degree in music education and saxophone performance at The University of Arkansas, where he studied with Chalon Ragsdale and Stanley Morris. He continued graduate study in percussion performance with She-e Wu, Bob Becker, and Christopher Deviney at Rutgers University, and received a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from CUNY’s Graduate Center, where he was a student of Morris Lang.