Grammy award-winning jazz percussionist and Simon Industrial Fellow Carlos Maldonado recently ran workshops for year 6 classes in two local primary schools.

Pupils from Stanley Grove Primary Academy and Abraham Moss Community School had the opportunity to learn about the origins and traditions of jazz, including an introduction to jazz instruments and how to recognise styles and music from Latin America. The workshops also saw the children experience jazz first-hand, with a live performance from Carlos and the chance for pupils to perform and improvise using traditional instruments such as Maracas, Guido, Claves, Cowbell as well as different drums such as the Bongo drums and Cajón. 

The pupils asked great questions about Carlos’ awards, being a professional musician and his favourite instruments and percussion sounds. They described the workshop as ‘Amazing,’ ‘Fun’ and ‘Unique,’ with teachers commenting on how well the session aligned with their music curriculum and how it engaged and inspired pupils who would typically not engage. 

Watch the video below to see highlights of Carlos’ visit to Abraham Moss Community School:

Carlos has also performed with The University of Manchester’s jazz ensemble. Watch the video here:

The University of Manchester's elite chamber choir, Ad Solem, conducted by Robert Guy, have been invited to perform at a celebratory concert this Friday in Hong Kong. 

The concert will include a work by a lecturer from the music department - Dr Joshua Brown's On the Stork Tower.

If you would like to stream the concert on Friday, please sign up via this .

The Music Department is delighted to appoint Dr Honghsuo Fan as Honorary Research Fellow in Music. Dr Fan is a PhD graduate at the focused on how AI and Machine Learning can augment interactive multimedia performance systems and interactive music composition. 

His thesis was supervised by Prof Ricardo Climent and emerged novel forms of human-machine musicianship and machine-machine communication in the form of six musical compositions. As part of his portfolio, he developed an evolving real-time interactive performance system using artificial intelligence technology. 

After his PhD, Hongshuo was appointed Research Software Engineer at The RNCM Centre for Practice & Research in Science & Music (Royal Northern College of Music) where he works part-time.

Among other things, this Honorary Research Fellowship will allow Hongshuo to keep interacting with the research community, and to access the studios at NOVARS so that he can continue to contribute and support The Machine Learning for Music Working Group at . 

This research group is a community of composers, musicians, computer scientists and audiovisual artists, exploring the creative use of emerging AI and Machine Learning technologies in Music, across NOVARS, AMBS and PRiSM.

A sample of Hongshuo's work:

Dr David Onac Composer and Lecturer in Harmony and Contemporary Music Studies at the University of Manchester has been awarded a substantial commission to write a Requiem (a c.45-minute piece for choir and orchestra) to be premiered in the underwriting room at Lloyd's in London. 

This is sponsored by Lloyd's through the charity Culture& and is part of Lloyd's recently announced response to the recent discovery of documents which show their part in the transatlantic trade in enslaved Africans. One of the Requiem's aims is to memorialise these enslaved Africans. 

To find out more, please see below a few links to the Lloyd's / Culture& requiem commission:

Composer, performer and Greek beatboxer champion has just completed his one-month residency at the (Music, SALC), sponsored by the British Council scheme '', in partnership with the British Embassy Athens and the Greek State Scholarships Foundation (IKY).

As a registered student he spent most of his time at the Sheila Beckles studio experimenting with NOVARS's own Hordijk system, a designed and launched by instrument maker and guru Rob Hordjik. Mr Gargalas attended a number of postgraduate courses during his stay and interacted with our postgraduate community. 

On November 9th he presented his recent compositions and performance work as part of NOVARS Matinée series #53.

In 2022, Gargalas was invited by to participate in his AI for music project entitled and enjoyed the University so much that he decided to come back for more. 

That year, Climent trained an AI machine with Gargalas's beatboxing singing style for 20 hours and his facial and performance body gestures (at ) so that Gargalas could sing along with a virtual replica of himself.

The AI was trained with the assistance of Dr Hongshuo Fan using IRCAM's and modelled by . It was presented at Unsupervised #2 festival, the Mantis Festival and at the Science Festival 2022 with 22.000 visits in one week.

Inspired by visits to the Kielder Observatory in Northumberland, Black Fell is a game-for-music, a story in song where a psychological landscape of memory, grief and scientific passion unfolds. 

The story explores the thoughts of a central female character, an astronomer, on a cloudy night. Without the use of her telescopes, she turns inwards, where a psychological landscape of memories and scientific passions unfolds.

Funded by DC Labs, the co-creation of the research practice artefact brought musical development, led by Martin, together with Frances who shaped the poetry narrative. Hailed as a new approach to music, Black Fell is designed to bring a gaming-feel to opera storytelling.
 

Martin Suckling, Head of Music at University of York said:

How does Black Fell work?

Players are situated within a virtual ‘orchestra’ where they can freely move. Where you are positioned gives a unique balance of audio elements coupled with a variation of type of music. This shapes the direction the story takes. Audiences navigate by ear alone, or with the optional aid of a virtual ‘forest’ which provides visual feedback on their movements. Black Fell is designed for solo listening with headphones and is best played using a desktop PC or laptop. The full story only emerges over several iterations and responds to the listener’s choices as to how they move.
 

Frances Leviston, Senior Lecturer in Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester said:

Black Fell is available from Friday 3 November 2023 on the . The piece is performed by Loré Lixenberg (voice) and Jonathan Morton (violin), with software development by Marco Ng.

David travelled to Scotland to adjudicate performances of his pieces as part of the wider jury.

Dr. Önaç's said: "I am excited that my piano études have been selected as the set work for the SIPC semifinals, and I'm delighted to accept the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland's invitation to attend the competition in person. This is a fantastic opportunity to hear a wide variety of interpretations of my pieces played by many superb pianists from all over the world all within the space of two days - a composer's dream!"

More information here:

The 'Virtuoso International Music Awards 2023' is an international classical music competition based in London. 

Dimitra said: 

“I am very glad I received this award for playing Beethoven’s C minor sonata. It's one of my favourite pieces and it is related to my dissertation at University of Manchester. This professional category is the most competitive one, as anyone over 25 years old (with no age limit) could come and perform from all over the world.”

Dimitra's PhD is supervised by Professor Barry Cooper', a distinguished musicologist and Beethoven expert. 
There will be a gala concert in London for selected prize winners in the first half of 2024. 

Links:

Third-Year PhD student, Murrough Connolly, was one of three composers to win this year’s WCCMF String Quartet Composition Competition with his string quartet ‘Ildaite’. 

The award provides composers with a generous bursary and the opportunity to workshop and record their piece with a featured quartet at this year’s festival (23rd June – 2nd July). 

Murrough will be working with the London-based Calathea Quartet in a series of workshops, culminating in 2 public performances on the 25th and 29th of June in Bantry, Co. Cork.

Murrough says:
 

Murrough is also looking forward to two premieres of his work before the festival:

1. The world premiere of his choral piece, ‘From the Chrysalis’ by Somnium Chamber Choir (Friday 12th May, Holy Name Church, 91ֱ��).
2. The Irish premiere of his orchestral work ‘Litmus Papers’ by the University of Manchester Symphony Orchestra (Friday 16th June, Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin).

Senior Lecturer in Music Analysis, , announces the publication of her monograph: which appeared with Cambridge University Press in April.

The study challenges the influential but under-explored claim that Schubert could not successfully incorporate the lyric style into his sonatas, and offers a novel perspective on lyric form that embraces historical musicology, philosophy and music theory and analysis. 

Hyland’s exploration of the quartets reveals Schubert’s development of a lyrically conceived teleology which brings musical form, expression and temporality together in the service of fresh intellectual engagement.

As well as providing a broad historical overview of Schubert’s quartets and those of his more obscure contemporaries in Vienna, Schubert’s String Quartets: the Teleology of Lyric Form presents an in-depth study of form in the quartets themselves, especially their first movements.

Hyland’s analyses grant special focus to the relatively overlooked early quartets of 1810–16, isolating the questions they pose for music theory, and employing these as a means of scrutinising the relationship between the concepts of lyricism, development, closure and teleology.

This opens up space for these works to challenge some of the discourses that have historically beset them and offers a reframing of Schubert’s quartet oeuvre as central to the development of a decidedly nineteenth-century conception of lyric form.

A book launch is taking place on June 12th, 4pm at the 'CIDRAL Creations Launch' in the Atrium of the Ellen Wilkinson Building at the University of Manchester. The event is open and it will be followed by a wine reception.

Further information:

• &�Բ�����;‘’ written by Dr Hyland for CUP’s ‘fifteeneightyfour’ academic blog. 

Klassik-Heute, Orchestergraben and Global Music Award have recently praised Pereira's latest piano recording. This is the first recording of the complete 12 Poemas do Monte (Poems from the Mountain) by Portuguese composer Luiz Costa (1879-1960), eight of which were recorded here for the first time. Poemas do Monte are a window to the 1920s’ rural atmosphere of northern Portugal and a prime example of Costa’s bucolic lyricism.

Artur Pereira is a noted pianist and musicologist. In 2016 he completed his PhD at the University of Manchester, Music Department, with a dissertation on Beethoven’s Dedications, under the supervision of Professor Barry Cooper. His dissertation was later revised and published as a book. Dr Pereira also worked as a Teaching Assistant at the University. Previously, Artur studied piano at the RNCM and had also issued recordings of several of Beethoven’s piano sonatas.

Links to Pereira's recent reviews:

 scheme.

Cameron Biles-Liddell’s piece Caer Drewyn (The Hill Fort) takes inspiration from an iron age hill fort based in Corwen, North Wales. The piece will be premiered on 7 March 2023 at Hoddinott Hall, Millennium Centre, Cardiff, and  

Biles-Liddell is spending the run-up to the concert rehearsing with BBC NOW and principal conductor Ryan Bancroft, while also being mentored by composers Gavin Higgins and Sarah Lianne-Lewis to bring the piece to life.

“It’s a wonderful opportunity to have the chance to explore my orchestral music with BBC NOW,” he said. “This piece is quite personal to me as it explores my Welsh heritage, being brought up in North Wales. Really can’t wait for this fab orchestra to bring it to life.”

You can register for the free livestream .

This event, rescheduled from November 2022, takes place at the John Rylands Research Institute and Library and sees Stephen in conversation with Professor of Popular Culture (The University of Manchester), , about his career and published works, taking the audience from the Joy Division and New Order years, all the way to the present day. Professor Jon Savage is an English writer, broadcaster, and music journalist, with multiple publications to his name, including his latest book, , which provides an oral history of Joy Division. Both Stephen’s and Jon’s books will be available to buy at the event, and a book signing will be held afterwards.

Booking information

If you would like to see these two of Manchester’s musical legends in discussion, you can register to attend this FREE event via .

This event ties into the John Rylands Research Institute and Library’s , the first specifically designated national popular culture archive in the UK. Based at the John Rylands Research Institute and Library, it aims to celebrate and preserve the records of British popular culture, such as popular music, recognising its pivotal influence on the world stage.

“What is learned and how it is learned are interconnected.” - (Folkestad, 2006, 142)

The figure of the instrumental or vocal teacher is one of the most significant influences in the education of a music performance student. As part of the “Professional and Pedagogical Skills” course within our new Master’s pathway in Music Performance Studies, you will acquire knowledge and understanding about how to impart expertise and artistry to performance students effectively, and develop as an inspiring and wise instrumental or vocal teacher. You will also develop pedagogical skills to guide performance students as they cultivate technical, expressive and communicative excellence. 

The course will introduce historical and current theories of instrumental and vocal pedagogy to develop a critical understanding of different approaches to teaching and learning music performance. You will discover the role tradition, discourses and institutions play in instrumental and vocal pedagogies and critically evaluate their impact on music performance students. In addition to the idiosyncrasies of musical instruments, the course will also advance your knowledge in instrumental and vocal concert repertoire. 

Moving beyond the master-apprentice model, the unit will present instrumental and vocal teaching and learning as a highly complex, multidimensional and thoroughly collaborative and reflective practice. This course unit will also develop an understanding of the personal qualities that are essential for effective teaching of the science and art of instrumental and vocal performance.

Folkestad, Göran. (2006). Formal and informal learning situations or practices vs formal and informal ways of learning. British Journal of Music Education 23/2: 135-145.

• For more about our MusM Music Performance Studies (Starting September 2023) visit:
• Full entry requirements:
• Apply Online: /study/postgraduate/how-to-apply/

 in a friendly and fun environment.

Geared towards creating a safe space for those who might not feel comfortable in a formal performance environment, the Relaxed Performance will keep the lights on, the doors open and anyone who comes along is free to chat, sing, express themselves and move around however they wish. 

Who is the Relaxed Performance for? The answer in short is: everyone! This performance warmly welcomes babies and children, and people with dementia or learning difficulties. People with disabilities will find the Martin Harris Centre’s Cosmo Rodewald Concert Hall to be a venue that is accessible and comfortable. Anyone who feels like enjoying some well-loved  tunes in a friendly and informal environment can come along.

There is no need to book and seats are first-come-first-served, while patrons are free to change seats or step out of the hall at any time. 

The music will be performed by the talented members of the 91ֱ�� University Music Society who are happy to chat to audience members throughout the event.

When: Friday 16 December 2022 1.10-2pm 

Where: Martin Harris Centre for Music and Drama

How to book: Just turn up!

More information on  and others like it at the Martin Harris Centre 

The historic synagogue in Cheetham Hill, north 91ֱ��, will play host to music in memory of lost sisters.

Felix Mendelssohn’s String Quartet No. 6 in F Minor, Op 80, was written in tribute to his sister Fanny Mendelssohn, also a composer, after her death. Felix Mendelssohn himself died just two months after completing this piece in 1847, making this his last great work. 

Mieczyslaw Weinberg’s String Quartet No. 16 in A-flat Minor, Op. 130, will also be played. Weinberg wrote the piece in memory of his sister Ester in 1981, with whom he fled Warsaw when it was invaded by the Nazis in 1939. They had planned to flee to the USSR but Ester turned back and the two would never see each other again.

To add further context to what is sure to be an extraordinary evening of music, Head of the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures Professor Thomas Schmidt - The University’s resident Mendelssohn expert - will introduce the quartet.

Tickets for this unmissable musical event 

At the University of Manchester, we have ca. 30 years of performance tradition with electronics and computers. Our Festival, taking place biannually since 2004, features national and international talented performers combining acoustic instruments with electronics or fixed media. 

The MANTIS system includes 56-genelec speakers, one of the largest speaker orchestras in the world. Along with concerts, it often hosts Postgraduate-led music symposia on topics such as: audification, acoustic ecology, analogue music and . Our guest performers include: , , KAIROS, Trio Atem, H.E.L.L.O ensemble and , (violin), (percussion and timbila), (recorder), (bass clarinet), Conrad Marshall (flute), , Linda Jankowska (violin), Nina Whiteman (voice), Gavin Osborn (Bass flute), Helmut Lemke (8-cassette recorder), Mark Pilkington (in-game performance at ) and ca. 300 fixed media works diffused live.

Our Electronic Music Festivals celebrates performance with Analogue and Modular Synthesis, featuring , Joker Nies, Andrew Duff, Alexander Senko, Ryan Gaston, Sarah Belle Reid, Merkaba Macabre, Epigone, Scrubber Fox, Ross Scott-Buccleuch, Dustin Lyon, Phil Durrant, Chelsea Bruno (aka Eden Grey), Sam Waver, Richard Scott, Rodrigo De León, Joseph Hyde, Philippe Gauthier, Tanya St-Pierre, David Ross, Andy Cox, Udo Moll, Ann Rosén, Sten-Olof Hellström, Matt Omahan, Daniel Warner, Marty Ehrlich, Adam Parkinson, Martin Klang, Leafcutter John and Steph Horak.

Professor Mine Doğantan-Dack publishes new edited volume on The Chamber Musician in the Twenty-First Century (2022, Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, Basel). The volume places the performer at its centre and introduces participatory, collaborative, and socially engaged musical practices as defining the emergent activity domain of the 21st-century chamber musician. 

The volume proceeds from a critical scrutiny of the cultural-historical baggage that the term “chamber music” has accumulated as repertoire and as activity over the last couple of centuries and moves through contributions that discuss institutional pedagogical issues and professional concerns, as well as the inner musical and social workings of chamber music ensembles. 

The volume finally turns to an exploration of the experiences, attitudes and values of amateur chamber musicians, an awareness of which is beneficial for the professional chamber musician in the 21st century. 

The contributions go beyond identifying and critically scrutinising the diverse challenges that the contemporary chamber musician faces; they also explore novel developmental and professional paths through which the musical and social practices of the 21st-century chamber musician can become more relevant for and more closely integrated with 21st-century lives. 

For further information on this new publication, visit:

“Knowledge is nothing else than a rumour until you feel it in your muscles.” - Papua New Guinea proverb

Within the various course units that form part of the new Master’s in Music Performance Studies, students will have the opportunity to discover and undertake one of the most recent and most exciting knowledge practices that emerged in academia, namely Artistic Research in Music Performance. 

First recognised in the area of Design and Visual Arts within British university contexts in the 1990s, academic research that is methodologically integrated with artistic practice is now well-established in music scholarship. In the new Master’s course units, students will learn about the ongoing debates in Artistic Research in Music Performance, and explore its unique mode of knowledge production, which is simultaneously cognitive and affective-embodied, objective and subjective, as well as methodical and improvisational. 

They will learn how to mobilise their intensely felt performerly experiences as part of scholarly research undertakings, and develop skills in transforming the minutiae of the pre-conceptual images and sense impressions they have in making music into articulated foundations for systematic enquiry. 

Students will be encouraged to ask the kinds of questions about music and performing that are deeply embodied, culturally-historically situated, as well as personal-idiosyncratic. They will engage in the captivating process of constructing novel meanings about the music they play from their own situated perspectives, acknowledging all the while the plurality of meanings that any musical text or performance necessarily invokes. 

In engaging with Artistic Research in Music Performance, the relevant course units will take the subjectivity, agency and identity behind processes of knowledge production in music seriously, and explore the ways the artistic values and sensibilities of the students can be brought into processes of rigorous academic research.

With Guest Artists:
Rocio Bolaños - Bass Clarinet, Giorgos Gargalas – Voice (beatbox), Constantin Popp
and WEȽ∝KER

Featuring works by:
Anastasios Asonitis, Penelope Bekiari, Mark Mushet and David Berezan, Ricardo Climent (with Giorgos Gargalas, Hongshuo Fan, Alena Mesarosova and Manu Ferrer), George Edmondson, Hongshou Fan, Nicolas Garcia-Peguinho, Ella Kay, Sarah Keirle, Eddie Lansley, Rufus Murphy, Cameron Naylor, Jake Parry, Rachel Beckles Willson, Ryan Woods, Keyi Xu.

All the works will be diffused over our 32-loudspeaker surround sound system in the John Thaw Studio Theatre, Martin Harris Centre, the University of Manchester.

• Location: John Thaw Studio Theatre, Martin Harris Centre, University of Manchester
• Download Programme (PDF):
• Buy Tickets:
• Web:

In their joint Introduction to the edited volume Taking it to the Bridge: Music as Performance (2013, University of Michigan Press), musicologist Nicholas Cook and Theatre Studies scholar Richard Pettengil wrote that “The wonder is not that music and performance studies have come together but that they ever needed to be brought together. After all, what is music if not performance, real-time collective practice that brings people together as players and listeners, choreographs social relationships, and expresses and constructs individual and group identities?... Take away the performance, and you take away the music.”

In the Researching Performance: Issues and Approaches Course Unit within the new MusM Music Performance Studies, students will discover the fascinating story behind the emergence of Music Performance Studies as a new academic discipline during the twenty-first century, learn about the continuities between artistic performance and performative behaviours in everyday life, and develop the skills to analyse, interpret and evaluate music performances from a variety of genres as culturally and historically contingent, fully embodied practices.

This Course Unit will broaden the aesthetic horizons of music students by introducing alternative ways of thinking about the art of musical performance, through the lens of recent research. It will also encourage students to bring the performative and textual aspects of music into creative dialogue, and inspire them to engage with scholarly knowledge as a creative partner in their artistic practice.

• For more about our MusM Music Performance Studies (Starting September 2023) visit:
• Full entry requirements:
• Apply Online: /study/postgraduate/how-to-apply/

Prof Malone, Professor of Social and Autoethnographic Composition at 91ֱ��, has visited Ukraine 11 times over the past two decades, with over a dozen pieces premiered and broadcast on their national TV and radio networks. 

With Ukraine enduring a war of survival for its identity and cultural, the country's Composers Union reached out to Prof Malone for some new music and support. 

Prof Malone has been providing personal assistance since March 2022, including help with this year's defiant Kyiv Music Fest held from 24 September to 2 October. The organiser, Igor Shcherbakov, stated that – for the first year ever – not one penny was used from state funding so as to not drain any part of Ukraine's fight against Putin's war. 

The Composer's Union President commissioned Prof Malone to write a piano piece, the politically-charged The People Protesting Drum Out Bigly Covfefe (a recent anti-Trump administration work). The music consists of chants Prof Malone has heard at UK and USA rallies over the past six years, carefully notated and then scored as a piano fantasy re-enacting the voice of oppressed and unheard peoples. The piece was performed in Kyiv but not officially listed within the festival programme, since it could be wilfully misconstrued. 

“The sheer bravery of the festival organisers, musicians, venue managers and audience comes as no surprise: their world-class artistry is something to fight for,” said Prof Malone.

The Oram awards (named after pioneer British composer and electronic musician
composer Daphne Oram) celebrate innovation in sound, music and related technologies and elevating the work and voices of Women, Trans and Non-Binary Artists.

is an electroacoustic composer and sound designer studying at NOVARS Research Centre who aims to draw attention to important cultural topics through sound. Focusing on fixed media acousmatic works, she aims to explore the intricacies of sound and humanity through a variety of auditory experiences.

is a 91ֱ�� based artist making work that combines performance, installation and sound. She began working in experimental concrete music and her practice has expanded to include dance, gesture, sonic drawings, stone sculpture and film. She is interested in creating a multi-sensory experience that creates possible conditions for communication and exchange.

• Oram Awards 2022 video showcase:
• Oram Awards website:

Professor Mine Doğantan-Dack, Director of MusM Performance Studies, Department of Music

For more details about the MusM Music (Performance Studies) visit:
/study/masters/courses/list/20871/musm-music-performance-studies/course-details/#course-profile

John Chantler is a musician and organiser living in Sweden. He mostly works with synthesizers and electronics to create unpredictable, highly dynamic music where passages of spare, alien beauty bridge held chords, saturated in harmonic distortion. In 2019 he started building a system for performance consisting of multiple battery powered synthesizer/speaker things that can be variably suspended, swung, spun and set in locations without depending on the typical concert/club infrastructure and classical modes of performer/audience interaction. His most recent solo recording ‘Tomorrow is too late’ (October 2019, ROOM40) was originally commissioned by INA GRM for the 2018 Présences Électronique festival in Paris. 

In 2020 he released recordings of two ongoing collaborations: a duo with saxophonist Johannes Lund (Andersabo) and a trio with drummer Steve Noble and saxophonist Seymour Wright (Atlantis). Originally from Australia he spent a decade in London before moving to Sweden in 2014 where he directs a small annual festival for ‘other music’ in Stockholm called Edition. The ‘Fifth Edition’ is provisionally scheduled for early August 2020 2021 February 2022.

Under the theme of ‘Future Human’, academic researchers, postgraduates and artistic residents at the NOVARS research centre from the University of Manchester are joining the festival’s ‘Family Zone’, with a mission to communicate complex musical research to younger audiences.

The showcase including four interactive works combining Music and AI in partnership with PRiSM (RNCM) explores the limits of human/computer interaction in sound, navigating the relationships between humans and artificial intelligentia through music and exploring future human habitats in sound away from our solar system.

21–30 October 2022 from 10.00–16.00 at the 1830 Warehouse, Science and Industry Museum, 91ֱ��. Free and suitable for all ages!

Book Tickets .

Installations:

• AURA#1: Algorithmic STEEL sound sculpture’ by Vicky Clarke.
  This research aims to demystify machine learning, break out of the hidden black box and share insights and approaches for other artists to create with sonic AI.
• EXOPLANETS by Cameron Naylor.
  This interactive installation uses the databases collected by scientists, and invites visitors to experiment for themselves how exoplanets may look and sound like, by creating them from scratch.
• AI BEATBOXER (Noh Virtual), a project by Ricardo Climent with Giorgios Gargalas (Greek beatboxer champion), Hongshuo Fan, Alena Mesarošová and Manu Ferrer.
  Masks in Japanese Noh theatre work like mysterious portals to the inner life and narratives of the characters they represent. But what if we use Artificial Intelligence to teach a mask to learn how to beatbox, so that they become your singing companion?
• #UnSupervised highlights: A collaboration between PRiSM and the NOVARS Research Centre at the University of Manchester. This community of composers, musicians, computer scientists and audiovisual artists explore the creative use of emerging AI and Machine Learning technologies in Music.

As a Professor of Social and Autoethnographic Composition, Kevin has decades of experience in interviewing, recording, editing, and creating sonic art from personalised interviews, and along with John and Australian researcher Dr Anh Nguyen, devised an approach to interview a UK-based descendant of the family that owned John’s ancestors. 

Kevin also served as recording engineer and editor for this interview, which took place in 91ֱ�� on 26 May 2022, and which will serve as the basis for John’s next work on how understanding and potential reconciliations across racial lines may be achieved.  A group visit to Liverpool’s International Slavery Museum informed more of the group’s research.

Our new concert series starts with two virtuoso performers from Cyprus and Iran playing original music by Dimitrie Cantemir (1673-1723), a Moldavian prince, statesman, a prolific writer, a philosopher, historian, composer, musicologist, linguist, ethnographer and a geographer, regarded as one of the most significant early Enlightenment figures.

Watch the performance:

Born in Nicosia, Cyprus, Giannis Koutis studied Byzantine Ecclesiastical, Classical Guitar and Oud the with the virtuoso Oud player Haig Yazdjian. He completed his Master studies on Ottoman Music at Codarts Conservatory for the Arts (Rotterdam, NL) with the neyzen master Kudsi Erguner (UNESCO Artist for Peace). He actively researches in the field of Modal Music of the Eastern Mediterranean, focusing mainly in sources of unpublished manuscripts of Monasteries’ archives. He performs on an Oud made by Dimitris Rapakousios.

Reza Mirjalali was born in Tehran, 1989. He started music at the early age of seven, while his father, Maestro Shahram Mirjalali, was teaching him Tombak and a Tar, giving concerts already at the age of 14. He is actively performing worldwide and has several collaborations with ensembles of different music genres such as Persian traditional music, Ottoman music, Jazz, Pop while maintaining a duo with his father. Currently, he is working on the release of his first solo album. He performs on a Tar made by Shahram Mirjalali.

British-Bahraini trumpeter and three-times Grammy winner Puerto Rican percussionist have received a . Working together with at the Department of Music at the University of Manchester, the team aims to bring together examples of new scholarship and musical production to cast light on the dynamic world of diasporic jazz practices in the framework of dialogue between composers, performers, scholars, and students of jazz.
The project will result in the composition and premiere of a new work on Thursday 15th December (1.10-1.55 pm, Cosmo Rodewald Concert Hall), and will be followed by a performance workshop and research forum with Dr Evanthia Patsiaoura that same afternoon.

Yazz says: “It’s an honour to have received this fellowship and I’m very much looking forward to collaborating with the students, Alexander and Carlos. During the summer I played alongside Carlos in New York when I was a guest soloist with Arturo O’Farrill’s Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra, and he is a wonderfully talented musician. This experience really sparked my interest in Cuban music and I’ve been having lots of fun learning about its complex rhythms and structures, exploring different ways to blend these characteristics with Middle Eastern rhythms and scales. The piece I have written for this project is inspired by popular music from 60’s Iraq, married with the sounds of Salsa and Montuno. It sounds like a crazy mix, but I feel it will work beautifully!”

Tongue Drum, an electroacoustic composition that explores the sounds of a steel tongue drum, has won second prize in the 2022 Fundación Destellos Competition for Electroacoustic Music based in Argentina, while the piece has also garnered a second runner-up prize in the Canadian 2021 Musicworks Electronic Music Composition Contest.

Listeners can find some of David’s music . 

Image credit: Marta Zigante (Italy), an artistic interpretation of the work.

Prof Ricardo Climent (Music academic and founder at Keep•It•Human) joined forces with marine biologist Camille Rivera (NGO co-founder) and her team, to record and monitor three contrasting mangrove forests in the Philippines. Visited sites included La Union, Bais (Negros Oriental island) and Makati bay, where they deployed a series of specialised audio loggers. 

The video-game spin-out from The University of Manchester also contributed to the plantation of 400 seedling mangroves and interviewed community leaders with the support of local environmental authorities.

The acoustic analysis of bird and bat species will provide a new understanding of the health of local mangrove areas across the country. However, it will also be part of the sound design of their new video-game which aims to create awareness of mangroves deforestation, leading players to real-world action. The game prototype was completed last May, in collaboration with and supported by the Faculty of Humanities recovery fund and .

Camille Rivera commented “We have to accept that technology is with us and we have to adapt very fast to these changes. And one of the changes is merging conservation and gamification. I see that we are tapping to an unused potential of gamers to contribute to change in the real world. That’s why I am excited with this project because it's a very nice innovative model to use video-game, and at the same time contribute to a positive impact on the ground, plus everyone loves to play games too!”

Prof Climent said “My body and soul still resonate loudly after this trip guided by Oceanus. One can’t build a game-for-good without a first-hand experience of the problem. It was heartbroken to visit devastated mangrove areas because of urbanisation, pollution, logging and intensive fishponds and aquaculture. However, discovering protected mangrove reservoirs brought us hope and strength to work on the solution.”

Watch the video below to find out more.

Chris Rhodes has been awarded a very prestigious UKRI Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) Doctoral Prize, for retaining top PhD level EPSRC funded students, at the University of Manchester. This prize was based on his PhD research at NOVARS Research Centre, (Music), which investigated the use of biometrics, machine learning and AI to compose a portfolio of music. 

He will investigate how AI technology can be used to play the guitar. The project starts in July 2022, within the School of Engineering, department of Computer Science, at the University of Manchester, sponsored by Prof. Caroline Jay.

Chris says:
“It was incredible to hear that I was awarded this prize after developing a proposal based on my PhD research within music composition, following the work done in this area with Prof. Ricardo Climent (NOVARS) and Dr. Richard Allmendinger (AMBS). It has been tremendously fun, educational, and rewarding to work with them as a team. It was also incredibly exciting to hear that Prof. Caroline Jay (School of Engineering, department of Computer Science) was joining this Doctoral Prize project as a sponsor at the University of Manchester, and it was vital to have her input and expertise when developing this project proposal.

Prof. Caroline Jay says:
“I am delighted Chris will be joining the department, and looking forward to doing some great research with him and the wider team”

De Richard Allmendinger says:
“It is superb news for Chris to be awarded this fellowship and continue this line of research now also with Computer Science”

Prof. Ricardo Climent says:
“This is the cherry on the cake to Chris’s PhD research; a prize very much deserved. His work at the intersections of Music, Machine Learning and Biometrics has been outstanding but his greatest contribution was his passion and unconditional dedication to our group.

This concert featured the premiere of Erysichthon’s Forest, a melodrama based on the Greek myth of Erysichthon, composed by Richard Whalley, with libretto by John McAuliffe. 

It was performed by Louise Wayman (soprano), Simon Grange (bass), Petr Prause (cello) and Richard Whalley (piano). 

Music from this melodrama will ultimately form part of a chamber opera telling the story of Erysichthon, to be performed in collaboration with 91ֱ�� Opera Project.

The work is based on a tale from Roman poet Ovid’s Metamorphoses, in which Erysichthon destroys a sacred forest, and is cursed for his actions by Ceres with the punishment of insatiable hunger: the more he easts the more hungry he feels, until he has consumed all of his wealth, and ultimately consumes himself. 

Analogies between this and the way humans today are consuming Earth’s resources at unsustainable levels are clear and echo the Faculty of Humanities’ priority themes of Sustainable Futures, Global Inequalities and Creativity.

The ‘Songs of Sustainability’ project was built around these values, through which four composers were selected through a call for proposals to set poems that engage with the beauty and vulnerability of nature chosen by John McAuliffe. The selected composers were Amy Crankshaw, Simon Davies, Finn McLean and Jasmine Simons, and the poets are Rebecca Hurst, Frances Leviston, Chad Campbell and Vona Groarke.

The evening concert was be preceded by an afternoon workshop with researchers from different disciplines relating to sustainability, in the hopes of informing further the expansion of the opera.

Ticket sales from the concert went to support

The  has awarded researchers at The University of Manchester, , and the  an 18-month grant to evaluate the impact of Manchester Camerata’s online 20-week  programme for people with dementia. 

The main focus of this funded project is on ascertaining care home staff and family carer wellbeing. The MiMR programme is based around music and ‘in the moment’ improvisation and builds on a successful collaboration between The University of Manchester and 91ֱ�� Camerata that stretches back to 2014. This collaboration continues, with academics from The University’s  and  forming key parts of the MiMR team, and at the end of the project,  will disseminate the project’s research findings in a series of hosted workshops. 

Principal investigator, Professor John Keady, said: "This study is a tremendous opportunity to better understand how change occurs in improvised music making for people living with dementia and the well-being effects that this can have on all those taking part in the sessions, especially care home staff and family carers. 

“We are planning to use creative social research methods in this study and to contribute towards an aesthetic of care practice.”

Commenting on the employment of Dr Robyn Dowlen as the lead researcher on the study, Lizzie Hoskin, Head of Community at 91ֱ�� Camerata, said: “We are really excited to be working with Robyn again in her new role as the lead researcher on this study and to welcome her back to 91ֱ�� Camerata. 

"The success of her previous ‘in the moment’ PhD research with our in-person Music in Mind programme has meant that we have been able to develop our work in music and dementia even further. It's great that this new NIHR SSCR project will focus again on the benefits that music can bring, not only to those people living with dementia, but for those who care for them as well.”

The MiMR team are: 

·      Professor John Keady (PI): Division of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work, University of Manchester/Greater 91ֱ�� Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust. Senior Fellow SSCR.

·      Professor Alys Young (Co-i): Division of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work, University of Manchester. Senior Fellow SSCR.

·      Professor Caroline Bithell (Co-i): Music Department, University of Manchester.

·      Dr Alexander Gagatsis (Co-i): Music Department, University of Manchester.

·      Lizzie Hoskin (Co-i): Head of Community, 91ֱ�� Camerata, The Monastery, Gorton, 91ֱ��.

·      Cathy Riley (Co-i): Open Doors Service Manager, Greater 91ֱ�� Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust.

Researchers:

·      Dr Robyn Dowlen: Division of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work, University of Manchester.

·      Helena Bull: 91ֱ�� Camerata, The Monastery, Gorton, 91ֱ��.

For more information, please contact John Keady.

[Image credit: Rachel Bywater Photography]

One of the Music department's PhD graduates, David Onac, has had one of his piano compositions included in the newly released Grade 5 syllabus of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM). This means that piano students all across the world will be learning and playing his music!

The piece, called 'A Distant Start in the Stillness', has already received from musicians and teachers, with one describing it as ‘my standout piece of the new syllabus … it’s an outstanding composition from a name I’ve not come across before. I hope he’s someone we’ll see and hear lots more from in the future’.

David graduated from 91ֱ�� with a PhD in Composition in 2013. Last year he held a fixed-term lectureship in composition here.

His piece, which is featuring in a promotional campaign for the new syllabus, can already be heard on .

The composer was inspired by a Qing Dynasty scroll held in the collections of the John Rylands Research Institute and Library which took centre stage at last year’s exhibition The Qing: China’s Multilingual Empire. Following three years of in-depth research into the China collection, the exhibition was eventually opened to the public from October 2021 until March 2022, attracting thousands of visitors from across the UK, especially Chinese and Chinese Studies students.

The 24-metre scroll illustrates bustling Beijing street celebrations for Emperor Kangxi’s birthday that took place in 1713 with meticulous detail of everyday life, shops, animals, infrastructure and entertainment. The music responds to the ceremonial and processional imagery shown, with some elements being the first depiction in Chinese art. Throughout the piece of music, the luachui or ‘scattering hammer’ rhythm is used to signify cultural exchange by combining rhythmic elements of Chinese opera with old English songs that existed around the same time. Another inspiration for this piece is the scroll as an object in itself, with the music being used as an analogy for the paper’s slow continuity and the deliberate but delicate ink marks on the surface.

Illustrations of the Grand Ceremony premiered online on 6^th June 2022 at the John Rylands Library where the performance by Mercury Strings was filmed. Its live premiere took place on 20^th June at St Anne’s church, Rossendale by the same ensemble. The accompanying tape track was produced and performed by Joshua Brown himself. 

 You can watch Illustrations of the Grand Ceremony on the 91ֱ�� Confucius Institute’s website and .

In addition to The Qing: China’s Multilingual Empire exhibition, 91ֱ�� Confucius Institute held a 16-day online campaign to mark their 15th anniversary. Through video and photo content on their social media platforms, they revisited key moments and accomplishments together in conversations with key stakeholders such as the former Chair of CI Board, Confucius Classrooms staff, cultural partners, teachers and staff.

  and relive the last 15 years with them!

Poetry 

Poetry by local school children will be on display following the success of MA and PhD student-delivered poetry clinics as part of the annual Schools Poetry Competition in partnership with , the and the . These poems all reflect on the theme of Climate Change and capture a generation’s fears, passions and frustrations using the magic of words. 

Photography 

The top 30 photos from this year’s International Photography Competition run by the in partnership with Creative 91ֱ�� and the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures will have a satellite exhibition at University Place, where the public will get the opportunity to vote for the People’s Choice Award-winning photo. This year’s theme was ‘The Feeling of Home’ and the 30 shortlisted photos were selected by a panel of expert judges for their composition and storytelling ability. 

Language 

91ֱ�� is a city of many languages and dialects and The Linguistic Diversity Collective is inviting Community Festival attendees to explore how they use their own language by contributing to a linguistic snapshot of the city. There will be family-friendly activities for everyone to participate in which will help to paint a linguistic picture of Manchester. 

Jazz 

At 14.15, a jazz quintet will take to the performance area at University Place to treat attendees to some live music. The audience can listen out for some jazz standards and some improvisation from the ensemble, whose influences include Charlie Parker, Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea, John Scofield, Ari Hoenig and Jaco Pastorius. 

The Community Festival takes place on Saturday 25 June from 11.00 to 16.00 across campus, with SALC’s activities taking place at University Place (aka the Tin Can) on Oxford Road, 91ֱ��. 

Find out more .  

Once again delivered by the talented students from the 91ֱ�� University Music Society (MUMS), this year’s theme is ‘Music Around the World,’ an exploration of different music cultures, including a performance by Nigerian Gospel singer Klezmer and Irish dancing. 

Previous Relaxed Performance events have included a singalong, where parents and young children were able to meet the musicians and even join in with their own instruments, clap hands, or jangle keys to the music. Visitors were vocal in their appreciation of the event, supporting the Martin Harris Centre’s ongoing campaign to become a more accessible arts venue and part of The University’s wider social responsibility goals.

This year’s performance is no different, having been designed to be sensitive to and accepting of those who may benefit from a more relaxed environment. This might include (but is not limited to) those with autistic spectrum conditions, anyone with a learning disability, or a sensory and communication disorder. Audience members will also have the chance to meet the performers and try some musical instruments themselves.

‘Relaxed Performance: Music Around the World’, takes place on 9 June 2022, at 1.30pm, and all are welcome for FREE (simply turn up).

For further information, please .

Venue: 

This year marks the 10th anniversary of the SCS Killaloe Music Festival, which will take place from the 3rd to the 5th of June 2022. 
Katherine Hunka, Artistic Director of the Festival and leader of the Irish Chamber Orchestra, had the good fortune to hear Murrough Connolly’s work being performed at the MTU Cork School of Music in 2021. She was very taken by his writing style and commissioned him to write a violin duo for this year’s festival. ‘Imperium’ is highly expressive and Murrough uses the two violins to evoke opposing forces, conflict, and struggles for power. On Friday 13th May, Murrough’s interview with Carl Roewer will be released on the SCS Killaloe Music Festival Podcast. The podcast will feature discussions about the piece, Murrough’s compositional process and his experience as a young emerging composer and can be found on the festival’s website or Spotify.

Watch Murrough’s interview .
 
Murrough says:
“I am delighted to be a part of such a wonderful festival which features outstanding musicians and contemporary composers from Ireland. Katherine’s support and eagerness to provide a platform for new music in Ireland has been inspiring. I would also like to thank my supervisor Prof. Camden Reeves for his guidance and advice, which have been so important for my musical and professional development.”

Murrough is in his second year of a PhD in Musical Composition, under the supervision of Prof. Camden Reeves.

Professor Camden Reeves’s new album, Blue Sounds for Piano, will be released on the Metier label on 13 May 2022. The record was recorded by pianist Tom Hicks, (alumni of the University of Manchester), after around 10 years of collaboration on three substantial piano works: Tangle-Beat Blues, Nine Preludes and Blue Sounds for Piano. Tom has toured these works extensively over the years, including in a profile recitals of all three works, in London and Chicago, in 2019 and 2020.

The album with be released in CD form and digitally on streaming platforms (including Amazon and Spotify).

Professor Reeves says:

‘It’s a real joy to see this disc come into reality, as both a celebration of this collaboration and a permanent record of our work together. Tom is one of the most astonishing pianists of his generation. That was clear to all, right from his first year as a student here. It’s been wonderful to see his career go from strength to strength, and to be part of that journey with him. I’m really pleased with the Artwork too. The artwork was done by another University of Manchester alumni – Maria Kolpatchki. Maria graduated with a BMus last year. She had done lots artwork for the University Music Society (posters, programmes and the like). It caught my eye, so I asked her if she’d like to do this. With Tom at the piano, and with Maria’s artwork, to me the result looks and sounds stunning. I’m delighted with it.’

NOVARS PhD candidate and EPSRC scholarship awardee Tasos Asonitis was awarded the Best Paper Award in the 11th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Music, Sound, Art and Design, EvoMUSART 2022 (part of Evostar). 

Asonitis' paper, titled "SonOpt: Sonifying Bi-Objective Population-Based Optimization Algorithms" and co-authored by Dr. Richard Allmendinger (AMBS), Dr. Matt Benatan (Sonos Inc.) and Prof. Ricardo Climent (NOVARS), introduces an application that sonifies multi-objective optimization algorithms to facilitate the understanding of the algorithmic behavior. 

Tasos was also featured in the Outstanding Students list for Evostar 2022.

Tasos says:
"It was huge honor to be awarded such a prestigious prize. My background and my main interest is in Music Composition assisted by computers, and therefore I was not sure what feedback such research would receive from a pure scientific community. I was very glad to see how many people were interested in the use of sound as an additional mode of process monitoring in their field. 

Sonification / Audification is an established practice for a few decades in the Electroacoustic Music community, especially at NOVARS, but for the scientific community working developing optimization algorithms, it is a relatively new world. Hopefully this research will be a first step towards a better understanding of how Artificial Intelligence sounds like. 

In the future, I also hope that musicians will be encouraged to look at such scientific methods in order to harvest creative potential at the intersections of music and the machine intelligence".

A lost early version of Jean Sibelius’s tone poem, The Swan of Tuonela, has been reconstructed by Dr Sarah Moynihan. It was performed for the first time by MUMS Chamber Orchestra at the Martin Harris Centre on Wednesday 23rd March 2022, conducted by Maren Kuzmak.

The Swan of Tuonela is one of four tone poems in Jean Sibelius’s symphonic suite, Lemminkäinen: Four Legends from The Kalevala, Op. 22. The work was completed by early spring of 1896, but after negative reviews following its premiere, Sibelius revised the whole work twice and reversed the order of its inner movements.

Among other amendments, he shortened The Swan by a fourth of its length. Though early versions of the other three tone poems in the suite have been reconstructed, performed, and recorded, the first versions of the Swan were thought to be entirely destroyed during an RAF bombing raid in Leipzig (1943). 

In 2013, however, editors of Sibelius’s complete works made an exciting discovery: two early Violin I parts for the Swan were found in the Helsinki Philharmonic Archives. These contain passages later omitted from the final version and many annotations. Moynihan’s analytically informed reconstruction takes the surviving Violin I parts as the harmonic and textural basis for what is, in equal part, a posthumous collaboration and orchestral reimagining.

The recent performance was accompanied by synchronised digital programme notes sent to audience members’ phones via the BBC Philharmonic’s innovative Notes web app: a particularly useful tool for drawing attention to the variation between Moynihan’s reconstruction and Sibelius’s final version of the work.

Second Year PhD Student, Cameron Biles-Liddell, has been awarded the 2022 Paul Mealor Bursary for Student Composers by the Welsh Music Guild. This prize is the opportunity to compose a work for the baritone, Jeremy Huw Williams, and piano which will be premiered in autumn 2022. This follows on from the recent premier of Cameron’s piece, Frozen Plains, as performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales as part of the BBC Composition Wales:2021 Scheme.

Cameron says:

‘I’m thrilled to be awarded this bursary by the Welsh Music Guild. As a composer based in Wales it is wonderful for my work to be recognised and supported by the Welsh Music Guild and receive the opportunity to compose a new work. Thanks goes to the music department and Camden Reeves for his support, advice and guidance that has prepared me to make the most out of these opportunities, I am looking forward to what comes next!’

Renowned violinist Madeleine Mitchell will be performing a new piece by University of Manchester Professor of Social and Autoethnographic Composition Kevin Malone in a recital celebrating music by women.

The unique work for solo violin and electronics, written as a gift to Mitchell, is entitled Your Call is Important to Us and uses recordings of women's voices from call waiting recordings interwoven with a violin solo.  

Described by The Times as “one of the UK’s liveliest musical forces”, Mitchell has performed as a soloist and chamber musician for the BBC Proms, BBC Radio 3, and at the Wigmore and Barbican Halls in London. She has traveled extensively internationally, performing at illustrious events including the British Embassy in Rome’s ‘A Century of British Music’ event to mark the Queen’s Jubilee.  

A Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts since 2000, the award-winning musician also founded the in Cardiff, the first international celebration of ‘the fiddle’ in the arts, and she has recently won a Royal Philharmonic Society Enterprise Award for her creative project linking art and music in film with the current V&A Fabergé exhibition. 

In addition to Your Call is Important to Us, by Kevin Malone, Mitchell’s Martin Harris Centre performance – which is accompanied by Nigel Clayton on the piano – will include pieces written for her by Errollyn Wallen CBE and Sadie Harrison, whose work Aurea Luce features on Mitchell's album Violin Muse. They will also perform the romantic Nocturne by Lili Boulanger (from Mitchell's album Violin Songs) and Romance by Amy Beach.  

The lunchtime concert, which is free to attend, welcomes all music lovers and is bound to be a stellar string event. The premiere of the Malone work will be recorded live for inclusion on Mitchell's forthcoming album. 

The concert will take place on Thursday 17 March 2022 at The University of Manchester’s Martin Harris Centre from 13.10 – 13.55 in the Cosmo Rodewald Concert Hall, Bridgeford Street, off Oxford Road, 91ֱ�� M13 9PL.

Full details are available . 

Find out more about Madeleine Mitchell . 

Photo by Daniel Ross.

A University of Manchester machine-learning music project has been shortlisted for a Prolific North Digital City Award.

UNSUPERVISED 2021 is a product of the ML4M (Machine Learning for Music) working group, a collaboration between the Royal Northern College of Music’s Centre for Practice and Research in Science and Music (PRiSM), the University’s NOVARS research centre and the Alliance 91ֱ�� Business School.

The fledgling ML4M group fuses postgraduate composers, artists and specialists in computer science and engineering.

UNSUPERVISED 2021 is ML4M’s debut project and features eight new works engaging with machine learning technology. It has been created by eight RNCM PRiSM and University of Manchester doctoral researchers and artists. Five of these pieces were created using PRiSM’s flagship software tool PRiSM SampleRNN and were as a result of collaborations between students and Dr Christopher Melen, PRiSM Research Software Engineer.

“Being a part of the UNSUPERVISED team since its inception has been an incredible and rewarding experience,” said Dr Chris Rhodes, Doctoral Researcher, NOVARS Centre, University of Manchester. “Working in a collective, focused on the application of AI for musical creativity, is always inspiring. As curious members, we help each other think about how AI can be applied to music composition by describing our philosophy when applying AI to art, our methods (technical and aesthetic) and our artistic angles.”

UNSUPERVISED 2021 has been shortlisted for the Digital City Award Best Use of Technology - Not-for-profit category. The Awards celebrate the organisations and individuals who are working to build a better future through technology.

The awards ceremony will take place on 10 March 2022 at the Etihad Stadium, where singer Sheila Gordhan will present the winners.

“We are delighted to have been nominated for the Digital City Awards,” said Dr Sam Salem, RNCM PRiSM Lecturer, who established ML4M in 2020 with Professor of Interactive Music Composition at The University of Manchester Ricardo Climent and Dr Richard Allmendinger, Associate Professor in Decision Sciences at AMBS.

“The Machine Learning for Music Working Group is still very much in its infancy … and it is therefore hugely encouraging to receive this nomination for our first event,” Dr Salem added. “We look forward to presenting our latest work in the next UNSUPERVISED events, scheduled for June 2022.”

The shortlist for this year’s Digital City Awards can be found .

The famous opening theme of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, which can be represented by the rhythm da-da-da-dumm, can now be seen in a new light, thanks to the investigations of Barry Cooper. 

The theme has been recycled numerous times, not least as a symbol for Victory during the Second World War, since it matches the rhythm of letter V in Morse code; but its origins have never been properly explored or understood.  Now, Cooper has shown that Beethoven apparently conceived it originally as a merely subsidiary theme in an unfinished piano fantasia. 

He began composing this fantasia around April 1804, but quickly abandoned it and adopted the theme as the start of a new symphony, as is indicated in a manuscript now in Berlin. Although the sketch for the theme was known to scholars, its function as part of the fantasia was not previously recognised. 

It is remarkable that an idea with such humble beginnings has become such a celebrated musical icon. Cooper’s account of his discovery is to appear imminently in the next issue of Ad Parnassum, a peer-reviewed music journal published in Bologna.

The Tippett Medal is a new prize for composition which welcomed 54 submissions from a wide variety of compositional practices.  

This prestigious honour was awarded for Casken's The Shackled King, a drama for bass, mezzo-soprano and ensemble based on Shakespeare's King Lear. According to the prize jury, 'the winning piece exhbited a level of creative excellence which was impossible to ignore. Imaginatively presented and ideally matching the quality of the composition, a piece which demands a rich future life.'

The Shackled King received its first performance under lockdown at The University of Manchester in December 2020 with Sir John Tomlinson in the title role and Rozanna Madylus as Cordelia, Goneril, Regan and The Fool. Its first public performance was at the Buxton International Festival on Friday, 23 July 2021 with the same cast.

Professor Casken worked at The University of Manchester from 1992 to 2008, and while Head of the School of Music and Drama oversaw the building of the Martin Harris Centre. He retains strong links with the Music Department as Emeritus Professor of Music and has established himself as one of the most distinctive composers of his generation, with works across every genre and inspiration from literature and legend as well as landscape and the visual arts.  

His other stage works include the opera Golem (for which he was awarded the first Britten Prize for Composition in 1990), God's Liar (2000) and the monodrama Kokoschka's Doll, premiered at the Cheltenham Festival in 2017.

Find out more:

Currently in her second-year of part-time studies on the MusM Masters in Composition, under the supervision of Professor Camden Reeves, Vinthya Vinthya Perinpanathan has been accepted onto the for women composers from minority ethnic backgrounds. Vinthya is working on fusion and cross-genre composition, bringing together Western styles with the music of her Sri Lankan heritage.

As part of the Manasamitra scheme, Vinthya will be working with artistic director Supriya Nagarajan, a Carnatic singer and composer. Vinthya hopes to compose a piece for a combination of both Western and Indian instruments to submit as part of her final Masters portfolio.

Vinthya says:
I am so excited to work with an Indian instrumentalist again, and to bring this music to the University of Manchester Music Department. My tutor, Professor Camden Reeves, has always supported my compositional interests, so I am eager to work with him, as well as Supriya, on this piece. I think this experience will bring my compositional practice to the next level!

For the past decade, each new incarnation of the ensemble – appearing as the Michael Kahan Kapelye – has thrilled audiences at 91ֱ��’s Jewish Museum and other venues in and around the city, with current ensemble members often being joined by members of the Kapelye’s past line-ups. Seeing so many of the players perform together again, alongside other friends and associates, after such a long hiatus made for a truly joyous occasion.

Richard (by day, Senior Lecturer in Education here at the University of Manchester) is also a graduate of our Master's programme in Ethnomusicology, and Martin Pleass, his co-student at that time, joined the ensemble playing his distinctive harp guitar.

The concert was preceded by the screening of a set of music videos created by former Music student Sam Gee, one of which also featured animations by recent graduate Claire Loveday.

The pieces included in Richard’s albums, interwoven with influences and inspirations from the Balkans, Ireland and Wales, as well as the world of klezmer, have been taking shape over the past thirty years. Their performance by such a talented company of musicians was a fitting celebration of his musical journey to date.

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