Faculty of Music Research Projects

The Faculty has many varied research interests, including:

Biography of Peggy Glanville-Hicks

Dr Suzanne Robinson. This project aims to research and publish a scholarly biography of the Australian composer and critic Peggy Glanville-Hicks (1912–90). Recognised as one of the foremost Australian composers of the century, Glanville-Hicks was educated in Melbourne, London, Vienna and Paris before emigrating to the USA in 1941. The majority of her career was spent in New York, where she worked as composer, newspaper critic and director of one of the most important American forums for the performance of new music. Glanville-Hicks’s experience as a creative woman and an expatriate is comparable to that of women such as Christina Stead, obliged to leave Australia in order to fulfil her creative instincts, and to do so at the margins of social and gender norms.

Domestic and Salon Australian Piano Music

Assoc Prof Kerry Murphy and Dr Jennifer Hill. This project examines the composition and consumption of domestic and salon Australian piano music in the period 1880–1900. It examines in particular French and Italian influences on Australian music through key visiting and émigré composers such as Henri Kowalski, Alice Charbonnet-Kellerman and Emmanuele De Beaupuis.

Formation of Musical Taste in 19th-Century Melbourne

With the support of an Australian Research Council Grant, this project examines the concert programs of a number of nineteenth-century amateur music-making societies in Melbourne, including the Royal Metropolitan Liedertafel, the Melbourne Liedertafel and the Philharmonic Society. A database of concert programs of these societies is being produced, which will facilitate studies of repertoire and concert life. A series of articles by scholars associated with the Faculty of Music, examining, via a number of case studies, various aspects of musical reception, repertoire development and the significance of these societies in the formation of music taste in nineteenth-century Melbourne, has recently been published in a dedicated issue of the journal Nineteenth-Century Music Review (more information).

Funeral Ritual of the Hmong

With the support of various ARC grants, Assoc Prof Catherine Falk has recorded and transcribed the three-day funeral ritual of the Hmong community who have resettled in Australia from Laos. This project consists of a large corpus of poetic text in both transcribed Hmong and English translation with musical transcription of both the sung version and that played on the bamboo pipes, or qeej. The research investigates the relationship between the vocal tones of the Hmong language and musical pitch and research assistance was provided by Mr Seng Thao and Mr Vangmar Virathone. Some of the results of the research are published on the web, in the Hmong Studies Journal, The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music and The Oxford Companion to Australian Music.

Hispanic Musical Nationalism

With the support of an Australian Research Council Fellowship Michael Christoforidis is continuing his research on Manuel de Falla, his milieu and definitions of Hispanic musical nationalism in the first half of the twentieth century.

Historic Australian Art-Song / Chamber Music Series

Assoc Prof Kerry Murphy and Dr Jennifer Hill. The first two volumes in this series are songs of Dorian Le Gallienne and Fritz Hart (Robert Herrick settings) respectively, with other volumes projected for 2003 and beyond.

Index to Australian Music Journal Canon

Assoc Prof Kerry Murphy and Dr Jennifer Hill. Jennifer Hill is currently involved in indexing the journal for publication. This research project also extends to a study of Canon’s editor, Franz Holford, which has resulted in the publication of the monograph A Franz Holford Miscellany in 2001.

16th-Century Spain and Italy

Under the direction of Prof John Griffiths, widely recognised for his international leadership in this field, numerous aspects of early Spanish music are being researched, many at the cutting edge of current knowledge. His recent book with co-author Javier Suárez-Pajares from the Universidad Complutense of Madrid, Políticas y prácticas musicales en el Mundo de Felipe II (2004) provides a bold new vision of the diversity of music in Spain and its empire during the second half of the sixteenth century. His work on vihuela music include studies of sources, musical style, social and cultural history, and the history of early music printing. In collaboration with Prof. Dinko Fabris (Università di Basilicata) he is pioneering new work on musical reciprocity between Spain and Naples in the 15th and 16th centuries, and a first volume of Neapolitan Lute Music was published in 2004. New work concerns the role of music in the sixteenth-century urban landscape.

Jan Dismas Zelenka

ARC QE II Fellow, Dr Janice Stockigt, is currently working on a project on a project titled: Catholic liturgical music in Saxony during Bach’s era. Her book on the life and works of the Bohemian composer Jan Dismas Zelenka was published in 2000 by Oxford University Press.

More than Gypsies and Gender: Rediscovering the Original Contexts of Bizet’s Carmen

Assoc Prof Kerry Murphy and Dr Michael Christoforidis. Many basic questions relating to the initial reception of Bizet’s opera Carmen remain unresolved. This project explores the Parisian context of Carmen and traces changing attitudes to the ‘unsuccessful’ premiere of the opera in 1875 and its successful revival in Paris in 1883. It also examines tropes of Spanishness identified by French audiences of the time, and compares these with the Spanish response to the first performances of Carmen in Madrid (1887–88).

Music for Mental Health

Assoc Prof Denise Grocke. The Music for Mental Health study is funded from the Joint Awards program at the University of Melbourne, in conjunction with Professor Sid Bloch (psychiatry department, St Vincent’s Hospital) and Professor David Castle (Mental Health Research Institute). The study investigates the effect of music therapy on social anxiety and quality of life of people who have chronic mental health problems and are living in
the community. Participants are being interviewed about their experience of music therapy sessions and their original songs created in music therapy are being recorded at the Faculty's recording studio.

Music, Adolescents and Mental Health Survey

Dr Katrina McFerran who is the newly appointed Lecturer in Music Therapy, has a collaborative research project underway with the Royal Childrens’ Hospital Centre for Adolescent Healthfunded by an ECR Grant from the University of Melbourne. . Music has been identified as a potential strategy for facilitating healthy behaviours, however concerns remain regarding the direction of its influence on behaviour. This research addresses this concern by investigating the relationship between teenagers’ music preferences and mental health. The results will be used to develop preventative programs for teenagers at-risk of mental health problems.

Music Therapy: Fostering a healthy adolescence through musical participation

Dr Katrina McFerran, funded by the ARC. Previous research suggests that active participation in structured leisure activities, such as music, can help teenagers to cope with adverse experiences. In contrast, lack of connection with peers through such activities can hinder coping. This is particularly relevant when considering bereaved adolescents because the unsuccessful management of a significant loss can trigger mental illness in the worst of circumstances. This project evaluates the benefits of a structured music therapy group intervention to foster resilience and enhance self worth. Innovative strategies of musical data analysis will be used to supplement traditional measurements, providing multiple perspectives on the relationship between creativity and resilience.

Radiotherapy-Music Therapy Study.

Assoc Prof Denise Grocke. This study is co-funded by the Faculty of Music, in collaboration with Dr Clare O'Callaghan and the team from Peter MacCallum Cancer Institute. The study is a random control trial investigating whether self-selected music reduces anxiety in patients who are attending radiotherapy for the first time.

Postmodernism and Australian Art Music

Dr Linda Kouvaras (with Dr David Bennett, English Dept) has been awarded a three-year ARC Discovery Project grant researching postmodernism and Australian art-music, commencing in 2005. The project will encompass critical reception of performances, composers’ stated aesthetic intentions and analyses of musical works. Findings will develop new methodologies for a synergy between Australian musicology and postmodern cultural studies.

S.M. Tagore and the Melbourne Philharmonic Society

Dr Reis Flora is researching details of the correspondence between Raja Sir Sourindro Mohun Tagore (1840–1914), a musicologist of Calcutta famous for his publications about Indian music, and the Melbourne Philharmonic Society and its president Sir George F. Verdon, during 1878–79, including details about the books and pamphlets on Indian music sent by S.M. Tagore to Melbourne and received by the society in mid-1878.

Spanish Music Studies and Joint Projects with the Universidad Complutense of Madrid

The interest in research in Spanish music in the Faculty has extended from Prof. Griffiths’ renaissance scholarship has extended to further areas, especially the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, particularly due to Dr Michael Christoforidis’ important contributions concerning Manuel de Falla, through to the study of less well-known areas. This is encouraged through undergraduate teaching in the area and by the close contacts maintained with several Spanish universities, particularly the Universidad Complutense in Madrid and its musicological research institute, the Instituto Complutense de Ciencias Musicales. Melbourne scholars such as Prof Griffiths and Dr Christoforidis have contributed to the ten-volume Diccionario de la música española e hispanoamericana, and many student and staff exchanges are undertaken.