Michael Spitzer opening the SMA’s ‘A Celebration of Analysis’, 21-22 September 2012
Many thanks for the warm welcome!
For my first item, I’d just like to report from a symposium I helped organize as a committee member of the Society for Music Analysis (SMA). This year, the journal Music Analysis turned thirty years old, and the SMA twenty one. In honour of this double anniversary, the SMA held a symposium titled ‘A Cerebration of Analysis’ at London’s Institute of Musical Research (IMR) in Senate House, September 21-22. It featured Julian Horton, Adam Ockelford, John Koslovsky, Elizabeth Eva Leach, Daniel Leech-Wilkinson, Nicholas Marston, Danuta Mirka, Nicholas Reyland, Michael Spitzer, and Edward Venn. There was a special ‘Schenker Documents Online’ session convened by Ian Bent and William Drabkin, and Richard Cohn and Jonathan Dunsby were the Special Keynote Speakers.
Arnold Whittall addressing the SMA delegates
At the end of the first day, Arnold Whittall — the elder statesman of music analysis in the UK and one of the founders of the discipline (if we can call it that, the debate is still ongoing) — was refreshingly optimistic about the future of analysis, despite changing fashions, withering attacks on its right to exist, etc. It is my understanding that this text will be published in the next issue of Music Analysis. More extensive reviews of the symposium itself will be published in the SMA’s Newsletter (forthcoming this October I hope), which yours truly is editing. In the meantime do have a look in the SMA’s website, which includes the programme and plenty of photos (captions are still work in progress, though): http://www.sma.ac.uk/event/a-cerebration-of-analysis/
Finally, a note to all postgrads: the SMA organizes special conferences for students (see for example http://www.sma.ac.uk/event/tags-2012/) and there are also informal meetings and events organized by our student reps (please get in touch with either Suzie or Kirstie via students@sma.ac.uk; their blog is on http://sma.academia.edu/SocietyforMusicAnalysis/Blog). It’s a great way to meet students with similar interests, get conference practice and so on, and the SMA helps with travel and accommodation bursaries. The good news is that until the end of 2013 student membership is free — please have a look and do take advantage: http://www.sma.ac.uk/join/
Shay
