Blog by Carolina Herrera, Year 3 BMus

For their last performance of the year, singers from the Music Department and the university staff choir came together in the festive spirit of the season to sing traditional Carols beneath the famous Norwegian Christmas tree as part of the Greater London Authority’s Carol Singing Programme for Christmas.

Densely wrapped to brave the cold, students and staff congregated in front of the mixed and enthusiastic audience, eagerly singing some of the most loved hymns and carols for an hour to raise funds on behalf of Mind and Islington Law Centre, their chosen charities. Favourites included Hark! The Herald Angels Sing; Ding, Dong! Merrily on High; In the Bleak Mid-winter; O Little Town of Bethlehem; We Wish you a Merry Christmas, Silent Night and O Come, All ye Faithful. In addition, the Staff Choir delighted the public with Carol of the Bells and the Chamber Choir added Sleep, my Jesu and Tomorrow Shall be My Dancing Day, for a memorable evening of Christmas cheer.

Led by Tim Hooper and constituted by talented students from the Music and other departments, the City University Chamber Choir performs at the end of each academic term. This year, it sang Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem in St Giles’ Cripplegate church in London and also as part of the festival de Printemps de l’Université PSL (Paris Sciences & Lettres) in Paris during the spring 2018. They recently performed their annual Christmas Carol Concert at St. Clement’s Church, in collaboration with Civitas, the university vocal ensemble devoted to the performance of early music and led by Dr Alexander Lingas.

The City University Staff Choir is a community ensemble open to academic and professional service staff with no previous experience required, from across the university. The choir was set up 18 months ago by Louise Gordon, who also manages and conducts. 15 of its 25 members sang in Trafalgar Square and their beautiful voices brightly resonated together with singers from the Music Department, creating a light-hearted atmosphere for which the public showed appreciation.

After the session, singers and staff were offered mulled wine and mince pies by the Music Department and had photographs taken by friends and the public.

Many thanks to Tim Hooper for conducting the choirs, to Dr Alexander Lingas for joining the singers, to Dr Laudan Nooshin and Dr Ian Pace who diligently collected funds from the crowd and, of course, to all the singers who helped us raise more than £200 for charity!

By Saule Boguzaite, BSc Year 3

On Friday, 30th November, the discussion about technology and media in the Sound, Art and Technoculture module was taken a tube ride away from campus to the world’s largest museum of decorative arts and design – the V&A. Led by Dr Claudia Molitor, we visited an interactive exhibition, ‘Videogames: Design/Play/Disrupt’, which explored the development, practice and magnitude of the medium since the mid-2000s.

The exhibition explores the world beyond the user’s interface of what for many of us, is a daily source of entertainment. Artefacts on display such as detailed blueprints and field research documentation revealed the extensive labour and process of video game production. The visitors from City enthusiastically gathered around the game-like exhibits that required hands-on interaction. An enormous screen showing an eSports tournament gave the visitor an idea of a rapidly growing player community and culture. The ‘Disrupt’ stage provides some food for thought through critical discussion about the social, cultural and political influence of videogames. The arcade with retro-style machines concluded the exhibition, where videogame enthusiasts of any level could find something they enjoyed.

Here is what some of the attendees had to say about the exhibition:

“I enjoyed the Play stage of the exhibit the most just for the simple pure enjoyment of having fun playing some of the unique and thought provoking games. The Design stage was also very interesting, to see the different motivations, ideas and techniques that went into the making of the games on display.” – Chris, BSc Year 2

 “I found that the plethora of sound effects present in the video game exhibition gave me new ideas for my major project, which involves sound design for video games.” – Moumen, BSc Year 3.

The exhibition is on until 24th February 2019

https://www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/videogames

by Carolina Herrera, BMus Year 3

The City University Chamber Choir and Civitas delighted the audience during their Christmas Carol Concert at St. Clement’s Church, Finsbury, on Wednesday the 5th of December 2018.

Joining forces for the first time, the two City, University of London choral ensembles performed repertoire that included a mix of Gregorian chant, English anthems, sacred motets, traditional carols and the premiere of Nunc Dimittis from Ty Gwyn Canticles, an original work by choir baritone, final year Music student and composer Jacob Collins.

Conducted by Tim Hooper, the Chamber Choir performed Henry Balfour Gardiner’s Evening Hymn (1908), Samuel Sebastian Wesley’s Thou wilt keep Him in perfect peace (1850), Josef Rheinberger’ Abendlied (1855) and Jamie W. Hall’s Sleep, my Jesu (2015). In alternation with these and Civitas’ pieces, the choir also sang Once in Royal David’s City (1848) by Arthur Henry Mann and Henry John Gauntlett, Tomorrow Shall be my Dancing Day (1830) by John Gardner; Ding Dong! Merrily on High, Eng. trad., arr. Charles Wood; A Maiden Most gentle, French trad., arr. Andrew Carter; Sans Day Carol and Nativity Carol (1963) by John Rutter, as well as O come, all ye faithful, J. F. Wade and Gabriel’s Message, Basque carol. The evening ended with Hark! The Herald Angels Sing by Mendelssohn, all arr. Willcox, for which the audience stood to join in song.

Civitas, led by Dr Alexander Lingas, performed Veni, Veni Emmanuel; Magnificat Antiphon Hodie, Cristus Natus Est; old Roman chant for the Mass of Christmas Day Kyrie in Natale Domini (MS Bodmer 79 ‘1071’); Christmas Canon, Ode 1 (Medieval Byzantine chant, MS Grottaferrata E. γ. II -13th c., ed. Ioannis Arvanitis); Lutheran chorale Wir schön leuchtet der Morgenstern by Philipp Nicolai; Resonet in Laudibus (S. Gall MS, ed. Keyte and Parrott) and Annunciation carol Nova! Nova! (Hunterian Museum MS, ed. Keyte and Parrott).

During the interval, mulled wine and mince pies were available to singers and guests, who included friends and family, as well as Music department lecturers and members of the local community.

Many thanks to Tim Hooper and Dr Lingas. Also, to Dr Laudan Nooshin and Leo Chadburn for their concert organisation, to St Clement’s for hosting the concert, and of course to everyone who played!

The Chamber Choir will be Carol singing in Trafalgar Square this Tuesday, 11^th of December and will be back in St. Clement’s Church for their annual Easter-themed spring performance.

In October 2018, Laudan Nooshin travelled to Montréal, Canada, to present an invited keynote paper at the conference ‘Music and Nation III: Music in Post-war Transitions (19^th to 21^st Centuries)’. Laudan’s paper was entitled ‘From Post-Revolution to Post-War: Music and the Play of Identities in 1980s Iran’.

The conference was attended by about 50 delegates from across the globe and papers covered a wide range of topics relating to post-war transitions, including music in Cold War Europe, the creation of a Spanish national orchestra following the Spanish Civil War; rock music and global countercultural citizenship after the Vietnam war; and music in post-Civil War Tajikestan.

The conference was held in the stunning setting of the Music Department at the University of Montréal, located high up on Mount Royal (see below).

From 13^th to 15^th September 2018, Head of Department Laudan Nooshin attended the Annual Conference of the Royal Musial Association, the largest annual gathering in the UK of those working across the range of music studies, including musicologists, ethnomusicologists, performers, composers, and many more! The conference was hosted by the Music Department at the University of Bristol and held in their building – the Victoria Rooms – built in the 1840s as Assembly Rooms: some of the original drinking bars are still in place and provided an interesting setting for conference sessions!

Laudan presented a paper entitled ‘A Window Onto Other Worlds: Musical Exoticism in Iranian Cinema – The Case of The Lor Girl’, which explored the role of music in processes of constructing and representing ‘otherness’ in early Iranian cinema, focusing on the first Persian-language sound film, The Lor Girl, made in Bombay in 1933.

Laudan also spoke on a panel entitled ‘Decolonising Analysis’, which considered some of the ways in which recent calls to ‘decolonise the academy’ have impacted on the practice of music analysis. In a music studies context, the notion of ‘decolonisation’ is about recognising the ways in which our knowledge is, and has been, shaped by power relations and about challenging the normative centres of privilege and taken for granted assumptions through a diversity of musics and perspectives. Given that we’re all enmeshed in some way in colonial histories that inevitably shape how we think, Laudan asked whether it is in fact possible to decolonise analysis before we decolonise our own minds and bodies, particularly in the context of academic institutions – together with their structural inequalities – that were founded on colonial thinking and funded by the riches of empire. The panel provoked an interesting discussion and the setting of the University of Bristol was particularly appropriate, given that an estimated 85% of the wealth that was used to found the university was derived from slavery. Other panel members were: Chloë Alaghband-Zadeh (University of Manchester), Freya Jarman (University of Liverpool), Byron Dueck (Open University) and Ruard Absaroka (SOAS, University of London).

The conference keynote speakers were: Professor Robert Adlington (University of Huddersfield), presenting the annual Le Huray Lecture: ‘Democracy in Action? Audience Participation as Community Organising’; and Alejandro L. Madrid (Cornell University), who was presented with the prestigious Edward J. Dent Medal and whose lecture was entitled: ‘The Importance of Being from ‘the Other Side’: Music and Border Studies in the 21^st Century’.

Next year’s RMA conference will be held from 11^th to 13^th September, and will be hosted jointly by the Music Department at the University of Manchester and the Royal Northern College of Music.

‘Decolonising Analysis’ Panel

University of Bristol, Victoria Rooms

Visitors to City, University of London have joined staff and students to create a new audio-visual art installation in the Department of Music.

Over a period of several months, participants recorded sounds from around the department’s rehearsal, teaching, studio and performance spaces. They also designed and painted artwork on walls of the foyer at the Performance Space.

Speakers have been installed in the area and the 30-minute composition of audio recordings is being played periodically into the room. The finished audio-visual artwork reflects the history, current profile and possible futures of the department, taking inspiration from the architecture of the building and activity happening within it.

Walls On Walls

The work was facilitated by Walls On Walls, a collaboration between Dr Tullis Rennie, who is a composer and City music lecturer, and artist Laurie Nouchka.

Dr Rennie said: “The idea of this project was that anybody in the City community was able to participate – we asked people to pick up paint brushes, explore the area to make recordings and help edit the audio.

“It’s a unique installation because a lot of participative art projects are visual but don’t involve sound. With this work, the group wanted to open up some of the hidden spaces in the department and record sounds that most people are not privy to.”

Practice-based research

The installation is part of Dr Rennie’s practice-based research into collaborative arts process. Practice-based research is a type of study where the aim is to develop knowledge through creative activity.

Dr Rennie’s objective was to observe participation in the creation of an audio-visual community project and see how this translated into the final artwork.

He said: “Participants were taken on a tour and recorded sound from lots of different areas, including the corridors, empty concert rooms, the spaces between rehearsal room and behind doors that are normally closed.”

Dr Rennie added: “They also had electro-magnetic equipment that they could use to record sounds from the wires around the department that connect various studio spaces.

“Students were able to access and edit the recordings themselves and we held an open listening group where everybody could voice opinions.”

The artwork is now a permanent installation in the Department of Music. It was launched at an open public event on Wednesday 30^th May 2018.

Dr Rennie recently received a commendation for his work with Walls On Walls in the Outstanding Contribution to the Local Community category of the university’s President’s Awards.

On Tuesday 29th May, the Department of Music welcomed Michael Nyman CBE, one of Britain’s most celebrated composers, to deliver its first Distinguished Lecture in Music.

In the talk – which was free and open to the public – Nyman discussed his diverse career and musical influences and borrowings. He focused in particular on his allusions to previous music which he has only seen on the page, never heard.

A champion of new music

City’s Head of Performance Ian Pace, who chaired the talk, said: “It was a great privilege to be able to welcome Michael Nyman for this talk.

“Many will know of his scores for films like The Draughtsman’s Contract, The Piano or Wonderland, but he is equally a composer of a great many autonomous and sometimes abstract works, including symphonies, string quartets, song cycles, and so on. Nyman was also a musicologist – and an ethnomusicologist – at the beginning of his career, working on early baroque music and collecting Romanian folk song.”

Ian Pace added: “Furthermore, he championed new music as a critic for The Listener, while his 1974 book Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond, was profoundly influential for many.

“For all of these reasons, his diverse work is especially relevant to a department like ours. Nyman’s work, drawing upon pre-existing musics, is far from simply nostalgic or idly eclectic, but represents a very clearly defined and individual sensibility.”

The lecture was part of the Department’s annual three-week festival of music, City Summer Sounds, featuring free events by our students alongside acclaimed international professionals.