RNCM Music Education Conference: Driving Change in Music Education

Please Note: Conference content/speakers may be subject to change. Please keep an eye on this webpage for conference programme updates.

Hear from a range of experts from the RNCM, including Nate Holder (International Chair in Music Education), Professor Jennie Henley (Director of Programmes and Professor in Music Education), Dr Robert Gardiner (Senior Lecturer in Music Education and Programme Lead for Music Education) and Dr John Habron-James (Head of Music, Health and Wellbeing) and a range of external guest speakers and workshop leaders.

Read their biographies below:

Professor Linda Merrick CBE

Professor Linda Merrick CBE is Principal of the RNCM, Chair of Conservatoires UK and an internationally renowned clarinettist. She was awarded a CBE for services to music in higher education in the 2023 King’s New Year Honours.

In addition to her role at the RNCM, Linda has performed as a concerto soloist across America, Asia, Australia, Europe, South America, the UAE and the UK, and broadcast for BBC Radio 3, Radio France, DRS1 Switzerland, CKWR Canada and Arte TV South Korea. A founder member of the contemporary ensemble ‘Sounds Positive’, she has premiered over 80 chamber works for winds and piano by British composers, and released a further three CDs.

Dr Robert Gardiner

Robbie is the Programme Lead for Music Education at the RNCM. Graduating as a clarinettist from the RNCM in 2009, Robbie then chose to train as a music teacher and has enjoyed a vibrant life as a teacher and musician across the North-West of England. Through his work with Bolton Music Service, he specialised in primary curricular and instrumental teaching, whilst also leading various choirs and ensembles. In 2017, Robbie came to the RNCM to lead the PGCE in Music with Specialist Instrumental Teaching, and has since helped to develop education programmes across the College. Gaining his Doctor of Education in 2021, Robbie is a passionate researcher and current research interests include music teacher education, educational discourse and policy, ideology and education, and musical inclusion. From September 2024, Robbie will lead the exciting new Master of Education degree at the RNCM.

Tosin Akindele

Tosin Akindele is a Music Entrepreneur, an award-winning Vocal Director and Songwriter. She is the founder of Voices Beyond Gospel Collective, a Manchester based group that consists of talented vocalists and instrumentalists who write original music and perform across the UK. At the end of 2022 she joined the RNCM as a Senior Tutor and quickly transitioned into the role of Head of Young Artists. Tosin currently over-sees the Junior Pop programme based at the Conservatoire.

Matt Rowe

Matt Rowe is 22 from Mansfield, Nottingham. He will be starting his final year at the RNCM in September studying Bass Guitar. Matt is working his way up to becoming a teacher through mentoring on the RNCM Young Artists programme, teaching private students as well as assisting in schools. His aim on completing his undergraduate studies at the RNCM is to begin a PGCE programme that will begin his journey towards a dream teaching job.

Professor Nathan Holder

Professor Nathan Holder is an award winning author, international speaker, musician and education consultant. With over a decade of experience, Nate has been advocating for inclusive and diverse music education globally through speaking engagements, writing, and consultancy.

As an experienced public speaker, Nate has led numerous CPD training, workshops and lectures for schools, universities, and hubs to tackle issues including pedagogy and critical perspectives in music classrooms, departments, and boards. His collaborations include working with top artists such as Ghetts, KOKOROKO, Emeli Sandé and Arkells, as well as with leading companies and organizations like the BBC, Hal Leonard Europe, Oxford University Press and Harper Collins.

Nate’s contributions extend beyond his consulting work. He serves on the board for F-flat books and the City of London Sinfonia. Currently, he holds the position of Professor and International Chair of Music Education at the Royal Northern College of Music.

As an author, Nate has written twelve books, including ‘I Wish I Didn’t Quit: Music Lessons’ (2018), ‘Where Are All The Black Female Composers’ (2020), and the award-winning ‘Listen and Celebrate’ (2022). His work aims to inspire and empower learners and educators to embrace inclusive and diverse music education.

Karin Greenhead

Karin is a Professor of Music (Dalcroze Eurhythmics), Teacher of Dalcroze Eurhythmics, and Doctoral research supervisor at the RNCM. She is an internationally renowned expert in Dalcroze Eurhythmics and the current Director of Studies for Dalcroze UK; Co-Director of Studies for the Dalcroze Eurhythmics International Examination Board (DEIEB); Vice-President of the Collège de L’Institut Jaques-Dalcroze (Geneva, Switzerland) and a Founder Member of the Scientific Committee for the international Conference of Dalcroze Studies (Coventry 2013; Vienna 2015; Québec 2017; Katowice, 2019; online 2021; Pittsburg, 2023; Luxembourg, 2025).

Geth Griffith

Geth has an eclectic taste in music which has led to work with the Hallé, Lewis Capaldi, James Morrison, Matilda (West End production), Opera North, Apartment House Contemporary Music Group, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Black Dyke Brass Band, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, the American Four Tops, Katherine Jenkins and Anthony Costa (Blue). He has also created arrangements for the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, RTE Concert Orchestra, the Hallé, and the Ulster Orchestra. Geth teaches improvisation in a variety of styles at the RNCM, Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, Junior RNCM and formerly at the University of York. He is also a mentor for the Live Music Now charity.

Dr Jen Hartley

Dr Jen Hartley studied Music at Cambridge, where she also did her PGCE. She has taught in secondary schools for the past 26 years, and has also been a one-to-one piano, theory, harmony, and aural teacher, alongside occasional performing and composing commitments. As a recent student at the RNCM, she completed her PhD on nurturing creative autonomy in A level composition students in 2023, and her current research interests include creative music-making and embodied listening, with a view to testing her own research findings. She is coming to the end of a one-year stint in the south, after which she returns to begin a new role at Chetham’s School of Music from September.

Bethan Habron-James

Bethan Habron-James has taught at the RNCM for 25 years. Her work as a musicianship educator focuses on the body as primary instrument, developing rhythmic awareness, embodied aural acuity and improvisation skills. As holder of the Diplôme Supérieur of the Institut Jaques-Dalcroze, Geneva, she is an internationally recognised teacher of Dalcroze Eurhythmics and is currently in the final year of doctoral studies at Bangor University, North Wales, where she is inquiring into her personal experience of Dalcroze practice. She was previously a professional violinist and continues to teach the violin. She is happiest when sea swimming.

Dr David Önaç

Dr David Önaç is a composer, pianist and educator based in Manchester, UK. He studied music (MA Hons: Cantab), composition (MPhil: Cantab, MMUS: RNCM, PhD: Manchester) and piano performance (LRSM) and has taught at both undergraduate and postgraduate level at the University of Birmingham and the University of Manchester, as well as at Junior RNCM.  He was BBC Young Composer of the Year runner up (2000) and winner of the RPS Composition Prize (2012), has compositions and arrangements in a variety of styles on the ABRSM piano syllabus from Initial Grade to ARSM, and has recently been published by EVC Music.  His current commission is a c.45-minute requiem to be premiered in London.

As a versatile musician, David is equally at home with established classical repertoire as with music in jazz and gospel styles and for c.15 years he has been the Musical Director and principal keyboardist for various gospel choirs in Manchester.  While MD of the student Harmony Gospel Choir they won UGCY 3 times and were finalists in BBC Songs of Praise Gospel Choir of the Year, and during his tenure with the professional gospel collective Voices Beyond they have been broadcast on BBC R4 and selected for Manchester Jazz Festival’s Hothouse development programme.   David has a deep passion for education – particularly that young musicians can recognise and articulate the extraordinary value of the arts both personally and in society, and fulfil their maximum potential as creative and confident pioneers of the music of the next generation.

Professor Lynne Dawson

Professor Lynne Dawson was one of Britain’s best loved and respected sopranos for more than 30 years. She trained as a translator and interpreter and spent several years in industry before beginning her training as a singer. She worked with all the major British orchestras and abroad with orchestras such as the Leipzigewandhaus, the Concertgebouw, San Francisco Symphony, La Scala Milan, Chicago Symphony and Berlin Symphony over many years, in addition to chamber orchestras all over the world. Her recordings number more than 80 and include many roles by Handel and Mozart, with many leading international labels. Operatic roles include Pamina, Zaide, Donna Elvira, Countess, Queen of the Night, Constanze, Aspasia and Vitellia, as well as Amenaide in Rossini’s Tancredi, leading roles in Handel’s Orlando, Guilio Cesare, Hercules and Ariodante, Marzelline in Beethoven’s Fidelio, Iphigenie in Gluck’s Iphigenie en Aulide, Mimi in La Boheme, Zdenka in Strauss’ Arabella, and Violetta in La Traviata, in opera houses such as Amsterdam, Opera North, Brussels, Paris, and Berlin Staatsoper.

Professor Andy Stott

Professor Andy Stott is the first Head of Popular Music at the RNCM, Musical Director of the RNCM Session Orchestra and the founding CEO of Northern Quarter Records. His career as a music educator has seen him heading music departments at a number of top institutions in addition to examiner roles in the UK and abroad, and mentoring for rock and pop festivals and consultancy for Music for Youth.

Andy has been the recipient of four RNCM Student-Led Teaching Awards; two for his musical direction of the RNCM Session Orchestra, and two for Employability Enhancement. In 2015 he became a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, in 2017 was appointed to the ABRSM’s Music Education Advisory Committee and to the board of the Association for Popular Music Education, and in 2023 became a Professor (personal chair) at the RNCM.

Dr Larry Goves

Dr Larry Goves founded, writes for and performs electronics with the experimental music group The House of Bedlam.  He has also worked on a variety of installation projects including; an installation for Aldeburgh Music’s Technology Residencies (building instruments and writing new music in collaboration with Sound Intermedia’s David Sheppard); a music for a film and installation with artist Aura Satz (for  the Tatton Park Biennial 2012); and music for Dr Beau Lotto’s wall of 88 speakers with corresponding visual (for The Brain Unravelled, an installation at the Wellcome Institute in 2009). He has been awarded a Jerwood-Aldeburgh Opera Writing Fellowship, been shortlisted for a Royal Philharmonic Society Award in composition and has been a recipient of a Paul Hamlyn Award for Composition.

Larry Goves studied at the RNCM with Anthony Gilbert and at Southampton University with Michael Finnissy. He is a Head of Composition at the RNCM and composition tutor for the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain.

Andrea Vogler

RNCM graduate Andrea Vogler enjoys a varied portfolio career as a percussionist. She has played with orchestras including the Hallé, BBC Philharmonic and English National Ballet; and works regularly with Royal Northern Sinfonia, Manchester Camerata and Northern Chamber Orchestra. Andrea has also worked in West End theatre, toured the UK as a recitalist for the Countess of Munster Musical Trust, and is an active chamber musician. Recent chamber projects include interdisciplinary collaborations with Noisy Toys Robotic Orchestra and MMU; and performance poet Louise Wallwein.

Her education and outreach work includes project design, staff training and mentoring for Live Music Now, Jessie’s Fund and NCO. She is also part of Manchester Camerata’s award winning ‘Music in Mind’ team delivering pioneering group music therapy sessions for people living with Dementia and their carers. Her broad range of teaching experience has led to roles as a specialist Clinician for BASBWE, RNCM Day of Percussion, the National Association of Percussion Teachers, and Percussive Arts Society UK.

Professor Mark Heron

Professor Mark Heron is a Scottish conductor noted for dynamic and well-rehearsed performances across an unusually wide repertoire. Professor and Head of Conducting at the RNCM, he works regularly with the College’s orchestras and ensembles, is the Music Director of the Nottingham Philharmonic, and guest conducts with professional orchestras in the UK and internationally. Alongside his conducting engagements, Mark has an international reputation as a teacher. He heads up the RNCM’s world-renowned conducting programmes and is frequently invited to teach at masterclasses all over the world. He is the lead content author for the online conducting pedagogy resource, ConductIT.

Professor David Horne

Professor David Horne has been commissioned and performed worldwide by groups as diverse as Scottish Opera, the BBC Symphony, BBC Scottish and BBC Philharmonic Orchestras, the Nash Ensemble, Remix Ensemble (Portugal) and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Centre. International soloists such as Evelyn Glennie, Boris Berezovsky, Nobuko Imai and Fred Sherry have also commissioned works from him, and he has appeared in the proms as both a pianist and composer. He was composer in association with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra from 2000-04. Winner of the piano section of the BBC Young Musician of the Year in 1988, he performs regularly as a pianist. He is in high demand in education and frequently delivers workshops and lectures for organisations including Sound and Music, Wigmore Hall, the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, and many others. He was a visiting Professor at the Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya in Barcelona and has mentored emerging professional composers on Making Music’s Adopt a Composer and Sound and Music’s Next Wave schemes. He is now Professor in Composition and Head of the Graduate School at the RNCM where he teaches composition at all levels. He also teaches across a range of disciplines with a particular interest in performance studies, supervising the work of PhD performers and composers.

Professor Jennie Henley

Professor Jennie Henley is Director of Programmes and Professor in Music Education at the RNCM. An internationally renowned expert in music pedagogy and education strategist, Jennie has taught music in various contexts for over 30 years, including instrumental teaching, ensemble direction and class teaching. She has worked in music teacher education and professional development since 2008. Covering diverse contexts, Jennie’s research is concerned with the relationship between pedagogy and inclusion. Her research impact is wide ranging with consultancy work involving curriculum design and development for international governments and contributing to policy development.

Professor John Habron-James

Professor John Habron-James is Head of Music, Health, and Wellbeing at the RNCM where he teaches undergraduates, supervises (post-)doctoral researchers and leads the College’s Student Health and Wellbeing Hub. Having trained as a composer and music therapist, he now undertakes transdisciplinary research at the intersection of music education, music therapy and the medical/health humanities. John’s research has appeared in Psychology of Music, Journal of Research in Music Education, and Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices and in 2016, he guest-edited a special issue of Approaches: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Music Therapy. He founded the International Conference of Dalcroze Studies (ICDS), chairing its Scientific Committee from 2012 to 2023. John is also an Extraordinary Researcher in the MASARA (Musical Arts in South Africa: Resources and Applications) Focus Area at North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa.

Kate Campbell-Green

A passionate advocate for inclusive music making and using music as a conduit for all educational outcomes, Kate has almost 20 years of experience in teaching and leading music across all key stages and in the wider community. She has run music departments and taught in a variety of settings including sixth form colleges and Alternative Provision along with several music services around Greater Manchester and Yorkshire. An alumni of the PGCE with Specialist Instrumental Teaching, she is currently Head of Tameside Music Service as well as Chair of the Board of Trustees for Good Vibrations Charity, Vice-Chair of the Board of Governors for Whitfield St James Primary School and a trustee for Band on the Wall. She has written several commissioned articles for Music Teacher magazine and was an examiner for the AQA A level music composition module. Kate was diagnosed with AuDHD later in life and this has added a personal element to her interest in educational reform – more particularly to ensure that education is reflective of the changing needs of all young people today and in the future.

Dr Jo Yee Cheung

Dr Jo Yee Cheung is a British pianist and music educator based in vibrant Manchester, and the Founder and Chief Executive of Olympias Music Foundation – a multi-award-winning charity which champions diversity in music education. An alumnae of Cambridge University, Jo Yee holds a PhD in Music Psychology and Music Education from the RNCM, having previously completed an MMus and PGDip in Piano Performance at the RNCM under the tutelage of Richard Ormrod with a scholarship. In 2022, Jo was made an Associate Member of the RNCM (ARNCM) and was one of the RNCM50Faces. Jo is a trustee of Contact Theatre and Manchester Concert Hall Limited, and an External Examiner for the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Dr Michelle Phillips

Dr Michelle Phillips is Head of Enterprise (Academic) at the RNCM. Her research interests include music and time, perception of contemporary music, audience response to live and recorded music, entrepreneurship, and music and Parkinson’s. From 2020-2022, Michelle was Principal Investigator of the two-year StART Entrepreneurship Project (in partnership with the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and University of the Arts London, granted funding of £902,153 by the Office for Students and Research England), which explored training for creative students in preparation for freelance and portfolio careers. The RNCM was awarded the Times Higher Education Outstanding Entrepreneurial University Award in 2023.

Sarah Crooks

Sarah is a Lecturer in Music Education at RNCM. She leads the Pedagogy option on the undergraduate Professional Placement module as well as teaching and mentoring on several other undergraduate and postgraduate modules and the PGCE programme. In addition to her HE work, Sarah leads Young Strings, one of RNCM’s most longstanding Junior Programmes.

Sarah was a student herself on RNCM/MMU’s PGCE with Specialist Instrumental Teaching, then a two-year course which included training in Dalcroze and Kodály musicianship and string pedagogy as well as classroom teaching. Following this course, Sarah completed gained a Masters in Performance, also at RNCM, focusing on the application of Dalcroze Eurhythmics to music rehearsal for her dissertation. Since then, Sarah has accumulated a wealth of experience as a professional violinist and teacher in a wide range of contexts, with a particular interest in small- and large-group learning. As Head of RNCM Young Strings, Sarah leads a team of teachers which strives to integrate the development of musical and creative skills into instrumental learning.

Sarah is also Head of Strings for the European Strings Association (ESTA) PG Cert, delivers CPD workshops for teachers, contributes resources to ABRSM’s new Teacher Hub. She also continues to teach the violin and viola in schools and through her private studio.

RNCM Young Strings

RNCM Young Strings aims to provide young people with a thorough foundation in musical, creative and instrumental skills. The programme is designed to help pupils become confident, expressive musicians who have a deep understanding of musical elements. The approaches of Dalcroze and Kodály underpin the teaching and learning; with the guidance of our highly-trained teachers, our musicians move, sing, play, improvise, create, question, perform and reflect. The majority of the learning takes place in small and large groups, which gives players the opportunity to learn collaboratively, exploring and discovering together, and supporting each other through group and peer appraisal. Weekly classes include Musicianship and Ensemble as well as a small group instrumental lesson or sectional rehearsal, depending on the stage of the programme. Teachers plan collaboratively so that areas of musical or technical development are approached simultaneously through different forms of activity. Our wish is for our graduating musicians to have had experiences which allow them to engage positively with music for the rest of their lives, whatever their path may be.

Driving Change in Music Education is ideal for music teaching professionals from all sectors, including primary and secondary schools, sixth form/FE colleges, music services and universities.

To book your place, please click here.

Costs

£40 Full Price

£30 RNCM Alumni

£15 RNCM Student

£40 Joint Ticket for Music Mark: Digital Innovation in Music Education Conference + RNCM Music Education Conference: Driving Change in Music Education

Further Information

Lunch and refreshments will be provided, please let us know of any dietary requirements when booking.

If you haven’t visited us before, we are situated on Oxford Road, just between All Saints Park and University Green. We would recommend travelling via public transport – we’re a short walk from both Oxford Road Station (10-15 minutes) and Manchester Piccadilly (20-25 minutes).

For more information on how to find us, click here.