Research Events
Research students are encouraged to play an active role in our lively research culture and to join in discussions of the work of their peers, staff, and visiting experts in all the many areas of musical research embraced at the RNCM.
The principal opportunity for this is the Sir John Manduell Research Forum, held most Wednesday afternoons in term-time, between 4.15pm and 5.45pm. Staff and students have the opportunity to hear internal and external speakers, including academics, performers, and composers, and to engage in the exchange of ideas that follows the presentations.
The Sir John Manduell Research Forum series is open to all and admission is free. Talks usually last about an hour, including a Q&A session, and are regularly followed by discussions in the bar.
Past Research Forums
Summer 2026
Tues 28 – Wed 29 Apr
Postgraduate Research Students’ Conference
Lecture Theatre and Studio 8
Wed 20 May
Eighteenth-Century Music Studies Symposium
Lecture Theatre
Wed 15 – Fri 17 Jul
Re/sounding Visions: Music, Sound, and the Moving Image at 20 and Sound on Screen V joint conference
Spring 2026
Wed 21 Jan
Prof. Emily Howard, Royal Northern College of Music
Discussion forum on artistic research
The Lounge
Wed 28 Jan
Dr Anna Détári, Royal College of Music
The Neurodivergent Musician: A Participatory Action Research Study
Studio 8
Wed 4 Feb
Dr Robert Gardiner and David Bullock, Royal Northern College of Music and Olympias Music Foundation, and Bryony Simcox and George Webster, Broaden
More than Music: Global Music Teacher Training with Olympias Music Foundation
Lecture Theatre
Wed 18 Feb
Prof. Wiebke Thormählen, Royal Northern College of Music, Prof. Jeanice Brooks, University of Southampton, and Sarah Cleave, Manchester Metropolitan University
Country House Legends: Imagining Unsung Voices at Erddig
Carole Nash Recital Room
Thu 19 Feb
Dr Nico de Villiers, Royal Northern College of Music
Book launch: Richard Hageman: The Becoming of a Song Composer
Carole Nash Recital Room
Wed 25 Feb
Dr Samuel Wilson, Guildhall School of Music and Drama
Contemporary Modernisms? Some Paradoxes of Time in British New Music
Lecture Theatre
Wed 4 Mar
Tebogo Monnakgotla, Örebro University
Tebogo Monnakgotla Talks about Her Compositions
Studio 8
Wed 11 Mar
Prof. Jennie Henley, Royal Northern College of Music
Book launch: Inclusive Pedagogy in Music Education
Enacting Change through Inclusive Pedagogy
Lecture Theatre 2
Wed 18 Mar
Dr Toby Young, Guildhall School of Music and Drama
Opera in Extended Reality
Lecture Theatre
Wed 25 Mar
Dr Morag Atchison, University of Auckland
Finding an Authentic Voice in the Art Song of Aotearoa New Zealand
Studio 8
Autumn 2025
Wed 24 Sep
Discussion forum (led by Dr Tom Parkinson and Dr Michelle Phillips)
Room 102
Wed 1 Oct
Dr Tom Parkinson, Royal Northern College of Music
Popular Music Education as Neoliberal Discipline
Studio 7
Wed 8 Oct
Prof. Wiebke Thormählen, Royal Northern College of Music
Identities and Boundaries: Musical Interactions and Cosmopolitanism beyond the City
Studio 8
Wed 22 Oct
Prof. Ian Cross, Dr David Duncan, and Katya Ness, University of Cambridge
Making Space for Accuracy: Can White Space Make Music Notation Easier to Read?
Studio 8
Wed 12 Nov
Discussion forum (led by Dr Austin Glatthorn)
Room 102
Wed 19 Nov
Dr Kristl Kirk, University of York
Instrumental Music Teaching with Dyslexic Students: The Development of an Innovative Risk–Resilience Model
Studio 8
Wed 26 Nov
Dr Winnie Huang, Conservatorio della Svizzera italiana
The Performing Body: The Site of Possibilities
Studio 5
Wed 3 Dec
Discussion forum
Room 102
Wed 10 Dec
Dr Michelle Assay, King’s College London and the University of Toronto
‘When Puppets Sing in Tehran’: Reconfiguring Iran’s ‘National’ Opera
Studio 8
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