Past and forthcoming talks, conferences, and other events.
Decompressing Sibelius’s Swan of Tuonela: Reconstructing a lost version (1896/97) (NewMAC)
Newcastle Music Analysis Conference, Society for Music Analysis, Newcastle University, July 2022 Abstract On 4 December 1943, an RAF bombing raid left Leipzig’s bookseller’s quarter in ruins. Many of the musical manuscripts kept at Breitkopf & Härtel’s original headquarters were destroyed. These…
Read abstractPanel: Formenlehre in Context (Music Research Forum)
Music Research Forum 9 (28 April 2022) Semester 2, Department of Music, University of Manchester This Forum brings together three contributors to the forthcoming edited collection Formenlehre in Context (ed. Kelvin Lee), to be submitted to Peeter’s ‘Analysis in Context’ series. Each…
Read abstractDancing under Quarantine: Carl Nielsen’s Imaginary Journey to the Faroe Islands in 1927
1st Biennial Carl Nielsen Studies Conference, Newcastle University (17 September 2021)
Read abstractSibelian Runo-Variation and the ‘Revival’ of Tonality in Seven Songs, Op. 17 (BruMAC)
SMA Birmingham Music Analysis Online Conference, University of Birmingham (July 2021)
Read abstract'Living' Tonal Processes in Sibelius’s Seven Songs, Op. 17 (ICMF)
International Conference on Musical Form, Online Conference (21 June 2021)
Read abstractLemminkäinen’s Swansong: A programmatic analysis of Sibelius’s Swan of Tuonela (VII International Sibelius Conference)
VII International Jean Sibelius Conference, Hämeenlinna, Finland (Sept 2025) Forthcoming conference deferred from 2020 to 2025 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Read abstractRotational Projection in Beethoven's "Appassionata" Sonata (CityMAC)
Music Analysis Conference (CityMAC), City University, July 2018 The principle of ‘rotational form’ is foundational to Hepokoski’s formaldefinition of late nineteenth-century ‘sonata deformations’ outlined in his1993 monograph, Sibelius, Symphony No. 5. Strikingly, the concept of‘rotation’ loses any deformational function in Elements of…
Read abstractSibelian Rotational Projection: Erfüllung in Sibelius’s Työkansan Marssi (TAGS)
Society for Music Analysis: Theory and Analysis Graduate Student Conference (TAGS), University of Edinburgh, April 2019 Abstract Long before the term ‘rotational form’ was coined by Hepokoski (1993), there was a sense in critical scholarship that Sibelius’s music revolves internally, more so…
Read abstractSlipping between Hexatonic Poles: Clara Schumann’s Piano Sonata in G minor
Clara Schumann and her World, University of Oxford, June 2019 Abstract Clara Schumann’s little-explored Piano Sonata in G minor (1841), is one of her few large-scale works that can be heard in dialogue with sonata-form traditions. Written during a period when the…
Read abstractDouble-Tonic Complexes and the Afterlife in Sibelius’s “Sydämeni Laulu” (SotonMAC)
Society for Music Analysis Conference 2019, University of Southampton (31 Jul 2019) Abstact Historically, depictions of Finnish landscape in Sibelius’s music have been attributed to Klangflächen, ‘sound-sheets’, or other processes that involve harmonic stasis and expansive ostinato patterns. Through detailed analysis, this…
Read abstractSibelius’s Lost Caesura Fill: The First Version of Symphony No. 5 (RMA)
Invited Speaker at Themed Session: ‘Sonata Theory 1900’ RMA Annual Conference 2019, University of Manchester (11 Sept 2019) Abstract Sonata Theory conceives of the caesura-fill as aural transportation between the two parts of an exposition. It is neither transition nor secondary theme,…
Read abstractUnpicking a Static Reception: Unheard Suspensions at the Seams of Sibelius’s Swan of Tuonela (OSiMTA)
Oxford Seminars in Music Theory and Analysis (OSiMTA), November 20, 2019 Abstract Sibelius’s early tone poem, The Swan of Tuonela, has a long-established reception as a ‘sound-sheet’ devoid of harmonic motion. Yet this interpretation tended to ‘flatten’ features that do not conform…
Read abstract
Dr Sarah Moynihan 