The IGRC are delighted to announce the International Guitar Research Centre Conference 7th to 9th October 2022
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For information: http://IGRC.site/IGRC22
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IGRC22
Category: Writing
Writing
‘Taking Care’: supporting and recognising nurses’ caring role
GSMD article
UK nursing trainees are better prepared to deliver patient-centred care as a result of ‘Taking Care’, a mixed-methods drama research project undertaken by researchers at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and Kingston University. This joint project was awarded the highest possible grade in the 2021 Research Excellence Framework.
The project was led by former Doctoral Programme Leader, Dr Alex Mermikides, who was inspired by the nurses she met when her brother Milton was treated for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia – a serious type of blood cancer. Taking Care addresses two challenges facing nurse educators: teaching the sensitive and effective communication of ‘care’ and preparing students for the demanding emotional labour required by their profession. The huge physical and emotional toll nursing can take on staff has been bought into sharp focus over the past two years, but the nursing curriculum hasn’t traditionally taught trainees how to ‘care’ for patients without compromising their own emotional wellbeing.
Mermikides’ ensemble created an interactive drama, Careful, following a collaborative research process with performers and trainee nurses. The process of devising Careful revealed that ‘care’ can be understood as a skilled practice rather than an inherent virtue. The feedback from students on the workshops and performances has been overwhelmingly positive and has led to the materials being rolled out to other nursing schools across the country. As student nurse Michal Kaim reflected in The Guardian, ‘elevating nursing to the level of art gave me another reason to be proud of the choice I have made to become one’. The full performance of Careful can be viewed online.
Keynote Lecture for the World Sleep Congress in Rome, Italy March 2022, examining the use of sonification to communicate and reveal the inner experience of sleep.
A shamefully/lessly nerdy exploration of the guitar fretboard, its nature, language and futures. Adapted from my keynote lecture at the 2022 Guitar Foundation of America conference.
It’s privilege to present the Keynote for the Guitar Foundation of America convention this year.
The event runs June 26, 2022,5 PM – 9:30 PM UTC+01 on Zoom (register to join)You are warmly invited to join us for a series of discussions with scholars from Brazil, the United States, Switzerland, and England. Attendees will have the opportunity to speak informally with the presenters or simply listen. Registration is required. Abstract below:
Diamonds, Abaci, and Hexagrams: Exploring the Pitch Surface of the Guitar Fretboard
In this presentation, I will analyze the idiosyncrasies, challenges, limits, and affordances of the guitar’s “pitch surface”: its fretboard and tuning. Whatever the context—staff notation, music theory, improvisation, performance, and other arenas of guitar activity—the layout of the fretboard exerts a profound influence on how guitarists learn, play, and compose. Inspired by De Souza, Goodrick, and Martino, I will also explore the benefits of creative constraints: scordatura, capo, MIDI tools, and other ways of remapping the guitar’s pitch matrix. These constraints can be used to break the guitarist’s tight auditory-motor link, revitalizing the fretboard as a primary musical space and insightful musical “abacus.”
A collaboration with Enzo de Sena (Senior Lecturer on the Tonmeister programme, University of Surrey), Deborah Dunn-Walters, Sarah Bailey and Nils Marggraf – sonifying kinship DNA and recognising familial relationships as shared motivic content. A documentary produced in collaboration with University of Surrey was aired on Italy’s Rai 3 flagship science programme Quinta Dimensione (viewership ≈886,000). Segment below.
May 24th 2022 2pm, a lecture for staff, students and public Oxford University’s wonderful new Centre for Eudaimonia and Human Flourishing. Directed by Prof Morten Kringelbach “The Centre undertakes interdisciplinary research into Human Flourishing, Eudaimonia and the Life Well-Lived with a special focus on human brain dynamics through its link with the Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford and Center for Music in the Brain, Aarhus University, Denmark.”
The talk Hidden Music: Sonic translations of Nature will explore music as a tool for listening, and understanding patterns of the natural world, blurring the boundaries between people and the ‘outside world’, and ‘art’ and science. It will take place in the Pink Seminar Room in Linacre College and streamed online. Details here.
The Sound Asleep project was presented with Professor Debra Skene in the World Sleep Congress on March 11 2022, Rome, Italy,
World Sleep 2022 is a global scientific congress bringing the best of sleep medicine and research to Rome, Italy, March 11–16, 2022. The World Sleep congress, now in its 16th iteration, consistently gathers the best minds in sleep medicine and research for multiple days of scientific sessions and networking.
Sound Asleep has now been presented at British Sleep Society, European Sleep Research Conference and World Sleep Congress engaging with hundreds of members of the International Sleep Community.
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J.S.Bach in Aeon
My essay on J.S.Bach’s crafty brilliance and its implications for us all is now published in the wonderful Aeon digital magazine. Many thanks to Nigel Warburton (author, philosopher and podcaster) for the commissioning, editing and constant support.
https://aeon.co/essays/look-into-the-secret-world-of-numerology-and-puzzles-in-bach
It was fun writing this track-by-track musicological analysis of Led Zep IV (50 this year ahem) for the cover feature of Classic Rock Magazine. Limited by copyright and terminology, it’s challenging and instructive to communicate deep theory without dumbing down. Also I now know how to hear the beginning of Rock n Roll and the bridge of Stairway. Get it here and all reasonable shops.
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Lessons from Eurovision
Total Guitar (Issue 345) has published an article on what Eurovision teaches us about music listening, and (guitar) performance. Some sample images below on rhythmic, perception, tempo and modulation respectively.
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Eurometal in Guitar World
My Total Guitar article is here re-adapted and syndicated in Guitar World. The intersection of Metal and Eurovision – Eurometal.
My article providing practical insights into the music and playing of the late, great Allan Holdsworth is now available for public free consumption on MusicRadar (including notation & audio). A teaser below.
Musical illustrations of Arvo Pärt’s Spiegel im Spiegel and Beatitudes are now published in Arvo Pärt’s Resonant Texts: Choral and Organ Music 1956–2015 (Shenton 2018) and Illiano, R., & Locanto, M. (Eds.). (2019). Twentieth-century music and mathematics. Brepols.
These unpack the musical mechanisms of Arvo Pärt’s music as outlined in this lecture below.
A breakdown of the musical science of the Sea Shanty in Total Guitar Issue 344
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Anatomy of a Guitar Solo
Originally commissioned for Total Guitar, this examination of the reader-voted top 50 guitar solos is now publicly available on Guitar World.
Engaging directly with time-feel and micro-timing on the electric guitar with specific exercises and style studies. This is for many levels of player who wants to draw focus to the elements of groove which are often excluded, glossed over or mythologized in the learning process.
