Let's play! A hybrid seminar exploring music, making, engineering and environmental sustainability in schools

Let's play! A hybrid seminar exploring music, making, engineering and environmental sustainability in schools

Wednesday 14 May (3.30-5.30pm)

 

Nicolas Gold, Ross Purves and Evangelos Himonides, University College London

 

A hybrid seminar jointly hosted by the UCL Science Education Special Interest Group and the UCL Centre for Climate Change and Sustainability Education:

In person attendees in Room 938, Institute of Education, 20 Bedford Way, WC1 0AL

Online attendees, please hold the date and look out for an EventBrite signup link to follow, or get in touch directly with Ross Purves (r.purves@ucl.ac.uk)

 

Session schedule:

3:30: informal play with construction system for in person attendees

4:00: formal presentations for all attendees

4:45: online demo for online audience in one room; in person demo for those onsite in the other room.

5:30: close

 

This hybrid in-person and online session will introduce a new environmentally sustainable construction platform designed to support creative, interdisciplinary learning at the intersection of music, making, and software engineering. Building on eight years of classroom‑based research using LEGO®, robotics sensors, and Raspberry Pi computers to design and program hybrid acoustic–digital musical instruments, our team has recently developed a fully recyclable, low‑cost alternative made from recycled cardboard, eco‑friendly adhesives, and open‑source electronics. Tested thoroughly via a recent five‑week primary school project, the system enables pupils to design robust structures, integrate sensors, and trigger synthesised sound through programmable workflows—while modelling principles of circular design and sustainable fabrication.

 

Participants attending in person will have generous time to enjoy experimenting with the new platform, explore its construction possibilities, interact with the electronic components, and consider opportunities for embedding sustainability, engineering design, and creative STEM/STEAM practice across primary and secondary curricula. Online attendees will have a dedicated, interactive demo of the system on camera – with the opportunity to discuss and ask questions.

All attendees are warmly invited to share expert feedback to help refine the system's educational, scientific, and sustainability applications; an optional anonymous questionnaire will be available for those wishing to contribute.

 

There will also be an opportunity to hear about the UCL Centre for Climate Change and Sustainability Education's recently launched music professional development modules for primary and secondary school teachers, which share similarly interdisciplinary approaches to creative engagement with environmental sustainability.

[additional resources] Instrumental Music Education Developing Pedagogies as Instrumental Teachers

The details of the book:

https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/instrumental-music-education-9781350408890/

Open access version: 

https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/monograph?docid=b-9781350408937

A list of some of the material we used when we were thinking about collaborative writing (clearly there will be more recent publications, but these were very useful starting points): 

Links to literature/blogs on shared writing

APA: Tips for determining authorship credit

Kara, H. (2021). LSE: A simple guide to ethical co-authorship 

Lee Brien, D. & Fredericks, B. (2015) Collaborative writing to enhance cross-cultural understanding within the Academy. Writing in Practice: The Journal of Creative Writing Research.

Thomson, P. (2016) Co-writing strategies -  or - what could possibly go wrong? Blog post

Thomson, P. (2016). Choose your writing partner carefully. Blog post

Thomson, P. (2017). Co-writing - a continuing story. Blog post

Articles:

Devine, E. Drake, T, Gilbert, A. Robinson, M. & White, I. (2017). Co-authorship in the Humanities and Social Sciences: A global view. A white paper. Taylor & Francis. https://authorservices.taylorandfrancis.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Coauthorship-white-paper.pdf 

Elbow, P. (1999). Using the Collage for Collaborative Writing. Composition Studies, 27(1), 7-14. https://www.jstor.org/stable/43501417

Frassl, M.A., Hamilton, D.P., Denfeld, B.A., de Eyto, E., Hampton, S.E., Keller, P.S., et al. (2018). Ten simple rules for collaboratively writing a multi-authored paper. PLoS Comput Biol 14(11): e1006508. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal 

Yeo, M. & Lewis, M. (2019). Co-Authoring in Action: Practice, Problems and Possibilities. Iranian Journal of Language Teaching Research 7(3), 109-123. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1230314.pdf 

Fwd: [MUSICOLOGY-ALL] Introduction to Grounded Theory – online seminar

Introduction to Grounded Theory led by Helen Scott (Grounded Theory Online) is now available as an on-demand streaming seminar. This seminar offers a practical introduction to Grounded Theory, a robust qualitative methodology for developing theory directly from empirical data. Musicologists can leverage these systematic techniques for data collection, coding, and analysis to generate novel theoretical frameworks from diverse sources, such as ethnographic studies, archival materials, or performance analyses. Mastering this approach will enable researchers to move beyond descriptive findings, constructing nuanced, data-driven theories that deepen understanding of musical practices, cultural contexts, and historical developments.

Access this seminar (https://instats.org/seminar/introduction-to-grounded-theory-1) at your own pace and please share this with colleagues and students who might benefit!


Best wishes

Michael Zyphur
Professor and Director
Instats | instats.org

Fwd: [MUSICOLOGY-ALL] CfP: INSAM Journal of Contemporary Music, Art and Technology No. 16

CALL FOR PAPERS:

INSAM Journal of Contemporary Music, Art and Technology No. 16

The Main Theme:
Environmental Concerns and Technology in Contemporary Music and Art

Deadlines:
No. 16
-for the theme and abstract submission: February 1, 2026
-for the full-text submission: April 1, 2026


***


Dear Colleagues,

The INSAM Journal of Contemporary Music, Art and Technology Editorial Team is excited to invite you to collaborate on our fifteenth issue (I/2026). The main theme of this issue is "Environmental Concerns and Technology in Contemporary Music and Art".

Contemporary society is facing a multilayered crisis, of which the environmental crisis is only one dimension. At the same time, rapid developments in technology, automation, and digital tools are reshaping the conditions of both labor and creativity in ways that would have been difficult to imagine even a decade ago. These transformations are not only altering how we work and create but are also redefining how artistic, musical, and research practices engage with ecological challenges.

For this issue, we seek contributions that examine how contemporary music, sound art, visual and intermedia art, as well as scientific and interdisciplinary research, respond to the evolving environmental crisis. We welcome submissions from scholars, artists, practitioners, and researchers that address (but are not limited to) the following themes:

- Music and art engaging with environmental issues
- Artificial intelligence, digital infrastructures, and resource depletion in artistic and musical contexts
- Acoustic ecology and soundscape studies
- Ecomusicology and zoomusicology
- Environmental art and eco-art practices
- Biotechnology and art
- Art, artists, and creative research in laboratory environments

INSAM Journal has four sections: The Main Theme, Beyond the Main Theme, Reviews, and Interviews. The main topic defines only the Main Theme section; in other sections, we welcome your contributions related to contemporary art and media theory, artistic music, performing and visual arts, and technology.
This issue will be published in July 2026. For detailed information on manuscript preparation, see the Author Guidelines on our website – https://insamjournal.com/index.php/ij/about/submissions. Send your proposals (theme, short abstract, and keywords) by February 1, 2026, to insam.journal@gmail.com, and, if accepted, submit full papers by April 1, 2026, via our website – https://insamjournal.com/index.php/ij/about/submissions.



Looking forward to our cooperation,

Editorial Team
INSAM Journal of Contemporary Music, Art and Technology

Fwd: [MUSICOLOGY-ALL] Conducting Interviews: Oral History, 19th January 2pm

School of Advanced Study • University of London

Conducting Interviews: Oral History
Research Training
Monday 19th January 2026, 14:00 - 15:30 GMT (UK Time)
Online live via Zoom
Register here: https://www.sas.ac.uk/news-events/events/conducting-interviews-oral-history-3

Session Leader: Professor Sue Onslow (King's College, London)

This session provides guidance and practical advice on conducting and transcribing interviews. It will start with group interviews and witness seminars. The session will explore issues related to objectivity and subjectivity; how to evaluate the usefulness of collected information and use it effectively for the research project; how to distinguish between fact and opinion; and the role of secondary sources. It will also address issues of sensitivity, cultural awareness, and ethical interviewing.



––––

Kremena Velinova

Head of Research Training

School of Advanced Study<http://www.sas.ac.uk/> | University of London

Fwd: Senior Researcher/Lecturer (f/m/x) in Computational Musicology

Dear colleagues,

we would like to draw your attention to this four-year fixed-term position at our institute (see below). Please forward this to anyone who might be interested. They are welcome to contact me with any questions.

Candidates can apply here: https://jobportal.uni-koeln.de/  ("Show filter" -> Title: "Computational Musicology")

Sincerely,
Hauke Egermann

Prof. Dr. Hauke Egermann
Pronouns: he, him, his

Cologne Systematic Musicology Lab (CSML) (Director)

Musikwissenschaftliches Institut 
Institute of Musicology 

Universität zu Köln
Albertus-Magnus-Platz
D-50923 Köln
Germany

Büro: Hauptgebäude, Raum 1.414
Telefonnummer: ‭+49 221 470-2825‬

hauke.egermann@uni-koeln.de
https://musikwissenschaft.phil-fak.uni-koeln.de
www.egermann.net
 
Hauke Egermann's Personal Meeting Room in Zoom:
https://uni-koeln.zoom.us/j/6238934429 
  
****please have a look at my TEDx talk: http://youtu.be/kzFgoaZ9-VQ*****

Fwd: [MUSICOLOGY-ALL] CfP: "From here, to there, to everywhere: Translocality and Cosmopolitanism in Music and Dance Practices" (Graz, 1-2 October, 2026)

Call for Papers

From here, to there, to everywhere:
Translocality and Cosmopolitanism in Music and Dance Practices

1-2 October, 2026
Institute for Ethnomusicology
University of Music and Performing Arts Graz

Many music and dance practices are not bound to a particular place. In an increasingly interconnected world, genres move through time and space in remarkable ways. This two-day symposium at the Institute for Ethnomusicology at the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz, Austria will focus on how various music and dance practices move into cosmopolitan contexts and become translocal through continuous transfer processes based on "movements of people, goods, ideas and symbols, as far as they transcend spatial distances and cultural boundaries with a certain regularity" (Klein 2007: 17–18). Cosmopolitanism in this context we understand as referring to the idea of performers and audiences considering themselves, whether actively or inherently, as being "citizens of the world", which includes valuing cultural openness, global interconnectedness, and shared human experience across borders. Cosmopolitan performances, performers, as well as audiences often critique notions of national identity, cultural essentialism, or the idea that a music or dance tradition "belongs" to one culture or people (see f.e. Turino 2000, Appiah 2006, Stokes 2007). Contemporary expressions of intercultural affinities (Slobin 1993) in sound and movement often involve performers transcending ethnic-national or diasporic parameters of belonging. For example, tango argentino is practiced throughout Europe (Stepputat 2024), Irish traditional music in Japan (Williams 2006), and Brazilian samba in Australia (Shaddick 2018). In relation to some of these practices, translocalisation may lead to a peculiar separation between music and dance practices (Stepputat and Djebbari 2020), while such processes of re-location potentially entail shifts from ethnic-national to sonic identity markers in others (Morgenstern 2020). Interestingly, most of these music and dance practices still have a particular place and time of origin, whether real or imagined, in relation to which performance practices continue to be validated and authenticated. All these issues raise important questions about the stakes of access and inclusivity, origin and change, identification, transmission, and agency when music and dance genres become mobile beyond their respective source domains. The aim of this symposium is to critically tease out these complexities in translocal and cosmopolitan contexts. A follow-up, peer reviewed publication featuring contributions from this symposium is planned.
Prospective participants are invited to submit proposals for individual 20-minute presentations engaging with the overarching topic. Presentation themes may include, but are not limited to, the following foci:

• What are social and cultural gatekeepers of belonging in cosmopolitan, translocal
music and dance practices?
• Who controls these narratives, and through which trajectories?
• What are economic factors of inclusivity, such as class and capital?
• Which power structures of gender and sexuality underpin cosmopolitan, translocal practices?
• Which recreational/competitive spaces exist in cosmopolitan, translocal music and dance performance?
• What modes of transmission evolve through translocalisation and in cosmopolitan contexts?

Please direct paper proposals in the form of an abstract (250 words) and a short biography
(150 words) or any further questions you have, to the organisers Kendra Stepputat and Felix
Morgenstern:

kendra-iris.stepputat@kug.ac.at<mailto:kendra-iris.stepputat@kug.ac.at>
felix.morgenstern2@ul.ie<mailto:felix.morgenstern2@ul.ie>

Submission deadline: 15 March 2026

We are looking forward to receiving your contributions!

_____________________________________________
Dr. Felix Morgenstern (he/him)
Postdoctoral Researcher
Irish World Academy of Music and Dance
University of Limerick
IRELAND

E: Felix.Morgenstern2@ul.ie

Fwd: [MUSICOLOGY-ALL] SysMus26 Conference

The 19th International Conference of Students of Systematic Musicology—SysMus26—is open for proposals, held this coming year at Durham University, UK, July 22–24 (Wed–Fri), 2026! We are offering a hybrid conference to include those who wish to come in-person or virtually attend online.

The abstract submission deadline is 30 January 2026 (5 PM GMT). Proposals should include a title, author(s), affiliation(s), abstract (300 words), and 3–5 keywords. For full submission details, see our webpage https://musicscience.net/events/sysmus26/.

Presentation Modes:

Long-form Talks: 12-minute presentation, 5-minute discussion. Long-form talks are allocated a total of 20-minutes each: a maximum of 12-minutes for the presentation, 5-minutes for questions and discussion, and 3-minutes switch-over time for the next talk.

Short-form Lightning Talks: 2-minute presentation, 15-minute joint discussion. Lightning Talk sessions are a collection of five video presentations with a joint roundtable discussion for the presenters. Presenters will be grouped by topic and their videos compiled to be played one after another. Then, all session presenters—virtual and in-person—will collectively answer (and ask!) discussion questions. Each Lightning Talk session is allocated a total of 30-minutes: a maximum of 2-minutes for each video presentation (five consecutively, totalling 10-minute presentation time), 15-minutes for joint questions and discussion, and 5-minutes switch-over time for the next talk/session.

For more information on the SysMus conference series in general, see the main home page: https://sites.google.com/view/sysmus

Fwd: [MUSICOLOGY-ALL] PhD scholarship in Music at the University of Aberdeen

Ogston Postgraduate (PhD) Music Scholarship

One scholarship is available for students commencing a full-time PhD in Music at the University of Aberdeen in the 2026-27 academic year.  It is valued at £2,000 per annum for the three years duration of the degree.  Scholarship is open to both home and international students: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/study/funding/424



The University of Aberdeen is a charity registered in Scotland, No SC013683.
Tha Oilthigh Obar Dheathain na charthannas clàraichte ann an Alba, Àir. SC013683.

Fwd: [MUSICOLOGY-ALL] Online Lecture Series "Artsong and Gender in Dialogue" this Monday highlights Pauline Decker, Carita Holström and Louise Reichardt

Dear Colleagues,

the fourth session of our online lecture-series "Artsong and Gender in Dialogue" this coming Monday. We are delighted to feature the following presentations:

Stephen Rodgers (Eugene, USA): Gathering Leaves: Pauline Decker and the Limits of the Song Cycle

Jenna Ristilä (Helsinki, Finland): Music as Emancipator in Carita Holmström's Södergran Songs

Lara Venghaus (Paderborn, Germany): From Gender as an Aesthetic Category in Friedrich Schleiermachers "Weihnachtsfeier" to the Underrated Compositions of Louise Reichardt

To join us, please visit www.songandgender.org<http://www.songandgender.org/> to register and receive the Zoom link.
We look forward to seeing you there and to an engaging discussion!
Warm regards,
Maria Behrendt & Anna Magdalena Bredenbach