Performance at the University of Manchester
We are passionate about music as a living, breathing entity through live performance. So many musicians – musicologists, composers and performers alike – report a childhood experience of a live concert as the trigger that sparked a lifetime of music. Indeed the synergy between performance and all other areas of music is central to the culture and organisation of our music department.
Comprehensive, professional-level teaching of instrumental and vocal music has always been a priority for us, and students can opt to dedicate a significant proportion of their degree to performing. We offer training at the highest level for in solo and ensemble performance, for which the vibrant music scene of Manchester allows us to draw on a vast range of expertise in our instrumental and vocal teachers [http://www.arts.manchester.ac.uk/subjectareas/music/teachers/]. Our teachers are highly sought after as teachers and performers, many of whom perform with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Hallé Orchestra or Manchester Camerata, or teach at the Royal Northern College of Music. Chamber music performers also benefit from the invaluable opportunity for coachings with our trail-blazing string-quartet-in-residence the Quatuor Danel
This kind of training translates into a depth and diversity of performance opportunities that few universities can rival. The university’s concert series includes well over 100 events per year, in which our students take a prominent role, and often amaze themselves in what they can achieve. The list below is not comprehensive, but gives an idea of the sort of opportunities that exist for students to perform in ensembles. Many, though not all of the following are run by the Manchester University Music Society (MUMS):
Built into the organisation of our ensembles is an elite conducting programme, which allows students to have conducting tuition at different levels through the degree programme with Mark Heron. Students can also audition for conducting opportunities across all of the university’s ensembles, which will typically give a student a number of short slots spread over the year’s concert series, working alongside Mark Heron. Students can also audition for the opportunity to take conducting as their “first instrument” for the third year recital course, which makes an excellent stepping stone into postgraduate training.
For composers, this energetic performance culture translates into countless opportunities to have their works performed. Every year Psappha , our Contemporary Ensemble in Association include a number of student compositions in their performances at the university, and the Quatuor Danel workshop compositions at PhD, Masters and Undergraduate level. A significant number of student compositions are performed to a high standard every year by Vaganza, and by various MUMS ensembles.
The combination of performance and musicology contributes significantly to our practice-based research in collaboration with the Quatuor Danel. Through Professor David Fanning’s research into the music of Mieczyslaw Weinberg, Manchester University hosted the first performance of the complete cycle of Weinberg’s quartets in November 2009. More recently, in September 2011, we experienced the first performance of Professor Barry Cooper’s reconstruction of an early version of the slow movement of Beethoven’s Op. 18 no. 2 quartet, to international acclaim.
Some of our past and present students have also enjoyed significant successes in international competitions. Many of our students go onto to postgraduate study in performance, and eventually to forge successful careers as professional performers in their own right. A number of the alumni profiles are on our Careers and Employability page are of outstanding performers who did their degree at the University of Manchester.
MANTIS (Manchester Theatre in Sound) biannually presents concerts of music and sound, featuring compositions and performances enhanced by the use of new technology and digital media. MANTIS combines a broad array of sonic events, which range from the live diffusion of acousmatic works on a 48-loudspeaker sound system (using the unique MANTIS System), to Live Instrumental and Electronics events involving large ensemble groups on stage (the MANTIS Battle of Gestures and Textures for voice, acoustic instruments and electronics). A call for national and international works, acousmatic, live or audiovisual compositions, regularly receives hundreds of submissions from all over the world.