Lead institution

CMPCP is based in the Faculty of Music at the University of Cambridge. At the forefront of research and education in music, the Cambridge Music Faculty specialises in four main research fields in addition to performance studies: historical musicology, musical composition, ethnomusicology, and science and music. Its facilities are among the best in the country, and include the Pendlebury Music Library, the University Concert Hall, an Ethnomusicology Laboratory, a large collection of historical instruments, and a Centre for Music and Science with purpose-built recording studio and computing centre. Performance Studies Network conferences will be held in the Faculty of Music, which will also host many of CMPCP’s Visiting Fellows.

Partner institutions

The Department of Music at King’s College London is an internationally distinguished centre of musical and musicological research, with a long history of research leadership and input. It is home to the King’s Sound Archive of early recorded performances and benefits from research clusters in composition, music theatre, eighteenth-, nineteenth- and twentieth-century studies, as well as specialities in music theory and psychology that embrace issues of performance.

The Music Faculty at the University of Oxford is a leading centre for research and teaching in music. It has an international profile for research across a wide range of specialisms including psychology of music, ethnomusicology, historical and critical musicology, composition, analysis, performance and performance practice. It has a very large population of music graduate students and is a partner (with Royal Holloway, the Royal College of Music, and institutions in Belgium and the Netherlands) in an initiative to establish a European doctoral programme in practice-based research in music.

The Department of Music at Royal Holloway has a strong international reputation for its academic staff and teaching and research programmes. Awarded the highest ranking of any UK music department in the 2008 RAE, it has benefited from a sustained programme of research growth and development over fifteen years, as well as extensive collaborative links. It also has excellent music facilities, thanks to c.£930,000 capital funding generated since 2002.

One of CMPCP’s research projects will be undertaken in collaboration with the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and the Royal College of Music. The Guildhall School has an outstanding international reputation, offering musicians, actors, stage managers and theatre technicians a unique environment in which to develop as artists and professionals. It is situated in the heart of one of Britain’s most important arts venues - the Barbican Centre - and has over 800 full-time music and drama students, who benefit from a range of innovative approaches to teaching and research. The RCM also ranks among the world’s leading conservatories, providing specialised musical education and professional training at the highest international level for performers and composers. This enables students to develop musical skills, knowledge, understanding and resourcefulness which will enable them to contribute significantly to musical life in the UK and internationally. The Centre for Performance Science (CPS) leads and facilitates interdisciplinary research in performance studies at the RCM.

CMPCP staff

Professor John Rink (Cambridge) is Centre Director, working closely with four Associate Directors - Professor Nicholas Cook (Cambridge), Professor Eric Clarke (University of Oxford), Professor Daniel Leech-Wilkinson (King’s College London) and Professor Tina K. Ramnarine (Royal Holloway). Eric Clarke’s project has one Research Assistant, while Daniel Leech-Wilkinson’s and John Rink’s each have two - thus totalling five postdoctoral Research Assistants (who will be recruited at different stages within the five-year period). The Centre will also be joined by Visiting Fellows working with CMPCP staff for one- to three-month periods according to need and perceived benefit. There is a full-time Centre Administrator, Kerri French, based in the Faculty of Music at the University of Cambridge. Professor John Sloboda serves as a consultant to CMPCP, following on from a similar role in CHARM.

Management structures

The Steering Committee, meeting at least twice each year, oversees and helps direct CMPCP’s work under the guidance of Chair, Professor Jan McDonald (Dean of Faculties and Emeritus Professor, University of Glasgow), who was appointed to this role by the AHRC. Other members of the Steering Committee include Dr Jennifer Barnes (Pro-Vice-Chancellor for International Strategy, University of Cambridge, and President, Murray Edwards College), Professor Simon Franklin (Head of School of Arts and Humanities, University of Cambridge), Professor Trevor Herbert (AHRC nominee; Open University), Professor Amanda Glauert (Kingston University), and the internationally distinguished musician and musicologist Professor Christopher Hogwood.

Both the Directorate and the Steering Committee are supported and guided by a panel of international experts, whose membership includes leading scholars from different areas of musicology and other disciplines, performers, pedagogues and so on. This group meets ‘virtually’, with panel members receiving annual reports on the Centre’s activities.