PhD Students

The SMRC has a proven track record of successful research supervision. A large number of Salford doctoral students have developed international careers as musicologists, performers and composers, and the SMRC prides itself on supporting both text-based and practice-led research at the highest level.

The SMRC team has a vast amount of experience in supporting doctoral candidates; our researchers are also used to working in partnership with members of CCM and Salford’s Performance Research Centre to supervise interdisciplinary research projects.

Current MPhil, PhD and DMA students include:

• Phil Brissenden: a study of the origins and evolution of musicianship, based on studies of tuning, pitch/timbre and rhythm

• Sharon Coleclough-Revill: Effects of post-production processes upon performance.

• Jonothan Corry: Conducting in the brass band

• Iain Culross: Cross-faculty research in Focal Dystonia

• Adam Frey: Instigating new music for euphonium

• Nick Grace: Music direction/commissioning

• Jack Harbord: The Minstrelising Discourse of 21st Century Rap Music

• Nick Katuszonek: Rhythm Changes studentship

• Jostine Loubser: Cape Town Jazz

• Hummie Mann: 2 time Grammy-award winning composer based in Seattle

• Matt McKay: The flute in jazz and popular music

• Peter Moss: Jazz Pedagogy and Performance

• David Revill (Associate Professor of Music in Baltimore): Philosophical exploration of the idea of ‘unity’ in contemporary music.

• Philip Seward: International Music Theatre Composer from Chicago

• Rachel Smith: Performance / commissioning new works for flute

• Tom Sykes: Jazz for the i-Pod Generation

• David Thornton: Instigating new music for euphonium

• Aniko Toth-Kilpatrick: Contemporary Music Theatre

• Tim Watson: Developing new music for saxophone

• Neil Yates: Jazz trumpet, recordings and collaborations

Case Studies

PhD - Tom Sykes

Tom is researching the effect of digital technology on the dissemination and consumption of ‘niche’ genres of popular music.  He has recently had a chapter of his work accepted for publication in a forthcoming Ashgate book about European popular music. The book chapter, provisionally titled ‘Transgressing borders in cyberspace’, discusses the way in which recorded music is now so easily distributed over the internet, transgressing not only geographical borders but often stylistic differences, language barriers and censorship laws, not to mention copyright legislation and royalty agreements. Tom is focusing on ‘niche’ or ‘specialist’ popular music, with a particular focus on jazz, looking particularly at how digital media, especially the internet, have affected the dissemination and consumption of jazz.  He is currently undertaking audience questionnaire surveys and interviews at selected jazz festivals, and carrying out online surveys. Tom has also presented research at several conferences including; the Sound Property conference (Salford, 2009); Mediating Jazz conference (Manchester, 2009), Leeds International Jazz Conference 2010, and the Rhythm Changes Conference (Amsterdam, 2011).

DMA - David Thornton

David Thornton is regarded as one of the foremost euphonium players and teachers of his generation and has a global reputation as a performer and clinician. His work as a soloist, conductor and educator is renowned throughout the brass playing world to have a distinct hallmark of extreme virtuosity, professionalism and an ability to connect with audiences like few others in his field. In 2001 he was named as 'The International Euphonium Player Of The Year' and in 2004 his debut solo CD, ‘Three Worlds’, was awarded Solo CD of the Year by the British Bandsman magazine. David’s research will explore the interaction of brass instruments with electronics and will include the commissioning of new compositions from some of the UK’s leading composers in the field. Read more about David Thornton on the website: http://www.euphoniumsoloist.co.uk/

PHD/DMA completions

The SMRC has supervised a number of successful PhD and DMA candidates, many with international profiles in performance, composition musicology:

• Evaristo Aguillar – DMA performance portfolio: the rhythms of the Huasteca

• Jesus Bello - Composition

• John Benson - Music composition

• Robert Childs – music direction/commissioning

• Nicholas Childs – music direction/commissioning

• Robert Childs - DMA portfolio

• Chris Davis– military music direction/commissioning

• Stephen Cobb - DMA performance-based portfolio

• Andrew Cope - Musicological and cultural research into the generic feature of heavy metal

• Lt Col Chris Davis - DMA - military band performance portfolio

• Robin Dewhurst - Composition, arranging, performances and music direction via the publication route

• James Dickenson - The impact of Norwegian folk music on Norwegian jazz, 1945-1995

• Michael Dines - An investigation into the emergence of the anarcho-punk scene of the 1980s

• Ian Dobie - The impact of new technologies and the internet on the music industry

• Kenneth Downie - DMA composition

• Martin Ellerby - DMA composition

• Howard Evans - DMA performance portfolio

• James Gourlay – music direction/commissioning

• Rebecca Guy - Popular music, progressive rock

• Thomas Harrison - 'Val Halen': changes in their stylistic development and a critical examination of audience reception, 1978-1986

• Major Graham Jones - DMA band performance portfolio

• Eddie Severn – jazz trumpet performance and pedagogy

• Sachi Uchida - folio by composition

• Luc Vertommen – new music commissioning and historical research

• Timothy Warner - PhD by published work

• Roger Webster - New developments in the teaching of trumpet techniques

• Steven Wood - composition

• Louise Yong - An internet-based audio synthesis resource: as case study in Manchester & Salford

Recent completions: case studies

Dorothy Gates

Dorothy Gates has a growing reputation as a composer specialising in the British Brass Band medium. Based in New York she currently holds the position of chief arranger to the New York Staff Band and has had her works recorded and performed in many of the world’s great concert venues.

Franner Otter

Franner Otter was born in Dorset to a brass banding family. After studying composition at Christchurch College, Canterbury and some time as a singer/songwriter Franner qualified as a teacher, working as a secondary school head of music before going on to lecture in composition as head of the music degree programme for Bournemouth University at Weymouth. Franner completed her MA(Ed) with the Open University whilst teaching and then went on to gain a PhD in Composition at Salford University studying with Professor Peter Graham.

In 2011 Franner won the Kirklees Composition Competition with her piece ‘Lonely Isle’ for brass band. Franner lives in the Scottish Highlands and is currently composing new works for brass and wind band.