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- Royal College of Music
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Submitting institution
- Royal College of Music
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Summary impact type
- Societal
- Is this case study continued from a case study submitted in 2014?
- No
1. Summary of the impact
This case study describes impact across four areas: (1) the research has led to a new, evidence-based lifestyle intervention based on group singing, leading to improved outcomes for women with symptoms of postnatal depression; (2) music and health practitioners have used the research findings to inform their practice, methods, and ideas; (3) the research has influenced the development of policy with respect to the provision of maternal and creative health services; (4) public awareness of the mental health benefits of singing has been raised via dissemination of the research and subsequent media coverage.
2. Underpinning research
The RCM has pioneered research into music, health, and wellbeing for the past decade. From 2015, with funding from Arts Council England, Dr Perkins and her team led the first large-scale, systematic project to investigate how music can be used to support maternal mental health. With around one in eight women in the UK experiencing postnatal depression (PND) and challenges with existing treatment models, the research met an important health need.
The cornerstone of the research was a three-armed Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) run in 2016 to establish whether group singing could support recovery from PND. 134 women with symptoms of PND were randomly allocated to either 10 weeks of group singing with their baby, 10 weeks of creative play with their baby, or 10 weeks of care as normal. Analysis revealed that, among women with moderate to severe symptoms of PND, group singing led to significantly faster reductions in symptoms of PND than either creative play or care as normal.[1] In-depth qualitative research showed that group singing provides an authentic, social, and multicultural creative experience, calms babies, provides immersive ‘me time’ for mothers, facilitates a sense of achievement and identity, and can enhance perceived mother-infant bonding.[2] Additionally, the singing workshops led to changes in maternal singing behaviours; women who had attended the singing workshops were significantly more likely to sing to their baby on a daily basis, were significantly more confident in singing, and had a significant increase in the number of songs they knew to sing to their babies compared with the control group.[3]
A set of further studies complemented and contextualized the main RCT. The first focused on the music facilitators who were recruited and trained by the RCM to run the singing and creative play groups in the RCT. A qualitative study with these facilitators evidenced the specific practices necessary to run workshops successfully, including a balance of forward-planning with the need to retain flexibility and to provide women with autonomy and opportunities for bonding with each other and their babies. Key challenges included coping with the emotional nature of the work. A strong sense of team, the progressive rather than one-off nature of the sessions, and the use of appropriate spaces supported the facilitators in their role.[4] The second focused on why singing in particular supports maternal mental health. A within-subjects experiment comparing group singing with group play showed that singing is associated with greater increases in maternal perceptions of emotional closeness than other social interactions. Mother–infant singing is also associated with greater increases in positive affect and greater decreases in negative affect, as well as greater decreases in both psychological and biological markers of anxiety.[5] The third was an England-wide survey involving over 2,500 pregnant women and new mothers, in order to understand the wider context of their music use. Findings demonstrated that there are associations between singing to a baby and lower symptoms of postnatal depression, enhanced wellbeing, self-esteem, and perceived mother-infant bonding,[6] suggesting that singing to babies at home, or outside of formal settings, may also be beneficial to maternal mental health.
3. References to the research
[1] Fancourt D & Perkins R (2018), The effect of singing interventions on symptoms of postnatal depression: a three-arm randomised controlled trial, British Journal of Psychiatry, 212, 119–121. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjp.2017.29
[2] Perkins R, Yorke S, & Fancourt D (2018), How group singing facilitates recovery from the symptoms of postnatal depression: a comparative qualitative study, BMC Psychology, 6 (41), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-018-0253-0
[3] Fancourt D & Perkins R (2018), Does attending community music interventions lead to changes in wider musical behaviours? The effect of mother-infant singing classes on musical behaviours amongst mothers with symptoms of postnatal depression, Psychology of Music, 47, 132–143. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735617742197
[4] Perkins R, Yorke S, & Fancourt D (2018), Learning to facilitate arts-in-health programmes: a case study of musicians facilitating creative interventions for mothers with symptoms of postnatal depression, International Journal of Music Education, 36, 644–658. https://doi.org/10.1177/0255761418771092
[5] Fancourt D & Perkins R (2018), The effects of mother–infant singing on emotional closeness, affect, anxiety, and stress hormones, Music & Science, 1, 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1177/2059204317745746
[6] Fancourt D & Perkins R (2017), Associations between singing to babies and symptoms of postnatal depression, wellbeing, self-esteem and mother-infant bond, Public Health, 145, 149–152. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2017.01.016
All articles are published in leading, international, peer-reviewed journals across health and music. The research was shortlisted for the ‘Best Research Award’ in the competitive AHRC/Wellcome Medical Humanities Awards 2020. It has formed part of the evidence base for securing four current RCM projects totalling over £1.5m: (1) HEartS: The Health, Economic, and Social Impact of the Arts in the UK (AHRC); (2) ProMiMic: Professional Excellence in Meaningful Music in Healthcare (Dutch Research Council); (3) ZikMus: Using Music to Meet the Psychosocial Needs of Families Affected by ZIKA Virus (British Academy); and (4) Songs from Home: Addressing Postnatal Depression and Loneliness Through Online Songwriting (ESRC, Network+ funding).
4. Details of the impact
Impacts on the health and wellbeing of people: outcomes for women
As a direct result of the research, a new evidence-based lifestyle intervention has been established for women with symptoms of postnatal depression. The 10-week programme that was designed and tested in the original RCM research was implemented in 2017 as an ongoing service – Melodies for Mums – by Breathe Arts Health Research, a social enterprise spin-out of Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity. The research led to the formation of this service, as explained by Breathe’s interim director (2019): “Our Melodies for Mums service came about directly as a result of the Music and Motherhood research; it would not have happened without it. The research study has both informed how we deliver the programme (in that we closely follow the study’s 10 week course structure, style and screening process) and been the basis on which we’ve been able to fund the service; individuals, the NHS and a large grant funder have all supported the programme financially because we have evidence from the RCM study that the programme is effective”. To date, £282,309 of funding has been secured for delivery of Melodies for Mums on the basis of the research. 300 women have benefitted with a further 620 set to benefit in the next two and a half years (with the roll-out delayed in 2020 due to COVID-19).[1] Women participating in the Melodies for Mums programme report that it supports their recovery, for example: ”I remember the first Melodies for Mums that I went to and it made me cry because I just felt quite invisible at that point and quite useless, and I think that having something that I could do with her [my baby] made a real difference. It was something to look forward to every week, and things started to get better. The feeding got better and she started to put on weight…and I think it was a turning point for me”.[2]
Impacts on practitioners and the delivery of professional services: music and health practitioners
For music practitioners, the research has provided evidence to underpin and support the development and continuation of singing groups for new mothers. For example, the Bristol-based Folks & Bairns Choir, London/Sheffield based Pram Chorus, London-based Big Red Bus Club, and UK-wide Music Bus all cite the research in their marketing materials, using it to develop and justify programmes, to attract participants, and to publicize the mental health benefits of singing.[3] The research has also supported continued professional development for both musicians and health professionals. In March 2019, the research formed the basis for a Thinktank hosted by Snape Maltings, where music practitioners worked alongside researchers and health professionals to consider how to develop their own use of music with mothers and families. Outcomes included a residency to develop training for practitioners wanting to deliver this work and a proposal to funders to upscale the Melodies for Mums programme (subsequently granted).[4] A music practitioner and one of the thinktank participants, commented (2019): “The Music and Motherhood research has contributed significantly to my professional development and direction over the past two years. Whilst I've worked with parents and young children for many years, it helped me to 'connect the dots', and gave greater depth and meaning to what I do. I regularly reference this research when either writing funding applications, or advocating the work I do, as being foundational to the projects that I design and lead”.
For healthcare practitioners, the research has been used to raise awareness of the role of music in maternal healthcare. For example, the evidence of music’s effectiveness was featured at the Central and North West London Trust Learning Round in November 2018, as well as at the Psychological Medicine Clinical Network Perinatal Mental Health Stream in September 2020, with participants describing the input as “interesting”, “informative”, and “relevant”. A thinktank participant and perinatal healthcare practitioner from South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation commented (2020): “Experiencing first-hand the discussion and practical session offered enabled me to confirm my knowledge around the importance of music and the mental health benefits to women. Music has always been a part of interventions in my work over the years, and having this research and knowledge as a practitioner is empowering to build on the knowledge and confidence as a tool to promote positive wellbeing, throughout some of the most difficult times as a new mum and parent".
Impacts on public policy
The research has contributed to key policy documents which have established the evidence and need for the role of the arts in healthcare. For example, it was cited in the World Health Organization (WHO, 2019) scoping review on the role of the arts in improving health and wellbeing which “in light of the size of the evidence base mapped…raises a number of policy considerations for members of the WHO European Region to support the development of long-term policies or strategies that will provide more synergized collaboration between health and arts sectors that could realize the potential of the arts for improving global health” (p.57). Further, it was listed in the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health, and Wellbeing 2017 Creative Health report as evidence for the recommendation that “local authorities might ensure that health visitors, midwives, GPs and antenatal teachers are informed of the health and wellbeing benefits of arts participation for expectant mothers and those with pre-school and school-age children, and that these benefits are communicated to expectant and new mothers. Where there is little or no provision, local authorities might encourage partnership projects with local arts organisations” (p.86) and was cited in the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health, and Wellbeing Submission to the Arts Council Strategy Consultation (2019) as “just one example of the enormous potential the arts has shown” in supporting maternal health.[5] Additionally, the research has been cited in public-facing discussions as evidence for the importance of the rapidly expanding social prescribing movement in the UK.[6]
The research was featured in the Tomorrow’s Child Exhibition at the Houses of Parliament, 26 June–1 July 2016: "This was a powerful showcase of mixed media art and science that ignited a lively and informed dialogue amongst participants and the 4,000 politicians and staff, generating greater awareness of the importance of the conception to age two period with an overwhelmingly positive response”.[7] The Mayor of London City Hall blog also cites Melodies for Mums and the “pioneering research” as “one of the programmes that inspired us as we researched how arts and culture can positively affect mental health and wellbeing”.[8] Finally, the research has underpinned health policy via stakeholders. A consultant perinatal psychiatrist at St Mary’s Hospital, London, commented (2019): “The research Music and Motherhood [MM] has had a profound impact on the newly established perinatal mental health services [PMHS], and as clinical lead of one of the largest services, I will ensure that the outcomes of the research will shape the future development of the PMHS in the context of the 10-year NHS plan. The current services target specifically women with severe acute or enduring mental illness providing assessment, psychosocial and pharmacological interventions. However, there are limited provisions to promote the recovery after discharge from specialist services and to maintain well the large proportion of women with mild to moderate degree of illness who do not meet criteria to access secondary specialist services. The research of MM indicates that this gap in provisions can be filled by participatory music-based initiatives”.
Impacts on understanding, learning and participation: Public awareness
Public awareness of the role of singing in maternal mental health has been raised via extensive media coverage of the research. In January 2018 the research was featured in 99 news outlets around the world, including in the UK, Europe, Asia, and North America,[9] resulting in over 14,500 engagements. The research was also featured as a ‘Top 100 breakthrough’ by MadeAtUni, a campaign to bring to life the impact of universities on people, lives, and communities. After its opening at the Houses of Parliament, the Tomorrow’s Child Exhibition toured to Oxford, Brighton, and London,[7] with the exhibition Director commenting (2019): "[We had] lots of visitors and very good feedback…Pretty much everyone said it made them think differently about the 1001 days period, definitely raised awareness, even prompted changes in behaviour. One lady and her brother came three times from quite a distance to see it over the weekend as it had such an impact on them and said it helped them to understand their childhood! Everyone said it was inspiring”. Finally, in 2019 the research featured on BBC2 Trust Me I’m a Doctor (Series 8 Episode 4) as part of a broadcast to 1.27 million people focusing on the “health evidence you can really trust”: “the study gives new insight into how singing can help you recover from postnatal depression…as the mums in this group have shown, finding the right support or treatment can lead to a full recovery”.[10]
5. Sources to corroborate the impact
[1] All individual testimonials available as emails on request. Contact details of individuals are also provided in the attached information.
[2] Breathe Arts Health Research Melodies for Mums. Testimonial evidenced in the video.
[3] e.g. Pram Chorus: https://www.pramchorus.com/singforpnd; Music Bus: https://musicbus.com/2019/02/baby-singing-groups-help-post-natal-depression/
[4] Snape Maltings Think Tank, 13-14 March 2019: https://snapemaltings.co.uk/project/singing-and-maternal-mental-health/
[5] All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing Submission to the Arts Council Strategy Consultation (2019) https://culturehealthwellbeing.files.wordpress.com/2019/02/appg-submission-to-ace-consultation-1.pdf
[6] Evidence for social prescribing: https://theconversation.com/how-creativity-on-prescription-can-improve-mental-and-physical-health-93818
[7] Tomorrow’s Child Exhibition and tour: https://www.zero2expo.com/parliament-2016/
[8] Mayor of London City Hall blog: https://www.london.gov.uk/city-hall-blog/melodies-mums
[9] Media metrics: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/the-british-journal-of-psychiatry/article/effect-of-singing-interventions-on-symptoms-of-postnatal-depression-threearm-randomised-controlled-trial/534122E539704BAEAC0824F9FCACC5A8#metrics. Media engagements calculated by social media engagement, where available, per press article. Data available on request.
[10] Trust Me I’m a Doctor episode link, Episode 4, Series 8 broadcast on 26 September 2018 (from 23:08) https://www.dropbox.com/sh/cp1tpnhd43gxujq/AADdVpCcSXhuyq4lcZVtcv81a?dl=0
- Submitting institution
- Royal College of Music
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Summary impact type
- Cultural
- Is this case study continued from a case study submitted in 2014?
- No
1. Summary of the impact
Mark-Anthony Turnage’s work is underpinned by a fundamental question: how can traditional genres of Western art music and the institutions and agencies that serve them, be used as vehicles for forms of musical expression that reach new audience demographics? His work as a composer is eagerly anticipated and performed in many of the world’s most prestigious venues, attracting new audiences and contributing to the economics of music production. Often controversial, his music contributes to new ways of thinking about music’s role in society, prompting new modes of engagement between art-music performance institutions and their audiences.
2. Underpinning research
Mark-Anthony Turnage enjoys an eminent position in today’s art-music world, as residencies with high-profile arts institutions such as the ENO, BBC SO, LPO and the Chicago SO attest. Through his compositions, he investigates two main questions: can classical music absorb contemporary narratives by including compositional and performance styles such as jazz, pop, and street-music, and, in so doing, can it reach new audiences who feel distant from it, especially the young? Turnage’s work explores the conflict of popular musical forms and its associated, seemingly instinctive performance styles, with the highly worked-out practices of contemporary classical music composition. He experiments with the effect of musical tropes originating in spontaneous, often collectively driven, processes such as football terrace chants or frantic parties within rational compositions for the concert hall and the opera stage (e.g., The Silver Tassie (1997-9); Scherzoid (2003-04); Anna Nicole (2008-10) ( 3.1; 3.2). His research has brought together performers who are at home in several modes of musical imagining to investigate the creative potential of collaboration and its resultant effect on audiences. The first performance of Anna Nicole (ROH, 2011), for instance, had Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones and Pete Erskine join the Covent Garden orchestra ( 3.2). Embracing and questioning the centrality and function of a ’prima donna cult’ in a wide variety of musics, as in other forms of art and entertainment, Turnage’s work pushes audiences to question their motivations for, and interests in, their consumption of culture, whether classical music, jazz or soap operas. In works such as From the Wreckage (2004) and Mambo, Blues and Tarantella (2007) – concertos for trumpet and violin respectively – Turnage integrated features of classical and jazz virtuosity, testing the boundaries of the genre ( 3.3). Turnage explores the idea of ‘the hero’ in the cultural imagination: both, musically and dramatically, his works frequently start out with hero narratives only to undermine them. Such irony offers the audience a self-reflexive view of their own engagement with contemporary culture. It also opens up ‘contemporary music’ and opera, both widely seen as impenetrable, to new audiences including children, who thrive off an imaginative re-invention of hero figures. Using a popular children’s novel, Coraline, for example, Turnage placed a child and her dreams of bravery, escapism and fear at the centre of an opera commissioned by a major opera house ( 3.4). Through his choice of subject matter, Turnage tests boundaries between genres – opera, reality TV, social media, the novel, the animation movie – to construct modern commentaries on an artistic past ( 3.5). This past, manifest in literary and musical works as in paintings, is thus presented as the ‘shared heritage’ that dissolves the seeming disjunctions of ‘high art’, popular entertainment and ‘street’ narratives (e.g. Francis Bacon in The Screaming Popes (1988-89), Emily Dickinson, Benjamin Zephaniah, W.H. Auden, Brian Bilston in Refugee (2018); William Hogarth and Igor Stravinsky in Anna Nicole (2008-10); Beyoncé in Hammered Out, 2009-10; Klimt/Beethoven in Frieze (2013) ; 1880s Paris and John Singer Sargent via Davis in Strapless (2015) ( 3.2; 3.5; 3.6).
3. References to the research
All citations are published scores of Mark Anthony Turnage’s compositions. His compositional output comprises over 150 works for a variety of vocal and instrumental forces which are published mainly by Schott and Boosey & Hawkes. Publication details of all works since 2000 are on the latter publisher’s website: https://www.boosey.com/composer/Mark-Anthony+Turnage.
3.1 The Silver Tassie: Tragi-comic opera in four acts. Vocal Score (Schott, 2002). Libretto by Amanda Holden after the play by Sean O'Casey (1928). Commissioned by the English National Opera (world première: 16.2.2000; revived 2002 and 2018).
Scholarship and media comments on the work and on its 2018 revival (incl. live BBC broadcast):
“Superb, fiery outing for Turnage’s First World War masterpiece.” ( The Guardian, 11.11.2018)
“A remarkable performance that whetted appetites for a fully staged production.” ( Rhinegold, 13.11.2018)
Scoggin, Elizabeth. “Mark-Anthony Turnage’s The Silver Tassie: Text, Subtext, and Context.” PhD. Boston University (2008).
Halliwell, Michael. “‘The Play’s the Thing’: Self- and Metareference in Contemporary Operatic Adaptation of Twentieth-Century Drama,” in Walter Bernhart and Werner Wolf eds. Self-Reference in Literature and Music (Amsterdam and NY: Rodopi, 2010), 105–39.
3.2 Anna Nicole: Opera in two acts. Full Score (Boosey & Hawkes, 2010). Libretto by Richard Thomas. Commissioned by the Royal Opera House (world premiere: 17.2.2011, revived 2014; pub. broadcast BBC 4 (67,700 viewers); DVD: Opus Arte OA 1054 (2011)).
Reviews of première and revival:
"Mr. Turnage’s music is the primary reason that so much seemed so right in Anna Nicole. There are flashes of Weill in the clattering, cabaret-like scenes when the reporters, wielding microphones, mutter like a Greek chorus; and jazzy sneering brass writing in the scene with the dancers at the “gentleman’s club” in Houston... this is a musically rich, audacious and inexplicably poignant work.” (NY Times, 19.2.2011)
“Turnage is well schooled in modernist compositional techniques. The marvel is the degree to which he is able to weave elements of jazz, rock and American pop, as well as television music, into his work while strongly retaining his own musical identity.” ( Opera News, 4.12. 2011)
“What gives the opera its power is the persistent disconnect between score and subject: intelligent urgency in contrast to dismaying mindlessness and the sleazily grotesque.” ( The Observer, 14.9.2014)
3.3 Mambo, Blues and Tarantella: Concerto for violin and orchestra. Full Score (Boosey & Hawkes, 2008). Commissioned by the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra (world premiere: 24.9.2008; CD: Chandos LPO-0066,2009 ).
“There's no doubting this is a significant addition to the repertoire. Accessible, tough and unmistakably Turnage … A stunning piece.” ( Financial Times, 26.9.2008)
- Coraline: Opera for family audience. (Boosey & Hawkes, 2017). Libretto by Rory Mullarkey, based on the novel by Neil Gaiman. Commissioned by the Royal Opera House, Folkoperan (Stockholm), Opéra de Lille, Theater Freiburg and Victorian Opera, Melbourne. German trans. Kerstin Schüssler-Bach, French trans. Mathilde Tamae-Bouhon. (world première: 27.3.2018).
“Mark-Anthony Turnage once again proves to be a composer with a knack for popular material… The music is accessible, suitable for the stage, and also truly singable…” ( Opernwelt, 5/2018).
“A highly effective piece for the stage... The distinctive and colourful score, infused with jazzy harmonies and rhythms, is full of energy, exuding an almost childish sense of joie de vivre. Vocal lines are syllabic, enabling the words to be heard and understood by even the youngest of listeners, and are underpinned by dance rhythms which are never less than engaging... The last word, however, must go to the many young members of the audience. They laughed uninhibitedly, screamed ear-piercingly, and left the theatre chatting enthusiastically about what they had seen. … Opera surely can't be understood and enjoyed by the under 12s? Coraline proves otherwise.” ( Opera, 6/2018)
- Frieze: for orchestra. Score (Boosey & Hawkes: 2014). Commissioned by the Royal Philharmonic Society for the 200th anniversary of their founding to react to their most famous commission, Beethoven’s ninth symphony. (world première 13.8.2013).
“Demonstrates vividly, like so much of his music, how lovely is Turnage’s unique take on harmony, past and present intermingling in passages that move freely between austerity and luxury.” ( 5against4.com, 13.8.2013)
“Without a doubt, one of the major symphonic scores of our century. Its expression is direct, its materials memorable, its orchestration brilliant and assured, and – on top of all that – it offers a bracing dose of its composer’s personality. Best of all, it provides an honest and unsentimental commentary on one of the West’s most daunting cultural objects.” ( artsfuse.com, 4.10.2014).
3.6 Refugee: for tenor and chamber orchestra (Boosey & Hawkes, 2019). Texts by Emily Dickinson, Benjamin Zephaniah, W.H. Auden, Brian Bilston. Commissioned by Britten Sinfonia for World Refugee Day, 2019. (world première 19.9.2020). Reviews – see ( 5.5, below)
4. Details of the impact
Sir Antonio Pappano, Music Director of the ROH, who conducted and was closely involved in the commissioning of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s two recent operas, summed up key aspects of the composer’s work as a researcher and performer when he commented that “his mission to embrace styles and forms that are deliberately aimed at widening audiences and capturing the attention of sectors of the population who feel distant from classical music, is consistently impressive.” ( 5.1)
Turnage’s work has been commissioned and repeatedly performed, broadcast and recorded by leading ensembles, orchestras and opera companies, attracting large audiences, making a significant contribution to the economy of the music business. A selective overview of commissions and performances since 2014 includes: The Berlin Philharmonic, London Symphony and Boston Symphony Orchestras ( Remembering, 2017), Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra ( Speranza, 2014) Philadelphia and Halle Orchestras ( Piano Concerto, 2015), Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra ( Hibiki, 2014). Commercial publication of scores document Turnage’s contribution to all major genres: 2 operas for the Royal Opera House; 2 ballets for ROH and Sadler’s Wells Theatre, as well as concertos, orchestral works, chamber music. He has projected art music forms in new directions by fusing western classical with non-western and popular compositional techniques and performance modes in unique ways to transmit musical meaning: in Shadow Walker (2017), for example, “Turnage includes, and very much exploits, Turkish percussion” (Andrew Mellor, Gramophone) ( 5.2). Since 2000, 22 of his works have been performed at the BBC Proms, a concert series accessed on Radio 3 and BBC Sounds by ca. 2 million listeners every week ( 5.3). His music has been recorded by Decca, Warner Classics, Chandos, Deutsche Grammophon, the LPO and LSO labels, and listener figures on leading streaming platform Spotify are currently 165,128 for his orchestral work Ceres, while Remembering has had 3.2k views on the LSO youtube channel ( 5.4).
2. Public Awareness of contemporary classical composition and current debates on music’s role in society
International commissions such as Hibiki (2014) for the 30th anniversary of Suntory Hall, Tokyo, have contributed significantly to the visibility of British contemporary music on the global stage. In the UK, this work was paired with Ravel’s jazz-inspired piano concerto in a 2017 BBC Proms programme (Prom 39) built around non-western classical influences in music ( 5.3). Maya, commissioned by the Swedish Chamber Orchestra, formed part of a new ‘music cycle’ for the BBC Proms in 2018 to bring contemporary music into dialogue with a key work in the concert canon: J.S. Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos. Soloist Maya Beiser describes how Turnage’s work “depicts the cello singing a delicate, soaring aria amidst shifting harmonies which stretches and expand the skeletal outline of Bach’s Concerto No. 1” ( 5.5). Speranza (2014), commissioned by three major international orchestras (London Symphony, Boston Symphony and Swedish Radio Symphony) demonstrates Turnage’s use of the symphony orchestra and non-western instruments to engage with a pervasive general contemporary concern with intercultural negotiation. ( 5.5). His works frequently engage with current socio-political issues. His song cycle Refugee for tenor and chamber orchestra, a threnody for the victims of the current refugee crisis, encourages the audience to reflect on their journeys and struggles as part of a larger human, trans-historical condition by setting topical poetry from the last 100 years to modern sounds; Turnage explains “The trigger for my piece was the photo of the drowned three-year-old Syrian boy on a Turkish beach. People were rightly shocked at the time and we need to feel the same outrage again today” ( 5.6).
Turnage’s critical engagement with genre has impacted wider public debates about the contemporary status of opera, its subject matter, its relationship with other theatrical art forms, and its audience. He has contributed four major works to what many understand to be an elitist art form, each of which has shone a new and different light on opera’s history and heritage, as one of his principal singers says: “he writes music about the people we live next door to or went to a football match with. (…) the themes are universal, and the characters are familiar” ( 5.7). The debates he has sparked are documented in press reviews as in the many international productions, both unusually numerous for contemporary opera. There have been 44 performances of Anna Nicole to date; 62 performances of Coraline (2018) were given or planned by opera houses internationally: Royal Opera House (2018); Theater Freiburg (2018); Opera de Lille (2018/19); Staatstheater Saarland (2019). Further runs at Folkoperan Stockholm (2020); Opernhaus Zürich (2020); Victorian Opera Melbourne (2020) were cancelled due to Covid-19. Public debates around contemporary opera also reintroduced earlier works onto the international stage: Anna Nicole, first performed in Germany in 2013 (Staatstheater Dortmund), has recently been performed at Staatstheater Nürnberg (2019) and Staatstheater Wiesbaden (2020). His opera, Greek (1988) was revived at the Arcola Theatre, London (2018); Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York, NY (2018); Munich Postpalast (2017); Edinburgh Festival Theatre and Glasgow Theatre Royal (2017), Emerson/Paramount Center Boston, MA (2016); Theatersaal National Bern, Switzerland (2015); and at Tongyeong Concert Hall, South Korea (2015).
Extensive international media coverage testifies to their contribution to wider debates about the subject matter for operatic treatment and the genre’s target audiences. Polarised reviews of Anna Nicole in the national broadsheets, for instance, illustrated clearly that the opera had over-stepped the boundaries of expectations of the genre by pulling the world of reality TV, with its own stardom cult, into the realm of the opera diva, causing discomfort to some and excitement to others. Descriptions of a “tacky sense of a misfiring musical” ( Guardian), and an “irresistibly visceral punch” ( Telegraph), document the forceful impact of this transgression of the comfort zone of operatic hero-worship.
3. Bringing new audiences to classical music, nurturing young audiences, and broadening the modes of engagement with classical music culture
Turnage’s collaborations with non-classical artists, his cross-over explorations and his direct address to young people have widened opera audiences to include large cohorts of under 18s, documented by the unusual uptake of Coraline at international opera houses. Mary Bevan, who created the title role at ROH, explains that there were many “who didn’t know anything about opera come to watch who totally “got it”,” and “there were so many children who would have had their first operatic experience or classical music experience there,” explaining that what it showed her was that “people don’t need an accessible or simple tune or orchestration to understand (opera).” ( 5.7; 3.4) Turnage’s inclusion of younger performers – children’s choirs are required in Hibiki (BBC Proms, 2017) and The Silver Tassie (Barbican, 2018), for instance – provides young musicians with high profile performance experiences and musical challenges. Children “liked the fact it was challenging to sing, and this gave them a strong bond in rehearsals,” explains their choral director; Turnage “doesn’t “play safe” when writing for youth choirs” and “the more complicated the music, the more time they spend around the orchestra in rehearsal! They benefit so much from this experience, and clearly love the final run of rehearsals and being part of a bigger picture.” ( 5.8). One of the singers explained “the power of the music made me care about what happened to the characters;” the parents of another said: “Our son was totally absorbed by this music. He sang it around the house all the time – we all learnt it! He was moved by the themes too and even though he was only nine he realised the significance” ( 5.8).
Turnage’s collaborative approach, giving voice to those outside the usual art music remit, includes a long-standing commitment to work in prisons. He brought his interest in the processes of musical construction beyond boundaries of “classical,” “rock” or “jazz,” as well as his experimentation with music’s rehabilitating potential, to his collaboration with the Irene Taylor Trust. Most recently, in 2016, he contributed to the Trust’s 21st anniversary celebrations by leading a collaborative composition project with participants in three Music in Prisons schemes, working with them on creating and performing their artwork. One participant described the “Bridges” project as a unique opportunity that “helped in personal growth,” while another described in a radio interview how the projects “for the first time ever give [young offenders] confidence,” while the experience “lets them know that somebody cares about them (…) realising that all of a sudden, a door opens; they can see light at the end of the tunnel” ( 5.9).
5. Sources to corroborate the impact
5.1 Email testimonial from Sir Antonio Pappano, ROH Music Director [see folder]
5.2 Andrew Mellor, Review of Shadow Walker, Gramophone Magazine (09/2018): https://tinyurl.com/36mfhdn2
5.3 Full list of Proms performances of Turnage’s music: https://tinyurl.com/k892dfh5
Average audience figures at the BBC Proms: https://tinyurl.com/4yauspm6
5.4 Spotify data ( Ceres) accessed 19.12.20 [see folder]; LSO trailer for Remembering premiere: https://tinyurl.com/yfapldxw
5.5 Select representative announcements and reviews for commissioned works Hibiki, Maya and Speranza: https://tinyurl.com/p2mkmcur; https://tinyurl.com/3v8rsbxr; https://tinyurl.com/53zbr8rw
5.6 Reviews for and artist’s statement on Refugee: https://tinyurl.com/2kfvbm7k; https://tinyurl.com/399nkmwj; https://tinyurl.com/rxnc5csf
5.7 Email testimonial from ROH title role singer Mary Bevan MBE [see folder]
5.8 Testimonials from Director, Finchley Childrens’ Music Group and young performers [see folder]
5.9 ‘ Bridges collaboration with Mark-Anthony Turnage for #ITTturns21’ (24.11.2016):
https://tinyurl.com/2wcnrdzn; https://tinyurl.com/yh4w8vbd
(includes quote 1); https://tinyurl.com/atf8bacf (BBC ‘Music Matters’ feature, includes quote 2 at 9’59””)
- Submitting institution
- Royal College of Music
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Summary impact type
- Cultural
- Is this case study continued from a case study submitted in 2014?
- No
1. Summary of the impact
The impacts described in this case study of practice-based research on Bolivian Baroque musical heritage are in two areas: Creativity, culture and society: enhancements to cultural heritage preservation and interpretation, new ways of thinking that influence artistic quality and audience reach; developing stimuli to cultural tourism and contributing to the quality of the tourist experience; research-led engagement with marginalised and diverse audiences leading to increased cultural participation. Social welfare: improved social and educational inclusion of marginalised groups in a developing country (Bolivia).
2. Underpinning research
In 2002, Ashley Solomon’s professional ensemble Florilegium performed at the 4th Festival of Renaissance and Baroque Music Misiones de Chiquitos, Santa Cruz, Bolivia. The Chiquitos missions were established in the 1670s by European Jesuits, who introduced Catholic liturgical music and fostered local talent, developing a sophisticated musical culture. The legacy of this period forms a rich cultural heritage. Tens of thousands of music manuscripts from the 17th and 18th centuries (the largest collection in the Americas), most composed by Europeans but some by Indians, was preserved for generations by local guardians, but unknown to the outside world until a process of restoration and promotion in recent decades, led by Dr Piótr Nawrót SJ, a Polish musicologist based in Boliva. Traces of this heritage had also survived in a living song culture in remote and marginalised Guaraní Indian communities.
Since 2002, with the support of the Prince Claus Foundation (Netherlands), Solomon returned several times per year to work with Nawrót on the restoration of this largely forgotten Baroque music legacy, preparing modern editions, training young musicians in historical performance and reanimating the music in performance. In 2004, Solomon recruited four Bolivian vocal soloists to join Florilegium for their first CD of mission music, recorded in the Mission Church of Concepción. The following year, he formed the Arakaendar Bolivia Choir, made up of singers from across Bolivia, a significant intercultural initiative. Solomon commuted to Santa Cruz during 2005–6 to prepare the choir for that year’s Festival and to make a second CD recording together with them; a third CD was recorded in Holland during the choir’s first European tour in 2008 and released in 2010. These three CDs include 67 separate works with a combined duration of over three hours, selected from many more that have been reconstructed. They represent hundreds of hours of score preparation, rehearsals, and dozens of live concerts, including 34 since 2014. Meanwhile, in 2010, a Baroque orchestra was formed by Solomon, who initially sourced European-made instruments for the musicians. Several have since been copied by local makers, creating the foundations of a new craft industry (see below). In 2014 the archives team identified fragments of 18c. scores with texts composed in the indigenous Guaraní language, an extraordinary find. They include villancicos for choir and orchestra and possibly an opera that includes vocal, orchestral and dance music. This discovery overturned the assumption that all musical compositions and productions were written in either Spanish or Latin to support the Jesuits’ evangelisation efforts and helps explain how remote communities kept their cultural identity intact during and after the expulsion of the Jesuits from Bolivia in 1767. In September 2014, Solomon travelled with Nawrót to the remote Guaraní village of Palmarito to work with its children’s choir, who joined the Arakaendar choir, its Baroque orchestra, 12 students from the Royal College of Music, and Norwegian Brass in four concerts of newly discovered music as part of the 10th Misiones de Chiquitos Festival. Further concerts with the Arkaendar choir and orchestra were led by Solomon at the 11th and 12th Festivals, and highlights from each Festival (2016, 2018 and 2020) were featured in associated CD recordings.
3. References to the research
- Bolivian Baroque: Baroque music from the Missions of Chiquitos and Moxos Indians. Florilegium and Bolivian soloists. Ashley Solomon, Artistic Director. Channel Classics: CCS SA22105 (2005). Sales figures (July 2020): 12,276 hard copies; 512 downloads. CD can be supplied on request.
‘The playing from Florilegium is as stylish as always…A fascinating and worthwhile project indeed.’ ( Gramophone – Editor’s choice, July 2005)
‘Florilegium and their Bolivian soloists perform all these pieces with wonderful verve... with imagination and resourcefulness. An important release.’ ( The Guardian, May 2005)
‘The most adventurous release I’ve reviewed so far this year … I’m still bowled over by it all and full of enthusiasm for such tremendous enterprise and imagination… The results of this European-Bolivian collaboration are by turns uplifting and moving.’ ( International Record Review 2005)
- Bolivian Baroque: Music from the Missions, Vol. 2. Florilegium and Arakaendar Bolivia Choir. Ashley Solomon, Artistic Director. Channel Classics: CCSSA24806 (2006). BBC Radio 3 Record Review Critics disc of the year, 2007. Sales figures (July 2020): 4,600 hard copies; 235 downloads. CD can be supplied on request.
‘This disc is packed with obscure treasures that amply reward the listener’ ( Gramophone – Editor’s Choice, March 2007)
‘Florilegium at its lithe, incisive best … this "mission statement" is a must. Spread the word!’ ( BBC Music Magazine, January 2007; Best Choral Recording of 2007)
- Bolivian Baroque: Music from the Missions and La Plata, Vol. 3. Florilegium and Arakaendar Bolivia Choir. Ashley Solomon, Artistic Director. Channel Classics: CCS SA 28009 (2009). Sales figures (July 2020): 3,583 hard copies; 174 downloads. Can be supplied on request.
‘The sound is captivating – fresh-toned and inexhaustibly animated… The music is totally absorbing from beginning to end.’ ( BBC Music Magazine – Disc of the Month, April 2010)
‘Florilegium plays some chamber instrumental work with customary finesse… There isn’t a dull moment during the disc’s hour-long duration, and plenty of musical subtleties and novelties to intrigue the ear.’ ( Gramophone, May 2010)
‘Florilegium’s pioneering Bolivian Baroque series contains some of the most delightful music I’ve heard in many a year... the directness of their approach, and the purity of their sound, transmits a youthful freshness that never fails to captivate.’ ( San Francisco Classical Voice, 23 Feb 2010)
‘a lively, nicely varied sequence, mostly of works showcasing Solomon's excellent Arakaendar choir, interspersed with an anonymous trio-sonatas and organ pieces recorded on a wonderfully gutsy instrument at the mission church of Santa Ana in the Bolivian part of the Amazon basin’ ( The Guardian, 15 January 2010)
‘All forces here are equally attuned to the spirit of the music… Heartily recommended as a nice change of pace to any baroque collection of sacred—and sometimes borderline sacred—music.’ ( Audiophile Audition, 17 February 2010)
’The Arakaendar Bolivia Choir is faultlessly neat and crisp, rhythmically very regular, but dramatically irrepressible. Enriching and uplifting.’ ( International Record Review, Feb 2010)
Overall: Spotify Bolivian playlist most listened-to tracks (plays):
‘Bolivian Improvisation’ (Vol 1): 706,110
‘Pastoretta Ychepe Flauta’ (Vol 1) 310,866
‘Sonata Chiquitanas’ (Vol 1) 236,852
‘Exaltate Regum’ (Vol 1) 182,269
10th Festival Internacional de Musica Renacentista y Barroca Americana, Misiones de Chiquitos, Vol 4 recorded between 24/4–4/5 2014; CD released April 2016. Arakaendar Choir & Orchestra, Coro Palmarito, Royal College of Music Baroque ensemble, directed by Ashley Solomon. CD can be supplied on request.
11th Festival Internacional de Musica Renacentista y Barroca Americana Misiones de Chiquitos Vol. 5, recorded between 22/4–1/5 2016; CD released April 2018. Arakaendar Choir & Orchestra, Coro Palmarito, Royal College of Music Baroque ensemble, directed by Ashley Solomon. CD can be supplied on request.
12th Festival Internacional de Musica Renacentista y Barroca Americana Misiones de Chiquitos Vol. 6, recorded during 2018 Festival. CD release postponed due to COVID-19.
4. Details of the impact
Enhancements to cultural heritage preservation and interpretation, new ways of thinking that influence artistic quality and audience reach.
Working with Piotr Nawrót, who made transcriptions from the fragmentary manuscripts at the Mission Church of Concepción, since 2014 Solomon has prepared more than 30 performance scores of sacred and semi-sacred 17th and 18th-century Bolivian Baroque music [ 5.1]. David Mollinedo, the mayor of Concepción, commented ‘The music forms a part of our identity. It may have come from Europe originally, but we have made it our own’ [ 5.2]. Building on the work of the past 17 years, during which he established and developed two performing ensembles (the Arakeandar Bolivia choir and Baroque orchestra) to sing and play according to principles of historical performance practice and established them on the international stage, Solomon has introduced this music to international audiences, both at the biennial Festivals of Renaissance and Baroque Music Misiones de Chiquitos, and across the world through concert tours, recordings and broadcasts. He directed 15 concerts in Bolivia in 2014, 2016 and 2018, and on tour in the US in 2015 [ 5.3]. Each run of performances is preceded by intensive periods of rehearsal and skills development sessions. For example, in 2017 and 2018, Solomon co-taught four training workshops for Baroque string players with the internationally renowned Chilean violinist, Raul Orellano. As a result, Bolivia now has its first Baroque orchestra and choir in a position both to perform examples of the Bolivian musical heritage at a professional standard, and also to provide a training ground for future generations of musicians.
This has created the basis for some to establish careers as professional musicians and teachers. For example, Simón Aguape spent two years playing baroque violin in Arakaendar Baroque Orchestra, auditioning at the Musikhochschule in Frankfurt whilst on tour with the orchestra, where he was accepted to study Baroque violin, returning to Bolivia to teach in his home community in Urubichá. Cristina Zankis, a bank administrator and gifted violinist, was inspired to pursue her ambition to become a professional musician after becoming involved in Arakaendar projects. She completed a master's degree in violin performance at San Diego State University in 2010 and is currently studying at El Alto Public University for a Bachelor’s in Music. Zankis is now leader of the Santa Cruz Symphony Orchestra, as well as Arakaendar Baroque Orchestra [ 5.4]. Meanwhile, Idebero Armoye, a carpentry instructor who has a workshop in Urubichá builds copies of Baroque string instruments from local cedar and mahogany; as he explains: ‘They were the only woods that could withstand the tropical heat’. There is now a thriving historical instrument-building industry, that exports within Latin America, and also to Europe and the US [ 5.5].
Research-led engagement leading to improved social and educational inclusion of marginalized and diverse audiences in a developing country. The most recent project undertaken by Solomon and Nawrót is the restoration in performance of some of the extraordinary discoveries of music with texts in the Guaraní language, described above. As part of this project, Solomon worked with the youth choir in the remote and marginalized community of Palmarito, that is serviced only by dirt-track roads and lacks the most basic infrastructure. A local music-teacher, Adelina Anori, who was in the original Arakaendar Bolivia choir while still at school, is now the director of music in Palmarito [ 5.1]. Under her supervision, 60% of the children can read music although many do not otherwise read or write. In 2018, Solomon rehearsed with them in Palmarito, subsequently directing them together with Arakaendar and international musicians in concerts at various mission churches of works in Spanish and Guaraní, as part of the Festival de Chiquitos. Jose Ignacio Sanz, Director of Total E&P Bolivia which sponsored the project, commented: ‘Total is active in the Guaraní territory and when I had the chance to premiere music sung in Guaraní within the framework of the international Baroque festival, it seemed like a great opportunity to publicize and give visibility to the language, the culture and the Guarani people’ [ 5.1]. A member of the audience in Santa Cruz said: 'It adds to our lives a spiritual dimension through words and history of our people in Chaco': another member of the Latin American Guaraní diaspora, interviewed by local television, agreed: ‘I come from Argentina, it's a long trip but it was worth it. I am very delighted and emotional. I am very excited as well'. Among those from Palmarito who took part, Arturo Cuellar said 'I hope we do more and have more choirs like this', while Viviana Zapata explained the importance of the wider impact of the event: 'this work will magnify our Guaraní people'. [ 5.1] As a result of these performances, in 2019 the Palmarito choir and Urubichá instrumental ensemble were invited to Rome, where they sang in the Vatican at pontifical mass, and gave further concerts in Poland and Tuscany [ 5.6].
Developing stimuli to cultural tourism and contributing to the quality of the tourist experience. International awareness of the music of the Baroque era Jesuit missions has brought new audiences to Santa Cruz and its region and made a significant contribution to the growth of cultural tourism [ 5.7, 5.8]. This in turn has stimulated the development of tourist infrastructure ranging from improvement of roads and provision of basic services such as electricity supply in remote villages, to new hospitality industry on the ‘Missions Route’. In 2015, the mayor of San Julián, whose population consists mainly of recently arrived immigrants from the impoverished Bolivian highlands, threatened to set up roadblocks if it was not allowed to participate in the following year’s festival. ‘Since the first music festival began, we have been recovering our music and our culture’, says Ronald Chinchi, 28, a music teacher in San Ignacio de Velasco, the largest of the mission towns; ‘Now, in all the towns, there are music schools, and the people are beginning to value their culture. It is growing all the time.’ [ **5.2.**] Ana Luisa Arce de Terceros, current President of La Asociación Pro Arte y Cultura (APAC) noted that the impact of the long collaboration with Ashley Solomon has included ‘significant improvement in the tourist infrastructure of the missionary peoples and important tourist influx.’ [ 5.8] Of a concert in 2014, Charles Driskell wrote in international Travel News, ‘This fine musical evening was a highlight and the perfect ending to the festival’s offerings for our group…Nobody wished the concert to end.’ [ 5.9] A 2018 study of tourism on the ‘Missions Route’ in the Chiquitos region by Juan de Dios Paramos Gomez, University of Mexico, included an analysis of why international visitors choose to visit the region; the Baroque music festival, spread across five mission church sites was by far the main reason (26.3%); he cited attendance figures for each Festival at c. 50,000 people per year [ 5.10]. In May 2020, Guillermo Mariaca Iturri, President of the Board of the Cultural Foundation of the Central Bank of Bolivia (FCBCB), announced that immediate plans to help the Santa Cruz region cope with the economic consequences COVID-19 include ‘the Baroque music of Eastern Bolivia’, stressing its importance to advancing Bolivian interculturality [ 5.11].
5. Sources to corroborate the impact
5.1 Documentary film about the project, including statements by Dr Piotr Nawrot, SVJ; archivist; Jose Ignacio Sanz, Director of Total E&P Bolivia; audience members; Adelina Anori and other members of Palmarito choir; articles in Gramophone and The Compass
https://tinyurl.com/8rk8z73n; https://tinyurl.com/xsh4zw6p; https://tinyurl.com/9paykrb8;
5.2 Statements by David Mollinedo, mayor of Concepción, the mayor of San Julían, and Ronald Chinchi, reported in Benedict Mander, ‘Bolivia’s ‘jungle Baroque’ music sees revival’, Financial Times, 26 October 2015 [ full text available]
5.3 Tour of US: El Día, Santa Cruz de la Sierra, 25 February 2015; Celia Wren, ‘Bringing historic Bolivian music to light, The Washington Post 27 February 2015; Review article in Bolivia.com, 16 March 2015 https://tinyurl.com/unv2xfzk; https://tinyurl.com/2xyfc4ct;
https://tinyurl.com/52k28cnb; https://tinyurl.com/msbeykkk
5.4 Simón Aguape: report ‘The world of the Guarayo violinist’, La Region, 5 April 2018 https://www.laregion.bo/el-mundo-del-violinista-guarayo/ ; filmed interviews with Cristina Zankis, March 2019 https://tinyurl.com/3ws694bj; https://tinyurl.com/4h65d5t6
5.5 Musical instrument building reported in: Nicholas Casey, ‘Jesuit Legacy in the Bolivian Jungle: A Love of Baroque Music’, New York Times 8 May 2018 https://tinyurl.com/5mcanaec
5.6 Performance at the Vatican: ‘Llevarán la música de Chiquitos al Vaticano’, Opinión 18 October 2019 https://tinyurl.com/2m8vp2wu
5.7 Report on tourism impact of Jesuit Missions route by the Ministerio de Culturas, Vice-Ministerio de Turismo [ full document available]
5.8 Testimonials from present and former Presidents of La Asociación Pro Arte y Cultura (APAC) [ emails]; impact report on 12th Festival (2018) [ full texts available]
5.9 Charles Driskel, ‘Report of the 2014 Festival of Renaissance and Baroque Music Misiones de Chiquitos’, International Travel News, June 2015, p. 6 https://tinyurl.com/9uskx6ux
5.10 Juan de Dios Páramo Gómez, ‘Desarrollo Turístico Integrado en el Circuito Misional de la Chiquitania, Bolivia’ (Master’s diss., University of Mexico, 2018) https://tinyurl.com/y2649n2f
5.11 Statement on COVID-19 by Guillermo Mariaca Iturri, President of the Board of Directors of the Cultural Foundation of the Central Bank of Bolivia (FCBCB), 13 May 2020