Department of Music

Academic profiles

Find out more about some of the staff in the Department of Music. If you'd like to meet some of us in person, sign up to our open day

Disclaimer: The modules we offer are inspired by the research interests of our staff and as a result may change for reasons of, for example, research developments or legislative changes. The modules mentioned on this page are examples of typical modules that we offer but are not guaranteed to be available in any particular year.

 

Meet... Hannah Thuraisingam Robbins

Associate Professor in Popular Music and Director of Black Studies

 Hannah Robbins Academic Profile

What's the first piece of music you fell in love with?

I grew up in what’s called the “Disney Renaissance”: The Little Mermaid to Mulan sort of time. They were almost all the films you could see at the cinema when I was small. According to my mum, I learned “Hakuna Matata” from hearing it in the cinema when I was very small and spent ages picking out the tune on the piano we had until it was right. I don’t remember that, so I am going to say “Who Do You Think You Are?” by the Spice Girls who were the first pop group I really remember or the Destiny’s Child album The Writing’s on the Wall, which was the first CD I ever owned. I still know all the words to all the tracks.

See Hannah's website here

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Meet... Nick Baragwanath

Professor

Nicholas Baragwanth next to a piano with a bookshelf in the background

Is classical music elitist? 

When George Gershwin asked the ultra-modernist composer Alban Berg how he could like jazz when he wrote such complex atonal pieces, Berg replied: ‘music is music’. There is no such thing as classical music, just music you like and music you don’t.

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Meet... Joanne Cormac

Associate Professor

My specialisms: 19th-Century music; the music of Franz Liszt; the symphony; musical biography

 Jo Cormac Academic Profile Picture

What's is your favourite composition or album?

Too difficult! At the moment I’m listening to lots of symphonies. Saint-Saëns 3 and Sibelius 5 are favourites. Liszt’s B minor Sonata and his symphonic poems Hamlet and Orpheus will always be special.  

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Meet... Henry Parkes

Associate Professor

My specialisms: Early European music, with a focus on medieval churches and monasteries. Music books and their notations   

Henry Parkes Academic Profile

What's is your favourite composition or album?

My tastes are fickle, but for inspiration I keep returning to Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time (1941) 

Read more from Henry..
 
 

Department of Music

The University of Nottingham
Lakeside Arts Centre
University Park
Nottingham, NG7 2RD

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