Music and Music Technology research

Introduction

The University of Huddersfield is home to a vibrant, diverse, international, and innovative group of music researchers. Our staff are recognised as leading figures in their fields, as evidenced by major commissions, performances, recordings, and publications. Our international postgraduate student community includes early career researchers who are already making significant contributions as composers, performers, technicians, engineers, and musicologists. 

Research excellence

In the 2014 REF, 85% of music research at Huddersfield was judged to be Internationally Excellent, with 44% of the overall submission ranked as ‘World-Leading’. In addition to a strong profile of individual research outputs, Huddersfield’s research environment for music was tied for 7th in the sector, alongside Edinburgh, Southampton, Royal Holloway and Cambridge. The impact of Huddersfield’s music research was judged to be 5th among the 84 submissions in music, drama, dance and performing arts, receiving the second highest possible score. The ranking for impact acknowledges the breadth and reach of research at Huddersfield, with impact case studies encompassing innovations in music technology and audio software, historically-informed performance practice in early music, and intercultural exchange in music composition as a model for social change.

Research strengths

Recognised research strengths across the departments of Music and Computing and Engineering include:

• composition
• contemporary music performance
• sonic arts and technology
• early music and historically informed performance practice
• music and the moving image
• music analysis
• sound synthesis
• sound quality
• artificial intelligence in music composition
• studies in performance history, canon, and reception
• opera studies
• cultural, critical, and historical musicologies
• popular music studies
• empirical and digital musicology