Academic Staff

Detailed profiles can be viewed by clicking on the staff member's title or picture.

Dr Jonathan P. Wainwright

Jonathan Wainwright is a musicologist and performer. He was educated at Durham University, the Royal Academy of Music, and St Catherine’s College, Cambridge. From 1989 to 1996 he was a College Lecturer at Oxford and from 1994 to 1996 held a half-time Lectureship at the Open University. In 1996 he moved to York to take up a joint appointment shared between the Department of Music and York Minster where he was Director of the Girls Choir. He has been full-time at the University since 2001 and in 2007 became Head of Department. He has published extensively on English and Italian music of the 16th and 17th centuries, is an editor of scholarly editions and of contemporary English church music, and his CD recordings range from Medieval carols through to Percy Whitlock’s Organ Symphony. He has been editor of the Royal Musical Research Chronicle since 1994.

Professor William Brooks

William Brooks studied music and mathematics at Wesleyan University (BA 1965), then received degrees in musicology (MM 1971) and composition-theory (DMA 1976) from the University of Illinois. Among his teachers were Charles Hamm in musicology and Ben Johnston, Kenneth Gaburo and Herbert Brün. He has been associated with John Cage as both performer and scholar; he played in the world premiere of HPSCHD and has several times directed production of Cage’s Song Books. Brooks taught at the University of Illinois (1969-73) and at the University of California (1973-7), then worked as a freelance composer, scholar and performer before returning to the University of Illinois (1987). There he was Associate Professor of Composition, director of the Contemporary Chamber Singers, and Chair of the Composition-Theory Division for many years. In 2000 he took up his present post at the University of York.

Professor Roger Marsh

Roger Marsh studied at the University of York in the early seventies. His composition PhD (1974) was supervised by Bernard Rands. He spent two years (1976-78) at the University of California, San Diego, on a Harkness Fellowship. From 1978 to 88 he lectured at the University of Keele, and was for three years Head of Department there, before returning to York, where he is currently Professor of Music. His music has been performed and broadcast widely. A work for piano and orchestra, Stepping Out, was premiered at the BBC Prom season in 1990. An orchestral piece Espace was premiered at the Huddersfield Festival in 1994. A work for percussion quartet, Sukeroku (2000), composed for 'Backbeat Percussion', has been extensively toured by them and was recorded in Japan along with a work for O-Tsuzumi and Percussion quartet, Atsumari (2004) (CD: NF61801). His setting of all of Albert Giraud's Pierrot Lunaire - 50 Rondels Bergamasques was released in 2007 on NMC records (NMC127), and a major article on Giraud was published in twentieth century music (CUP) also in 2007. A setting of Dante, 'Il Cor Tristo', was premiered by the Hilliard Ensemble in Perugia, Italy, in September 2008, and a new work for the ensemble 'de ereprijs' is scheduled for performance in Arnhem, Holland, in October 2009. Roger Marsh directs the ensemble Black Hair which specialises in the theatrical realisation of contemporary music. He is also known for his abridgements and productions of all the novels of James Joyce for Naxos Audiobooks, including Joyce's 'Ulysses' - unabridged on 22 CDs (2004).

Dr John Potter

John Potter joined the Music Department in 1998, and continues to combine his career as a singer with his teaching and research work. Although educated in the English choral tradition (chorister at King's College Cambridge, Music Scholar at King's School Canterbury and Choral Exhibitioner at Gonville & Caius Cambridge), he has always been fascinated by vocal activity of all sorts. His teachers included Lieder singer Walter Gruner, the accompanist Paul Hamburger, and the tenor Peter Pears. His early career included spells with the BBC Singers and Swingle II, and he was a founder member of the avant-garde ensemble Electric Phoenix. He was a member of the Hilliard Ensemble from 1984 to 2001 and has enjoyed a long association with ECM Records' Manfred Eicher. John also coaches ensembles on the European mainland and in the USA, and chairs the jury for the contest for ensembles at the Tampere International Choir Festival (Finland).

In 1989 he founded Red Byrd, together Richard Wistreich; their Hyperion CD of music by Leonin won a Diapason d'Or d'Année in 1998 and a second CD of music by Leonin (also featuring the York student ensemble Yorvox) released in November 2001 also won a Diapason d'Or and had excellent reviews (see the Yorvox link below). A third CD 'A Scottish Lady Mass' (also featuring York students) was released in April 2005. Red Byrd's recordings also include Roger Marsh's Pierrot Lunaire, Monteverdi's Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda and the cult classic Songs of Love & Death featuring Monteverdi performed on electric instruments and specially-commissioned pieces by the former Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones. John is also the prime mover behind The Dowland Project, an improvising group of jazz and early music performers who have made three highly-acclaimed CDs for ECM. John's most recent ECM release is Being Dufay, a collaborative project with composer Ambrose Field. His complete discography numbers some 150 titles, including 5 gold discs.

John also sings with the Gavin Bryars Ensemble and the Anglo-German group The Sound and the Fury. The latter ensemble is supported by Austrian Radio (ORF) and the artists Muntean and Rosenblum, and is involved in a major recording project that will produce several CDs a year of Franco-Flemish polyphony. In addition to recording John has a very active career as a performer and vocal coach, both activities taking him all over the world. His extensive bibliography includes two books for Cambridge University Press and Tenor: History of a Voice for Yale University Press (2009). For more information about John Potter's concerts, recordings and publications see http://www.john-potter.co.uk/.

Dr Tony Myatt

Tony Myatt is the Director of the Music Research Centre and principle investigator of AHRC’s New Aesthetics in Computer Music research project. His research and teaching is based in four areas: contemporary aesthetics in computer music; the perception of spatial sound, composition and performance of computer music and audio art.

Tony’s 1995 Computer Music Journal article Three dimensional sound spatialisation using ambisonic techniques (19(4) with Dave Malham) has been cited as a significant factor in the resurgence of interest in Ambisonics for computer music. He was a co-founder of Cambridge University Press’ Organised Sound; an international journal of music and technology in 1995 and an editor of the journal until 2003. He’s now an occasional guest editor and member of the journal’s editorial board. He coordinated and led a team from the EPSRC’s Digital Music Research Network who formulated the UK Roadmap for Digital Music Research; a guide to the development of music technologies for funders, politicians and academics (2005). He has delivered invited lectures in the US, UK and a number of EU countries, and has presented papers in China, across the EU and North America. He has performed and had exhibitions in UK, France, Germany, Italy, in China and in the US. Tony’s accumulated research grant portfolio totals over £1.5M. Funders have included the European Commission, UK research councils, Silicon Graphics Inc. and BT. He led the project to finance, design and construct the £2.5M Music Research Centre at the University of York which opened in 2004.

Tony is a co-founder of SightSonic, an organisation based in York who promote digital and experimental arts. Tony is currently Chair of the SightSonic curatorial committee.

Tony was awarded a Herald Angel Award by the Glasgow Herald at the 1997 Edinburgh Festival and the International Critics Award, with kinetic sculptor Peter Fluck, for Chaotic Constructions an interactive kinetic sculpture/audio installation. This piece was originally created for the Tate Gallery, St Ives UK where it was installed in 1997. after via gleam, an electronic work, was a finalist in the WPA/Cocoran Gallery’s colorfield.remix experimental media competition in 2007.In June 2007 Tony was resident composer at Hochshule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe, Germany, where he developed a live performance work for a forty-three channel, multi layer sound system. The piece used surround sound techniques informed by research in spatial audio perception.

Tony also acts as a consultant to contemporary art organisations, and is a reviewer for a number of research funding organisations and international conferences.

Dr Jenny Doctor

Jenny Doctor earned a BA in Mathematics (1980) from Oberlin College and a BM in Piano Performance (1981) from Oberlin Conservatory of Music. She studied viola for a time with the Vermeer Quartet (1984–5), before working on postgraduate degrees in music history at Northwestern University (MMus 1986, PhD 1993). She was granted a Fulbright Scholarship to London (1989–90), during which time she was affiliated with King's College London, supervised by Prof Arnold Whittall. Her PhD investigated interwar programming practices by the BBC, exploring the BBC Music Department's attitudes and policies towards Second Viennese School composers and their works; her thesis is published in revised form by Cambridge University Press (1999). She was later affiliated with St Hilda's College, Oxford, where she organized the archives of Elizabeth Maconchy and researched aspects of her life and music.

For seven years Jenny worked at Macmillan Publishers with Stanley Sadie, as an editor on various New Grove dictionaries, and as a senior editor responsible for twentieth-century composers on the second edition of The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2001). She began her teaching career at Trinity College of Music in London (2003–5). Since 2005 she has taught here at the University of York, and in addition she is a Research Fellow at the Borthwick Institute for Archives, with responsibility for the University of York Sound Archives.

Dr Ambrose Field

Ambrose Field is a composer motivated by innovation and a human approach to digital technologies. Field's recent large-scale piece 'Being Dufay' is a new setting of fragments of medieval song (John Potter, tenor) within lush, contemporary electronic soundscapes. Being Dufay is published by ECM Records (ECM 2071), with worldwide distribution. Being Dufay is currently touring as a live performance (which premiered at Vienna Konzerthaus in January 2009). Field's music is broadcast regularly by the BBC and other international radio stations. In 2006, his critically acclaimed studio album 'Storm!' for Sargasso, London, was awarded an honorary mention at the Prix Ars Electronica, Linz (Europe's largest digital culture forum). Field has also received two further honorary awards from the Prix Ars Electronica in 1997 and 1998 for digital music composition.

Ambrose is particularly interested in the impact of interactive digital technology on musical performance. His piece World Facts (premiered live at the ICA, London, June 2007) employs live data feeds from the internet to influence the real-time composition of a multi-channel, immersive audio piece. Various works from Field's back catalogue also appear on CD from Memnosyne Media (France), Centaur Records (USA), and on compilation disks from the ARS Electronica (ORF/Sony DADC: 1997,1998,2006).

Ambrose's research interests are in Composition, Postmodernism, Crossing Genre and Style Boundaries in Music, and the production of next-generation immersive media. In 2006, Ambrose was invited to work at Recombinant Media Labs, San Francisco (Asphodel), and has previously been resident artist at HFG Karlesruhe, and Hungarian National Radio.

Field has instigated a number of high-profile projects which directly involve partners from Industry. In 2006, he developed the Worldscape Laptop Orchestra, an ensemble of 50 wireless musicians investigating the large-scale application of digital technologies to creativity. The Worldscape project received international acclaim from BBC Radios 3, 4, 5, ABC news, Berlin Style, The Guardian, Der Spiegel and the premier performance was generously supported by Apple Computer, Inc. From 2002-2004 Field's production experience was sought by a well-known manufacturer, for a series of professional audio mastering products.

Dr Field has been actively involved in the review, validation and external examining processes at five other UK higher education institutions. He has lead courses and given guest lectures internationally from China to the USA, including several conference keynote addresses and professional residencies. Field has contributed to a number of books on digital creativity, and was a Director of the UK Sonic Arts Network in the late 1990s.

Dr Tim Howell

Tim Howell is a senior lecturer in the Department of Music at the University of York, where he has worked since October 1986.

After graduating from Southampton University, he studied with Professor Arnold Whittall for the MMus in Theory & Analysis at King's College, London, while working as an Editorial Assistant on The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Having gained the MMus with distinction, submitting a thesis on Sibelius' Tapiola, he pursued Doctoral Research on all the Symphonies and Tone-Poems of Sibelius at Southampton University, under the supervision of Professor Peter Evans, and held a visiting Research Fellowship at the University of Helsinki, working with Professor Erik Tawastsjerna. That thesis, Jean Sibelius: Progressive Techniques in the Symphonies and Tone-Poems, was published by Garland Press and has led to a number of articles, conference contributions and visiting lectures - most notably to the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki - as a leading analytical authority on Sibelius's music.

Tim Howell contributed a chapter, 'Sibelius the Progressive', for the Cambridge University Press Sibelius Studies volume ( January 2001), was an editor and contributor to A companion to Contemporary Musical Thought (Routledge, 1992) and has contributed articles to Music Analysis, The British Journal of Music Education and Music and Letters. He has regularly written reviews of music books for Music and Letters and the British Journal of Aesthetics.

His most recent work is a major survey of Finnish 20th-century music; After Sibelius: Studies in Finnish Music, (Ashgate publishing). The seemingly disproportionate creative energy from this small country defies prevalent trends in the production of classical music. Tim Howell provides an engaging investigation into Finnish music and combines elements of composer biography and detailed analysis within the broader context of cultural and national identity. The book consists of a collection of eight individual composer studies that investigate the historical position and compositional characteristics of a representative selection of leading figures, ranging from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present day. These potentially self-contained studies subscribe to a larger picture, which explains the Sibelian legacy, the effect of this considerable influence on subsequent generations and its lasting consequences: an internationally acclaimed school of contemporary music.

Dr Nicky Losseff

Nicky Losseff (b. 14 May 1962) received her musical education at the Yehudi Menuhin School (1971-75), the Royal Academy of Music (1980-83) and King's College, London. Before taking her first degree, she spent three years as a school music teacher, first in Iceland (1983-5) and then India (1985-6). From 1994-97 she was British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at York University.

As a musicologist, she has written on medieval polyphony, representations of music in 19th- century fiction, Bartók, Kate Bush, and silence. Her current research focuses on the interfaces between music and psychoanalysis. As a pianist, she performs regularly, especially contemporary piano music, and has appeared with Gamelan Sekar Petak at the Huddersfield and Cheltenham Festival

Dr Peter Seymour

Peter Seymour studied at Huddersfield School of Music and at University of York, including post-graduate work researching into the performance of baroque music. In July 1994 he was awarded the degree of D Mus., at University of York for research into performing style. He is director of Yorkshire Baroque Soloists and of Yorkshire Bach Choir, and has worked and recorded in most European countries. He is also an artistic adviser to York Early Music Festival and Senior Lecturer in Music and Organist at the University of York. He records regularly both as conductor and keyboard player for WDR-Köln, BBC and other radio stations. His keyboard work focuses on harpsichord, organ and fortepiano both as soloist and in ensemble. Particularly rewarding projects have included recording CPE Bach's last six volumes of keyboard compositions and long-term musical partnerships (in both Baroque and Classical repertoire) with Stephen Varcoe, Yvonne Seymour, Emma Kirkby, Lynne Dawson, David Thomas, Thomas Guthrie and Thomas Thomaschke; he also works with James Bowman, Robin Blaze, Christoph Prégardien, James Gilchrist, Ian Partridge, as well as instrumentalists including Lucy Russell, Simon Jones, Anthony Robson, Pamela Thorby and Crispian Steele Perkins.

Dr Neil F. I. Sorrell

Neil Sorrell obtained a B.A. in Music from the University of Cambridge in 1967, an M.A. in Area Studies (specialising in North Indian music) from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London in 1969, and a Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology from Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut in 1980. His doctoral thesis was on Indian music, and he co-authored a book on the subject with his teacher, the great sarangi player, Pandit Ram Narayan. He was the first ethnomusicologist to be appointed to a British university music department (York, 1973). A secondary interest, which has assumed greater importance over the past 25 years, is Javanese gamelan music, which he began studying at Wesleyan University. In 1980 he co-founded the English Gamelan Orchestra, the first group of British musicians dedicated to the study, composition, and performance of music for the Javanese gamelan, and in 1981 he organised the manufacture by Tentrem Sarwanto of York’s Gamelan Sekar Petak, the first complete Javanese gamelan in a British teaching institution. Gamelan Sekar Petak has toured Britain, and also performed in Italy in 1984, and in 1987 gave the first performance of Javanese Wayang Kulit (shadow theatre) accompanied by British gamelan players. In 1993 he supervised the acquisition of a gamelan by La Cité de la Musique in Paris, also made by Tentrem Sarwanto and named Gamelan Sekar Wangi, and he has also taught and performed in Paris. In 1994 he participated, as composer and workshop leader, in the Rhythms of Harmony Festival in Indonesia, which brought together the British percussionist, Evelyn Glennie, and the gamelan musicians of S.T.S.I., Surakarta. He also acquired, in 1989, a set of Thai Pi-Phat instruments for the department.

Neil Sorrell has written, broadcast and lectured around Britain, and also the United States, France, Italy, Switzerland, Sweden, India, and Indonesia, on Indian and Javanese music, providing entries for the Encarta Encylopedias and numerous insert notes for compact disc recordings of Indian music issued by the Nimbus and Navras companies. He has been invited to address conferences in India and also to interview several leading musicians, including Vilayat Khan, Ram Narayan, Hariprasad Chaurasia and Shivkumar Sharma at the Nehru Centre in London, and his interviews with Ravi Shankar and other famous musicians have been published in the Gramophone magazine.

Dr Jonathan Eato

Jonathan Eato studied at Goldsmiths College, University of London, and the University of York. His composition PhD (2003) was supervised by Nicola LeFanu and Tony Myatt. He was the Academic Director for the BMus Jazz degree at Exeter University from 2002, before returning to York in 2005. From October 2007 until October 2008 he was a Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa.

As an improvising saxophone player he formed the duo ev2 with composer Craig Vear in 2003. Since then ev2 have performed in the UK, Germany, Canada, and the Falkland Islands. Their music has featured on BBC1 television's 'Countryfile' (2006), the short films '5 Antarctic Solitudes' by Craig Vear (2004), and the interdisciplinary performance piece 'Stretch' (2004-2007). Other performance credits include the BBC Cage Weekend at the Barbican (2004), and as soloist in 'construction 3' by Tony Myatt and Peter Fluck - a multiple media concerto for digitally enabled saxophone and high performance computers premiered in Berlin in 2001.

As a composer Jonathan was a finalist in the 2004 Luxembourg International Prize with the orchestral piece 'Bling Bling Balaam'. This has been recorded by Luxembourg Sinfonietta (Editions LGNM 404) and a live performance by Århus Sinfonietta was broadcast on Danish Radio. In 2006 he was commissioned by choreographer Jacky Lansley to compose a dance score based on the music of Jelly Roll Morton. The resultant piece, 'Anamule Dance', was premiered on 18 and 19 January 2007 at The Hall for Cornwall in Truro, before transferring to the Clore Studio at the Royal Opera House in London for three more performances. The premiere of the song cycle 'Bright Blades and Heart Grey' was given by James Gilchrist and Alison Nicholls at the World Harp Congress in 2005. More recently Jonathan was composer and sound designer for the site-specific cross-disciplinary promenade performance piece 'Here, at home'. Conceived and directed by Hannah Bruce, this was given six performances in Stellenbosch in August 2008.

Dr Daniel March

Daniel March's research focuses upon music of the late 20th and early 21st Centuries. His doctoral thesis, entitled Beyond Simplicity: Analytical Strategies for Contemporary Music was completed in 1997: it provides analytical readings of works by Andriessen, Feldman, Ligeti and others, and a framework for the analysis of music which escapes traditional models. Recent research involves an examination of the work-concept in relation to 20th Century 'recompositions'.

As a composer Daniel has written music for a variety of ensembles, including the Javanese Gamelan: his compositions Bronze by Gold, and Pieces of Five and Three, have both been broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Other pieces include O Souverain (O Juge) for chamber orchestra, On the Liffey for bodhran and tape, and Together Again and All the King's Horses for piano.

Daniel has also worked as a composer within the field of community and music education, taking part in a number of creative projects and writing music both for and with participants. Large-scale pieces include music for shadow puppet theatre, The Shadow of the Rose, and Noah's Opera, both of which involve extensive electro-acoustic elements.

Dr Thomas Simaku

Thomas Simaku (b. 1958) gained a PhD in Composition at the University of York (1991-96) Winner of the coveted Lionel Robbins Memorial Scholarship in 1993 (Simaku was the only candidate in the UK to win the award that year), he also was the 1996 Leonard Bernstein Fellow in Composition at Tanglewood Music Centre in the USA studying with Bernard Rands, and a fellow at the Composers' Workshop, California State University (1998), with Brian Ferneyhough. In 2000 he was awarded a highly prestigious Fellowship from the Arts & Humanities Research Council in London.

Simaku’s music has been reaching audiences all over Europe and the USA for over a decade, and it has been awarded a host of accolades for its highly expressive qualities and its unique blend of drama, intensity and modernism.

Notable performances include, among others, those given by the Arditti Quartet, English Northern Philharmonia, European Union Chamber Orchestra, London Kreutzer Quartet, Insomnio Ensemble, Polish Radio Chamber Orchestra, the New London Orchestra, Amsterdam New Music Ensemble, Goldberg Ensemble, Tokyo Phonosphere Musicale, Capricorn Ensemble, Norwegian Medieval Trio, New Music Players, Concorde (Dublin) and Austrian 'Ticom' Ensemble. Internationally renowned soloists such as Peter Sheppard Skaerved, Ian Pace, Vania Lecuit and Madeleine Shapiro have performed his solo pieces.

Simaku's works have been performed in festivals such as the ISCM, Tanglewood, Avignon, Miami, Manchester, Zagreb Biennale, Birmingham, Munich, Cagliari, Odense (Denmark), KlangSpectrum (Austria), Viitassari (Finland), etc. Broadcasts of his music include those by the BBC Radio-3, Radio-France, ORF (Austria), SWR2 and MDR (Germany), ABC (Australia), Swedish, Polish, Hellenic, Danish, Israeli, Croatian, Swiss, Icelandic and Brazil national radio stations. A concert-portrait featuring his music took place at the 2003 Begegnungen Internationale Konzertserie in Innsbruck, Austria. In 2000 he was granted British citizenship and now lives in York with his wife and two daughters. Winner of a number of prestigious awards such as Serocki International Prize, Lutoslawski Award, Leverhulme Research Fellowship, DAAD Residency in Berlin, and Honourable Mention at the Musical Personalities International Competition – Alexander Tansman 2006, Simaku is a lecturer at the University of York.

Dr John Stringer

Born in Newcastle, John Stringer studied at Huddersfield and York. As a composer, his work has been performed by ensembles such as the Philharmonia and BBC Symphony Orchestras, Basel Soloists, Corrente Ensemble, Black Hair, New Music Players, de ereprijs, Ensemble 10/10, Apollo Saxophone Quartet and 4Mality Percussion Quartet. As a conductor he has conducted contemporary music ensembles such as Black Hair and the New Music Players as well as groups such as the Philharmonia Orchestra. He has worked with Jonathan Harvey, James Wood, Hanna Kulenty, Richard Ayres, Hans Abrahamsen, Stephen Montague, Robert Saxton and Karlheinz Stockhausen amongst others. His recent works include Drill for oboe and percussion (performed in May by New Noise, London) and Lied for solo cello (performed in June by Matthew Barlow). Disquiet for piano will be premiered in Rome in October and Rohan de Saram will be performing Lied in 2009. He is published by the University of York Music Press (UYMP).

John Taylor

John Taylor, one of Europe's most celebrated jazz pianists and composers, joined the Music Department staff in October 2005.

Taylor has played with Cleo Laine, Enrico Rava, Gil Evans and many other leading performers. He has long championed the music of jazz legend Kenny Wheeler, with whom he has performed and recorded extensively. Taylor has recorded over 80 LPs and CDs, many for the ECM label. Of Insight, his most recent album, The Guardian wrote, "this is one of contemporary jazz's great performers at work . . . a beautiful solo statement by a very modest star." His composition The Green Man Suite received the 2002 BBC Jazz Award for Best New Work.

Áine Sheil

Áine Sheil studied Music and German at Trinity College Dublin and Historical Musicology at King's College London. Her PhD thesis (2004) was on the performance and reception of Wagner's Meistersinger von Nürnberg during the Weimar Republic. She subsequently worked for three years in the Publications Department of the Royal Opera House, London, where she became very interested in opera production and the effects of arts policy on artistic practice.

In 2006 she joined the Department of Drama at Trinity College Dublin as a postdoctoral research fellow. Here, she taught an introductory course on opera and carried out research on Irish arts policy and its effect on the theatrical arts in Ireland. She also developed an interest in theatre and performance theory, and continues to explore ways in which these can be applied to music. As a Lecturer in Music at University College Cork (2008-2009) she taught several undergraduate courses ('Critical Theory and Music', 'Music Theatre and Politics', 'Exploring Opera') and contributed to several modules in the MA in Music and Cultural History.