Upcoming Events 2025
Music Matters XLII (22/05/2025) A Masterclass On Music and the Resilience of New Orleans
The Music Matters at University of Groningen Lecture & Performance Series returns on October 31st with a lecture, performance, and panel discussion on the music cultures of New Orleans.
Louisiana based singer-songwriter Gill Landry (former member of the band Old Crow Medicine Show, see www.gilllandrymusic.com/) perform and engage in discussion with NPO Radio 1 journalist Laila Frank, pop culture journalist Jan Donkers, and Arts Culture and Media professor and musicologist Dr. Kristin McGee. There will also be a short lecture on New Orleans music by American Studies professor Dr. Mark Thompson.
This event is a collaboration with the Take Root Festival https://www.spotgroningen.nl/events/takeroot/ and the American Studies program at University of Groningen.
All are welcome to join. Tickets are 5 EUR and are available at:
www.spotgroningen.nl/programma/american-studies-presents-takeroot-talks/
Read more here.
Past Events 2025
Music Matters XLI (22/05/2025) Artistic Responses to Artifical Intelligence: Fears, Formulas, and Frontiers
The series “Future Sounds” focuses on how AI and the shift toward right-wing politics across Europe and the US are shaping both the future of the music industry and artistic expression more broadly. We are delighted to have Professor Keith Negus from the University of Agder as our third speaker. Drawing from dialogues across the humanities, arts, and sciences, the talk will raise questions about the role of AI in shaping the practices and meaning of creativity within the broader ecologies of cultural production.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XL (24/04/2025) Who Owns the Future? Black Music, AI, and the Digital Colour Line
This talk is the second in the series “Future Sounds” which focuses on how AI and the shift toward right-wing politics across Europe and the US, are shaping both the future of the music industry and artistic expression more broadly. We are delighted to have DPhil Music Candidate and Lecturer in Popular Music Industry Studies, Yvonne Ile, who will investigate the evolving relationship between Black music and artificial intelligence, examining how digital technologies shape its future.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XL (24/04/2025) Oral Traditions & AI
This talk is the first in the Music Matters mini-series “Future Sounds” which focuses on how AI and the shift toward right-wing politics across Europe and the US, are shaping both the future of the music industry and artistic expression more broadly. We are delighted to have writer and Music Industry professional Rahel Aklilu as our first speaker.
Read more here.
Past Events 2024
Music Matters XXXXVIII (20/11/2024) Cumgirl8 in Conversation
This Music Matters event sees the return of the Interview Series in partnership with the legendary Groningen music venue VERA. cumgirl8 are made up of Lida Fox (bass), Veronika Vilim (guitar), Chase Lombardo (drums) and Avishag Rodrigues (guitar). The band render the immersive and chaotic energy from cyberspace into our world, coming together to make a boundary-less sound that stretches across the likes of ESG, Cocteau Twins, Suicide, CSS, B-52s, The Shangri-Las, Madonna, and many more. This discussion will focus on their aesthetics and activism.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXXVIII (6/11/2024) Employing Technology for the Preservation of Indigenous Music at Risk of Extinction
In this workshop, DJ Juan Chao will showcase examples that demonstrate how the introduction of various technologies can positively influence the preservation of the music of indigenous communities. The workshop will explore a project carried out with the Wayuu indigenous group, which included: an archive of their local music; a musical education digital tool; the production of an EP, and an installation of a sampling studio within the community. The workshop aims to provide concrete examples of how having a social and cultural sustainability approach can positively impact our work.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXXVIII (16/05/2024) Electronic Dance Music, Entrainment, and the Extended Self
Over the last decade, entrainment (as the temporal coordination of interacting mechanical systems) has been shown to play a significant part in music cognition in a variety of contexts. Motor and neural entrainment to periodicities in music have been observed in audiences and musicians, and related to affect induction, increased perceptions of musical pleasure, and prosociality. In these studies, electronic dance music (EDM) is often favourably invoked for its ability to promote multiple levels of entrainment due to its emphasis on interlocking cycles of regular, repetitive beats and the physicality of its mode of consumption, with dance movements providing additional cues for social synchronisation. In this paper, Dr. Maria Perevedentseva will take a wide-angle view of entrainment, speculating on the possibility of entraining to timbral as well as rhythmic periodicities, and consider the musical, social, and psychophysical repercussions of these forms of self and environment coupling.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXXVIII (18/04/2024) Music, Memories & Identity
The Lapsed Clubber Audio Map is the co-produced result of a community project that was funded by the Heritage Lottery. It captures the memories of rave spaces in Greater Manchester, UK, between 1985 and 1995. In this talk, Dr Beate Peter discusses the findings of a thematic analysis of the memories.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXXVIII (21/03/2024) The Whiteness of Dutch Electronic Dance Music
Music genres articulate relationships to social groups. As these genres travel, disperse and change form, the social formations of the collective music worlds they develop change. This lecture by Dr. Timo Koren will investigate genre trajectories by highlighting the work of Amsterdam-based nightclub promoters in the cultural production of club nights through genre-based orientations, conventions and ideals.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXXVIII (20/02/2024) Music, Affect and Sociability on the Dancefloor with Luis Manuel Garcia-Mispireta
How is it that “the one rush of hearts”—that swirl of feelings and music and sweaty bodies on a crowded dancefloor—can thicken into something that feels like communion and community? In this talk, Dr. Luis Manuel Garcia-Mispireta will turn to the nexus of sound, feeling, and togetherness to investigate how collective listening and dancing can give rise to a sense of inchoate sociality.
Read more here.
Past events 2023:
Music Matters XXXXII (14/11/2023): Tamil Elegance: Re-Centering Tamil Heritage in the Diaspora with Dr. Arththi Sathananthar, SVDP, and Yanchan
Nearly twenty years since M.I.A. (Mathangi Arulpragasam) carved her own space internationally with her infusion of Tamil folk music and political messaging on Sri Lanka, there is a burgeoning music scene from the diasporic Eelam Tamil community in which themes of displacement, dispossession and exile are at the forefront. Canadian artists SVPD and Yanchan pay homage to their homeland while also forging a sense of communal belonging by performing their diasporic identity through their music. This panel, in conversation with the aforementioned artists explores how Tamil Eelam heritage is mediated sonically to uncover how the remembered past affects the present.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXXI (23/10/2023): Recomposed: Music & Climate Change Crisis with Dr. Kyle Devine
Everywhere you look, music is changing—overhauling itself in response to climate crisis. There are records made of plants and stereos that run on sunshine. There are sector-specific carbon calculators and literacy programs, organizations that size up (and draw down) the environmental impact of music on all levels. There are declarations of emergency, anthems for the anthropocene, playlists for the planet. Top to bottom, we are witnessing a climate-oriented recomposition of what music is and how it comes to be. Music’s recomposition probably seems like a good thing. It is. And it isn’t. In this talk, Kyle Devine will highlight what is good about the good things, drawing on years of work with the people devoted to change. He will also explain what is not so good about the not-so-good things, showing how music gets stuck in ruts that turn even the best intentions into the problems they hope to solve.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXX (11/09/2023): Sound and Soverignty in Ukraine with Dr. Maria Sonevytsky
Music Matters kicks off the 2023-2024 series with an exciting talk from Bard College’s Maria Sonevytsky, who will discuss her award winning book Wild Music. Wild Music tracks vernacular Ukrainian discourses of “wildness” as they manifested in popular music during a volatile decade of Ukrainian political history bracketed by two revolutions. From the Eurovision Song Contest to reality TV, from Indigenous radio to the revolution stage, Sonevytsky assesses how these practices exhibit and re-imagine Ukrainian tradition and culture.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXIX (24/5/2023): A Discussion with Bo Ningen
Music Matters at RUG will continue their artist discussion series in partnership with VERA on May 24 with a public interview with Japanese noise rock group Bo Ningen.
This event takes place at VERA Groningen (Oosterstraat 44, 9711RT) on Wednesday May 24 from 14:30 until 15:30, ahead of Bo Ningen’s performance at the venue that evening.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXVIII (2/5/2023): On Being Touched by Boeremusiek with Dr. Willemien Froneman
The Music Matters at University of Groningen Performance and Lecture Series invites you to “On Being Touched by Boeremusiek: Listening as a Haptic Event” with dr. Willemien Froneman (Stellenbosch University, South Africa). This 38th talk of the series takes place at the room 1312.0018 in the RUG Harmony Building from 18:00 until 19:30 on Tuesday May 2nd, 2023. For further information on this talk, see the abstract below.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXVII (26/04/2023): “Saying It Differently” with Dr. Philip Ciantar
The Music Matters at University of Groningen Performance and Lecture Series invites you to “Saying It Differently: Political Activism and Parody Songs in Malta” with Philip Ciantar (Department of Music Studies, School of Performing Arts, University of Malta). This 37th talk of the series takes place at the Heymanszaal in the RUG Academy Building from 17:00 until 18:30 on Wednesday April 26th, 2023.
Read more here.
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Past events 2021-2023:
Music Matters XXXVI (21/3/2023): ESNS Diversity and Inclusion Panel
The Music Matters at University of Groningen Performance and Lecture Series invites you to its 36th event, the ESNS Diversity and Inclusion Panel with Lisa Schoemaker (Eurosonic Noorderslag), Ilona Deuring (Eurosonic Noorderslag), Juan Carlos Méndez Álvarez (Utrecht University), Dan Pădure (University of Groningen). This discussion takes place at the RUG Harmony Building, room 1312.0012 from 17:00 until 18:30 on March 21st, 2023.
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Music Matters XXXV (08/12/2022): “We Are All Improvisers” with Dr. Raymond McDonald
The Music Matters at University of Groningen Performance and Lecture Series is proud to present Dr. Raymond Macdonald (University of Edinburgh), who will give the 35th Music Matters talk entitled “We Are All Improvisers: The Psychological Foundations of Musicality.” This talk takes place at the Heymanszaal in the RUG Academy Building from 17:00 until 18:30 on December 8th, 2022. All are welcome to attend.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXIV (02/12/2022): “Telling Alternative Stories” with Dr. Mimi Haddon
The Music Matters at University of Groningen Performance is proud to present Dr. Mimi Haddon (University of Sussex) who will give a talk entitled “Telling Alternative Stories: Women’s Knowledge Cultures of Music.” This talk takes place at the USVA Theatre (Munnekeholm 10) from 09:15 until 10:00. All are welcome to attend.
Read more here.
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A Music Matters Symposium on Queer Futurities (15-16/11/2022)
The Music Matters at University of Groningen Performance and Lecture series is proud to present a two day symposium on queer futurities, starting with a karaoke queer music history lecture at Dorothy’s drag bar on November 16th. On November 17th we continue in the academy building of the University of Groningen with a panel discussion on Janelle Monae and Queer Afrofuturisms in music with Dr. Dan Hassler-Forrest (Utrecht University) and Dr. Magdalena Fürnkranz (University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna). All are welcome to attend.
Read more here.
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Music Matters XXXII (20/09/2022) “A Discussion with Shortparis”
The first Music Matters event of the 2022/2023 lecture series is a special talk in collaboration with VERA Groningen with Russian group Shortparis. This event will takes place on Thursday 22 September 2022, from 15:00 to 16:00 in VERA Groningen (Oosterstraat 44, 9711NV Groningen), ahead of the group’s performance at the venue that evening.
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Music Matters XXXI (11/05/2022) “The Soundtrack to My Life, but I Can No Longer Listen to It: Insights into Music Fandom Across the Life Course”
This talk was the fifth Music Matters event of the 2021/2022 lecture series, featuring dr. Simone Driessen. This event took place on May 11th 2022, from 16:00 to 17:30 (CEST).
For details, click here
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Music Matters XXX (07/05/2022) “Music Collectives and Community Activism: A Discussion with Crack Cloud”
The fourth (and first physical) Music Matters event of the 2021/2022 lecture series was a special talk with Canadian post-punk group Crack Cloud on music collectives and community activism. This event took place on Saturday May 7th 2022, from 15:00 to 16:00 in VERA Groningen (Oosterstraat 44, 9711NV Groningen), ahead of the group’s performance at the venue that evening.
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Spot On! x Music Matters (10/12/2021) “Who Tells Your Story? Musical Theatre in the UK and the Netherlands”
On December 10th 2021, the Department of Arts, Culture and Mediahosted a collaborative event by the music and theater departments for a special Spot On! & Music Matters lecture. For this talk (Friday December 10th 2021, 13:00-15:00 CEST) we invited the newly appointed Special Professor of Musical Theatre at the University of Amsterdam (Joop van den Ende Chair): dr. Millie Taylor.
For details, visit this link.
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Music Matters XXIX (09/12/2021) “F*** tha police! á la russe: Rancière and the metamodernist turn in contemporary Russian music”
The third Music Matters event of the 2021/2022 lecture series involved Elizaveta Gaufman and Anatoly Reshetnikov. This event took place on December 9th 2021, from 16:00 to 17:30 (CEST).
For details, click here.
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Music Matters XXVIII (25/11/2021) “Speaking, Cheering and Eating: Sonic Transitions in Performative Sound Art”
This second (online) event in the 2021/2022 Music Matters lecture series took place on November 25th 2021 from 16:00 until 17:30 (CEST) and involved composer, sound artist and sound researcher Cathy van Eck.
For details, click here.
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Music Matters XXVII (29/09/2021) “Voice and Technology, Voice as Technology”
The first (online) event in the 2021/2022 Music Matters lecture series took place on Wednesday, September 29th 2021 from 17:00 until 18:45 (CEST) and involved Christine Duncan and Franziska Baumann.
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For earlier events, see the overview below.
Music Matters XXVI: “On Listening Positionality”
A Lecture & Discussion with Dr. Dylan Robinson
Wednesday, Apr. 28th 2021 17:00-19:00 (CEST)
Please Note: This event will take place online via Google Meets!
Click HERE for more information!
Music Matters XXVI: “Twerking at the Intersection”
A Lecture & Discussion with Dr. Kyra Gaunt
Friday, May 14th 2021 16:00-17:00 (CEST)
Please Note: This event will take place online via Google Meets!
Click HERE for more information!
Double Book Launch: Remixing European Jazz Culture by Kristin McGee & Voices Found: Free Jazz and Singing by Chris Tonelli
Wednesday, Jan. 27th 2021 17:00-19:00 (UTC+1)
Please Note: This event will take place online via this Google Meets!
Click HERE for more information!
“Hearing Feminist Interventions in Popular Music”
Time: 16:30 – 17:30
Location: Broerstraat 9, room A901
Free of admission – No registration required
Click HERE for more information!
Music Matters XXV by Dr. Leonike Bolderman “Sharing Songs on Hiragata Square: Exploring the Popularity of Contemporary Music Tourism”
Friday 22nd February
Time: 16:00 – 18:00
Place: Free of admission – No registration required
Click HERE for more information!
Tuesday 13th November
Place: Faculty of Law, Turftorenstraat 21 (entrance via Uurwerkersgang), Room T14
Free of admission – No registration required
Music Matter XXII Symposium and KIEM Workshop on “Gender Quotas in Music Festival Programmes
Friday 21st September
Time: 13:00 – 16:30
Place: Broerstraat 9, Room A901 (Archaeology Faculty)
Free of admission – No registration required
Music Matters XXI Symposium “Technology’s Disruption of Music Composition”
Friday June 15th
13:00 – 18:00
Faculty of Arts. Oude Boteringestraat 34. Room 002
Free of admission!
Registration via: a.l.a.arends@rug.nl
RESCHEDULED TO APRIL 24!
Music Matters XXI Lecture by Dr. Justin Williams (university of Bristol)
Tuesday April 24th 2018
16:00-17:00
Harmony Building (Onder de Bogen) / Room 13.14.0014
Free of admission – No registration required
Music Matters XX ec
ture by Dr. Katharina Rost (University of Bayreuth)
Friday March 23th 2018
16:00-17:00
Academy Buillding (Broerstraat 5, Room A900. Separate building)
Free of admission – No registration required
Music Matters XVIIII Lecture by Dr. Barbara Titus (University of Amsterdam)
Friday February 23th 2018
16:00-17:00
Harmony Building (Onder de Bogen) / Room 13.14.0014
Free of admission – No registration required
Music Matters XVIII & Workshop on Gender Dynamics in the Music Industry [Lecture by Dr. Robin James (University of North Carolina at Charlotte)]
Friday, June 23th, 2017 [14:00-18:00]
Academy Building, Heymanszaal / Broerstraat 5, Groningen
Music Matters XVII – Lecture by Dr. Oliver Seibt (University of Amsterdam)
Friday, May 12th, 2017 [16:00-17:30]
Harmony Building, Room 13.14.0014 (onder de bogen) / Oude Kijk in Het Jatstraat 26, Groningen
Music Matters XVI – Lecture by Dr. Koos Zwaan (Inholland University of Applied Sciences)
Friday, March 17th, 2017 [14:30-15:30]
Harmony Building, Room 13.14.0014 (onder de bogen) / Oude Kijk in Het Jatstraat 26, Groningen
Music Matters XV – Lecture by Gayle Young
Friday, February 17th, 2017 [14:30-15:30]
Harmony Building, Room 13.14.0014 (onder de bogen) / Oude Kijk in Het Jatstraat 26, Groningen
XIV Thursday June 9, 2016: The Shanty Choir
Speaker: Evert Bisschop Boele (Hanze University Groningen, Netherlands)
Time: 17:00-18:00
Place: Oude Boteringestraat 34, room 002.
Concert: Elizabeth Kooy + piano (www.elizabethkooy.nl) Introduction by Evert Bisschop Boele.
Time: 13:00-14:00
Place: Harmonie Cantine, upstairs behind the cafe
XIII Thursday May 19, 2016: Against the Grain: Protest Songs of an Irish Singer-Songwriter (Damien Dempsey – A Case Study)
Speaker: Aileen Dillane (University of Limerick, Ireland)
Time: 17:00-18:00
Place: Oude Boteringestraat 34, room 002.
Concert: The Freelancers (www.thefreelancers.nl) Irish and Scottish Folk
Time: 13:00 – 14:00
XII Thursday April 07, 2016: Learning From Bastard Pop? – Moving Beyond Subversion and Piracy in the Mashup Community
Speaker: Maarten Michielse (Maastricht University, Netherlands)
Time: 17:00-18:00
Place: Oude Boteringestraat 34, room 002.
Concert: ESN Music Project
Time: 13:00-14:00
Place: Harmony building (upstairs behind the care on the first floor)
XII.5 Tuesday May 10th, 2016: Jewish Music and Its Others
Speaker: Philip V. Bohlman (University of Chicago, Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover)
Time: 17:00-18:00
Place: Oude Boteringestraat 34, room 002.
XI Thursday February 25, 2016: Eurovision, Media and European Culture
Speaker: Johan Fornäs (Södertörn University, Sweden)
Time: 17:00 – 18:00
Place: 1314.0014 (Harmony Building, ‘under the arches’)
Concert: Eurovision Song Jamboree (featuring Juliette Poulisse)
Time: 13:00 – 14:00
Place: harmony building, first floor behind the cafe
VIII Thursday April 10: Music Festivals Study Day IASPM Benelux
Keynote Speaker: Fabian Holt (Roksilde University)
13:00 (A12, Academy Building, RUG)
VIV Thursday May 7: “Kill the Hippies? Legacies of the Sixties in American Punk”
Speaker: Mike Foley (University of Groningen)
17:00 (Harmony Building, 1314.0014 ‘under the arches’)
X Thursday June 11: Swimming Against the Tide: Producing Musical Theatre in The Netherlands
Concert: Mariska Oostijen van der Kooi and Cas Straatman 13:00 (Marie Loke Hall)
Speakers: Bastiaan Roeters (Musical Theater Director) 14:00 (Marie Loke Hall)
Laura MacDonald (University of Portsmouth) 15:00 (Marie Loke Hall)