About this Group

This research group is grounded in a multidisciplinary approach, combining historical musicology with the input of cultural history, ethnomusicology and music sociology. Between 2015 and 2017, some activities of the group have been planned in close articulation with two thematic strands “Music and Media” and “Historical Approaches to Musical Performance”. More recently, the group expanded its research scope to the social and professional status of musicians in Portugal since the Ancien Régime to the late 20th century.

Objectives

• To develop a Cultural Studies perspective in the research on "art music" in Portugal and Brazil from the 16th century up to the present;

• To study musical ideas, genres and practices from an interdisciplinary perspective, including a wide range of approaches, such as Cultural History, Sociology, Anthropology and Musical Analysis;

• To carry out field and archival research on the music heritage and contemporary processes in Portugal and Brazil, focusing on a wide range of resources: historical and contemporary documents, scores, theoretical treatises, literary sources, iconography, recordings and audiovisual materials;

• To develop outreach activities aimed at the general public.

Priorities

• The main Portuguese musical institutions and its repertoires from the 16th century up to the present;

• History of musical ideas in Portugal and Brazil from the Old Regime to modernity;

• Music in Portugal during the Old Regime, with a special focus on the royal and private patronage, the ceremonial models and the production and circulation of repertoires;

• Musical sociabilities in public and domestic spaces and the interaction between art, traditional and urban popular music,

• “Music and State”, focusing on the relations between Portuguese musical life and the creation and evolution of the State’s cultural policies, with two main areas: Music and the representation of royal power during the Old Regime and Music and politics during the Estado Novo;
  

• The social and professional status of musicians and its transformations;

• The history of musical genres in correlation with their contexts and performance practices;

• The impact of the introduction and dissemination of technological mediation in Portuguese music (theatre, phonography, radio, cinema).
  

Principal Investigator

Scientific Production (2013 - 2018)

Ongoing Competitive Projects

Concluded Competitive Projects

Knowledge Transfer Projects

Team