Research Catalogue

an international database for artistic research

• 3. Internal publication Research published in this issue are only for internal circulation within the Royal Conservatoire, The Hague.
• 2. Royal Conservatoire Investigations Royal Conservatoire Investigations
• 1. Master Research Projects All research in KC

• FROM SEQUENZA TO... (2015) author(s): Matteo Sampaolo Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Main Subject: Classical Flute Research Coach: Paul Scheepers Title of Research: FROM SEQUENZA TO... an itinerary in the Italian contemporary music for flute after the theories of Opera Aperta Research Question: Did Berio's Sequenza contribute to create a compositional genre in the Italian flute repertoire? Summary of Results: From its publication in 1958 “Sequenza I” by Luciano Berio has been subject of a lot of studies. How to understand its theatrical emblematic construction and how to develop a good interpretation are questions that every flute player asks himself when he/she approaches that piece for the first time. But Sequenza is not only a milestone in the flute repertoire, in fact is one of the first works quoted by Umberto Eco in his photography of the one main artistic trend born in the last years of fifties, the book “Opera Aperta”. Berio was one of the leading composers, he dedicated Sequenza to the most innovative flute player, Severino Gazzelloni, and they were both part of the most fruitful musical environment of those years, the Ferienkurse of Darmstadt, so a question arises: which other pieces have been written in reply to the provocation launched by Sequenza? This research aim was to find concrete connections in pieces for solo flute written after Sequenza following the concepts described by Eco; while first and second chapter introduce the concepts of Opera Aperta and their evidences in Sequenza, the third looks to the repertoire for solo flute and proof that a real reply to Berio's work does not exist in it; in the last chapter is presented the production of Salvatore Sciarrino, a composer who wrote a lot works for solo flute and whose style is extremely different from Berio's but perhaps the philosophy behind his “Opera per Flauto” is not that far away from the theories of Eco. The presentation of this research will include a power point and some musical samples, recorded as well as played live by me. Biography: Matteo Armando Sampaolo studied flute with Di Tommaso in Pesaro where he was awarded his Diploma with honourable mention. He began his orchestral studies with the Italian Youth Orchestra (OGI) and he participated to the masterclasses of Sir. James Galway, Giampaolo Pretto and Andrea Oliva. He has worked with the Orchestra Cherubini, Orchestra della Toscana, Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino and the European Union Youth Orchestra under the batons of Riccardo Muti, Vasily Petrenko and Vladimir Ashkenazy. In 2013 he moved to The Netherlands to study in a Master degree at the Royal Conservatoire of Den Haag with Thies Roorda, where he received a scholarship from the Residentie Orkest for the orchestral Master. Matteo frequently plays as soloist and is a passionate chamber musician.
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• Watching Music (2015) author(s): Anja Brons Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Anja Brons Main Subject: Bassoon Research Coach: Wouter Verschuren Title of Research: Watching Music Research Question: How can the kinetic paintings of Norman Perryman lead to a deeper experience of classical music? Summary of Results: Norman Perryman paints with liquid paint on glass plates that lay on several overhead projectors. The painting is projected on a large screen behind the musicians, in live classical concerts. Because the watercolours are flowing and the paintbrush is moving, it is called “kinetic” painting, which means “moving”. This artist developed the art form of kinetic painting on music for almost forty years, and performed with famous orchestra's, conductors and musicians all over the world. The late violinist Yehudi Menuhin called him “a musician, who makes music with his brush”. His aim is to enhance the music with his kinetic painting. When I saw for the first time a live performance of him, together with a clarinettist, I was very surprised about the way that visual arts and music were brought together, and how that led me to a deeper experience of the music. Although not everyone will have this same experience (some others will experience the painting as detracting), I wanted to research how it can be that his kinetic painting is able to enhance the experience of music for some people, including for me. To come to an understanding of this, I studied the historical context of the combination of visual art and music, and I pointed out the role of synaesthesia. Synaesthesia is a neurological phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in another sensory. In this case it means that some people automatically see colours when they hear music. Perryman is using this phenomenon in some way in his paintings. An interview with Norman Perryman in his atelier in Amsterdam helped me to come to an understanding of the methods that he is using to paint with classical music. The reason that the kinetic painting is able to lead to a deeper experience can be because of some correspondences between classical music and Perryman's kinetic painting. For example: He intentionally uses an analogue art form, to let it correspond with the purity of the acoustic sound in classical music. Another resemblance is that Perryman does not improvise on the music, but he prepares his compositions carefully; like a classical piece is composed and not improvised, or like a choreography is designed, with an interplay and counterpoint between the musical lines. To approach the subject from different angles (beside the context, my own experiences and the intentions of Perryman) I gathered some remarkable experiences that other people had with the kinetic painting of Perryman: some interviews with musicians that cooperated with him, some reviews of performances in the newspapers, and some responses that Perryman received after the concerts. Biography: Anja Brons was born in the Netherlands, in 1989. She started to play bassoon when she was 9 years old, and at the age of 19 she started to study bassoon at the conservatory in Groningen, in the prepatory year. In this same time she started a study at the Art Academy in Groningen, but after one year she decided to quit there, to be able to focus on the music study. She is still searching for ways to combine her passion for both music and visual arts. In this research these two art forms come together.
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  Thrilling or killing? - Applying pictures in a classic concert performace (2015) author(s): Luise Kimm Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Luise Kimm Main Subject: Classical Singing Research Coaches: Gerda van Zelm, David Prins Title of Research: Thrilling or killing? – Applying pictures in a classical concert performance Research Question: What function can a screen have on the concert stage? Summary of Results: In concerts of classical music, more and more often extras are applied to the basic concepts of performance. This comes in light-shows, with pictures or a film-version of the piece on stage projected in the hall. Pleasing the eye has always been an issue on the concert stage of course. It is essential to consider how a performance should proceed and look like. But illustrating the music that is played in a concert has more consequences than only decorating the stage even a bit more or making a bigger impression in the audience. In my research paper, I document several formats of classical concert productions that used a visual interpretation in performance. In this case study I tried to figure out the function of screen and film on stage and their effect during the concerts. I summarized my findings in a list of ‘Do’s & Dont’s’. This list I, or others might use in a project where there is the wish to give a visual form to an own interpretation of a piece. In a second more theoretical part I shortly introduce music-historical background of the idea to illustrate classical music and the aesthetic discussion this idea rises. Furthermore I pay closer attention to the tool of the (electronic) screen in concert and to what a screen does with our brain. Biography: My name is Luise Kimm. I come from southern Germany. I am finishing my Master studies in classical singing at the Royal Conservatory. I have two bachelor degrees, one German one in musicology and voice and one Dutch one in classical singing. Next to my studies, and beforehand, I always performed. I sing as a soloist as well as in ensemble in churches, in concert and in opera throughout Europe.
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• The Second Violin Concerto of Béla Bartók (2015) author(s): Huba Hollókői Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Huba Hollókői Main Subject: National Master Orchestral Conducting Research Coach: Theo Verbey Titel of Research: The Second Violin Concerto of Béla Bartók Research Question: How much do we know about the genesis of Béla Bartók’s Second Violin Concerto, and in what extent did the collaboration between composer, soloist and conductor influenced the compositional process – final form of the piece? Summary of Results: Following the flow of letters exchanged between the composer, Béla Bartók and Zoltán Székely, who was not only the dedicatee of the piece, the soloist of the premier, but played a more versatile rule as motivator, also helped the composer with his advises, an interesting documentary we can find of the 1930’s in Europe. An analysis of the score of Willem Mengelberg, the conductor of the premier, provides us with some practical details of the working style of the Maestro. With the help of a power point presentation and some musical examples, I will present a brief analysis of the piece and it’s genesis. Biography: Huba Hollókői is completing his last year of the National Master Orchestra Conducting program of the Royal Conservatoire of The Haag and the Conservatory of Amsterdam. With NMO, he has assisted Stefan Asbury with Noord Netherlands Orchestra, Christoph Poppen with Het Gelders Orkest, and Kenneth Montgomery with Irish National Orchestra and The Belfast Philharmonic. He was finalist of the 53rd Besancon Conducting Competition in 2013. He conducted orchestras Finland, Holland, Denmark, Hungary, Slovakia, Germany, USA and Mexico. His teachers include Jac van Steen, Ed Spanjaard, Kenneth Montgomery, Atso Almila, and Yuri Simonov.
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• The Effects of Non-Musical Attributes on Ratings of High-Level Performances (2015) author(s): Sevilya Hendrickx-Lyumanova Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Sevilya Hendrickx Main subject: Viola Research coach: Paul Scheepers Title of research: The effects of non-musical attributes on ratings of high-level performances Research question: What are the effects of non-musical attributes on ratings of high-level performances? Summary of Results Quality judgements form a routine part of musical listening. Depending on a particular situation and occasion, such judgements may be more or less formal ranging from a post-concert discussion and a review in the newspaper, to a thoughts expressed in a mark or awarded prize in an examination context. As musicians and music-lovers are focussed on examining the quality of the music their whole productive career, we consider ourselves to be experts at it. But research has shown otherwise, and that even though many of us might be experts at assessing musical quality, we all are liable to biases. This purpose of this study is to determine if judgements of expert musical performances would be affected by non-musical attributes of perceived outspoken appearance of the performance. In the first part of my research existing theories on the subject will be explicated. In the second part of this research an own experiment and its findings will be discussed and in the third part the results will be held against the stories of professional performers and jury members. With this study I hope to broaden the field of research on this subject and enlighten musicians and music reviewers with our human unconscious flaws and biases when it comes to assessing such a complicated matter as high level performances in music. Additionally, the results will be presented in fun way in a Powerpoint presentation. Biography Sevilya was born in Tashkent in a musical family and a mixture of different cultures. Already from a young age Sevilya knew she would like to become a professional musician, so when she was older she studied violin at the Gnesin College and Academy, Moscow. After her study, she wanted to explore more and started playing the viola under her teacher Mikhail Zemtsov. Last summer she finished her Bachelor Cum Laude at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, is about to finish her Master’s degree and will be performing with the Residentie-Orkest as their newest addition to the viola section.
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  New discoveries of Vivaldi in Dresden (2015) author(s): Javier Lupiañez Ruiz Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Francisco Javier Lupiáñez Ruiz Main Subject: Baroque Violin Research Coach: Charles Toet Title of Research: New Discoveries of Vivaldi in Dresden Research Question: Is Vivaldi the composer of the Sonata (Mus.2-R-8,74), the Trio Sonata (Mus.2-Q-6) and the Concerto (Mus.2-O-1,45)? Summary of Results: The Schrank II (Cabinet II) collection from the Die Sächsische Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden (SLUB) is not only one of the most interesting archives open to the worldwide audience thanks to the new technologies but also one of the major archives of Vivaldi's instrumental music. Although the archive had been digitized and studied there are more than 60 sonatas for violin and continuo, around 12 string trio sonatas and most than 50 concertos remaining anonymous. A Sonata for violin and continuo, a Trio Sonata for violin, violoncello and continuo and a Concerto for violin and orchestra captured my attention due its similarities with Vivaldi. Through the analysis of the external features of the sources (paper, watermarks, copyist, etc.) and the analysis of the style and language of Vivaldi and its characteristics, the final goal of this work is to highlight the possibility of a Vivaldi authorship as much as possible. In other words, attempting to put together the strongest proofs and facts that can be used to point to Vivaldi as author of the analyzed pieces. In the light of the results of the present research, the Vivaldi attribution is very consistent. An explanation of the attribution methodology and its application to the pieces will be shown in a slideshow presentation. Biography: Javier was born in Melilla (Spain), where he received several prizes in performing and composition. He has lead ensembles such the Baroque Orchestra of the Superior Conservatory of Salamanca, Baroque Orchestra of Salamanca, the European Baroque Academy of Ambronay and Academia Montis Regalis. As cofounder of the ensemble Les Esprits Animaux he plays regularly in Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Germany, Japan and The Netherlands, and has recorded for the label Harmonia Mundi. Javier has a baroque violin Verbeek made in 1682 on loan from the collection of The Dutch Musical Instruments Foundation.
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