Summary of the impact

The brass band sector embodies a unique cultural, community and industrial history, and the sector continues to thrive. University of Salford researchers have informed this development, demonstrating the following impact:

• Supporting the development of brass band cultures internationally, from the UK to the US, from Scandinavia to Australia, developing opportunities for amateur musicians to participate in professional standard and creatively challenging music-making;
• Promoting inclusion and personal and community aspiration:
• Enhancing the repertoire of brass bands by bringing contemporary "concert hall" techniques to amateur music making, setting competition standards to which brass bands aspire, and:
• Supporting practitioners to assume world leading roles in the field and integrate new research methods into their creative practice;
• Bringing associated economic benefit to the industries which support the movement and the communities which practice.

Summary of the impact

Research on the history, repertoires and performance cultures of brass instruments has reconfigured the international music community's understanding of how brass instruments have been played in the past and has unveiled new repertoires. The results are new understandings of performance techniques and instrumentation that continue to influence creative practice among leading professional performers. The findings from the research are recognised as major points of reference for professional and amateur performers, and have also contributed to work in the heritage industry and to that of print and broadcast media professionals. The research has also been translated for wider consumption in pivotal publications such as Grove Music Online, which features new entries on bands and individual brass instruments. The research also inspired Music in Words, the seminal textbook for teachers and students of music performance outside the higher education sector.

Summary of the impact

Misa de Corpus Christi, a choral-orchestral composition by Agustín Fernández, has been of seminal benefit to Instituto Laredo, a specialist music school in Cochabamba, and of key significance to the wider community in Bolivia. As the focal point of a major music-educational project developing instrumental, vocal, choral and orchestral practice, the composition has had a direct influence on the personal and professional development of 220 students and teachers from the school. Performances of the piece to several capacity audiences in large (1000+) venues were received with enthusiasm and acclaim. Misa is viewed as an emblem of both Instituto Laredo's success and Cochabamba's musical achievements, and represents a pertinent example of the role of musicking in the articulation of cultural identity.

Summary of the impact

The impact claimed in this statement comes from the composition and performance history of Fantasias by Julian Anderson, a major work for large orchestra composed in 2009. Three key spheres of impact are noted: first, improving the technical and expressive abilities of seasoned and young professional musicians through the preparation and performance of a challenging piece of contemporary music; secondly, drawing a wider audience than that which normally listens to uncompromising contemporary music; and lastly, supporting young composers by the involvement of Fantasias' composer in various bodies concerned with new music.

Summary of the impact

This case study describes the impact of the on-going practice-based research undertaken by Matthew Fairclough, started in 2003, into new ways of working with percussion and electronics. It has resulted in wide ranging cultural and economic benefits, including impact on individuals and organisations in the private sector. More specifically, the research has resulted in:

• Enhancement to the career, profile and creative practice of a percussionist
• Opportunities for the creative outputs and development of a visual artist
• Exposure, sales and product feedback for an instrument manufacturer
• Performance, creative and career development opportunities for other composers
• Public understanding and appreciation of new music and performance techniques through concerts in public venues outside the Higher Education sector, and through workshops, recordings, broadcasts and digital downloads

Summary of the impact

Birmingham Conservatoire has established a leading reputation in the UK and Europe for the composition and dissemination of new music outside of concert hall conventions, including: site-specific work; concept pieces; contesting genre boundaries; and re-framing the relationship between composition, performer and audience. Through their award-winning compositions and performances, notably for the Cultural Olympiad, the Conservatoire's composers have played a key role in changing understanding of the experiences that new music affords (wit, entertainment, spectacle, theatre, surprise), and in effecting public discourse through media coverage, audience reach, participation and audience co-creation. Their influence on curricula of other HEIs has similarly expanded through an Erasmus programme with nine other European bodies.

Summary of the impact

Since 2006 Professor Christopher Fox has been engaged in a series of linked projects which explore ways in which the engagement of performers and listeners in texted music for vocal ensemble can be enhanced. The research was initially based on received understandings of the perceptible relationship between music and text but, as the project and its impact have developed, the research has extended into a collaborative scientific study of this relationship, funded by two successive awards from the Wellcome Trust. Each stage of the research has been extensively disseminated through public performance, broadcast, recording, print and on-line media and the impact of the research now reaches into a wide range of communities of interest and the general public.

Summary of the impact

This case study focusses on the impact of research carried out by Robin Holloway. As a composer, Holloway has pioneered a sophisticated and multifarious practice based around quotation and reference, which continues to shape both compositional and critical thinking about postmodernism in music. His unique and idiosyncratic approach was initially regarded as controversial before becoming a point of reference and establishing itself as an integral part of a musical mainstream that it helped to form. Through its diversity, allure and referential richness, Holloway's music has reached a large and widespread public and has played a major role in shaping the discourse and terms of reference of new music both nationally and internationally.

Summary of the impact

Peter Hill is an internationally-acclaimed scholar and pianist, and one of the leading authorities on the French 20^th Century composer Messiaen. His research into the music of Messiaen made a significant contribution on an international and local level to cultural life and musical understanding, through written work for non-academic audiences, public lectures and master-classes, pre-concert and broadcast talks, and, most significantly, through the impact of that research on his and others' performances and recordings. The scale of his contribution is indicated by the number and range of public engagements, particularly during Messiaen's centenary year (2008), and critical acclaim and personal testimonies from professionals and the music-loving public. His work is a prime example of research informing performance, and enriching the cultural experience of the music-loving public beyond academia.

Summary of the impact

This case study describes the impact of an AHRC-funded project examining the `St Emmeram Codex', a key source of early fifteenth-century European polyphony. Amongst the principal impacts of this research have been: (a) exposure of high-quality yet largely unknown repertoire for performers of late medieval music; (b) new insights into performance practice, enhanced prestige, and new performance opportunities for one of the project's collaborators, the German vocal group Stimmwerck; (c) increasing audience reach and understanding for this repertoire, through a series of concerts around Europe, over a period of six years; (d) creation of a highly distinctive and attractive offering for concert venues and a commercial CD company.