Belonging and not Belonging

Forman Lecture Theatre, Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester

To coincide with Holocaust Memorial Day 2020, Monica Bohm-Duchen, the initiator and Creative Director of the Insiders/Outsiders Festival, will reflect upon her experience of working on the project, and Norbert Meyn, a professional tenor and the initiator of Singing a Song in a Foreign Land will give a talk-cum-recital about his on-going research on émigré musicians and composers.

Dr Norbert Meyn (Royal College of Music) is the Principal Investigator of the new AHRC funded research project Music, Migration and Mobility which explores the legacy of migrant musicians from Nazi Europe in Britain through practical music making, archival research and mapping. Norbert will perform a couple of songs by émigré composers Peter Gellhorn (1912-2004) and Karl Rankl (1898-1968) and discuss the challenges in contextualising, researching and marketing this repertoire today. He will also give an outline of the repertoire written by these emigres in Britain and share his experience from performing this at the RCM and with his professional group, Ensemble Émigré.

Monica Bohm-Duchen is a London-based art historian and the initiator and Creative Director of the year-long, nationwide Insiders/Outsiders Festival, which celebrates the contribution made to British culture by refugees from Nazi-dominated Europe in a wide range of different media. Monica will explain her motives for undertaking this ambitious project and – since the festival officially ends in March 2020 – consider the ways in which it has been received and the longer-term impact she hopes it will have on keeping the all-important concept of cultural cross-fertilisation firmly in the public eye.

4.15pm

Free