Penn Music Colloquium Series

The Department of Music's main Colloquium Series showcases new research by leading scholars in music and sound studies and composers both in the United States and internationally.  All Music Colloquia takes place in Room 101 of the Lerner Center on Tuesdays at 5:15 PM.

Fall 2023

October 3: Nina Eidsheim, Professor of Musicology and Humanities, UC Los Angeles

October 24: Brian Kane, Associate Professor of Music and Film and Media Studies, Yale University

November 28: Alessandra Ciucci, Associate Professor of Music, Ethnomusicology, Columbia University

December 12: George Lewis, Edwin H. Case Professor of American Music, Composition & Historical Musicology, Columbia University

Spring 2024

January 30: Steven Takasugi, Composer, associate of Harvard University Department of Music

February 13: Gavin Steingo, Associate Professor of Music, Princeton University

March 12: M. Myrta Leslie Santana, Assistant Professor of Integrative Studies, UC San Diego

April 9: Mark Burford, R.P. Wollenberg Professor of Music, Reed College

Upcoming Events

Schedule TBA. Please check back later.

Past Events



Birmingham and the Voice of Al Hibbler

Colloquium Lecture by Brian Kane
Oct 24, 2023 at - | Penn Music Building - Lerner 102, 201 S. 34th Street Philadelphia, PA 19104

Hibbler’s idiosyncratic use of the voice presents a challenge to the orthodoxies of “voice studies.”



Nina Eidsheim

“Presence within Presence:” Camille Norment’s Intermaterial Vibrational Practice
Oct 3, 2023 at - | Penn Music Building - Lerner 101, 201 S. 34th Street Philadelphia, PA 19104

Join us for a talk with Nina Eidsheim, Professor of Musicology and Humanities at UC Los Angeles, as she considers artist, composer, and musician Camille Norment’s solo shows at Dia Chelsea (2022) and Bergen Kunsthall (2023).



Dr. Ioanida Costache

Hearing Romani-ness: Affect, Subjectivity, and Musical Histories
Apr 4, 2023 at - | Penn Music Building - Lerner 101, 201 S. 34th Street Philadelphia, PA 19104

Dr. Ioanida Costache is an ethnomusicologist and sound studies scholar specializing in Romani artist practices. Her work explores the legacies of Romani historical trauma, and the feminist and de-colonial critiques of the present, inscribed in Romani music, sound, and art.



Huda Fakhreddine

Umm Kulthum and the Arabic Qasidah: Selection, Curation, and Performance
Mar 28, 2023 at - | Penn Music Building - Lerner 101, 201 S. 34th Street Philadelphia, PA 19104

In this lecture, Dr. Huda Fakhreddine will discuss Umm Kulthum, the celebrated Egyptian singer who is one of the most successful re-animators of the Arabic qas̩īda in the twentieth century.



Marcos Balter

Recent Compositions
Feb 28, 2023 at - | Penn Music Building - Lerner 101, 201 S. 34th Street Philadelphia, PA 19104

As part of the 2022-23 Penn Music Colloquium Series, the Penn Music Department presents Marcos Balter, Fritz Reiner Professor of Musical Composition at Columbia University, to discuss his recent works.



Yun Emily Wang

Listening Incommensurably: Sounding “out” and Queer Taiwanese Toronto’s Multiple Sexual Modernities
Feb 21, 2023 at - | Penn Music Building - Lerner 101, 201 S. 34th Street Philadelphia, PA 19104

In this talk, Yun Emily Wang will present her paper that draws on fieldwork from 2013 to 2018 (the pivotal years during which Taiwan became the first Asian country to legalized same-sex marriage) and traces how a group of queer Taiwanese immigrants listen to and for multiple incommensurable sexual modernities in Toronto.



Richard Wicksteed

Making the documentary "SanDance!" in the context of San life in southern Africa today
Jan 24, 2023 at - | Penn Music Building - Lerner 101, 201 S. 34th Street Philadelphia, PA 19104

SanDance! celebrates the ancient dance and musical culture of San/Bushman peoples in southern Africa, focusing on the trance healing dance at the core of San cultural expression. The award-winning film features San dance groups rehearsing in remote areas in the Kalahari in preparation for performance at the annual Kuru Dance Festival in Botswana, and follows them to performance at the festival. Richard will discuss the making of the film itself, and San dance culture, in the context of the historical oppression and ongoing marginalization of San culture across southern Africa.