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Dr Christopher Wiley writes programme notes for Bard Music Festival

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Dr Christopher Wiley has written programme notes for a performance of Ethel Smyth’s opera Fête Galante given as part of the Bard Music Festival/Bard SummerScape at the Fisher Center, New York, on Saturday 14 August 2021

The Bard Music Festival takes place in August each year, dedicated to a specific composer (this year’s festival centred on Nadia Boulanger), on the campus of Bard College.

An internationally acknowledged expert on Smyth, Dr Wiley has previously given many public talks on the composer and written programme notes and liner notes including for the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and for the CD recording of Fête Galante.

The full text of Dr Wiley’s programme note is available for download here: https://www.academia.edu/65112002/Programme_note_for_Ethel_Smyth_F%C3%AAte_Galante

Dr Christopher Wiley leads session on student evaluation of teaching at University of Surrey Teaching Symposium

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Dr Christopher Wiley led a session on ‘Playful methods of student evaluation of teaching’ at the University of Surrey’s annual Surrey ExciTeS (Excellence in Teaching Symposium) on Wednesday 14 April 2021, on the theme of playful learning.

Dr Wiley outlined several different case studies of student evaluation of teaching using playful methods, which led to a fruitful discussion with the 30 academics from across the University who were in attendance.

The session was undertaken in advance of the appearance of Dr Wiley’s co-edited SEDA Special on student evaluation of teaching (pictured), and follows his other published research in the field.

This year, the Surrey ExciTeS symposium was split across two mornings (14–15 April) and was held online. Dr Wiley has also delivered sessions (in person) at all the previous Surrey ExciTeS events, in 20192018201720162015, and 2014, including one on student evaluation of teaching in 2015.

Dr Christopher Wiley publishes major book chapter on musical biography in Oxford University Press volume

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Dr Christopher Wiley has written a major book chapter on musical biography for a new essay collection published by Oxford University Press, The Oxford Handbook of Music and Intellectual Culture in the Nineteenth Century, edited by Paul Watt, Sarah Collins, and Michael Allis.

Dr Wiley’s 12,000-word chapter, entitled ‘Biography and Life-Writing’ (abstract available here), discusses the advent of musical biography, its proliferation in the long nineteenth century, and its legacy up to the present. It includes two case studies: a compilation of anecdotes, to explore how Victorian values were reflected in contemporaneous life-writing; and a collected biography, to investigate the role of women as characters within musical biographies.

Dr Wiley is an internationally acknowledged expert on musical biography, the subject of his doctoral dissertation, and has previously published widely on the subject.

Bibliographic citation

Wiley, Christopher. ‘Biography and Life-Writing’, in Paul Watt, Sarah Collins, and Michael Allis eds. The Oxford Handbook of Music and Intellectual Culture in the Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020, pp. 77–101. doi: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190616922.013.4

Full text

The full text of Dr Wiley’s chapter is available here: https://www.academia.edu/35186914/Biography_and_Life_Writing_Oxford_Handbook_of_Music_and_Intellectual_Culture_in_the_Nineteenth_Century_

Dr Christopher Wiley publishes book chapter in major Edinburgh University Press volume on literature and music

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Dr Christopher Wiley has contributed an essay to a major 70-chapter anthology, The Edinburgh Companion to Literature and Music, edited by Delia da Sousa Correa and published by Edinburgh University Press.

Dr Wiley’s chapter, entitled ‘The Eighteenth-Century English Novel and Music: Virtuous Performers and Well-Mannered Listeners’, discusses the role of music in selected novels by Samuel Richardson and Frances Burney.

Further information about the volume (including the table of contents) may be found here: https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-the-edinburgh-companion-to-literature-and-music.html

Bibliographic citation

Wiley, Christopher. ‘The Eighteenth-Century English Novel and Music: Virtuous Performers and Well-Mannered Listeners’, in Delia da Sousa Correa ed. The Edinburgh Companion to Literature and Music. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020, pp. 318–26. 

Full text

The full text of Dr Wiley’s chapter is available here: https://www.academia.edu/35119223/The_Eighteenth_Century_English_Novel_and_Music_Virtuous_Performers_and_Well_Mannered_Listeners

Dr Christopher Wiley co-writes essay in CD booklet for new Ethel Smyth recording

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FeteG_front_coverDr Christopher Wiley has co-written, with Dr Valerie Langfield, an essay published in the accompanying booklet to Retrospect Opera’s new CD of Ethel Smyth’s Fête Galante, entitled ‘Fête Galante: Ethel Smyth’s Neoclassical Dance-Opera’. He also contributed the work’s synopsis.

The disc represents the first recording of Smyth’s opera Fête Galante, conducted by Odaline de la Martinez. It also includes Liza Lehmann’s recitation The Happy Prince, recorded at the University of Surrey (Dr Wiley arranged and helped out with the recording sessions), together with some historical transfers of recordings of Smyth’s operas made during her lifetime.

This is the seventh CD release by Retrospect Opera, for whom Dr Wiley serves as one of four Trustees. Dr Wiley previously wrote essays for the liner notes to Retrospect Opera’s releases of Smyth’s operas The Boatswain’s Mate and The Wreckers.

For further information, and to buy the CD: https://retrospectopera.org.uk/SMYTH/FeteG.html

Full text

The full texts of both Dr Wiley’s synopsis and co-written essay are available for free download under licence from Surrey Research Insight Open Access: https://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/853063/

Update: Dr Wiley has also co-written, with Lucy Stevens and Odaline de la Martinez, the liner notes for the CD Dame Ethel Smyth: Songs and Ballads (SOMM 2020), featuring Lucy Stevens (contralto), Elizabeth Marcus (piano), and the Berkeley Ensemble conducted by Odaline de la Martinez. Further information: https://www.somm-recordings.com/recording/dame-ethel-smyth-songs-and-ballads/

 

Dr Christopher Wiley publishes entry in major Haydn encyclopedia

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9781107129016Dr Christopher Wiley has written the entry on ‘Contemporary Reception’ in the Cambridge Haydn Encyclopedia, edited by Caryl Clark and Sarah Day-O’Connell.

The Cambridge Haydn Encyclopedia features over 80 interlocking entries fanning out from seven extended essays at the heart of the volume, and includes a total of 67 contributors.

Dr Wiley’s 1500-word encyclopedia entry discusses Haydn’s reception during his lifetime and immediately afterwards, including the earliest biographies by Griesinger, Dies, and Carpani.

Dr Wiley previously contributed to Haydn scholarship in a major volume on the composer published in 2013.

Further information  on the volume may be found at the publisher’s website: https://www.cambridge.org/de/academic/subjects/music/eighteenth-century-music/cambridge-haydn-encyclopedia

Bibliographic citation 

Wiley, Christopher. ‘Reception, Contemporary’, in Caryl Clark and Sarah Day-O’Connell eds. Cambridge Haydn Encyclopedia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019, pp. 321–5. ISBN 978-1-1071-2901-6.

Dr Christopher Wiley contributes Foreword to CD booklet for re-issued recording of Ethel Smyth’s opera The Wreckers

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The Wreckers booklet front coverRetrospect Opera’s re-release of the Conifer Classics recording of Ethel Smyth’s opera The Wreckers includes a newly written Foreword by Dr Christopher Wiley in the accompanying CD booklet.

The 2-CD set is a live recording of the performance at The Proms in 1994 with the Huddersfield Choral Society and the BBC Philharmonic, conducted by leading Smyth interpreter Odaline de la Martinez.

An acknowledged expert on Ethel Smyth, Dr Wiley is one of the four-strong team of academics at Retrospect Opera, whose debut release, the first complete modern recording of Ethel Smyth’s opera The Boatswain’s Mate, also included an essay by Dr Wiley for the CD liner notes.

The CD of The Wreckers is available direct from Retrospect Opera at the following link: http://www.retrospectopera.org.uk/CD_SALES/CD_Sales_Wreckers.html

Full text

The full text of Dr Wiley’s Foreword is available for free download under licence from Surrey Research Insight Open Access: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/842086/

Dr Christopher Wiley contributes essay to CD booklet for newly released Ethel Smyth recording

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The Boatswain's Mate - CD front coverRetrospect Opera’s newly released CD of Ethel Smyth’s The Boatswain’s Mate, the first complete modern recording of the work, includes an essay by Dr Christopher Wiley in the accompanying booklet.

The recording appears in the centenary year of Smyth’s comic opera, which premiered on 28 January 1916 at the Shaftesbury Theatre, London. It features singers Nadine Benjamin, Edward Lee, and Jeremy Huw Williams in the principal roles, accompanied by the Lontano Ensemble conducted by pioneering Smyth interpreter Odaline de la Martinez.

Dr Wiley is acknowledged as an academic expert on Ethel Smyth, with recent research activity including publication of a major journal article, a score preface, and promoting Smyth’s music in concert, in addition to giving several public lectures on the composer. His essay The Boatswain’s Mate in the context of Smyth’s life and works’ appears in the CD booklet alongside contributions by Odaline de la Martinez and Retrospect Opera’s Professor David Chandler.

The CD is available direct from Retrospect Opera at the following link: http://www.retrospectopera.org.uk/CD_Sales.html

It may also be ordered through Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Boatswains-Mate-Ethel-Smyth/dp/B01HIJX83Q/

Full text

The full text of Dr Wiley’s essay is available for free download under licence from Surrey Research Insight Open Access: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/811593/

Dr Christopher Wiley writes preface for new publication of Ethel Smyth study score

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Smyth, Variations on Bonny Sweet RobinDr Christopher Wiley has contributed a preface to a republication of an Ethel Smyth work – the Variations on Bonny Sweet Robin (Ophelia’s Song) for flute, oboe, and piano – as a study score.

The republication was one of the new releases for November 2015 by the publisher Musikproduktion Hoeflich. The score and parts are available to purchase for €16 from the publisher’s website here: https://repertoire-explorer.musikmph.de/product/smyth-ethel-3/

The complete text of Dr Wiley’s preface may be read in both English and in German translation (by Anke Westermann) here: https://repertoire-explorer.musikmph.de/wp-content/uploads/vorworte_prefaces/1724.html

Dr Wiley, who is recognised as a leading researcher on Ethel Smyth, has also promoted her music as a performer, including the Variations on Bonny Sweet Robin which featured as part of a commemorative recital of Smyth’s music on the 70th anniversary of her death in May 2014.

Bibliographic citation 

Wiley, Christopher. Preface for Study Score of Ethel Smyth, Variations on Bonny Sweet Robin (Ophelia’s Song). Munich: Musikproduktion Hoeflich, 2015. Available online at <https://repertoire-explorer.musikmph.de/wp-content/uploads/vorworte_prefaces/1724.html>.

Dr Christopher Wiley publishes Higher Education Academy report on Using Electronic Voting Systems in the Arts and Humanities

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Dr Christopher Wiley - Using Electronic Voting Systems in the Arts and HumanitiesDr Christopher Wiley has written a report entitled Using Electronic Voting Systems in the Arts and Humanities, published by the Higher Education Academy as part of its newly launched Innovative Pedagogies series.

The 8,000-word funded report discusses a wide variety of ways in which electronic voting systems (EVS) may be embedded within arts and humanities teaching, drawing on a range of examples from Dr Wiley’s own academic practice, as well as offering advice to educators who may be considering the introduction of EVS in their own teaching.

As a National Teaching Fellow, Dr Wiley was one of a number of Higher Education practitioners across the UK who were recently invited to contribute to this series of publications.

Through his innovative work on the use of electronic voting systems in Higher Education teaching, Dr Wiley has become a Distinguished Educator with Turning Technologies as well as delivering presentations at conferences across Europe (Ireland, Greece, Germany, and Denmark) and at six UK universities in the past two years.

Dr Wiley’s full report may be freely downloaded at the following link: https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/sites/default/files/dr_chris_wiley_final.pdf

The abstract may viewed be here: https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/using-electronic-voting-systems-arts-and-humanities

Bibliographic citation 

Wiley, Christopher. Using Electronic Voting Systems in the Arts and Humanities, Innovative Pedagogies series. York: Higher Education Academy, 2015. Available online at <https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/using-electronic-voting-systems-arts-and-humanities>.

Update: Dr Wiley’s report was featured on the Turning Technologies blog on 20 July 2016. The link to the post is as follows: https://www.turningtechnologies.com/blog/2016/07/Audience-Response-Systems-Arent-Just-For-STEM

Dr Wiley also contributed an invited blog entry to the Turning Technologies UK website on 2 August 2016. Entitled ‘Three Creative Ways to use Audience Response Systems’, it may be read here: http://turningtechnologies.co.uk/blog/2016/08/Three-Creative-Ways-to-

Dr Christopher Wiley contributes book chapter to new volume on music historiography

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Critical Music Historiography: Probing Canons, Ideologies and InstitutionsAn essay written by Dr Christopher Wiley, entitled ‘Musical Biography and the Myth of the Muse’, has appeared as the final chapter of a new anthology in which 17 international musicologists subject the writing of music history to groundbreaking scrutiny.

Critical Music Historiography: Probing Canons, Ideologies and Institutions is edited by Vesa Kurkela and Markus Mantere, and developed from the Radical Music History Symposium held at the Sibelius Academy, Finland (now part of the University of the Arts Helsinki) in December 2011, at which Dr Wiley presented a paper.

Dr Wiley’s essay explores the pattern in musical biography of specific female characters being cast in the role of ‘muse’ to a male genius, rising to prominence at specific points in that person’s life story as a signifier of their productivity and increasing artistic powers. Such women were thereby portrayed as having inspired their associated composer to greater heights, while implicitly denied the possibility of undertaking analogous creative activity themselves.

Further information

Listing of the volume on the publisher’s website: http://www.ashgate.com/default.aspx?page=637&title_id=19817&edition_id=1209349954&calcTitle=1

Listing of the volume on amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Critical-Music-Historiography-Ideologies-Institutions/dp/1472414195/

Bibliographic citation

Wiley, Christopher. ‘Musical Biography and the Myth of the Muse’, in Vesa Kurkela and Markus Mantere eds. Critical Music Historiography: Probing Canons, Ideologies and Institutions. Farnham: Ashgate, 2015, pp. 251–61.

Full text

The full text is available for free download under licence from Surrey Research Insight Open Access: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/803216/

 

Article by Dr Christopher Wiley published in The International Journal of Assessment and Evaluation

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The International Journal of Assessment and EvaluationDr Christopher Wiley‘s article ‘Divided by a Common Language? Evaluating Students’ Understanding of the Vocabulary of Assessment and Feedback at a Single UK Higher Education Institution’ has been published in the May 2014 issue of The International Journal of Assessment and Evaluation.

Based on educational research conducted during his time at City University London, Dr Wiley’s article represents the published version of his paper delivered at the Nineteenth International Conference on Learning, Institute of Education, London on 16 August 2012 (see here for details).

Drawing on a series of interviews and consultations, the article reviews students’ understanding of the vocabulary of assessment and feedback in order to establish the extent to which it aligns with the sense intended by academic institutions in using this terminology. Dr Wiley identifies a series of recommendations for future enhancements to assessment and feedback practices to relieve the present disjunctures between university staff and students.

The journal issue may be viewed here: http://ijlae.cgpublisher.com/product/pub.251/prod.42

The link from which to order to article is as follows: http://ijlae.cgpublisher.com/product/pub.251/prod.43

Bibliographic citation

Wiley, Christopher. ‘Divided by a Common Language? Evaluating Students’ Understanding of the Vocabulary of Assessment and Feedback at a Single UK Higher Education Institution’, The International Journal of Assessment and Evaluation, Vol. 20, No. 3 (May 2014), pp. 1–11.

Full text

The full text of the article is available for free download via City Research Online: http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/3235/

Dr Christopher Wiley presents research seminar at the University of Surrey

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Ethel Smyth and Virginia Woolf (R-L)Dr Christopher Wiley presented a research seminar based on his paper ‘Music and Literature: Ethel Smyth, Virginia Woolf, and “The First Woman to Write an Opera”’ at a research seminar hosted by the School of Arts at the University of Surrey on 20 November 2013.

Dr Wiley joined the University of Surrey in September 2013 following a nine-year tenure at City University London. One aspect of his research concerns the intellectual dialogue between Ethel Smyth and Virginia Woolf (pictured, R-L). The article on which his paper is based is being published in the refereed journal The Musical Quarterly.

Dr Christopher Wiley contributes book chapter to major new volume on Haydn

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The Land of Opportunity: Joseph Haydn and BritainA book chapter written by Dr Christopher Wiley, entitled Mythological Motifs in the Biographical Accounts of Haydns Later Life, has appeared in a recently-published anthology that represents a major new contribution to Haydn scholarship.

The volume, The Land of Opportunity: Joseph Haydn and Britain, is edited by Richard Chesser and David Wyn Jones and has its origins in a conference hosted by The British Library (who also published the book) in 2009, organized to commemorate the bicentenary of Haydn’s death.

Dr Wiley’s essay investigates three prominent stories in life-writing on Haydn’s later life: his visit of 1795 to the monument erected in his honour by Count Harrach at Rohrau; the performance of The Creation in March 1808; and the episode of his death the following year. It explores various revealing themes that emerge from their retellings in musical biographies over the decades, including the rising social status of the artist, Haydn’s reconciliation with Beethoven, and notions of The Creation as a harbinger of the composer’s death.

Bibliographic citation

Wiley, Christopher. ‘Mythological Motifs in the Biographical Accounts of Haydn’s Later Life’, in Richard Chesser and David Wyn Jones eds. The Land of Opportunity: Joseph Haydn in Britain. London: The British Library, 2013, pp. 195–211. ISBN 978-0-7123-5848-4.

Full text

The full text is available for free download under licence from Surrey Research Insight Open Access: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/800492/

Further information

Listing of the volume in the British Library Publishing catalogue:

Listing of the volume on amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Land-Opportunity-Joseph-Britain/dp/071235848X/

Dr Christopher Wiley writes for The Conversation UK

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Anti-gay prejudice protestDr Christopher Wiley has contributed an article to The Conversation UK, reflecting on aspects of Stephen Fry’s open letter on Russia’s controversial new anti-gay laws (which called for a ban on the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi) from his own perspective as musicologist, scholar, and teacher.

One claim that Fry made in his letter about the potential consequences of exploring Tchaikovsky’s sexuality and its relationship to his life and work under Russia’s controversial new legislation prompted Dr Wiley to reconsider elements of his own research on musical biography, not just on Tchaikovsky but also on Britten and Ethel Smyth.

Published on 12 August 2013 shortly after Fry’s letter went viral, Dr Wiley’s article, ‘Academics should stand with Fry against anti-gay Russia’, broke new ground for The Conversation UK for its content. It soon received thousands of views, helped in part by a mention by Fry himself on Twitter three days after it originally appeared.

Stephen Fry - Twitter feed

The Conversation UK is an independent news and commentary website offering in-depth analysis, research, news, and ideas from academics and researchers, and has received over 300,000 visitors since its launch three months ago. Modelled on its successful Australian counterpart, its founding partners comprise 13 UK universities including City University London and the University of Surrey.

Dr Christopher Wiley publishes book chapter on Michael Jackson

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Michael Jackson Grasping the SpectacleAn interdisciplinary volume of essays on Michael Jackson published earlier this year, Michael Jackson: Grasping the Spectacle, includes a chapter on musicology written by Dr Christopher Wiley.

Informed by his participation in the international press coverage of Jackson’s death in 2009 and crystallizing around the iconic tracks ‘Thriller’ and ‘Black or White’, Dr Wiley’s essay, ‘Putting the Music Back into Michael Jackson Studies’, seeks to refocus attention on Jackson’s music in relation to discussion of his music videos and their sociocultural contexts.

It concludes by exposing the danger of over-interpreting the art through the lens of the biography of the originating artist, asking whether Jackson’s celebrity will ultimately rest on his contribution to the late twentieth-century entertainment industry or on the serious controversies with which he became associated.

Bibliographic citation

Wiley, Christopher. ‘Putting the Music Back into Michael Jackson Studies’, in Michael Jackson: Grasping the Spectacle, new essays ed. by Christopher R. Smit. Farnham: Ashgate, 2012, pp. 101–16.

Full text 

Dr Wiley’s essay is available for download from City Research Online, the University’s research repository, at the following link: http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/1211/

 

New book publication for former doctoral student of Dr Christopher Wiley

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DF. W. Ferling's 48 Studies for Oboe, Op. 31r Kostis Hassiotis, who completed the Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA) programme at City University London in 2010 under the supervision of Dr Christopher Wiley, has recently published a book based on his doctoral thesis.

Entitled F. W. Ferling’s 48 Studies for Oboe, Op. 31: A Critical Edition Based on Historical Evidence with Particular Reference to Nineteenth-Century Performing Practices (ISBN: 978-3-8465-9724-8), the book is available for purchase from stores including Amazon and MoreBooks.

As the first systematic investigation of Ferling’s landmark 48 Studies for Oboe, the book includes information concerning Ferling as a performer and composer, a detailed description of his known compositions, and reference to the importance of the 48 Studies in modern instrumental training.

Now Assistant Professor of Oboe at the University of Macedonia, Thessaloniki, Dr Hassiotis is active internationally as a performer and researcher.