The Beethoven Question: Can Art Make Life Worth Living?
Purcell Room, Southbank Centre - October 2012
Saturday 27th October
Introduction
– Stephen Johnson
Beethoven’s
life and deafness - John Suchet
Followed by discussion with Stephen Johnson and questions
Beethoven’s
deafness, his string quartets and his three styles–
Prof Age Smilde, and Dr EdoardoSaccenti, of
Biosystems Data Analysis at the Swammerdam Institute for Life Sciences at the
University of Amsterdam: with the Sacconi Quartet
Followed by discussion
and questions – with the Sacconi Quartet and Stephen Johnson
Music
and Deafness:
Introduced by Prof Michael Trimble
Music and its Impact on the Deaf
Dr Paul Whittaker OBE, Artistic Director of Music and the Deaf
The role of art in coping with sensory impairment Robert Fulford, Centre for Music Performance Research, Royal Northern College of Music Effects of Hearing Impairment on Music Making Joined by Nigel Osborne, composer, co-director of the Institute for Music in Human and Social Development, and Lloyd Coleman, composer
Discussion with Michael Trimble, Paul Whittaker, Robert Fulford, Nigel Osborne and Lloyd Coleman
Panel
discussion: The Need to Compose
Introduced by Nigel Osborne with Stephen Johnson, Barry Cooper and
Lloyd Coleman
Audio Archive - 2011 conference
Why Music? Is Music Different from the Other Arts?
Institute of Neurology, Queen Square - October 2011
There have been debates going back for over 2,000 years about the similarities and differences between art forms, and several writers at various times have venerated music as superior to the rest. This symposium will explore these views from a multidisciplinary perspective, from the philosophical to the therapeutic, and from the psychological to the neurological. The relevance of the latter, especially as revealed to us with modern brain imaging, will be the subject of discussion, questioning the current role of neuroscience for philosophy and aesthetics. Click here to download the transcript as a PDF document
We speak of understanding and misunderstanding music; music is a form of communication; and the habit of sitting still and listening while music plays is one that demands an explanation, especially at a time when hardly anyone does it. What form should such an explanation take, and is neuroscience likely to have a part in shaping it? And what bearing would the explanation have on our understanding of other art forms? Click here to download the transcript as a PDF document
Neuroaesthetics tends to look to neuroscience for help in the study of universals, such as beauty. Neurohistory uses neuroscience to help to explain those behaviours of individuals and groups that are exceptional, from the creativity of particular artists and musicians to the responsiveness of particular viewers and listeners. The talk suggests ways in which brain scanners and electron microscopes offer insights into the most mysterious activities of the human mind. It also argues that in doing so, far from reducing the mind’s mystery, they greatly enhance it. Click here to download the transcript as a PDF document
There has been a well-documented decline in attendance at classical music concerts at the same time as audiences for other art-forms (e.g. visual art) have never been healthier. This lecture reviews some of the psychological factors that impact on audiences when experiencing music and other art forms, and outlines some recent initiatives, which encourage musicians to build a stronger relationship to audiences by learning from other arts, particularly drama. Click here to download the transcript as a PDF document
Art, like human consciousness, is gloriously useless. It has no biological function but rather is an attempt to come to terms with, even to heal, the wound in the present tense, which is in part the result of the fact that ideas and experience, content and form are in conflict. It is an expression of the unique freedom of human beings to make their own sense of the world. The therapeutic implications of this for those who have been damaged by life or by illness are both self-evident and ambivalent. Click here to download the transcript as a PDF document
