A recent symposium

Rachel Orzech writes:

On 2–3 August 2024, I convened a symposium on the theme of “Musical Nationbuilding and Cultural Exchange in Interwar France and Australia” hosted by the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music and supported by the Macgeorge Bequest as well as by my Melbourne Research Fellowship, “Nationbuilding through Twentieth-Century Franco-Australian Cultural Exchange”. It was held across the Southbank and Parkville campuses.

The symposium opened on 2 August with an enlightening keynote lecture by Macgeorge Visiting Speaker Professor Barbara Kelly (University of Leeds), an expert in French music from 1870 to 1939, and on internationalism and transnationalism in the interwar period. Professor Kelly’s keynote was titled “A Question of Perspective: Musical Internationalism in the Interwar Period (France, Europe and Australia)” and was followed by a small concert by staff and students of MCM and a reception. The concert was curated by Professor Kerry Murphy to showcase works related to the Editions de l’Oiseau-Lyre Archive at the University of Melbourne, particularly the work carried out by Australian music publisher Louise Hanson-Dyer in the early years of the music press in interwar Paris. Included were wonderful performances of works by Louis Couperin, François Couperin, Peggy Glanville-Hicks, Francis Poulenc and Noël Gallon.

The second day of the symposium comprised papers from local and international scholars on the following topics:

Sarah Kirby, “‘Home Made Music’: The British Music Society and Musical Exchange Between Australia and the United Kingdom in Interwar Sydney”

Ross Chapman, “Cosmopolitan Connections: Concert Saxophonists in 1930s Australia”

Kerry Murphy, “Louise Dyer and the Exposition Internationale, Paris 1937: Forging the Amitié Franco-Australienne”

John Gabriel, “The National Limits and Transnational Appeal of Catholic Universalism in Darius Milhaud and Paul Claudel’s Christophe Colomb”

Samantha Owens, “‘A German Martyr’? Gerhard von Keussler’s Contribution to Musical Nationbuilding in Australia, 1932–1935”

Helena Tyrväinen, “New Times, Old Affinities: Association française d’Expansion et d’Échanges artistiques as a Sponsor of the Finnish Opera”

Peter Tregear, “‘Putting One’s Hart in the Right Place’: Reconsidering the Reception of an Australian Composer between the Two World Wars”

Also included in the day’s programme was a fascinating session at the Baillieu Library where the Curator of Rare Music, Jen Hill, displayed and spoke about items from the Editions de l’Oiseau-Lyre Archive, including a number of items related to the conference papers.

To read speakers’ abstracts and bios, please visit the Editions de l’Oiseau-Lyre International Research Network website.