Events
Performing Arts Research Seminars
Performing Arts Research Seminars are hosted by SPARC and the Department of Performing Arts. They bring together world-leading artists, practitioners, and scholars in the broad fields of music, sound, and performance. Seminars are open to the public in person and online and take place Wednesdays 17:00-19:00, room AG08, College Building, 280 St. John Street. Please follow the link to attend or receive Zoom details: Performing Arts Research Seminars.
Practice Research Workshops
Practice Research Workshops are presented by Dr Mira Benjamin for postgraduate students in Performing Arts and beyond to develop their creative practice research. Sessions take place Wednesdays, 14:30-16:30, room AG10, College Building, 280 St John Street (unless otherwise noted). Please sign up to attend at the following link: Practice Research Workshops.
Past events
SPARC Symposium 2026
27-31 May 2026, this year’s SPARC symposium was centred on creative health and wellbeing. Through immersive concerts, talks, workshops and a fieldtrip we invite practitioners from diverse artistic and academic backgrounds to come together to discuss, explore and debate. About
Understanding REF Impact in Music
Podcast Gold - An Evening of British Podcast Award Winners
, City St George's Centre of Podcasting Excellence to welcomed and celebrated the winners of this year's British Podcast Awards. About
Embodied Research Methods in Music and Sound Study Day
June 2025, Co-organised by Dr Mira Benjamin. The goal for this study day was to take the temperature of this recently enlivened discourse - how are music and sound practitioners conducting research through embodiment? About
SPARC Symposium 2025: Entangle!
In June 2025, the SPARC symposium was centred on entanglement between humans and our natural, built or technological environments. Through immersive concerts, talks, workshops and a fieldtrip we invited people from diverse artistic and academic backgrounds to come together to discuss, explore and debate. This year we entangled a marine biologist, sound artists, composers, instrumental and electroacoustic performers. About
GBSR Duo - George Barton (percussion) and Siwan Rhys (piano)
Nkisi performs Shapes of Ruins as Energetic Devices
Intra-Action Knowledge Exchange Workshops
, Erik Nyström led a series of three Knowledge Exchange workshops, in which he shares his computer music research. About
- Intra-Action Workshop One: Topographic Synthesis: multichannel sound textures
- Intra-Action Workshop Two. Intra-acting with sounds: principles of sonic influence
- Intra-Action Workshop Three: Cognitive assemblages: sonic cognisers and generative systems.
SPARC Symposium 2024: [Im]probable Networks+
The 2024 Symposium focused on the networks that underpin our world, from the natural networks that have been intrinsically woven through our human history and existence, via our collaborative/collective nature, to the digital networks that affect every aspect of contemporary life. About
River Her Stories installation (left) & Catherine Kontz's Fleet Footing (right)
SPARC Lab Spotlight
December 2024
The SPARC Lab Spotlight featured a concert of music by SPARC PhD students Pantea Armanfar, Günseli Feral Ucar, and Kristian Skårbrevik, alongside a hands-on workshop and a research seminar on ‘Articulating Space through Granular Immersive Audio’, both led by Prof. Steve Beck (Louisiana State University)
Sound Museums: Designing for Inclusion, Wellbeing and Community
June 2024
Organized in partnership with Charcoalblue, Apex Acoustics, and the Institute of Acoustics
SPARC Collective
November and December 2023
City undergraduate alumni undertook a project with the Huddersfield multi-ethnic walking group ‘We in Front’, resulting in a performance at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and a broadcast of this work on BBC Radio 3’s New Music Show.