Introduction The workshops will draw together new research on music-making and the domestic interior from a variety of disciplines. They will be thematic, and cross historical and geographical boundaries. The aim of these workshops is to create networks of interest between disciplines. These may include historians of art and design, interiors and architecture, historians of performance, musical instrument production and consumption, conservators, curators, contemporary architects and designers, and performers. They will offer a forum for established scholars, and will also encourage young academics, curators and performers to consider new approaches to their work. Each workshop will focus on a different aspect of the music room and will open with two 20 minute papers. There will then be an opportunity for questions and wider discussion. Please contact Suzanne Fagence Cooper, Research Department, V&A Museum (s.fagence@vam.ac.uk) if you would like to present a paper, or need more information about the workshops. To view the abstracts, please follow the hyperlinks below.
Schedule Monday 9th October 2006 - What is a music room? The evolution of music rooms as definable spaces The architectural context: heating, lighting, furnishing The impact of changes in musical taste and technology on interiors
Speakers Tessa Murdoch (V&A Museum) Great Music Rooms in London and Paris, 1660–1800 Stephen Rose (Royal Holloway, University of London) Sacred music in public and private during the German Baroque Chair: Suzanne Fagence Cooper (V&A/BCUC) Summary
Monday 6th November - Production and consumption speakers Meredith Macfarlane (Royal College of Music) String Quartets in the Burghley House Music Collection Jason Petty (Bard Graduate Center, New York) The French Lyre-Guitar, 1797-1840: An 'Unhappy Metamorphosis?' Chair: Jenny Nex (Royal College of Music) Summary
Monday 4th December - Private and public Speakers Sophie Fuller (author of The Pandora Guide to Women Composers) Women and Music Rooms in 19th and 20th century Britain Sarah Teasley (University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth) Performance spaces for traditional chamber music in Meiji era Japan Louise Stein (University of Michigan) Private and Public: Decorum, Space, and Musical Performance in the Spanish Orbit Chair: Juliet Simpson (BCUC) Summary
Monday 15th January 2007 - 'At home' Class differences: music in the upper-class, middle-class or artisan home The role of music in family relations
Provisional Speakers Mark Katz (University of North Carolina) The Gramophone and the Family Tarek Barreda (Insititut National d'Histoire de l'Art) Music in French Architecture of the 17th and 18th Centuries Chair: Flora Dennis (Curator: The Renaissance Interior, V&A Museum) summary
Monday 12th February - Musical heritage The conservation and display of historical musical instruments Recreating musical interior spaces in museums and historic houses Music-making and the quest for authentic performance
Provisional Speakers Martin Souter (director of The Gift of Music) Recording Practices Andrew Lamb (Bate Collection, University of Oxford) Displaying Historical Domestic Instruments Chair: Jake Kaner (BCUC)
Monday 12th March - The music room now The impact of recorded music Music in contemporary design and architecture Sound and vision: multi-media performances in the home
Provisional Speakers Christopher Cook (broadcaster) Turning Radio into Furniture David Wright (Royal College of Music) Listening to Mechanised Music Chair: Paul Banks (Royal College of Music)
Location V&A Museum, Cromwell Road, South Kensington, London, SW7 2RL Seminar Room A, Research Department, 17.15-19.00 Nearest tube: South Kensington (link to map) Please note that the V&A Museum closes at 17.45 on Mondays, so latecomers (after 17.30) cannot be admitted. Seminar Room A is found at the top of the Ceramics staircase, above the Silver Gallery. | 
