Posture is a multifaceted and complex concept. As physiotherapists, we tend to view posture through a biomechanical lens, but it also encompasses historical, educational, sociocultural and behavioural dimensions. 'Poor' posture or postural impairments are often described as a risk factor for musculoskeletal disorders, particularly in relation to music-related disorders affecting musicians, including instrumentalists, singers and conductors. However, a recent review argues that this relationship is not clearly established in the current literature and provides potential explanations for the discrepancy between the beliefs of musicians and their specialised healthcare practitioners and the current state of research.
This one-hour presentation will discuss recent research into how posture is defined and investigated in musicians, including singers and instrumentalists, and the challenges that clinicians, music teachers, and researchers face when considering posture as a potential risk factor for musculoskeletal health and as a means of enhancing musical performance.
Céleste Rousseau, PhD, PT, PhD cand., is a specialist physiotherapist for musicians. Having been raised by a family of artists and having played music herself from an early age, she graduated in 2016 and immediately specialised in providing care for musicians. Her passion for research led her to pursue further academic studies while working as a private practitioner at the Clinique du Musicien in Paris. She gained her first experience during a Master's 2 STAPS placement in Australia with Bronwen Ackermann. In April 2022, she defended her thesis, entitled 'Prevention of musculoskeletal disorders in orchestral musicians', at Liverpool John Moores University in partnership with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. Since then, she has taught and supervised research at the IFMK, working with musicians in various orchestras, institutions, and conservatoires. In the voluntary sector, she co-founded the SFP’s Philosophy and Physiotherapy Study Group and the French Association for the Health of Performing Artists, which she has chaired since its inception. She is also secretary of the European Network of Physiotherapists for the Performing Arts (ENPPA). From January 2025 onwards, she will be a postdoctoral researcher on the P.AH|lifetime.ai project at Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences, which focuses on artists’ health. Finally, having completed two Master's degrees in Philosophy at the University of Bordeaux Montaigne, she is now pursuing a PhD at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, entitled 'Ageing as a Musician', under the supervision of Marie Gaille.
Prof. Amalia Lavinia Rizzo: Didattica efficace e insegnamento dello strumento musicale per allievi con DSA: principi teorici e strategie inclusive
L'intervento si propone di fornire ai docenti di strumento musicale strumenti teorici e pratici per una didattica realmente inclusiva rivolta ad allievi con Disturbi Specifici dell'Apprendimento (DSA). Nella prima parte verranno illustrati i principali riferimenti normativi e i fondamenti teorici relativi ai DSA, con particolare attenzione alle implicazioni che dislessia, disgrafia, disortografia e discalculia possono avere nell'apprendimento strumentale — dalla lettura della notazione musicale alla memorizzazione, dalla coordinazione motoria alla gestione del tempo. Nella seconda parte il focus si sposterà sulle strategie didattiche inclusive applicabili in sede di lezione individuale e di gruppo: adattamento dei materiali, uso di canali multisensoriali, strumenti compensativi e misure dispensative, tecniche di rinforzo positivo e valutazione formativa. Attraverso esempi pratici e momenti di confronto, i partecipanti saranno guidati a riconoscere precocemente i segnali di difficoltà e a costruire percorsi didattici personalizzati, capaci di valorizzare le potenzialità di ciascun allievo nel rispetto dei suoi tempi e delle sue modalità di apprendimento.
Fare ricerca empirica nella didattica dello strumento musicale: nodi metodologici e questioni critiche
L'intervento propone una riflessione critica sulle principali difficoltà metodologiche che incontra chi fa ricerca empirica nell'ambito della didattica dello strumento musicale. Muovendo da un breve inquadramento del rapporto, spesso problematico, tra pratica strumentale e ricerca scientifica, il contributo metterà a fuoco alcuni nodi ricorrenti, quali: la costruzione di campioni e disegni di ricerca adeguati in un contesto didattico difficilmente riconducibile ai modelli sperimentali classici, le sfide nella misurazione di competenze in larga parte tacite e il tema della replicabilità e della validità dei risultati. Attraverso il confronto con esempi tratti dalla letteratura nazionale e internazionale, l'intervento intende offrire strumenti critici per orientarsi nella ricerca esistente e per impostare consapevolmente future indagini in questo campo.
Amalia Lavinia Rizzo è professoressa associata in Didattica inclusiva nel Dipartimento di Scienze della Formazione dell’Università degli Studi RomaTre. Pianista, diplomata in didattica della musica, specializzata nelle attività di sostegno e in musicoterapia, laureata in DAMS con un PhD in Pedagogia, ha indagato il concetto di musica inclusiva applicato al contesto italiano di «full inclusion». La sua attività di studio tiene conto dell’orientamento dell’«Evidence Based Education» in campo educativo speciale.
Catherine Laws (University of York/ Orpheus Instituut)
For musicians, touch is often bound up with proprioceptive navigation of sonic nuance: we feel our way around qualities of resonance, tone, and timbre. Most studies of musical touch examine how measurable characteristics of touch (velocity, pressure, etc) relate to measurable sonic outcomes. However, touch-related movements affect a performer’s experience of and interaction with haptic-proprioceptive feedback from the instrument. If the dynamic experience of touch changes how we feel as we perform, this entwines the physical experience of ‘touching’ with affective impact – how we are ‘touched’. Moreover, recent research into vicarious perception has shown that we, to different extents, represent in our brains the touch experiences of others, as if they are ours. The dynamics of touch can form an important role in the ecology of performance: in performers’ interactions with objects (instruments and beyond), materials, and contexts, but also, perhaps, as the forms of embodied empathy.
This presentation draws out aspects of my research project ‘Musical Touch and Vicarious Perception,’ taking as case studies three new, interdisciplinary performance pieces, created through processes of artistic research into forms of musical touching. Each involved different artistic research methods: different experimental and improvisatory music processes, sometimes combined with physical theatre techniques, employed to disrupt intuitive touch, intervening creatively to expose and scrutinise its operation.
Catherine Laws is a pianist specializing in new music and interdisciplinary practices. She is Professor of Music at the University of York and a Research Fellow at the Orpheus Institute, Ghent. Her artistic research as a pianist is focused on aspects of embodiment, subjectivity, and collaboration in performance practices, with her current primary focus the research project ‘Musical Touch and Vicarious Perception’. This forms part of the research cluster ‘Performance and Embodiment’, which Catherine co-leads with Emily Worthington, as a partnership between her two institutions. Recent outcomes of the ‘touch’ project include her multimedia performance project, Hands On!, premiered in June, a series of ‘piano films’ developed with film maker Minyung Im, and a video article is forthcoming in a special issue of the Journal of Embodied Research, entitled ‘On Music’. Two books focused on aspects of subjectivity and identity in musical practices were published in 2019 and 2020: Performance, Subjectivity, and Experimentation and Voices, Bodies, Practices: Performing Musical Subjectivities. Her musicological work examines the relationship between music, language, and meaning, focusing especially on music and musicality in the work of Samuel Beckett. Catherine’s publications in this field include numerous articles and the monograph Headaches Among the Overtones: Music in Beckett/ Beckett in Music.
La presentazione verterà sulle origini e sull’evoluzione del mio interesse per la musica formalizzata e la composizione assistita dal computer. Verranno analizzate le motivazioni estetiche e tecniche alla base della creazione e dello sviluppo del “bach project”, un ecosistema digitale per la composizione assistita dal computer in tempo reale, nonché le varie idee emerse da questo lavoro e le sfide affrontate nel corso degli anni.
Analizzerò inoltre il mio costante interesse per le forme di notazione musicale e le questioni che esse sollevano in un’epoca in cui molte di esse sono passate in secondo piano rispetto a un numero crescente di pratiche contemporanee. Accanto a queste riflessioni, alcuni esempi musicali ripercorreranno l’evoluzione del mio rapporto, a tratti travagliato ma sempre appassionato, con la musica procedurale.
Nato nel 1984, Daniele Ghisi è un compositore e ricercatore italiano, vincitore del premio Ernst von Siemens Förderpreis 2024, cofondatore del collettivo /nu/thing e co-ideatore della bach library per la composizione assistita dal computer. Ha svolto attività di ricerca presso l’Ircam, l’HEM e l’Università della California a Berkeley, e attualmente insegna e coordina un programma di dottorato presso il Conservatorio di Torino. La sua musica è edita da Ricordi.
