The School has always offered supervision in local Northern Irish / Irish topics. Dissertations have been completed on Concert Life in Belfast and Dublin, the Armagh Cathedral School and the Organ in Ulster, and one on BBC Northern Ireland is in progress.

There are several opportunities for PhD topics focusing on the rich holdings of the Queen’s University Library, notable the Thomas Moore Collection, a world-class resource for the study of Irish melodies in the nineteenth century, and the Hamilton Harty Collection, which includes autograph manuscripts, conducting scores, letters and other memorabilia. A catalogue of the latter is underway.

Recent appointments have enabled the School to extend its PhD supervision into new areas. Topics in Irish Traditional Music and in Contemporary Music and Sound Art are now available. Staff research interests are listed below.

Dr Sarah McCleave seeks PhD applicants with an interest in the area of the analysis of dance music. 

Dr David Robb seeks PhD applicants with an interest in political uses of music, particularly in the area of popular, folk and protest song"

Dr Franziska Schroeder seeks Ph.D. students whose research interests include: new performance environments, performance studies, critical/cultural studies in music and sonic arts, and improvisation.

Professor Yo Tomita is interested in proposals from prospective research students in any aspect of Bach studies.  He is particularly keen to supervise topics in the reception of Bach's works in foreign lands, for example, the fugues in the early nineteenth century France.

Professor Ian Woodfield is currently working in the area of Mozart source studies, in particular on the operas Così fan tutte and Don Giovanni. There are opportunities for PhD research in the little-studied area of eighteenth-century keyboard arrangements of these works.

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