Research projects

Evaluation of the BMBF-funded sub-project of the innovative Alsterphilharmonie Stage 2.0 university (quantitative questionnaire survey and qualitative interview study)

In the Elementary Music Practice International (EMI) project, immigrant musicians and music teachers with a first professional qualification from outside the EU are given the opportunity to obtain a German university certificate for making music in daycare centers within one year. Together with educators from the daycare center, participants attend seminars on five weekends and in two intensive weeks during the training period.

The theoretical and practical cornerstones are current findings from the field of elementary music education and the approach of audiation-based music learning (Music Learning Theory). In music education, this is based on listening to and experiencing a repertoire that is as varied as possible and thus explicitly offers the opportunity to incorporate different musical styles and folk music traditions into the work. The study of music and movement, voice training, early education and music theory fundamentals enables participants to build a solid foundation. The qualification in the EMI further training course is also achieved by working in tandem, consisting of musicians and educators, who experience the seminars together as well as designing practical units together in the actual daycare center field of activity. These practical projects, supported by supervision from experts at the Hamburg University of Music and Drama, and joint attendance at seminars enable educators and musicians to learn from and with each other and to benefit from each other's expertise.

The EMI training program was evaluated at the end of the BMBF funding period in 2022 in a quantitative questionnaire survey and a qualitative interview study. This revealed the great success and social impact of the project. All participants feel motivated after the training and in a position to promote, support and support early musical education in daycare centers. In interviews and conversations with the graduates, it became clear time and again how important EMI was for their individual biographies and personal development, which has a direct impact on countless children with whom they work over the course of their professional lives.

In the words of one participant from the EMI class of 2021/22: "EMI is a gift from heaven"

EMI-me! is a sub-project of the second funding phase of the federal-state initiative "Innovative University. The Department of Elementary Music Education at the HfMT Hamburg would like to develop a digital learning format (learning platform/app or similar) with EMI-me! in cooperation with the HAW Hamburg during the five-year funding period (I/2023 - XII/2027). With this offer, we would like to offer people interested in music (educators, pedagogy, social pedagogy, musicians ...) on the one hand a low-threshold access for their own musical development and at the same time provide music pedagogical suggestions for teaching music in the sense of audiation-based music learning, e.g. in daycare centers/elementary schools/social work etc. 

How can cultural organizations be shaped and developed for the future? What kind of leadership culture is needed in cultural organizations? How can public cultural institutions (re)find their role in a society in transformation? And what can our own personal contribution be to this process?

In fall 2023, a visionary pilot project was launched by the Institute for Cultural Policy of the Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft in cooperation with the Institute for Cultural and Media Management at the HfMT Hamburg, which is dedicated to these questions of cultural leadership, among others:

The new "Cultural Leadership" scholarship program gives young leaders from the cultural sector in North Rhine-Westphalia the opportunity to develop skills, knowledge and attitudes in the field of cultural leadership and to expand their network. The program is designed and implemented by both institutes and receives support from the Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia and the Kulturstiftung der Länder.

Over eight months, participants undergo a development journey through three intensive face-to-face modules, focused online impulses and peer-to-peer exchange and receive a certificate from the Hamburg University of Music and Drama upon successful completion. In addition to personal development, the focus is always on networking - the group forms a community of practice that will continue to support each other in their practice beyond the end of the program and will grow steadily through future participants.

Research into new forms of making and reading music in hybrid networks
Project management: Prof. Dr. Georg Hajdu

Synaesthesia and interactive installation in virtual space
Project management: Dr. Konstantina Orlandatou

Interactive hybrid instruments.
Project management: Prof. Dr. Jacob Sello

Interactive sound and music synthesis with AI and in virtual space.
Project management: Dr. Grégory Beller.

More information will follow soon.

13th European Music Therapy Conference 2025, Topic: Bridges, date: July 23rd to 27th, 2025 Place: HFMT

Research workshop 23 February 2024 Invitation and program (PDF)

Next research workshop: Friday, May 17, 2024

The research platform"Music/Music Mediation and Gender on the Internet" is dedicated to the musical work and creativity of women past and present and to questions of cultural gender representation. Through lexical articles, multimedia presentations, images, interviews, music and sheet music examples, female musicians and their variously interlinked fields of activity take shape in words, images and sound.

"Music/Music Mediation and Gender on the Internet" went online in 2004 and has been growing continuously ever since. The platform currently offers 17 multimedia presentations on topics as diverse as "Music and the Body", sound installations and "Playing Women" and around 300 lexical articles on well-known female musicians such as Clara Schumann and Fanny Hensel, but above all on female musicians and patrons who are forgotten today but were renowned in their time.

For some years now, a change in perspective has been emerging, not least as a result of the "new musicology" and gender research: away from a purely work-related historiography of music towards a history of cultural action. As a result, people who work for the performance, interpretation and dissemination of music, including numerous female performers, music writers, teachers and patrons, and the places where they work, are now coming into focus.

DFG project by Dr. Sophie Fetthauer

In the spring of 1941, the pianist and voice teacher Paula Fruchter and the singer, singing teacher and cantor Josef Fruchter fled to Shanghai with their eight-year-old daughter Frieda. They were among the approximately 18,000 mainly Jewish refugees who sought refuge from Nazi persecution in the Chinese port city.

Supplemented by messages from her husband and daughter, Paula Fruchter wrote almost 70 letters, postcards, telegrams and Red Cross messages to her mother and other relatives in Vienna between 1941 and 1949. As her mother was not affected by anti-Semitic persecution, she survived the Nazi era in Vienna and the letters with her. This is absolutely unique, as in most cases the recipients of letters were deported from Shanghai and the correspondence was lost along with their belongings.

The first messages were written during the flight from Vienna via Berlin, the Soviet Union and Manchukuo and give an impression of the circumstances of the journey, of cities and landscapes as well as the approach to foreign living environments. The book concludes with four letters written during the ship passage from Shanghai via Italy to Israel and Raanana. These are mainly about hopes and fears about the future. The letters from Shanghai make up the largest part. In addition to the professional situation (concerts, teaching, work as a cantor in the synagogue, working conditions, competitive situation, etc.), they deal with everyday life in Shanghai (accommodation, food, health, climate, education, contact networks and considerations for onward migration or remigration in the post-war period). Against the backdrop of the difficult situation in Shanghai and her concern for her mother in Vienna, Paula Fruchter developed writing strategies - typical of letters from exile - that served to reassure herself as well as to reassure her mother. At the same time, she was always aware of the censorship of letters, which also did not allow free communication.

The aim of the project is a two-part publication. The first part will be an analytical study. It will analyze the Fruchters' exile-specific communication strategies and thus, among other things, the image that was conveyed to the family in Vienna of the conditions in Shanghai, including musical life. This is combined with explanations of the state of research, the sources, the historical background, the Fruchters' biographies and the family connections. The letter edition, including a commentary and reference apparatus, an index of letters and a report on the editorial problems and decisions form the second part.

www.sophie.fetthauer.de