"My songs lie unheeded and unknown...": Fanny Hensel's Lieder in Reparative Practice Research
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Parker-Langston, Tim. 2025. "My songs lie unheeded and unknown...": Fanny Hensel's Lieder in Reparative Practice Research. Doctoral thesis, Goldsmiths, University of London [Thesis]
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Text ("My songs lie unheeded and unknown...": Fanny Hensel's Lieder in Reparative Practice Research)
MUS_thesis_ParkerLangstonT_2025.pdf - Accepted Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives. Download (35MB) | Preview |
Abstract or Description
Despite being one of the most established female figures in Western classical music, Fanny Hensel (born Mendelssohn) continues to face the underrepresentation that restricts women in music more broadly. Although her presence in scholarship is considerable, over a third of her 239 composed songs remain unpublished and unrecorded. This practice research asks: how can singing Fanny’s songs contribute to scholarship around her music and Lieder in general?
Positioning practice research as a feminist methodology, this study engages with Suzanne Cusick’s concept of “reparative musicology” to envision the dimensions of reparative practice research. This approach addresses the neglect of Hensel’s music through the creation of scores, recordings and resources while aligning with feminist calls for rebalancing Western classical music’s hierarchies of thought. An embodied ‘discovery-led’ trajectory prioritizes reparative practice and puts trust in the epistemic nature of technique.
Through embodied engagement with Hensel’s Lieder this research challenges dismissive notions of ‘simplicity’ and ‘repetition’ often ascribed to her unsung works. By tracing the technical responses required in performing her songs, the study foregrounds the dynamic interplay between text and music, revealing their expressive and technical depth.
The submitted portfolio of reparative practice includes the first complete song edition (via the open-access resource henselsongsonline.org), the CD Hensel: Lieder and 31 premieres recorded for the advocacy project #HENSEL. At the point of submission, all the unpublished Lieder are now widely available and only 14 songs await their (planned) premiere recordings.
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Item Type: |
Thesis (Doctoral) |
| Identification Number (DOI): |
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| Keywords: |
practice research, lieder, art song, feminism, technique, phenomenotechnique, singing, reparative musicology, Fanny Hensel, Fanny Mendelssohn, long nineteenth-century |
| Departments, Centres and Research Units: |
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| Date: |
31 July 2025 |
| Item ID: |
39394 |
| Date Deposited: |
14 Aug 2025 15:35 |
| Last Modified: |
14 Aug 2025 15:37 |
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URI: |
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