Dr Robert Manley was appointed as a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the UQ School of Music in July 2021.
He is continuing research undertaken during his PhD, which examined the sociocultural and musical factors that facilitated and constrained audience engagement with classical chamber music in a regional Australian community.
Dr Manley is currently investigating social capital as part of his post-doctoral research; exploring its relationship to social wellbeing in the reported experiences of classical music audiences in a regional Australian community.
A second strand of the project also considers social capital in the context of Australian arts policy, particularly in relation to the municipalisation of culture and the use of ‘wellbeing frameworks’ to illustrate the delivery of public value through arts and cultural activities. Central to this discussion are conceptions of intrinsic vs instrumental benefits of cultural participation, which have varied across time and across Western countries.
Since commencing his position, Dr Manley has made two submissions to present at the International Society for Music Education (ISME); their World Conference will be in Brisbane during July 2022.
Both submissions include discussions of the role of improvisation in engaging audiences for classical music and the music identities of regional chamber musicians. Late in 2021 Dr Manley will travel to regional Queensland in order to undertake interviews and surveys.
Dr Manley will submit two articles for peer review in 2022: a policy-focused manuscript for the Australian Journal of Public Administration and an engagement-focused manuscript for the International Journal of Community Music.
Previously he has studied at The Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM) and worked with numerous symphony orchestras in Australia and New Zealand.
