Conference Speakers

Karen O’Connor B Sc (Hons) Psychol GRNCM PPRNCM ARCM

Performance Coach and University Fellow for Teaching and Learning

Karen’s groundbreaking work at the Conservatoire has been turning heads all over the country. She has been profiled in national publications, invited to do numerous workshops and was recently appointed a University Fellow to continue her innovative work in performance coaching. Recently Karen asked her students to sum up mental skills training for performance in one phrase, for those who don’t know what it is. Here are some of the responses:

• “The smallest mental changes can make the biggest performance differences”
• “It can make you think about yourself in a new light and be more aware of the potential you can reach”
• “Learn how to prevent anxiety from hiding your performance talent”
• “There are solutions available”
• “Do it even if you don’t think you have any big problems – it can really, really help”
• “I found it so helpful to air my views and realise that others face the same worries”
• “Learn how to get the best out of yourself in order to produce a successful performance”
• “Even if you don’t suffer from performance nerves, you can learn how to expect the unexpected and develop strategies to deal with it”
• “Everyone can benefit from it”
• “Essential!”

In 2007, Karen was appointed a University Fellow in Teaching in Learning to continue developing this area of innovative work.

Declan Costello, MA, MBBS, FRCS (ORL-HNS)

Mr Costello was a Choral Scholar at St John's College, Cambridge, where he studied music. He then studied medicine at Imperial College. He is now a fifth year specialist registrar in ENT in the Oxford region, and is undertaking sub-specialist training in laryngology with Meredydd Harries in Brighton.

Prof. Julian Pike ARCM

An accomplished tenor, Julian Pike toured extensively in the UK and Europe before embarking on his teaching career. He has performed with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and was chosen by legendary theatre director Peter Brook to sing Don Jose in his famous production of Carmen (1982). He later created the central role of Michael in Donnerstag aus Licht (1985) for the eminent composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, with whom he enjoyed a close working relationship.

Dr. Peter Johnson DPhil(Oxford) MA(Cantab) MusB(Cantab) FRCO

Peter Johnson is Head of Research at Birmingham Conservatoire, personally establishing its research department in 1993. His DPhil was on early atonality in Webern and Schoenberg, and he has lectured on most areas of music history and musicianship, with specialisms in twentieth century history and analysis, improvisation and the philosophy and aesthetics of music. He has pioneered research on the practice and aesthetics of musical performance, drawing on his considerable earlier experience as keyboard player, choir training and conductor. He has published on several aspects of performance, including intonation in string quartet playing, recordings and the relationship between performer and listener. He has designed a comprehensive performance analysis tool named Span in which processes of spectral and spectrographic analysis are integrated and combined with methods such as tapping in a user-friendly framework designed for musicians.

He reviews regularly for several journals and is in the peer review college for the AHRB. He is a widely experienced examiner to PhD level, and has to date successfully supervised thirteen PhDs at Birmingham Conservatoire.