Professor Shirley Thompson

Vice Principal (Music)

Royal Birmingham Conservatoire

Email:: shirley.thompson@bcu.ac.uk
Phone:: +44 (0)121 331 7214

Professor Shirley Thompson graduated from the University of Hull with a first class BMus degree in 1987. She subsequently undertook a PGCE (at the then Birmingham Polytechnic), and thereafter spent three years as teacher-in-charge of Music at a Northamptonshire secondary school. Having won a British Academy Major Scholarship to return to study for a PhD at Hull, she was awarded her doctorate in 1998 for a thesis on the music of the seventeenth-century French composer Marc-Antoine Charpentier (‘The Autograph Manuscripts of Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Clues to Performance'). Following a five-year period as a Lecturer (then Senior Lecturer) in Music at the University of Wolverhampton, she moved in 2001 to Royal Birmingham Conservatoire where, after occupying a series of different roles, including Director of Postgraduate Studies in Music, she was appointed Vice Principal for Music in 2018 and Interim Principal in September 2020.

Shirley's research has continued to focus on French Baroque music and on Charpentier in particular. Her publications have included an edited book on Charpentier (Ashgate, 2010), a 700-page, two-volume critical edition of the composer’s motets (Centre de musique Baroque de Versailles, 2018) and a co-edited book on Rameau’s operas (Routledge, at press), along with numerous articles and book chapters. She has also prepared many performance editions of Charpentier's music, including music for two BBC Promenade Concerts, and has contributed as a reviewer (of books, recordings and scores) to a range of publications.

Shirley presents regularly at international conferences and has organized or co-organized several, including anniversary conferences for Charpentier (Birmingham, UK, 2004), Rameau (Oxford, UK, 2014) and Couperin (Birmingham, UK, 2018). She is an active member of the US-based Society for Seventeenth-Century Music, and has been Chair of both the Program Committee and the Nominating Committee. She is currently a member of the editorial board of the Society’s Journal for Seventeenth-Century Music.

Current Activity

Areas of Expertise

Qualifications

Memberships

Teaching

Research

Postgraduate Supervision

Publications

PhD Thesis

‘The Autograph Manuscripts of Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Clues to Performance’, The University of Hull, 1997

Edited Book

The Operas of Jean-Philippe Rameau: Genesis, Staging, Reception [with co-editors Graham Sadler and Jonathan Williams], Routledge, at press
New Perspectives on Marc-Antoine Charpentier (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010) (including a chapter by me (see below), and co-authorship of the Appendix)

Editions

Marc-Antoine Charpentier – Petits Motets – Vols. 4 a) and b) [part of the monumental critical edition of Charpentier’s works] (Versailles: Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles, 2018)
Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Amor vince ogni cosa, Pastoraletta Ia, H492, for five voices, two treble instruments and basso continuo, ed. Shirley Thompson (Launton: Edition HH, 2013)
Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Cupido perfido, dentr’al mio cuor, Pastoraletta IIa, H493, for four voices, two treble instruments and basso continuo, ed. Shirley Thompson (Launton: Edition HH, 2013)
(Supporting Essay: ‘Charpentier’s Two Pastoralette: Questions of Authenticity’, downloadable from http://www.editionhh.co.uk/ab_sthompson.htm

Book Chapters and Articles

‘Charpentier and Couperin: Evidence of a Mentor-Student Relationship’ (in preparation)
‘Marc-Antoine Charpentier and the Double Reeds: Adapting to New Technology’, in Catherine Massip, Bernard Dompnier, Solveig Serre (eds), Musiques en liberté: Entre la cour et les provinces au temps des Bourbons (Paris: École Nationale des Chartes, 2018), pp. 189–99
‘Marc-Antoine Charpentier and the Cecilian Tradition’, in Catherine Cessac (ed.), Les histoires sacrées de Marc-Antoine Charpentier: une histoire de genre (Turnhout: Brepols, 2017), pp. 173–89
‘“La seule diversité en fait toute la perfection”: Charpentier and the Evolution of the French String Orchestra’, in Jean Duron and Florence Gétreau (eds), Les cordes de l’orchestre français sous le règne de Louis XIV (Paris: Éditions Vrin, 2015), pp. 241–61
Co-author (with Graham Sadler) of ‘The Italian Roots of Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s Harmonic Idiom’, in Anne-Madeleine Goulet and Gesa zur Nieden (eds), Europäische Musiker in Venedig, Rom und Neapel 1650-1750 / Les musiciens européens à Venise, Rome et Naples 1650-1750 / Musicisti europei a Venezia, Roma e Napoli 1650-1750 (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 2015), pp. 546–70
‘Charpentier and the Language of Italy’, in Caroline Giron-Panel and Anne-Madeleine Goulet (eds), Musique à Rome au XVIIe siècle (Rome: L'Ecole française de Rome, 2012), 417–32
‘Charpentier’s Motets melêz de symphonie: A Nephew’s Offering’, in Shirley Thompson (ed.), New Perspectives on Marc-Antoine Charpentier (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010), pp. 287–314
‘Declensions and Debauchery: Exploring Two “New” Charpentier Attributions’, Bulletin Charpentier, 2 (2009), pp. 20–40
‘Colouration in the Mélanges: Purpose and Precedent’, in Catherine Cessac (ed.), Les manuscrits autographes de Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Etudes du Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles (Wavre: Mardaga, 2007), pp. 121–36
‘Charpentier and the Viol’, Early Music, 32 (2004), pp. 497–510
‘Once More into the Void: Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s croches blanches Reconsidered’, Early Music, 30 (2002), pp. 82–92
‘Reflections on Four Charpentier Chronologies’, Journal of Seventeenth-Century Music, 7 (December 2001); http://www.sscm-jscm.org/jscm/v7no1.html
Revision of ‘Duplessis’, in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians: Second Edition, ed. Stanley Sadie & John Tyrell (London: Macmillan, 2001), 7, pp. 721–2
‘A Mute Question: Charpentier and the Sourdines’, Bulletin de la Société Marc-Antoine Charpentier, 17 (2000), pp. 7–18; reprinted in Catherine Cessac (ed.), Marc-Antoine Charpentier, un musicien retrouvé, Etudes du Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles (Sprimont: Mardaga, 2005), pp. 183–97
Co-author (with Graham Sadler) of ‘Marc-Antoine Charpentier and the basse continue’, Basler Jahrbuch für historische Musikpraxis, 18 (1994), pp. 9–30

Reviews

In Early Music, Music & Letters, The Consort, Eighteenth-Century Music, Journal of Seventeenth-Century Music, Newsletter of the American Musical Instrument Society. I have also acted as pre-publication reviewer for Early Music, the Web Library of Seventeenth-Century Music and British Journal of Music Education.

Performing Editions

Including the following, for high profile concerts:

Charpentier’s Messe à quatre chœurs and Salve regina à trois chœurs: performed in January 2003 by Ex Cathedra (in Birmingham and at St John’s, Smith Square, London). Recorded by Hyperion in January 2003; CD released in January 2004.
1999 BBC Promenade Concert, Royal Albert Hall, London: Charpentier, Extremum Dei judicium
1994 Lufthansa Festival, Wigmore Hall, London: Charpentier, Missa Assumpta est Maria; In obitum; De profundis
1993 BBC Promenade Concert, Royal Albert Hall, London: Charpentier, Messe pour les trépassés; Dies iræ; Motet pour les trépassés

Conference Papers

Every Biennial International Conference on Baroque Music from 2010 (Belfast, Southampton, Salzburg, Canterbury, Cremona)

Annual conferences of the US-based Society for Seventeenth-Century Music (Iowa City, 2015; Toronto, 2006)

Various other European & UK conferences: Birmingham, 2018, 2014; Royaumont, 2013; Rome, 2012; Versailles, 2011; Rome, 2011; Schwetzingen, 2009; Amsterdam, 2009; York, 2005; Versailles, 2004; Birmingham, 2004.