Workshops
Asaf Bachrach: Flourishing in the Contact Zone |
Centre national de la recherché scientifique (France) |
Asaf Bachrach is a CNRS (Centre national de la recherché scientifique) researcher and a dance improviser in France, specializing in the intersection of dance, cognition, and intersubjectivity (labodanse.org). With a PhD from MIT in formal linguistics and cognitive neuroscience, his research integrates cognitive science methods, physiological measures, and experiential inquiry, recently exploring shared virtual reality. For Asaf, dance and improvisation are not just subjects of study but tools for understanding creativity and connection. A practitioner of Contact Improvisation for over 30 years, he has taught, performed, and facilitated internationally. He is also a certified Rolfing practitioner and a member of the Larret en Mouvements collective (larret.org). |
Bettina Bläsing: Touching Nature Touching Us. Multisensory Explorations, Interactions and Improvisations in the Outdoors |
Bielefeld University, Department of Sport Science, Neurocognition and Action, Germany |
Bettina Bläsing studied in Bielefeld, Münster and Edinburgh and holds a doctorate in biology, specializing in relationships between movement and cognition. In 2019, she was awarded the venia legendi in sports science at Bielefeld University for her habilitation on memory, learning and expertise in dance. Until 2023, she worked as a senior lecturer at the Faculty of Rehabilitation Science at TU Dortmund University, focusing on dance in the context of disability and inclusion. Bettina has published more than 50 scientific articles and book chapters and co-edited several books featuring neurocognitive perspectives on dance and the performing arts. She also works as dance and improvisation teacher and science journalist. |
Graham Fitch: Sleuths at Work: Detecting Practice Optimization Opportunities |
London, UK |
Graham Fitch maintains an international reputation as a pianist, teacher, workshop leader and writer. He regularly publishes in Pianist Magazine, with video demonstrations on the magazine’s YouTube channel. He runs a private studio in London, working with professional performers, talented youngsters and piano teachers, Graham also helps amateur pianists develop their playing. He is a tutor on The Piano Teachers’ Course UK and at the Summer School for Pianists at Stowe, gives sell-out courses at Finchcocks, and offers courses in Blonay, Switzerland. He published an ebook series based on his popular blog and curates a considerable library of written and video content on his website, the Online Academy. |
Bettina Hafner: Conquering Challenges – Mental Techniques for Difficult Situations |
Coach and Personal Development, Munich, Germany |
Bettina Hafner, M.A., M.Sc. is an organizational psychologist. She works as a coach, team developer and trainer in various industries and universities. For over ten years she was an exam coach at the Technical University of Munich, helping students through difficult study situations. During this time, she learned a lot about the power of coaching and mental techniques – her heart still beats for empowering people in every kind of challenging situations. |
Frank Heuser: Life-Long Learning: Thriving Through Dialogue |
University of California Los Angeles, UCLA, USA |
Frank Heuser is Professor Emeritus of Music Education at UCLA where he taught courses in music education and supervised student teachers. His research focuses on developing ways to improve music pedagogy. He has used electromyography to investigate tone commencement problems in brass players, developed strategies to improve pre-service music teacher education, and is currently applying the principles of information design to improve teaching materials employed in music instruction. He is a guest conductor and clinician for public school ensembles and has served on a variety of arts education committees for the State of California as well as on evaluation panels for the National Endowment for the Arts. |
Noa Kagayama: Turning Practice Up to 11: Research-based Strategies for Making Practice More Effective and More Fun |
The Juilliard School; Cleveland Institute of Music, USA |
Performance psychologist Noa Kageyama is on the faculty of The Juilliard School and the Cleveland Institute of Music. A conservatory-trained violinist with degrees from Oberlin and Juilliard before completing a Ph.D. in counseling psychology at Indiana University, Noa specializes in teaching musicians how to utilize sport psychology principles and demonstrate their full abilities under pressure. His work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, NBC News, CNN, and other media outlets. He maintains a coaching practice, has taught over 8000 musicians through his online courses, and authors The Bulletproof Musician blog and podcast, reaching over 45,000 subscribers every week. |
Costas I. Karageorghis with Holger Geschwindner and Christian Felix Benning: Groovy Kind of Dunk: Exploring the Power of Rhythm in Elite Basketball |
Brunel, University of London, UK |
Professor Costas Karageorghis is a UK author and academic whose expertise is in sport and exercise psychology. He is a Chartered Psychologist, Chartered Scientist and Fellow of the British Psychological Society. Professor Karageorghis is also a double-accredited member and Fellow of the British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences. He has held several leadership positions, including most recently as Divisional Lead for Sport, Health and Exercise Sciences at Brunel, University of London (2018–2022). Professor Karageorghis’ main area of research concerns the application of music and audio-visual stimuli in sport and exercise. His scientific output includes over 200 scholarly articles. |
Klaus Rom: Your Dragon’s Helping Hands: How to Not Get Lost on Your Personal Trajectory |
Karl-Franzens University Graz, Austria |
Born in 1977 in Klagenfurt/Austria, Mag. Dr. Klaus Rom studied physical education and physics at the Karl-Franzens-University Graz, Austria. Since 2003, he has been teaching and doing research at the institute for human movement, sport and health science at the K.F. University and in schools. His scientific focus is on the theory of sports training. He is an experienced mountaineer and triathlete (Olympic distance and Ironman). Besides his physical activities Klaus Rom is an experienced saxophone and guitar player, father of 3 kids, husband, keeper of about 14 sheep and up to 20 chickens, and – guess what – never bored. |
László Stachó: Thriving in the Practice Room by Training Musical Attention – Feeling the Future, Enjoying the Present, and Reconnecting with the Past |
Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest (Hungary) |
Music educator, pianist, psychologist, and musicologist László Stachó is a faculty member at the Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest and a regular guest professor at the Santa Cecilia Conservatoire (Rome) and the Centro Superior Katarina Gurska Conservatoire (Madrid). As a pianist and chamber musician, he has performed across three continents. As a music educator, he has led attention training workshops as well as piano and chamber music coaching sessions in 19 countries to date – in Europe, Asia, and the US, spanning a wide range of musical cultures. As a musicologist-pianist, he specializes in early 20th-century performance practice, has written the first monograph on the pianist Béla Bartók’s performing style, and leads masterclasses and coaching sessions in historically informed performance (HIP) of the late 19th and 20th centuries, employing a specific cognitive approach to performance history. He was Visiting Fellow at the Faculty of Music of the Cambridge University in 2014 and 2017, and Guest Professor at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance in 2023. |
Oliver Margulies1, Ulrike Wohlwender2, and Silvia Molan2: Potentials Unlocked: Science-based Approaches for Instrumentalists' Hands to Thrive |
1 Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK), Switzerland 2 University of Music and the Performing Arts Stuttgart (HMDK), Germany |
The Zurich Centre for Musicians’ Hands (ZZM) at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) and the Future Initiative SIRIUS 6.0 at the University of Music and the Performing Arts Stuttgart (HMDK) represent use-inspired research focusing on bringing the full potential of musicians’ hands to the fore. Both workshops – one for instrumentalists in general and one for pianists – give insight into ongoing research and how results translate into practical consequences for teaching, counseling and therapy.
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