Melodic milieu of the mdw

I was delighted to be able to return to the Department of Music Acoustics (Institut für musikalische Akustik — Wiener Klangstil, henceforth, “the Institute”) in May 2026, having visited here for the first time in October 2024. Again funded by the ERASMUS+ program, I was able to deliver teaching, build professional networks, and collaborate with colleagues. I am grateful to the funders and the inviting organisation as well my colleagues, David Weigl, a long-term co-author, (and friend!) and Werner Goebl as the Head of the Institute, for making this trip happen and for giving me this opportunity to spend time in Vienna.

As part of this teaching-mobility trip, I gave two workshops, one on Linked Data theory, and the other of it in practice;  a seminar on the interplay of Linked Open Data and the MEI XML schema of the Music Encoding Initiative (together with David Weigl); and, I was also privileged to give a presentation as part of the Distinguished Lecture Series Music and Digital Humanities at mdw. These events attracted representatives from mdw, Anton Bruckner Privatuniversität, Vienna University of Technology, the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, and the Ludwig Maximillian University of Munich. The presentation also attracted some 40 additional online participants. Since returning to Australia, I have been contacted by those who were not able to attend due to the challenges of time zones: proof of the far reach of these talks and their truly global audience. I felt particularly privileged by the opportunity to be part of the Distinguished Lecture Series as my paper fell, timing-wise, between two eminent scholars, Frans Wiering (Utrecht University) and David De Roure (University of Oxford) – both of whom played a role in my earlier career, as chief investigators on projects such as Transforming Musicology. During David’s visit to the Institute, we were treated to a guided tour that included the anechoic chamber!

As part of the trip, I had the opportunity to consult on the UX (or user experience) of three digital musicology resources developed at the Institute; mei-friend, ListenHere!, and Primal. The development of GUIs that allow users to benefit from the computational power of the underlying knowledge graphs but do not require users to develop skills such as learning the query language SPARQL (pronounced “sparkle”) remain centrally important as a research agenda in our field. This makes these examples all the more impressive.

During my visit, I was again struck by the melodic milieu of the mdw. Not a day has gone by that one composition or another would not be heard somewhere on this delightful campus. As a research environment I think the mwd campus is unmatched – the leafy courtyard provides a beautiful spot to take a break or have lunch; the office spaces upstairs are spacious and quiet. Last time, I was visiting from Canberra, Australia’s capital but colloquially known as “The Bush Capital”, in reference to its (deliberate) urban design that merges city infrastructure with nature reserves and bushland. This time, I was visiting from Melbourne, and so the contrast between the two cities was more pronounced. 

My visit to the City of Music coincided, to my absolute joy, with the Eurovision Song Contest being held there. Indeed, the Eurovision Village at the Rathaus formed a big part of the social aspect of my visit. As a devout fan, and a co-author on a published paper on Eurovision, the timing could not have been more perfect. Other social aspects – perhaps a bit more niche – were bouldering sessions and lessons in Esperanto! Having made a conscious decision to go see new places, during this trip I managed to go to the Leopold Museum, mumok, Schönbrunn (including the zoo!), the Votive Church for the “Light of Creation” Votivkirche Immersive Light Show, Spanish Riding School, Haus der Musik, the Wien Museum…and although I have been there before, I could not resist the opportunity to go again to the Haus des Meeres, and to the Prater amusement park (which is very cool, especially after dark!).

I cannot recommend the Institute, the mdw, or the beautiful city of Vienna enough. It has again been a delightful experience, and one which I would gladly repeat given the chance. For anyone thinking of applying to study here, do it!  You’ll love it. For anyone thinking of applying to visit here or research here, do it! You’ll love it. I certainly do.