The music of Soundgarden represents a unique blend of heavy metal power and and art-rock sensitivity, this is clearly displayed in the song ‘Outshined’. The unorthodox harmony, use of odd time time signatures and sectional variation seem to blur genre boundaries within rock music and also lend the music a sense of emotional instability that runs…[Read more]

Guitar solos were a defining foundational aspects in the early formative years of what would become known as heavy metal music. Though Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath has been largely credited as the most influential guitarist on the wider genre, this essay argues that it is the style of Ritchie Blackmore that has been of greater importance and…[Read more]

Early seventeenth century lute improvisation — a phrase that by its mere utterance may cause debates full of uncertainties, fears and fantasies. What is proper improvisa-tion? How did they do it 360 years ago? In this article I seek to revive a systematic prac-tice of teaching ornamentation and improvisation from the Renaissance scholars — i.e…[Read more]

Informed Play presents a conceptual understanding of tone production based on extensive historical research on primary sources, modern literature and handbook reviews, physical and psychological perspectives as well as on technology. As the first volume in English to discuss and contextualise the topic of tone production on Early Modern lute…[Read more]

En su edición del Romancero del Cid de 1871, un compendio de todos los romances del Cid disponibles en versiones impresas de los siglos XVI y XVII, Carolina Michaëlis incluyó un apéndice para demostrar la vitalidad de la tradición cidiana en pleno siglo XIX. Michaëlis escribe: “Para muestra del género de romances populares que aun hoy dia en A…[Read more]

The architectural evolution of the Louvre between the 15th and 17th centuries is characterized by systematic attempts to distinguish the building within the broader context of French styles. In the 15th and early 16th centuries, this is achieved by producing grander and more elaborate versions of the contemporary French architectural solutions.…[Read more]

The works of Pietro Bembo (1470-1547) intrigue readers approaching them from various angles… Here, my aim is modest: to highlight passages in Bembo’s literary texts which exploit the erotic lexicon so popular in his day.

El Cid Campeador, obra teatral de Antonio Enríquez Gómez (1660-1663), se publicó reiteradamente a lo largo del siglo XVIII y los primeros años del XIX. La obra, casi desconocida hoy en día, gozó de una popularidad enorme entre 1700 y 1830, tanto en el teatro como en la imprenta, debido en parte a su tema histórico y el estilo barroco, tan de gus…[Read more]

This paper is the project narrative for a grant proposal submitted in February 2019, that resulted in funding from two different sources to cover travel expenses in support of archival work in Spain (summer 2019). I share this project narrative to encourage others who are considering similar proposals, or who may be thinking about the scholarly…[Read more]

In this essay Queen Margaret’s curses in Richard III become part of a feminist ethics on the early modern stage. As a parrhesiast, in Foucault’s terms, Margaret speaks truth to power and claims a right of citizenship. That Margaret elicits universal revulsion from the other characters while also holding a unique, though not untroubled, pos…[Read more]

This dissertation ‘Inns and Innkeeping in North Hertfordshire: 1660-1815’ addresses the lack of a localised study on this building type and supplements the wider body of work that has been undertaken, on inn form, function and innkeeping lifestyles in other regions of England during the long eighteenth century.

Young Michelangelo Buonarroti’s experience was deeply marked by his cult of Antiquity, reverberated in the creation of artworks such as the Sleeping Cupid and the Bacchus and shared with Raffaele Riario and Jacopo Galli, his patrons during his first stay in Rome (1496-1501). The cardinal-camerlengo Raffaele Riario was an important promoter of t…[Read more]

The peculiar iconography of the winged horse surmounted by several puttos, as appears in the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili sixth woodcut, turns out to be unprecedented and enigmatic at a glance and it’s the result of the depth and complexity of the author’s concepts. Considering the iconographic details of the sculptural group as well as the text sca…[Read more]

This essay explores glass engravings by Dutch authors Anna Roemers Visscher, Maria Tesselschade
Roemers Visscher, and Anna Maria van Schurman. I place these engravings in their rich contemporary
contexts, comparing them to other art forms that were the product of female pastime. Like
embroidery, emblems, and alba amicorum, engraved glasses…[Read more]

Shakespeare’s representations of history often have replaced history itself in the popular imagination: Julius Caesar, Margaret of Anjou, Henry V, Richard III — popular recollections of their lives and deaths are intimately linked with Shakespeare’s accounts of their stories, despite the playwright’s deviations from historical facts. In order t…[Read more]