UNSUNG HEROES
Michael Spencer tells us how his origins as a violinist have has led from work with major orchestras to global organisations
prospect of three weeks of conferences and workshops with teachers, students and… electrical engineers. When I reflect on how I have come to be sitting where I am, some years on from the London Symphony Orchestra and Royal Opera House’s education department, it seems strange how picking up a violin for the first time at the age of nine has opened up such a rich diversity of opportunities and experiences. As a player, I was extremely content to rush around the world from venue to venue with dazzling experiences at the highest level, whether Star Wars with John Williams, or Bernstein with ‘Lennie’. It was only when the surge of new thinking about education and outreach work grabbed me in its undertow some twenty years ago that cabin fever started to set in: a subversive twinge of curiosity, suggesting that there was perhaps more to music than being a performer, irrespective of at what level. The apotheosis came gradually, with an increasing awareness that there was more to music than meets the ear, and that this was supported by a growing canon of psychological research. We all understand music as a
A Musical Organisations
skill; learning instruments, theory, performance practice. And everyone, to some extent, uses music as a service; imbibing as an individual or group for pleasure or background. Where it becomes particularly intriguing is when we start to plumb the depths of how it functions and how we, homo sapiens, relate to it. It is this that has brought me into contact with a wide diversity of clients, from bankers to brand managers, from organisational theorists to engineers, from hoteliers to educationists.
Much of what I do now is derived from the transition to experiential or
s I write this article I am hovering somewhere over Siberia, with a touchdown in Tokyo in six hours and the
WHO MICHAEL SPENCER WHAT MD OF SOUND STRATEGIES
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