Genevieve Robyn Arkle is a Lecturer in Music History, specialising in 19th- and 20th-century Austrian and German music. She received her PhD from the University of Surrey in 2021 and has since worked as a Lecturer in Music at the University of Bristol, the University of Surrey, and City, University of London. She is a Co-Founder and Deputy Director of the Institute of Austrian and German Music Research and an Affiliate of the Black Opera Research Network. She has also previously served on council for the Royal Musical Association, the Society for Music Analysis, and the Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion in Music Studies Network.

Her research has previously explored issues of musical hermeneutics and socio-cultural change in 19th- and 20th-Century Austrian and German music, focusing on the life and works of Richard Wagner and Gustav Mahler. Her current work builds on this and examines issues of gender and sexuality in the musical cultures of fin-de siècle Vienna, specifically in the context of composer Alma Mahler-Werfel. Her recent articles have been published in 19th-Century Music and Music Theory Online and she has been invited to share her work at various international conferences and research seminar series.

Robyn also enjoys sharing her work outside of academia, and was recently invited to give talks at Longborough Opera Festival, Cheltenham Music Festival, and on NewsTalk Radio’s ‘Talking History’ programme.

Research interests and PhD supervision

• Austrian and German music in the 19th and 20th centuries
• Music and socio-cultural change
• Gender and Sexuality at the fin-de-siècle
• Musical hermeneutics, specifically intertextuality

Teaching

Robyn's teaching focuses on 19th-century music and opera studies, often considering the relationship between music and society / politics both historically and in the modern day. Although she predominantly teaches on the subject of music history, she also enjoys engaging with students on issues of musical hermeneutics and intertextuality in the long 19th century.

As well as covering more traditional aspects of music, her classes seek to reflect the changing landscape of academia and society more broadly by including topics such as music and climate change, opera and disability, race / racism on the musical stage, queer representation in opera, performing gender at the Eurovision Song Contest, and women composers in the 19th and 20th centuries.

She holds a Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice from the University of Bristol and was nominated and shortlisted in 2024 for an Outstanding Teaching Award. She is also currently training as an academic coach and mentor and upon completion she will be an accredited coach/mentor for the European Mentor and Coaching Council.

Selected publications

• 'Rethinking Mahler-Werfel: An Analytical and Socio-Cultural Study of Alma Mahler-Werfel and Gender Politics in the Artistic Cultures of 20th-Century Vienna' Agreed in Principle with Routledge Press. [Monograph]
• ‘Gustav Mahler and the Crisis of Jewish Masculinity’, 19th-Century Music, Vol. 47, No.3, (Spring, 2024):157-175. [Article]
• ‘Analysing Mahler: The Turn Figure in the Finale of the Ninth Symphony’, Music Theory Online, Vol. 30, No.1. (March 2024). [Article]
• ‘Expressions of Suffering: The five ‘turn motifs’ of Wagner’s Parsifal’. The Wagner Journal. Vol. 17, No.1,(March 2023): 22-44. [Article]