Murmuring Echoes: Reenacting Conflicts and Identities in Eighteenth-Century Music Theatre

PhD defence by Peter Koch Gehlshøj

Assessment Committee

Associate Professor Erik Steinskog, Sections of musicology, Department of Arts- and Cultural Studies, University of Copenhagen (Chairperson)
Associate Professor Katherine Hambridge, Department of Music, Durham University
Professor Charlotta Wolff, University of Turku, Finland

Supervisors

Associate Professor Jens Hesselager

Department

Department of Arts and Cultural Studies

Place

Building: 8b, Room: 8b-1-14, Karen Blixens Plads 16, 2300 København S

Email address to gain access to the thesis: pekge@hum.ku.dk.
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Short description of the thesis

This dissertation explores eighteenth-century music theatre in Denmark-Norway as a site where questions of gender, class, race, power, and cultural identity were negotiated through performance. Combining archival research, musical analysis, and practice-based performance research, it examines how Danish and foreign works addressed their audiences in their own time and how the issues they raised continue to resonate today. The study argues that cultural heritage is not a fixed account of the past but is continually shaped through interpretation and performance. By re-examining historical repertoire in contemporary performance contexts, the dissertation uncovers overlooked perspectives and demonstrates how performance can reshape our understanding of the past.