NMH’s longstanding research on instrumental and vocal practising constituted an important knowledge base for the workshop. The course was organised as a series of workshops, with input from us as responsible teachers and a number of guest lecturers. The workshops addressed practising and performance preparation from a variety of angles, such as different musical genre domains, sports, and theatre/acting. The open workshop format allowed for sharing ideas and experiences, collaborative explorations, discussions, and reflections.

The students who selected the course were both bachelor’s and master’s students and represented a diverse genre background, covering jazz/pop, classical, and contemporary music. As part of the course requirements, the students had to conduct a small-scale individual development project related to their practising. We encouraged them to articulate a problem that was relevant to them and to attempt to investigate it within the given time and resource limits. At the end of the course, the students presented the results either as a written essay or a video, along with practical demonstrations.