The Music Department was well represented at the Hunter College 2025 Undergraduate Research Conference on April 30. Two of our majors who have been mentored by our own Prof. Catherine Coppola in the Mellon Public Humanities and Social Justice Program were selected to present their work.
Renee Ricevuto gave a slideshow presentation titled “Girls Who Murder: The Ironic Prima Donna in Opera and Pop Music.” Renee explores violent associations with femininity and applies Sabrina Carpenter’s ironic gender performance in ways that can be used to reinterpret operatic heroines such as Lucia. Her original stance views irony as a tool that enables the diva to critique patriarchal compositions through performance.
Tyler Diaz offered a poster presentation on “De-centering Europe in American Music Education: Francis Johnson and Philadelphia’s Black Metropolis.” At the heart of the project is Tyler’s detailed scholarly study of the music and the context in which Francis Johnson worked, which he presented to an enthusiastic audience at the November 2024 conference of the American Musicological Society.
