Amplification Project welcomes global experts to first conference
The Amplification Project at the University of Huddersfield has hosted a highly successful two-day conference, as part of the £5m Leverhulme project exploring sound amplification technologies and their effects on music and society.
Amplification and Everyday Life brought together researchers from across the UK and as far afield as Hong Kong, Qatar and the United States for two days of interdisciplinary presentations exploring the study of amplification, alongside performances and installations curated by Yorkshire Sound Women Network.
The Amplification Project, which began in 2025 backed by £5m from the Leverhulme Trust, is the first large scale research project dedicated to how amplification technologies and amplified sound have impacted musical practice, listening experience, political activism, the shape of modern media, and the fabric of everyday life.
Professor Steve Waksman is one of the world’s leading scholars in the study of music technology, instruments and live music and leads a team of six Post-Doctoral Researchers, 12 PhD students and a Project Officer on The Amplification Project.
“I was very pleased to see how the conference took shape in the way that it did, as we have approached the topic of amplified sound in an imaginative and expansive way,” says Professor Waksman.
“On the project we have thought about the various ways in which amplification is put to use, is encountered and is experienced in settings where people may not think about it being so integral. The conference’s programme and the presenters really demonstrated that.
Professor Steve Waksman
Leverhulme International Professor of Popular Music
“One of the most provocative and most insightful, was a presentation from a PhD student from the University of Kentucky in the US about the use of ultrasound and the ways in which it has become politicised through the debates around abortion and reproductive politics."
Elisabeth Pfeiffer, University of Surrey
Mary Stark presents an extended cinema performance
Rose Kindred-Boothby, Timothy Hacquoil, Nigel Humberstone, Steve Waksman, Lawrence Davies, Luke Worgan.
The Silver Field performs in Phipps Hall.
Speakers at the conference included the University of Huddersfield’s Professor Rupert Till, Head of Department for Humanities, and the first day of the conference was complemented by an evening of music and sound art curated by Yorkshire Sound Women Network featuring new pieces from Mary Stark, The Silver Field, Ryoko Akama, Naomi Hart and Anna Ross.
Dr Shawni Wilkinson, Leverhulme Professorship Project Officer, added, “We worked to foster a supportive and inclusive atmosphere where researchers at all stages of their career felt able to share their research and be part of a wider community exploring amplification. There was a great energy across the events and we were really pleased with the feedback we received.”