Jane W. Davidson

Who is Jane W. Davidson?

Jane Davidson is a British musicologist and Professor of Creative and Performing Arts on the Faculty of the Victorian College of the Arts and Melbourne Conservatorium of Music at The University of Melbourne.

Davidson has written more than one hundred scholarly contributions on performance, expression, therapy and the determinants of artistic abilities. Her edited volume The Music Practitioner explores the uses of research for the practising musician. Current research projects include: the expressive body movements of duettists; the adaptive value of music, including singing and personal identity; the development of ‘talent’; the function of music in mental health settings; the music performances of the Temple Street musicians in Hong Kong; the process of music theatre directing, and the staging of Baroque works. These interests reflect her unusual background in music psychology and musicology, vocal performance and contemporary dance.

Davidson has undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in music, vocal performance and contemporary dance, having studied at University of Newcastle, University of Leeds and University of London, and at Laval in Quebec, Canada.