Registration ends on 12.10.2026 at 23:59.

As part of the Leuphana Concert Lab, a seminar in cooperation with the Cuban artist collective “Espirales” will take place. Originally classically trained, the five musicians have increasingly focused their careers on creating cross-genre performances with idiosyncratic Cuban roots. They aim to present and explain Cuban musical heritage to their audiences through workshops and lecture performances, and they have already showcased their music in different countries around the world. At the same time, they navigate a challenging environment: Cuba has been experiencing an economic and migration crisis with strong repercussions on the daily practices and careers of musicians and music institutions.

Together with Cuban arts manager and researcher Gabriela Rojas Sierra, we will explore how Cuban musicians and ensembles navigate the challenging environment. We will dive deeper into the context and selected aspects of the Cuban music ecosystem. The concept of “bricolage” will be taken up in the seminar from various disciplinary perspectives and artistically implemented by the students together with the musicians. Originally introduced by Lévi-Strauss (1967), the concept of bricolage can be found in many disciplines, including entrepreneurship research, where it is defined as “making do by applying combinations of the resources at hand to new problems and opportunities” (Baker and Nelson, 2005). Furthermore, we will touch upon questions of Cuban transculturality and music identity.

The seminar will contain a workshop with the ensemble “Espirales” on Cuban music and rhythms, as well as a concert that is organized and contextualized as part of the seminar.

During the workshop weekend, the students will split up into small groups and work on different contextualizing aspects of the Espirales concert on Monday, 9th November in the Forum - e.g. a digital/analogue concert brochure, an introduction to the concert, a podium discussion, or interactive elements integrating the audience.

The students will work closely with the musicians, conduct interviews with them, and engage in guided observations. These will form the basis for the second part of the course assignment_ a creative output format, such as a podcast or video on the project, each based on a specific guiding question or aspect related to the seminar topic.


PRÜFUNGSLEISTUNGEN
1. Practical Part / Presentation (40% of the overall grade)
In small groups, the students work on a specific aspect of the performance during the workshop, e.g. by actively participating, by designing sound / video / text, by designing the setting of the performance or info material for the audience. They are required to explain their idea to the group and contribute to the overall project.

2. Reflection format (60% of the overall grade)
The students will create a creative output format, in which they reflect on their learning experience and specific guiding questions or aspects related to the concepts and topics covered in the seminar. This could be, for example, a podcast episode or a video. Data for that format will be collected during the workshop weekend, e.g. through interviews or observations.

Students will be able to explain how musicians or ensembles navigate resource-scarce and uncertain environments, using the concept of bricolage as an analytical lens. Through direct collaboration with the ensemble "Espirales", they will gain practical experience in developing and contextualizing a concert for a public audience (e.g. writing programme texts, moderating a discussion, or designing audience-interaction formats). Finally, students will practice qualitative research methods (interviews, observation) and translate their findings into a creative output format such as a podcast or video.

Further information on teaching evaluation: https://www.leuphana.de/en/teaching/quality-management/evaluation/course-evaluation.html