Tobias Pontara
About Tobias Pontara
Research
My research lies at the intersection between cultural theory, philosophical aesthetics, and audiovisual studies. In my earlier research project Creativity and Justification: The Epistemology and Methodology of Critical Interpretation in Musical Research I focused on issues of methodology, epistemology and interpretation in relation to three disciplinary fields: historical musicology, film music studies and the philosophy of music. In the recently completed research project Tarkovsky’s Soundtracks: The Significance of Music and Sound in Andrei Tarkovsky’s Cinema (funded by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond) I examined the role and function of music and sound in the films of Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky. The project issued in the monograph Andrei Tarkovsky’s Sounding Cinema: Music and Meaning from Solaris to The Sacrifice (Routledge, 2020).
My ongoing research is concerned with questions of how traditional ideas and beliefs about classical music are reproduced, challenged and subverted in contemporary screen media fictions. I am also the project leader for the research project Classical Music for a Mediatized World: Visual and Audiovisual Representations of Western Art Music in Contemporary Media and Society (funded by the Swedish Research Council 2018-2023): https://www.gu.se/forskning/klassisk-musik-for-en-medialiserad-varld-visuella-och-audiovisuella-representationer-av-vasterlandsk-konstmusik-i-det-moderna-mediesamhallet
In 2023 I will start on a new research project titled Conspiracy soundtracks: The role of music and sound in audiovisually mediated conspiracy theoretical discourse (funded by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, 2023-2026). The purpose of the project is to develop a comprehensive understanding of the roles played by soundtrack elements – sound effects, music, voice, silence – in audiovisually mediated conspiracy- theoretical discourse. The overall research question is: to what extent and in what ways can the sonic dimension be regarded as central for effective communication and persuasion in the spreading of conspiracy theoretical content?
Teaching
My teaching covers most areas of musicology: music history, music theory and analysis, popular music, film music, contemporary composition techniques, music and cultural theory, the aesthetics and philosophy of music, feminist perspectives in musicology, music and media theory, opera and ethnomusicology. I havesupervised a number of student essays on all levels and has also functioned as supervisor for several doctoral theses. I have a special interest in pedagogical questions that concern how musicological teaching can be more research-oriented, problem-focused and student-active.
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Music as Embodied and Emergent: Expanding on a Theme by Joseph
Margolis
Tobias Pontara, Ulrik Volgsten
International Review of the Aesthetics and Sociology of Music - 2023 -
Filmmusik och
världsskapande
Tobias Pontara
Ikaros - Tidskrift om människan och vetenskapen - 2023 -
Art Music, Perfection and Power: Critical Encounters with Classical Music Culture in Contemporary
Cinema
Tobias Pontara
Open Library of Humanities - 2021 -
Musicalized ontologies: Exploring the role of music in contemporary cultural and political
worldmaking
Tobias Pontara, Ulrik Volgsten
Musikforskning idag, Lund,10 juni 2020 - 2020 -
Performance, Perfectionism, Power: Critical dialogues with classical music culture in Grand Piano (2013), The Violin Player (2018) and The Perfection
(2019)”
Tobias Pontara
Music and the Moving Image, New York, USA, 28 - 31 May, 2020 - 2020 -
Vem är egentligen Arthur
Fleck?
Tobias Pontara
Röda Rummet - 2020 -
Andrei Tarkovsky's Sounding Cinema: Music and Meaning from Solaris to The
Sacrifice
Tobias Pontara
2020 -
Människan, musiken och kunskapen: om kunskap som slutgiltighet i Arvo Pärts
Magnificat
Tobias Pontara
Finsk Tidskrift - 2019 -
Hur lyssnar rollkaraktären? Skildringar av lyssnande till teknologiskt medierad musik i svenska filmer
1930-1970
Tobias Pontara
Musikens medialisering och musikaliseringen av medier och vardagsliv i Sverige / red. Ulrik Volgsten - 2019 -
Musikalisering och
medialisering
Tobias Pontara, Ulrik Volgsten
Musikens medialisering och musikaliseringen av medier och vardagsliv i Sverige / red. Ulrik Volgsten. - 2019 -
Allmänna teknologier och privata rum: förutsättningar för den digitala tidsålderns solipsistiska
ljudkultur
Tobias Pontara, Ulrik Volgsten
Musikens medialisering och musikaliseringen av medier och vardagsliv i Sverige / red. Ulrik Volgsten. - 2019 -
The Music of Sacrificial Acts: Displacement, Redemption; Beethoven and Verdi in Andrei Tarkovsky’s
Nostalghia
Tobias Pontara
Music, Memory, Nostalghia and Trauma in European Cinema after the Second World War (M. Baumgartner & E. Boczkowska, eds.) - 2019 -
Scoring the incomprehensible: The role and significance of electronic music in Andrei Tarkovsky’s Mirror
(1975)
Tobias Pontara
Music and the Moving Image. New York: May 24-27, 2018 - 2018 -
Listening to technologically mediated music in film:
Representations of social and solitary listening in Swedish cinema
1930–70
Tobias Pontara
Svensk tidskrift för musikforskning - 2018 -
Musicalization and
Mediatization
Tobias Pontara, Ulrik Volgsten
Mirac 2017 (Music Focused Interdisciplinary Research & Analysis Center), Stockholm, Sweden, November 22-23, 2017 - 2017 -
Domestic space, music technology and the emergence of solitary listening:
Tracing the roots of solipsistic sound culture in the digital
age
Tobias Pontara, Ulrik Volgsten
Svensk tidskrift för musikforskning - 2017 -
Musicalization and
Mediatization
Tobias Pontara, Ulrik Volgsten
Dynamics of mediatization: Institutional change and everyday transformations in a digital age / edited by Olivier Driessens, Göran Bolin, Andreas Hepp, Stig Hjarvard - 2017 -
Here, There and Everywhere: On the Musicalization of Everyday
Life
Ulrik Volgsten, Tobias Pontara
6th European Communication Conference. Mediated (Dis)Continuities: Contesting Pasts Presents and Futures (ECREA 2016), Prague, Czech Republic, November 9-12, 2016 - 2016 -
Classical Music in the Films of Andrei
Tarkovsky
Tobias Pontara
Royal Musical Association Annual Conference 2016. London: September 3-5, 2016. - 2016 -
Between creativity and justification: Theoretical and philosophical perspectives on critical interpretation in musical
research
Tobias Pontara
Keynote speech at the 2016 Finnish Doctoral Musicology Network. Helsinki/Järvenpää: September 26-28, 2016. - 2016 -
Interpretation and Underscoring: Modest Constructivism and the Issue of Nondiegetic versus Intradiegetic Music in
Film
Tobias Pontara
Music and the Moving Image - 2016 -
Scoring sacrificial acts: haunting memories, impossible longings and classical music in Andrei Tarkovsky’s
Nostalghia
Tobias Pontara
Music and the Moving Image. New York: May 29-31 2015 - 2015 -
Interpretation, Imputation, Plausibility: Towards a Theoretical Model for Musical
Hermeneutics
Tobias Pontara
International Review of the Aesthetics and Sociology of Music - 2015 -
A World With and Without Music: Models of Musical Underscoring and the Construction of the Cinematic
Diegesis
Tobias Pontara
17th Nordic Musicological Congress, Aalborg: August 11-14. - 2015 -
Bach at the Space Station: Hermeneutic Pliability and Multiplying Gaps in Andrei Tarkovsky's
Solaris
Tobias Pontara
Music, Sound, and the Moving Image - 2014 -
Bach, Wagner and Narrative Levels in Film – Classical Music in Ingmar Bergman’s Through a glass darkly (1961), Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris (1972) and Lars von Trier’s Melancholia
(2011)
Tobias Pontara
Musikforskning idag. Växjö: June 11-13 2014 - 2014 -
Interpretation and Underscoring: Modest Constructivism and the Issue of Nondiegetic versus Intra-diegetic Music in
Film
Tobias Pontara
Music and the Moving Image. New York: May 28 - June 1, 2014 - 2014 -
Recension av Ulrik Volgsten: Från snille till geni: den svenska kompositörsrollens omvandlingar från Kraus till
Måndagsgruppen
Tobias Pontara
Respons - 2013 -
Recension av James Wierzbicki (red.): Music, Sound, and Filmmakers: Sonic Style in
Cinema
Tobias Pontara
Svensk tidskrift för musikforskning - 2013 -
Bach at the Space Station: Exploring the Fantastical Gap in Andrei Tarkovsky’s
Solaris
Tobias Pontara
Music and Media, Torino: June 28-29 - 2012 -
Tolkning och trovärdighet: en diskussion utgående från två invändningar mot tolkningsstrategier inom den ”nya”
musikvetenskapen
Tobias Pontara
Musikforskning idag. Uppsala: June 14-16 - 2011 -
Methodology in Aesthetics: The Case of Musical
Expressivity
Tobias Pontara
Philosophical Studies - 2011 -
Beethoven Overcome: Romantic and Existentialist Utopia in Andrei Tarkovsky’s
Stalker
Tobias Pontara
19th Century Music - 2011 -
Intuitions and Evidence in Theories of Musical
Expressivity
Tobias Pontara, Erkki Huovinen
Music and Philosophy Study Day. Kings College, London: February 20-21 - 2010 -
Recension av Giles Hooper: The Discourse of
Musicology
Tobias Pontara
Svensk tidskrift för musikforskning - 2010 -
Ode to Silence: Beethoven’s Ninth and the Fate of Humanity in the Last Scene of Andrei Tarkovsky’s
Stalker
Tobias Pontara
Music and the Moving Image. New York: May 29-31 - 2009 -
Intuitioner, evidens och kunskapsanspråk: En närmare blick på den musikfilosofiska diskussionen om musikens
expressivitet
Tobias Pontara, Erkki Huovinen
Musikvetenskap idag. Lund: June, 9-11 - 2009 -
Beethoven, Bach and Tarkovsky: Classical music in Andrej Tarkovsky’s
films
Tobias Pontara
Leeds Film Music Conference. Leeds: November 6-7 - 2009 -
Recension av Olle Edström (red.): Säg det i toner och därtill med
ord
Tobias Pontara
Finsk Tidskrift - 2009 -
Recension av Alf Gabrielsson: Starka musikupplevelser: Musik är mycket mer än bara
musik
Tobias Pontara
Nutida Musik - 2009 -
Recension av Henrik Marstal: Arvo Pärt: Længslen efter de hvide
tangenter
Tobias Pontara
Nutida Musik - 2008 -
Ett tonalt välordnat samhälle eller anarki: estetiska och sociala aspekter på svensk konstmusik 1945-1960 (Mats
Arvidsson)
Tobias Pontara
Nutida Musik - 2008 -
Historiskt informerade framföranden: några kritiska reflektioner kring en övergiven
diskussion
Tobias Pontara
Svensk tidskrift för musikforskning - 2008 -
Retorik, hegemoni och musikforskning: mot en pragmatisk syn på
musikvetenskapen
Tobias Pontara
STM-Online - 2008 -
Brev från den autonoma musikens värld: den diskursiva konstruktionen av musikalisk autonomi i den samtida klassiska
CD.skivan
Tobias Pontara
2007 -
Constructing the relevant listener: power, knowledge and the construction of identity in the discourse of musical
autonomy
Tobias Pontara
Music & Identity: Transformation and Negotiation - 2007 -
Constructing the Relevant
Listener
Tobias Pontara
Music and Identity II. Mthatha, South Africa: April, 4-6 - 2006 -
Johannes Brahms symfonier och den musikaliska autonomins
diskurs
Tobias Pontara
Musikvetenskap idag. Växjö: June 7-9 - 2005 -
The Discourse of Autonomous Music and the Construction of
Identity
Tobias Pontara
Music and Identity I. Stellenboch: November 24-25 - 2004 -
The Possibility of Critically Informed
Performances
Tobias Pontara
Music: Concept, Writing and Performance. Copenhagen: November 25-29 - 2002