Nicholas's research encompasses piano music of the nineteenth century, hermeneutic studies, musical intertextuality, and the intersection between analysis and praxis. His work has been recognised with an array of awards, including Winner of the Young Scholars’ Chopinological Essay Competition (The Chopin Institute, 2019), the Rose Lawrence Academic Prize (Guildhall School of Music & Drama, 2020), and, for his Honours thesis, the University Medal at the University of Sydney ("Coming to Terms with the Past: Allusion and the Achievement of Mastery in Brahms's Piano Sonata, Op. 5," Sydney Conservatorium of Music, 2018). Nicholas's PhD study, "The Antechamber of the Beyond: Narratives of Life, Death, and the Afterlife in Beethoven's Last Three Piano Sonatas” (Sydney Conservatorium of Music, 2024), was completed under the supervision of Dr David Larkin and Prof. Neal Peres Da Costa, and is currently under examination.
Since 2022, Nicholas has been a casual academic at the Sydney Conservatorium, where he teaches lectures, seminars, and tutorials in range of undergraduate musicology courses. He also has experience in individual academic tutoring.
Recent Publications
Kennedy, Nicholas. “A Fantasy about Sonata Form: Re-Examining Chopin’s Fantasy, Op. 49.” The Chopin Review 3 (2020): 88–111. https://doi.org/10.56693/cr.122.
Kennedy, Nicholas. “Romani Reinvention: Modernism and the Gypsy Influence in the First Movement of Brahms’s Cello Sonata, Op. 99.” Sydney Undergraduate Journal of Musicology 7 (2017): 27–53. https://openjournals.library.sydney.edu.au/SCM/article/download/12674/11628.
Kennedy, Nicholas, pianist. The Last Piano Sonatas. Recorded 2021. Orpheus Classical OR 93215368, 2021, streaming audio. https://open.spotify.com/album/2REBnPYcpmnRv9YfyITtFh?si=CiWE6uk5SraDp25AxRk9Vg.
Recent Conference Papers
Kennedy, Nicholas. "Reflections on a Recording: A Case Study in the Interaction between Analysis and Praxis." Performers(') Present: Flowing Resonances, Yong Siew Toh Conservatory, Singapore, 25–28 October 2023.
Kennedy, Nicholas. "Bringing Poetic Back: Embracing Nineteenth-Century Fancy in Beethoven’s Piano Sonata Op. 111. Reimagining Musical Programming, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, 24–26 November 2022. https://youtu.be/8wyZL82aDuA?feature=shared.
Since 2022, Nicholas has been a casual academic at the Sydney Conservatorium, where he teaches lectures, seminars, and tutorials in range of undergraduate musicology courses. He also has experience in individual academic tutoring.
Recent Publications
Kennedy, Nicholas. “A Fantasy about Sonata Form: Re-Examining Chopin’s Fantasy, Op. 49.” The Chopin Review 3 (2020): 88–111. https://doi.org/10.56693/cr.122.
Kennedy, Nicholas. “Romani Reinvention: Modernism and the Gypsy Influence in the First Movement of Brahms’s Cello Sonata, Op. 99.” Sydney Undergraduate Journal of Musicology 7 (2017): 27–53. https://openjournals.library.sydney.edu.au/SCM/article/download/12674/11628.
Kennedy, Nicholas, pianist. The Last Piano Sonatas. Recorded 2021. Orpheus Classical OR 93215368, 2021, streaming audio. https://open.spotify.com/album/2REBnPYcpmnRv9YfyITtFh?si=CiWE6uk5SraDp25AxRk9Vg.
Recent Conference Papers
Kennedy, Nicholas. "Reflections on a Recording: A Case Study in the Interaction between Analysis and Praxis." Performers(') Present: Flowing Resonances, Yong Siew Toh Conservatory, Singapore, 25–28 October 2023.
Kennedy, Nicholas. "Bringing Poetic Back: Embracing Nineteenth-Century Fancy in Beethoven’s Piano Sonata Op. 111. Reimagining Musical Programming, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, 24–26 November 2022. https://youtu.be/8wyZL82aDuA?feature=shared.
Photo courtesy of Yong Siew Toh Conservatory, Singapore
