John Sloboda

About me

My first love was music, and I took classical piano lessons from the age of 7 till adulthood, and have most enjoyed chamber music, accompanying singers and instrumentalists.  Alongside this I developed a love of ensemble singing, and have sung in choirs big and small over the years, ranging from local community choirs to large symphony choirs.  I also have worked as a choral conductor, including being founder Director of the Keele Bach Choir for 20 years.  Currently I am member and associate conductor of the Hackney based community choir, Chorus of Dissent, founded by Ruth Whitehead.  Most recently of all I have begun an artistic collaboration with the Argentinian Tenor Rafael Montero, centred on the early music ensemble which he founded El Parnaso Hyspano.

My main professional work has been as an academic psychologist, first at the University of Keele, where I am now Emeritus Professor of Psychology.  I have now retired from Guildhall School of Music & Drama, where I was Research Professor, Founding Head of the Institute for Social Impact Research in the Performing Arts, and was Principal Investigator on an AHRC-funded international research project "Music for Social Impact: Practitioners' contexts, work, and beliefs" (2020-2023).  I now have emeritus status there, as well as at Keele.  My academic work and my practical music making constantly cross-fertilise each other.

I have also had a longstanding concern for the effects of war on the civilian population.  With Hamit Dardagan I founded the web-based project www.iraqbodycount.org which provides an ongoing record of violent deaths following the 2003 invastion of Iraq.  This concern has placed me in what is conventionally described as the "antiwar left". It puzzles me that this is seen as a "fringe" movement, when I see it rather as being a central part of most ethical and religious systems (including that of the Catholic Church of which I am a member). They assert that humans should nurture and support each other, rather than exploit or harm each other. Wars, and the power systems which enable and sustain wars, are the antihesis of human flourishing.