Simon P. Keefe

Professor Simon P. Keefe is the James Rossiter Hoyle Chair of Music at the University of Sheffield within the School of Languages, Arts and Societies. He previously served as Head of Music at City University London (2005-2008) and Head of Department at Sheffield until 2015. Keefe will assume the role of President of the Royal Musical Association from January 2024.

• Education: BA, MA, MusM, PGCE, MPhil, PhD (Columbia University, 1997)

His primary academic focus is late 18th-century music, particularly Mozart, alongside research in music reception, biography, 20th-century French popular song, Wagner studies, and the concerto genre. His 15 most recent publications analyze Mozart and Haydn’s reception history, biographical narratives, anniversary studies, and critical traditions, with a recurring emphasis on manuscript analysis, performance practice, and cultural context. Keefe’s work bridges musicology, historical research, and opera studies.

Among his accolades, Keefe received the Marjorie Weston Emerson Award (2013) for Mozart’s Requiem: Reception, Work, Completion and an Outstanding Academic Title (2019) for Mozart in Context. He actively supervises doctoral students in areas like Beethoven annotations, editing Mozart's works, and 18th-century keyboard music, and holds editorial roles for journals including Journal of the Royal Musical Association and Eighteenth-Century Music.