Kristin Franseen
@kmfranseen.bsky.social
Musicologist. Postdoc at Western University, prev. at Concordia. Current project: Antonio Salieri’s Intriguing Afterlives: Gossip, Fiction, and the Post-Truth in Musical Biography. I also wrote a book on the history of queer musicology! Holmesian. she/her
What concerns me is how much this is clearly affecting how hiring and research funding are happening now. How many of us will continue to be pushed out of academia before this bubble bursts? How many tenure lines and how much research funding will be used for university admin to promote AI hype?
Collecting the best examples (pejorative) of this genre to pull back out in a few years when the bubble has burst
Wow. Just wow.
"Students pay premium prices for information that AI now delivers instantly and for free. A business student can ask ChatGPT to explain supply chain optimization or generate market analysis in seconds. The traditional lecture-and-test model faces its Blockbuster moment."
"Students pay premium prices for information that AI now delivers instantly and for free. A business student can ask ChatGPT to explain supply chain optimization or generate market analysis in seconds. The traditional lecture-and-test model faces its Blockbuster moment."
October 16, 2025 at 2:49 PM
What concerns me is how much this is clearly affecting how hiring and research funding are happening now. How many of us will continue to be pushed out of academia before this bubble bursts? How many tenure lines and how much research funding will be used for university admin to promote AI hype?
Since the trailer for the limited series adaptation for Amadeus launched, I've seen a lot of opinions, some of which suggest this is an affront to the 1984 film adaptation. While I have zero time for those being racist about Will Sharpe, I do have some thoughts about remaking Amadeus now. 1/8
October 16, 2025 at 1:50 PM
Since the trailer for the limited series adaptation for Amadeus launched, I've seen a lot of opinions, some of which suggest this is an affront to the 1984 film adaptation. While I have zero time for those being racist about Will Sharpe, I do have some thoughts about remaking Amadeus now. 1/8
Reposted by Kristin Franseen
I wrote this. As part of our promotion we are going to destroy every single copy of the 1984 original movie in existence and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it
The teaser trailer for ‘AMADEUS’ starring Will Sharpe and Paul Bettany has been released.
Premieres in December on Sky.
Premieres in December on Sky.
October 14, 2025 at 3:20 PM
I wrote this. As part of our promotion we are going to destroy every single copy of the 1984 original movie in existence and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it
I always like teaching his clarinet quintet in music history.
150 years of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, overlooked icon of Black classical music
www.npr.org/2025/08/14/n...
www.npr.org/2025/08/14/n...
150 years of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, overlooked icon of Black classical music
The British composer was a generational success story before his death at 37 — yet keeping that legacy in view has always been a challenge, even during his lifetime.
www.npr.org
August 20, 2025 at 12:50 AM
I always like teaching his clarinet quintet in music history.
It is not at all the most important thing to happen today, but it is (going by the current date where I am) the 275th anniversary of Salieri's birth. Whatever one thinks of musical commemorations, it seems like a good excuse to put on a meta-opera and eat some marzipan.
August 19, 2025 at 2:24 AM
It is not at all the most important thing to happen today, but it is (going by the current date where I am) the 275th anniversary of Salieri's birth. Whatever one thinks of musical commemorations, it seems like a good excuse to put on a meta-opera and eat some marzipan.
Reposted by Kristin Franseen
musicological conspiracy theories eschewed by non-musicologists are so fascinating to me (& random!)
and as a musicologist, the answer to the question is: no. (sorry! 🤣)
and as a musicologist, the answer to the question is: no. (sorry! 🤣)
Are we playing it all wrong? defector.com/are-we-playi...
Are We Playing It All Wrong? | Defector
At some point in the thick of the pandemic, I became briefly obsessed with a silly-seeming online controversy over what is known as the double-beat theory. The argument concerns classical music, which...
defector.com
August 13, 2025 at 8:49 PM
musicological conspiracy theories eschewed by non-musicologists are so fascinating to me (& random!)
and as a musicologist, the answer to the question is: no. (sorry! 🤣)
and as a musicologist, the answer to the question is: no. (sorry! 🤣)
I need Mozart/Mozart and the new Amadeus miniseries to be released ASAP. Partially so that I can include them in this book project, but mostly so that the rest of the world can share my (and my very patient friends') experiences of some truly strange musical fictions.
August 15, 2025 at 9:51 PM
I need Mozart/Mozart and the new Amadeus miniseries to be released ASAP. Partially so that I can include them in this book project, but mostly so that the rest of the world can share my (and my very patient friends') experiences of some truly strange musical fictions.
Excellent thread about the frustrating state of so-called "AI" in academia. It's especially telling in my opinion that a lot of this is being pushed by the same admin constantly telling us there is no money for new tenure lines or student funding, especially in the arts/humanities/social sciences.
I'm so tired of hearing that we need to "teach our students how to use AI" when the thing they most need to use it is a critical-thinking skill set that can only be acquired by NOT using it. I'm tired of hearing that it's inevitable. I'm tired.
August 2, 2025 at 9:26 PM
Excellent thread about the frustrating state of so-called "AI" in academia. It's especially telling in my opinion that a lot of this is being pushed by the same admin constantly telling us there is no money for new tenure lines or student funding, especially in the arts/humanities/social sciences.
Compared Mälzel's metronome marketing to current tech hype during a job interview this week, so that's how my summer is going.
August 1, 2025 at 2:34 PM
Compared Mälzel's metronome marketing to current tech hype during a job interview this week, so that's how my summer is going.
Volume 44, Issue 1 of the Journal of Musicological Research was just published! For those who prefer their musicological research with page numbers, you can read my article on the rapid fictionalization of Salieri's legacy and late 19th-century queer writings on musical crime for free here:
“Some Strange Temptation to Evil”: Salieri as Literary Type and the Queerness of Musical Crime in 19th-Century Fiction
Walter Thornbury’s “The Old Chapel-Master” (1873) and Edward Prime-Stevenson’s “When Art Was Young: A Romance in Two Parts”/“Aquæ multæ non—” (1883/1913) both grapple with acts of musical crime in ...
www.tandfonline.com
July 25, 2025 at 2:52 PM
Volume 44, Issue 1 of the Journal of Musicological Research was just published! For those who prefer their musicological research with page numbers, you can read my article on the rapid fictionalization of Salieri's legacy and late 19th-century queer writings on musical crime for free here:
This is how I feel when the same people and institutions that go "it's so sad that we can't hire TT faculty" and "here's another event for postdocs about your ~choice to leave academia" pour money and effort into trying to convince us all that tech is the cutting edge of research and teaching.
i bring a real "stop saying this is impossible/a problem only solved by tech when you mean institutionally we've committed to under-resourcing human expertise" to a lot of meetings that people are forced to begrudgingly agree with before moving on as if i said nothing
The (Ed) Tech Industry has made citizens believe that the problem with education is reading, thinking, and writing when the problem with education is austerity.
Reading, thinking, and writing are not the problems to be solved. Austerity is.
Reading, thinking, and writing are not the problems to be solved. Austerity is.
July 25, 2025 at 1:07 PM
This is how I feel when the same people and institutions that go "it's so sad that we can't hire TT faculty" and "here's another event for postdocs about your ~choice to leave academia" pour money and effort into trying to convince us all that tech is the cutting edge of research and teaching.
For someone who makes zero claims to being a Beethoven scholar despite the (very) odd publication and conference presentation, I just checked out the new critical edition of the conversation books while carrying a Ninth Symphony tote bag.
(I needed to cite Czerny's comments on Salieri's health.)
(I needed to cite Czerny's comments on Salieri's health.)
July 14, 2025 at 6:44 PM
For someone who makes zero claims to being a Beethoven scholar despite the (very) odd publication and conference presentation, I just checked out the new critical edition of the conversation books while carrying a Ninth Symphony tote bag.
(I needed to cite Czerny's comments on Salieri's health.)
(I needed to cite Czerny's comments on Salieri's health.)
Oh hi, new exciting fear. While dubious and invented sources are kind of my thing, this is horrifying. As Bull mentions, there is already a problem with myth in history of sexuality. (And historians are all-too-often accused of "reading too much into" sources, especially in LGBTQ+ history.) But wow.
Earlier today, Patrick J. Kearney emailed me to tell me that he fabricated five letters allegedly written from James Campbell Reddie to Henry Spencer Ashbee, a transcription of which he has posted on his website +
scissors-and-paste.net/pdf/Reddie_L...
scissors-and-paste.net/pdf/Reddie_L...
July 13, 2025 at 11:12 PM
Oh hi, new exciting fear. While dubious and invented sources are kind of my thing, this is horrifying. As Bull mentions, there is already a problem with myth in history of sexuality. (And historians are all-too-often accused of "reading too much into" sources, especially in LGBTQ+ history.) But wow.
I am looking forward to the new adaptation of Amadeus, think Simon Keefe's research is great, and always want more on Nannerl (even if skeptical of media touting "controversial" evidence). But part of me definitely went "doing a Mozart season during a Salieri anniversary year is certainly a choice."
Sky Arts Unveils New Mozart Season, Celebrating the Legacy of Classical’s Greatest Maestro
Sky Arts presents Mozart Season – a collection of new programmes offering a fresh take on classical music’s most iconic name, featuring Lauren Laverne, David Harewood and Danielle de Niese.From a live...
www.skygroup.sky
July 13, 2025 at 4:29 PM
I am looking forward to the new adaptation of Amadeus, think Simon Keefe's research is great, and always want more on Nannerl (even if skeptical of media touting "controversial" evidence). But part of me definitely went "doing a Mozart season during a Salieri anniversary year is certainly a choice."
Reposted by Kristin Franseen
<cough> healthcare <cough>
July 11, 2025 at 1:18 PM
<cough> healthcare <cough>
Musicologists and historical fiction folks! If you are planning a colloquium or seminar series, I'd love to come speak (in person or virtually) about my in-progress book project on anecdote and gossip in music history!
Feel free to reach out and/or share with anyone who might be interested! Thanks!
Feel free to reach out and/or share with anyone who might be interested! Thanks!
July 9, 2025 at 3:46 PM
Musicologists and historical fiction folks! If you are planning a colloquium or seminar series, I'd love to come speak (in person or virtually) about my in-progress book project on anecdote and gossip in music history!
Feel free to reach out and/or share with anyone who might be interested! Thanks!
Feel free to reach out and/or share with anyone who might be interested! Thanks!
This sort of thing comes to mind when I read about people using it to make connections between historical sources.
I gotta say I find a lot of AI discourse around higher ed very confusing. "if ChatGPT can write your essays is college even worth it?" did people think math teachers were assigning problem sets because *they* couldn't figure out the answers?
June 30, 2025 at 3:01 PM
This sort of thing comes to mind when I read about people using it to make connections between historical sources.
I've seen some people celebrating how this might represent a move away from academic history. But the thing is, really good pop history or public history or history communication is still good history. And good history requires some level of curiosity about sources and interpretation.
(the black hole here, too, is how can you possibly evaluate the analysis that your LLM produces if you are not trained to interpret, analyze, historicize?) everything is amazing if you know nothing
June 17, 2025 at 2:06 PM
I've seen some people celebrating how this might represent a move away from academic history. But the thing is, really good pop history or public history or history communication is still good history. And good history requires some level of curiosity about sources and interpretation.
I have now been to two Salieri-themed music festivals wherein the idea of focusing on Salieri instead of his canonical students or colleagues was itself a topic of mild humor. Something about pointing out the limits of the canon while also kind of reinforcing them? Need to unpack this further.
June 12, 2025 at 7:25 PM
I have now been to two Salieri-themed music festivals wherein the idea of focusing on Salieri instead of his canonical students or colleagues was itself a topic of mild humor. Something about pointing out the limits of the canon while also kind of reinforcing them? Need to unpack this further.
There are so many things I wish the people who write (and read) articles about US academics choosing to move to Canada knew, both about immigration and the academic job market.
Signed, a postdoc who has been a foreign worker for a while and who still might wind up having to leave next year 1/9
Signed, a postdoc who has been a foreign worker for a while and who still might wind up having to leave next year 1/9
June 12, 2025 at 7:14 PM
There are so many things I wish the people who write (and read) articles about US academics choosing to move to Canada knew, both about immigration and the academic job market.
Signed, a postdoc who has been a foreign worker for a while and who still might wind up having to leave next year 1/9
Signed, a postdoc who has been a foreign worker for a while and who still might wind up having to leave next year 1/9
Nothing makes me feel more like a (temporary) part of the music faculty like getting piano scam emails.
June 11, 2025 at 11:52 AM
Nothing makes me feel more like a (temporary) part of the music faculty like getting piano scam emails.
I am limiting this book to one (1) chapter about Peter Shaffer, partially because I have spent years telling people that my Salieri project is not about Amadeus and partially because this happens whenever I think I maybe know enough about Shaffer, his collaborators, and his endless writing process.
Randomly stumbled across yet another person who claimed to compose the music attributed to Salieri in Amadeus. As I messaged a friend last night, that is too many guys for what was supposed to be one footnote about fictional music attributed to historical composers and is now getting ridiculous. 1/3
June 6, 2025 at 4:45 PM
I am limiting this book to one (1) chapter about Peter Shaffer, partially because I have spent years telling people that my Salieri project is not about Amadeus and partially because this happens whenever I think I maybe know enough about Shaffer, his collaborators, and his endless writing process.
Randomly stumbled across yet another person who claimed to compose the music attributed to Salieri in Amadeus. As I messaged a friend last night, that is too many guys for what was supposed to be one footnote about fictional music attributed to historical composers and is now getting ridiculous. 1/3
June 6, 2025 at 4:38 PM
Randomly stumbled across yet another person who claimed to compose the music attributed to Salieri in Amadeus. As I messaged a friend last night, that is too many guys for what was supposed to be one footnote about fictional music attributed to historical composers and is now getting ridiculous. 1/3
Looking forward to presenting my paper "Reputation, Myth, and Fiction in the Nineteenth-Century Reception of Salieri’s Axur, re d’Ormus" (on a session on "the historical post-truth" with Shaena Weitz and Hester Jordan and chaired by Frederick Reece) at the AMS/SMT meeting in Minneapolis in November!
June 5, 2025 at 9:00 PM
Looking forward to presenting my paper "Reputation, Myth, and Fiction in the Nineteenth-Century Reception of Salieri’s Axur, re d’Ormus" (on a session on "the historical post-truth" with Shaena Weitz and Hester Jordan and chaired by Frederick Reece) at the AMS/SMT meeting in Minneapolis in November!
As is typical after too much maple cold brew, I'm pondering writing a thing about Mälzel and tech puffery. I don't think metronome ads will make it into the Salieri book. "Early adopter of the metronome" isn't exactly central to Salieri's posthumous reception, even if it definitely should be! 1/3
June 3, 2025 at 6:35 PM
As is typical after too much maple cold brew, I'm pondering writing a thing about Mälzel and tech puffery. I don't think metronome ads will make it into the Salieri book. "Early adopter of the metronome" isn't exactly central to Salieri's posthumous reception, even if it definitely should be! 1/3