The Department of Music, University of Sheffield is delighted to welcome Dr Simon Keegan-Phipps to the lecturing staff on a two-year contract. An expert in English traditions, Simon recently held an AHRC-funded post at the University of Sunderland where he worked on the project "Performing Englishness in New English Folk Music and Dance" (see also Simon's staff profile). Meanwhile, three Sheffield ethnomusicology students have been awarded PhDs during the last twelve months: Chien Shang-Jen, "Voices of Eternal Spring: A Study of the Hingcun diao Song Family and Other Folk Songs of the Hingcun Area, Taiwan"; Loo Fungying, "Exploring Taijiquan in the Physicality of Piano Playing" (& Lecture Recital); and Samuel Wong Shengmiao, "Hua Yue: The Chinese Orchestra in Contemporary Singapore". Another four students completed the MA in Ethnomusicology this year. Jonathan Stock has recently finished his duties as chair of the AHRC Beyond Text Commissioning Panel, and has been busy on two projects in the last several months: recording music for flute and violin to provide sample tracks for reissues of his editions Chinese Flute Solos and Chinese Violin Solos and writing up a book on daily musical life in a Taiwanese village.