City St George’s academic co-leads international music and wellbeing symposium

City St George’s academic Dr Katie Rose Sanfilippo played a leading role in a recent major international symposium that explored how music can support the mental health and wellbeing of parents.

The Music and Parental Wellbeing Symposium, held at the Royal College of Music, London (RCM) in late July, brought together more than 75 speakers from around the world. The event was co-chaired by Dr Sanfilippo, Presidential Research Fellow at City St George’s, University of London, and Professor Rosie Perkins from the RCM.

Dr Sanfilippo’s research focuses on the implementation and sustainability of arts-based interventions, particularly in under-resourced settings. She works closely with policy bodies, charities and health services to ensure that creative approaches such as music are used more effectively and equitably to support parental mental health. At the symposium, she also helped launch the Music and Parental Wellbeing Alliance, a new international initiative co-led by City St George’s and the RCM.

The Alliance builds on the success of the Music and Parental Wellbeing Research Network, which Dr Sanfilippo and Professor Perkins founded in 2023 with funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). Since then, the network has grown into a vibrant global community of more than 260 members, including researchers, practitioners and parents with lived experience.

Held over two days, the symposium featured keynote talks from Professor Helen Shoemark (Temple University, USA) and Professor Lauren Stewart (University of Roehampton), as well as a policy panel chaired by Alexandra Coulter, Director of the National Centre for Creative Health. Sessions covered a wide range of topics, from music therapy and group singing to perinatal mental health policy and parental lived experience.