Dr. Jessie Fillerup
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Profile
Dr. Fillerup’s research interests are driven by her curiosity about French musical cultures, illusory experiences, and the nature of musical temporality. Her first book, Magician of Sound: Ravel and the Aesthetics of Illusion (University of California Press), examined illusory perceptions in Ravel’s music, including timbre, orchestral effects, figure/ground relationships, and impressions of motion and stasis. With Joanna K. Love, she was a contributing co-editor of the volume Sonic Identity at the Margins (Bloomsbury), which featured the work of scholars, composers, and performers thinking about various markers of musical identity. Her current book project, Enchanted: Music, Stage Magic, and Illusory Technologies, explores music in magic shows, revealing how musical virtuosity, exoticism, gender, and sonic experience function in illusory contexts.
Her work has been supported by numerous grants, including a two-year research fellowship at the Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies (Denmark), the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Mellon Foundation, and the Associated Colleges of the South. She has published widely in leading music journals, such as Music & Letters, 19th-Century Music, Journal of the Royal Musical Association, Cambridge Opera Journal, and Music Theory Online. She is the vice president of the International Association for Word and Music Studies, which supports scholars working on the intermedial relationships between verbal texts and music.
As a teacher, Dr. Fillerup’s courses focus on opera, French music, research methods, and illusions of music and sound. She enjoys introducing students to new musical experiences, teaching research and writing skills, and helping students develop creative, rigorously tested projects that advance current knowledge in music studies.
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Grants and Fellowships
External awards
Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies, Aarhus University (Denmark), two-year research fellowship, 2018–2020
Associated Colleges of the South, Faculty Advancement Grant ($10,000), with Sewanee University, 2013–2014
Mellon Foundation Research Fellowship, Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas, 2011
National Endowment for the Humanities, Enduring Questions grant ($24,978), 2010–2013
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Awards
Ned N. Fleming Excellence in Teaching Award, Washburn University, 2005
Performance prize, Conservatoire Américain de Fontainebleau, France, 2000
Fontainebleau Foundation Study Abroad Award, 2000
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Presentations
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Institutional Service
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Grants and Fellowships
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Publications
Books
Enchanted: Music, Stage Magic, and Illusory Technologies. In preparation.
Sonic Identity at the Margins, ed. Jessie Fillerup and Joanna K. Love. New York: Bloomsbury, 2022.
Magician of Sound: Ravel and the Aesthetics of Illusion. California Studies in Twentieth-Century Music series 29, edited by Richard Taruskin. Oakland: University of California Press, 2021.
Journal Articles“Heller’s Wonders: Music, Conjuring, and Virtuoso Pianism.” Journal of the Royal Musical Association, forthcoming.
“Robert Heller’s Magical Mystery Tours.” 19th-Century Music 47 (July 2023): 3–32.
“Marimbo Chimes and the Wizard’s Monster Band: Music in Theatrical Magic Shows.” Music & Letters 103 (May 2022): 291–321.
“Lucia’s Ghosts: Sonic, Gothic, and Postmodern.” Cambridge Opera Journal 28 (November 2016): 313–345.
“Ravel’s Lost Time.” Journal of the Royal Musical Association 139 (Spring 2014): 205–220.
“Ravel and Robert-Houdin, Magicians.” 19th-Century Music 37 (Fall 2013): 130–158.
“Eternity in Each Moment: Temporal Strategies in Ravel’s Le Gibet.” Music Theory Online 19 (March 2013).
“Ravel, La Valse, and the Purloined Plot.” College Music Symposium 49 (2009): 345–355.
Book Chapters“Forming Time: Music, Literature, and Modernity.” In The Routledge Companion to Music and Modern Literature, edited by Kathrina Clausius, Peter Dayan, Rachel Durkin, and Axel Englund, 193–206. London and New York: Routledge, 2022.
“Introduction,” with Joanna K. Love. In Sonic Identity at the Margins, edited by Jessie Fillerup and Joanna K. Love, 1–15. New York: Bloomsbury, 2022.
“Hearing Borderline Personality Disorder in Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” with Joanna K. Love. In Sonic Identity at the Margins, edited by Jessie Fillerup and Joanna K. Love, 185–202. New York: Bloomsbury, 2022.
“What If? Counterfactual Thinking and Primary Source Study.” In The Norton Guide to Teaching Music History, edited by Matthew Balensuela, 95–106. New York: Norton, 2019.
“Professional Development.” In The Music History Classroom, edited by James Davis, 171–185. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2012.
“Cage and the Chaotic Classroom: Pedagogy for the Avant-garde.” In Vitalizing Music History Teaching, edited by James R. Briscoe, 177–188. New York: Pendragon, 2010.