Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowships
The Music Department at The University of Manchester is pleased to be able to support prospective applicants to the Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowships Scheme.
We invite expressions of interest from prospective applicants to the forthcoming round of the Leverhulme Trust's Early Career Fellowship scheme (2027). Please note our initial internal deadline of 28 October 2026.
Early Career Fellowships are tenable on a full-time basis for a period of three years, to commence between 1 September 2027 and 1 May 2028. They offer support for early career researchers who have not yet held a full-time permanent academic post in a UK university or comparable UK institution. Applicants must normally have submitted their doctoral thesis for viva voce examination not more than four years prior to the Trust's final closing date of 18 February 2027.
In addition, they must either hold a degree from a UK higher education institution at the time of taking up the Fellowship, or at the time of the Trust's application deadline must hold an academic position in the UK (e.g. fixed-term lectureship) which commenced no less than four months prior to the closing date.
During the award period, fellows are expected to undertake a significant piece of original publishable research which must be distinguishable from their PhD project, rather than a mere extension of their doctoral research.
Full details of the scheme are available from the Leverhulme Trust website.
As one of the leading research-intensive Music departments in the UK, we have a long-standing track record of producing world-leading research. Our staff maintain outstanding international profiles in a wide range of specialist areas encompassing musicology and music analysis, ethnomusicology, composition and performance studies.
Our diverse research community of academic staff, postdoctoral researchers and postgraduate students provides an inspiring environment for the development of new ideas and sounds, while our location within the musically and intellectually vibrant city of Manchester encourages exciting interdisciplinary collaborations with external partners as well as researchers in other parts of the university. Examples of our research activity, together with further detail about our core research areas, may be found on our research web pages.
Applicants who wish to apply through the Department of Music are advised to make contact with their proposed mentor as early as possible before submitting their proposal, which should then be completed with additional input from the mentor.
Applicants may also make informal contact with Prof. Caroline Bithell to discuss the suitability of their project.
Applicants must submit their initial proposal as an email attachment by midnight on Wednesday 28 October 2026, addressed to Prof. Caroline Bithell: Caroline.Bithell@manchester.ac.uk.
A copy of the application template that must be used may be obtained from the proposed mentor or from Prof. Bithell. Before completing the template, applicants should consult the relevant section of the Application Help Notes that may be downloaded from the Trust's website (see above link).
Proposals received by 28 October will in the first instance be subject to an internal competition within Music and the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures. Those applicants who are successful at this stage will receive specialist support to complete the full online application before the Leverhulme Trust's submission deadline of 18 February 2027.
We look forward to hearing from prospective candidates.
Professor Caroline Bithell
Research Director
Department of Music
School of Arts, Languages and Cultures
University of Manchester (UK)