Crystallizing the Community: a CNMN research project

CNMN makes its first for­ay into the world of sta­tis­ti­cal analy­sis with a project to be pre­sent­ed at ISCM’s World New Music Days, in Van­cou­ver, Novem­ber 2–8, 2017.

Won­der­ing just how it is that peo­ple come to the prac­tice of new music in Cana­da, and how these routes may have changed over the past few decades, we have pro­posed the following:

To exam­ine the routes, path­ways and acci­dents that bring peo­ple in Cana­da to the prac­tice of new music com­po­si­tion. We will look at: (1) how the path­ways may have changed over the past five decades; (2) gen­der and diver­si­ty; (3) region­al vari­a­tions; and (4) changes in the impor­tance of tra­di­tion­al musi­cal lit­er­a­cy. The study will also iden­ti­fy events, per­cep­tions and expe­ri­ences that pro­pel some peo­ple into com­po­si­tion rather than some oth­er musi­cal occupation.

Riv­et­ing, you say? Indeed, it is. Inter­views con­duct­ed in the prepa­ra­tion of ques­tions reveal a fas­ci­nat­ing range of entry points and inspi­ra­tion. We imag­ine that the hard data results will have impli­ca­tions for what post-sec­ondary insti­tu­tions require as pre­req­ui­sites, and what skills they teach.

Crys­tal­liz­ing the Com­mu­ni­ty is con­duct­ed with assis­tance from CNMN mem­ber Mary Ingra­ham (PhD Musi­col­o­gy), with Dean­na Yerichuk (PhD Music Edu­ca­tion) and Gillian Stevens, (PhD Soci­ol­o­gy) through the Sound Stud­ies Ini­tia­tive at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Alber­ta. Ross War­ing (PhD Com­mu­ni­ca­tions The­o­ry) con­tributes exper­tise in data visu­al­iza­tion, while Jim Rux­ton (elec­tri­cal engi­neer, inven­tor, instal­la­tion artist and founder of Sub­tle Tech­nolo­gies Fes­ti­val) is advis­ing on data display.

Oth­er part­ners pro­vide con­tact with the com­mu­ni­ty: the Cana­di­an League of Com­posers and the Cana­di­an Music Cen­tre will assist in send­ing the sur­vey to their membership.

Get­ting the sam­pling is the trick and this is where you, our CNMN mem­bers, come in.

Please fill out the ques­tion­naire when it comes your way.

Late spring/summer we will be send­ing it out to the com­mu­ni­ty. And because we want to see where and how peo­ple branch into the dif­fer­ent sub-prac­tices of new music, the sam­pling will be broad­er than just com­posers, impro­vis­ers and oth­er sound/music cre­ators. Make sure your per­son­al sto­ry con­tributes to the com­mu­ni­ty sto­ry – form part of this crys­talline structure.

The pre­sen­ta­tion of this research project at ISCM’s World New Music Days in Van­cou­ver, Novem­ber 2–8, includes a pan­el dis­cus­sion as well as a pro­jec­tion installation.

Steer­ing Com­mit­tee mem­bers: Jen­nifer War­ing (chair), Megu­mi Masa­ki, Tim Brady, Mary Ingra­ham, Gillian Stevens and Ross Waring.

For more infor­ma­tion, con­tact Jen­nifer Waring:
jwaring@interlog.com

Direct link: Crys­tal­liz­ing the Community
Return to full Bul­letin – June 2017