The World Music Expo, WOMEX, has publicized the first jury-selected conferences for its 2016 edition. The largest professional gathering of its kind, WOMEX will take place in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, October 19 – 23, 2016 at the Cidade da Cultura (City of Culture). The showcase program will be announced over the next month.
The WOMEX conference program includes an overview of popular music styles from around the world. For instance, the indie scene from the Arab world is explored in a session devised by Basem Abuarab, booking manager for Almoharek and Eka3 label (who presented Tamer Abu Gazadeh at WOMEX 15) with Maan Abu Taleb, editor of the influential Arabic music magazine Ma3azef.com and Sarah El Miniawy, music PR and management at Simsara.
There will also be a session chaired by music and live event producer Danny Kapilian to discuss “integrating world music in pop music festivals and concerts”.
Spotify, represented by engineering lead Jonathan Marmor, will host an interactive “Un-Conference” – an open workshop format, in which attending delegates and other players from the digital sector will create concrete solutions to pressing challenges.
Scott Cohen, founder of The Orchard, will take part on a panel put together by Patrick Lee-Thorp of Templit Entertainment / Songwrights on the future for global music albums. Lee-Thorp provides additional details: “This WOMEX panel will look at the possible scenarios of how producers will deal with the challenge creating revenue in the streaming age. This is now an urgent question for the world music business“.
Another focus of this year’s conference will be music education, with sessions on education for deaf children through music with the Muse Seek Project, and “Between Identity and Diversity” that explores music education and migration (led by Rotterdam’s Codarts University and Mannheim’s Popakademie Baden-Württemberg represented by Connie de Jongh and Udo Dahmen respectively. Dahmen says: “It is a perfect situation that WOMEX offers a place for our panel, which has in mind the network between educational institutions within the global music scene.”
Jung-Hun Lee (Jazz in Seoul) will chair a session on how to connect to the music market in Asia together with Kaushik Dutta (Kolkata International Music Festival) and Patrick de Groote (Sfinks Mixed festival).
Sonya Mazumdar, founder and director of EarthSync from India, will chair a session with Daniel Brown (Freemuse) on “unspoken censorship” and how artists and media may counter it.
More information at www.womex.com
Headline photo: Sonya Mazumdar, EarthSync
Author: Angel Romero
Angel Romero y Ruiz has dedicated his life to musical exploration. His efforts included the creation of two online portals, worldmusiccentral.org and musicasdelmundo.com. In addition, Angel is the co-founder of the Transglobal World Music Chart, a panel of world music DJs and writers that celebrates global sounds. Furthermore, he delved into the record business, producing world music studio albums and compilations. His works have appeared on Alula Records, Ellipsis Arts, Indígena Records and Music of the World.
