The seventeenth meeting of the ‘Music and Media’ study group of the International Musicological Society will take place in-person on June 11-12 2026 in the School of Music at University College Dublin. The theme of this year’s conference is “Directions and Aesthetics of the Digital Era” and will feature a keynote address hosted at the Irish Film Institute.

Since 2000 and the increasing dominance of digital film, music for screen media has experienced substantial changes. With the waning of the “classical” scoring style, the popularisation of composition on Digital Audio Workstations, the arrival of Dolby Atmos, the increasing prioritisation of sound over score, and the rise of streaming services, shifts in music and sound have distinguished digital-era aesthetics from those of the twentieth century. This conference invites proposals that consider these aesthetics, the directions of arising trends, or precursors foreshadowing contemporary practices. Papers may consider, but are not limited to, the following:

● Divergent trends in the treatment of music and sound in screen media since the dawn of the digital era

● The blurred lines between sound design and score

● The changing role of the composer, and the increasing influence of music supervisors, sound editors, sound mixers

● The influence of film score companies (such as Hans Zimmer’s Remote Control Productions) on the direction of audio aesthetics

● Screen media case studies from around the globe representative of recent phenomena, or of pre-digital media that predicts future sonic aesthetics

● The place and influence of AI on contemporary practice and aesthetics

We seek proposals for 20-minute papers or three-paper panels from scholars of music and sound in screen media, graduate students, and industry practitioners. All papers will be 20 minutes in length, followed by 10 minutes of discussion.

Abstracts for all individual papers should not exceed 250 words. In the case of themed panel sessions, there should be an abstract for the whole session (maximum 250 words) plus an abstract for each individual speaker (maximum 150 words each), and should be submitted as a single document. Abstracts should include:

● A title for the paper and/or session

● The name, contact details and affiliation (where applicable) of the speaker(s) and, in the case of themed panel sessions and round-table sessions, the panel convener

● Brief biography of the speaker(s) (maximum 100 words per speaker)

Proposals should be sent, as a PDF, to Conor Power at conor.power1[at]ucd.ie by December 5 2025.

The Organizing Committee for the conference is:

● Conor Power (University College Dublin), Conference Chair

● Emile Wennekes (Utrecht University), MaM Chair

● Laura Anderson (University College Dublin)

● Anika Babel (Northumbria University)

● Ciaran Crilly (University College Dublin)

● Julin Lee (Hochschule für Musik und Theater München)

The Programme Committee for the conference is:

● Chloé Huvet (Université Évry Paris-Saclay/IUF)

● Julin Lee (Hochschule für Musik und Theater München)

● James Denis McGlynn (Trinity College Dublin)

● Jessica Shine (Munster Technological University)

● Emile Wennekes (Utrecht University)

We would like to bring to your attention to the joint annual conference of the IMS Study Group “Music and Media” and the Kieler Gesellschaft für Filmmusikforschung, “Music, Media, and Narrative in the Streaming Age,” which will be held in hybrid form in Munich (Germany) from June 6 to 7, 2024. The conference is open to the public, free of charge for both in-person and online participation, however registration is required. Visit https://musicmedianarrative.de for all details.

The Department of Music and Art at Linnæus University Växjö, Sweden, invites applications for one full PhD position (4 years) in musicology within the Graduate School The Future of Democracy: Cultural Analyses of Illiberal Populism in Times of Crises (FUDEM). The successful applicant will be affiliated at the Linnæus University research center for Intermediality and Multimodality (IMS) as well. Deadline for applications is August 31.

Find out more about the job here:

If you have any questions, you are welcome to contact me:

Martin Knust (martin.knust@lnu.se)

The 14th meeting of the Music and Media Studygroup (MaM) under the auspices of the International Musicological Society met this past week in Paris, France. An enriching series of papers was presented by researchers from ten countries. Sincere thanks to the organisers from the Université d’Évry Paris-Saclay, who did an excellent job in hosting us. My personal thanks to all those who presented their papers as well as the two keynote speakers: Prof. James Deaville (Carleton University, Ottawa) and Prof. Dominique Nasta (ULB, Brussels). Already looking forward to the 15th annual MaM event which will take place at the Hochschule für Musik und Musiktheater in Munich, from 6 to 8 June, 2024. The conference will be jointly organized with Kieler Gesellschaft für Filmmusikforschung. An open call for papers will be published this coming fall. The overarching theme will be Music and Media in the Streaming Age.

Emile Wennekes

Nous sommes heureux de vous transmettre le programme du prochain colloque MaM auquel vous participez et qui aura lieu à Evry et à Paris du 19 au 21 juin 2023.

Vous pouvez en prendre connaissance ici :

https://mamxiv.sciencesconf.org/resource/page/id/3

(Il est a priori presque définitif, mais sera finalisé prochainement pour la version papier et .pdf).

Dear all,

We are pleased to send you the programme for the next MaM conference, which will take place in Evry and Paris from 19 to 21 June 2023.

You can read it here :

https://mamxiv.sciencesconf.org/resource/page/id/3

(The programme is almost definitive, but the paper and .pdf versions will be finalised shortly).

The Music and Media Study Group meeting of 2022 coincided with the quinquennial IMS conference, which took place in August in Athens, Greece. In the multipurpose room of the impressive concert hall building Μέγαρον Μουσικής Αθηνών, MaM hosted its 13^th conference as a hybrid meeting throughout the morning of 23 August. Combining in-person and on-line presentations was the go-to, not only due to time zone differences, but also because Greece was still considered a Covid danger zone according to diverse foreign organizations.

Where MaM normally convenes multiple day, annual conferences, we now opted within the possibilities of the overall IMS conference for a smaller roundtable session, discussing the topic of Music in Comedy Cinema. This time, as well, no international open call for papers was published, but all invited speakers are involved in the upcoming Palgrave Handbook of Music in Comedy Cinema, edited by Emilio Audissino and Emile Wennekes.

Dr. Chloé Huvet (Université d’Évry Paris-Saclay, France) opened the panel with her live talk ‘From E.T. to Tintin: John Williams’ Humorous Touches in Non-Comedy Films’. Dr. Emilio Audissino (Linnaeus University, Sweden) continued on the Williams theme with his on-line presentation ‘John Williams, from Comic to Humour: The pre-Star Wars Period’. Next up was Dr. Michael Baumgartner (Cleveland State University, Cleveland, USA) who gave an on-line, and partly pre-recorded presentation entitled ‘Self-Reflexive Music and the Comic Incongruity in the Golden Age of French Comedies’. Prof. Emile Wennekes (Utrecht University, The Netherlands) then brought the overarching topic ‘(Under)scoring Laughs: Theoretical ingredients for a Handbook Introduction’ to the table, live from the Athens Concert Hall. Prof. James Deaville (Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada) closed the line-up of Handbook contributors with the online presentation ‘Taking Mancini’s Comedy Scores Seriously’.

The papers were amply discussed, after which the round table meeting was closed by unveiling location and topic of the 2023 annual MaM meeting.

MaM’s 14^th annual conference will be hosted by Université d’Évry Paris-Saclay, and will take place in Paris (France) on 19-21 June, 2023. The topic will be Music and Sound in Francophone Audiovisual Media.

Prof. dr. Emile Wennekes, chair of the Study Group MaM