MUSICNL PARTNERS WITH THE TOWN OF GANDER AND CENTER FOR MUSIC ECOSYSTEMS TO INCREASE RURAL REMOTE MUSIC RESILIENCE.

MusicNL is excited to partner with the Town of Gander and Center for Music Ecosystems (CME) to help advance music’s role in rural remote communities. This project aims to demonstrate that any community, anywhere, can leverage and benefit from its musicians and music ecosystem, and that through partnership and best practices, conditions for musicians can improve and with it, places will become more resilient. CME will also highlight two members from the central region, Adam Baxter and Robyn Slade, on an international playlist for this initiative. 

See below Press Release from the CME. 

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CENTER FOR MUSIC ECOSYSTEMS LAUNCHES THE MUSIC POLICY RESILIENCE LAB TO ADVANCE MUSIC’S ROLE IN REMOTE AND RURAL COMMUNITIES AROUND THE WORLD www.centerformusicecosystems.com/resilience

KEY POINTS
● First ever Music Policy Resilience Lab launched with over a dozen global partners
● The Lab advances the recommendations of the Nordic Culture Fund research project, Defining Resilience in Remote and Rural Music Ecosystems.
● 11 different communities in Canada, the United States, Sweden, Finland and Kyrgyzstan, Greenland and the Faroe Islands have signed up to the Lab, along with a global suite of experts, including Bandcamp, the Texas Music Office, Stockholm Center for Resilience and LiveDMA.
● This is the first time music has been directly linked to resilience policy, and is being tested on the ground, in different communities around the world, at the same time.

The Center for Music Ecosystems (CME) is proud to launch the Music Policy Resilience Lab, a landmark transnational collaboration with the aim of implementing music policies in remote, rural and isolated communities. Following the publication in November of the landmark report, Defining Resilience in Remote and Rural Music Ecosystems, and supported once again by the Nordic Culture Fund, the Center has partnered with 11 communities around the world to take the report’s findings and test them in the field, to further music’s role in making places more resilient. From Greenland to Northern Canada, Southwest United States to Central Asia and across the Nordics, the communities will participate in 6 Labs from March 2023 to April 2024. The labs will feature global music and cultural policy experts such as Serenade, the Texas Music Office and Live DMA, among others.

At the same time, each community will work with CME and experts to implement 1 or 2 recommendations. All progress will be recorded in each place and together with the roundtable findings, a comprehensive Guide to Music And Resilience will be published in Spring 2024 at Tallinn Music Week in Estonia, with each community serving as an example of best practice. This guide will then be made available for free, for all communities.

The Lab – the first of its kind – aims to demonstrate that any community, anywhere, can leverage and benefit from its musicians and music ecosystem, and that through partnership and best practices, conditions for musicians can improve and with it, places will become more resilient. The project will launch in March 2023 and conclude at the end of May, 2024.

Music Policy Resilience Lab Communities: (in alphabetical order):
● Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan)
● Gallup, New Mexico (USA)
● Gander, Newfoundland and Labrador (Canada)
● Lerwick, Shetland Islands (UK)
● Mariehamn, Åland Islands (Finland)
● Nuuk (Greenland)
● St. Johnsbury, Vermont (USA)
● Torshavn (Faroe Islands)
● Umeå (Sweden)
● Whitehorse, Yukon (Canada)
● Whitesburg, Kentucky (USA)

Lab Dates and Times
● Lab 1 – Supporting Local Venues, March 10th 2023, 4pm GMT (hybrid with in person in Faroe Islands) – featuring Live DMA and TransMusicHalles
● Lab 2 – Supporting Musicians and Music Makers, May 26th 2023 – 4pm GMT (hybrid with in person in Greenland) – featuring Bandcamp and Serenade
● Lab 3 – Mapping, Representation and Recognition September 12th 2023 – 4pm GMT (online) – featuring Sound Diplomacy
● Lab 4 – Better Local Music Policy – November 24th 2023 – 4pm GMT (online) – featuring Texas Music Office
● Lab 5 – Music & Future Global Challenges – January 23rd, 2024 – 4pm GMT (online) – Featuring Dr Christina Ballico and Stockholm Resilience Center
● Lab 6 – Education, Music Business & Embracing Digital – March 8th, 2024 – 4pm GMT (online) – featuring

Songtrust Lab Funders and Partners
The project is made possible by funding from the Nordic Culture Fund’s Globus Program, as well as additional support from the Mimi and Mortimer Levitt Foundation, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Music NL and the Yukon Government.

About The Center for Music Ecosystems
The Center for Music Ecosystems is a nonprofit organization with a mission to conduct globally relevant research that supports communities to use music to help solve problems at the local, national and global level.

About the Nordic Culture Fund
The Nordic Culture Fund is a catalyst for arts and culture in the Nordic region. The Fund has been working in the area of Nordic cultural co-operation since 1966 on the basis of an agreement between the Nordic countries. The Nordic Culture Fund supports, creates and participates in the promotion, development and communication of knowledge of art and culture, and engages in strategic collaborations that have the potential to be policy-developing in the Nordic Region and beyond. The Globus program was launched in 2020 with the aim to facilitate deep and sustainable networks possessing global relevance, thus paving the way for new approaches to temporality and open-ended practices in the tradition of arts funding.

Quotes from Partners:
´We are looking very much forward to learning from the results of how a better music ecosystem can benefit our capital and our music scene’s resilience in the future.’ – Elin Brimheim Heinesen, Audio Books Manager at The National Library’s Audio Book Service, Chairman of MenTón (Association that works to improve the conditions for Faroese musicians).

‘To this date the municipality has paid very little attention to the role of music in its economic development and this seems like a very interesting project which can become a good start for looking into music and nightlife of the city as one of the factors of resilience and economic development.’ – Chingiz Batyrbekov, CEO of “KOLFEST” Music and Arts Festival, Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan)

‘We are excited to have been selected for this project because we really want to learn how to grow the support for music and arts in our community. We see this as an opportunity as both an economic driver and more importantly an increase in the quality of life for Gallup and McKinley County.‘ – Michael Bulloch, Gallup MainStreet Arts and Cultural District Executive Director, Gallup, New Mexico, USA