The Rhythm Changes team is hugely looking forward to welcoming all delegates from all academic areas interested in jazz studies, as well as the music and creative sectors, to the latest in our international conferences on jazz, which opens at the Conservatory of Amsterdam on 31 August. Our theme, in this centenary year for recorded jazz music, is Re/Sounding Jazz.
The team met a year ago to firm up the shape and call of the event. The conference committee consists of Dr Christa Bruckner-Haring (Kunst Uni. Graz), Prof Nick Gebhardt (BCU), Prof George McKay (UEA), Dr Loes Rusch (UvA and CvA), Prof Catherine Tackley (U. of Liverpool), Prof Tony Whyton (BCU), and head of conference Prof Walter van de Leur (UvA and CvA). We are delighted that the conference has come together so well and we feel that this programme is one of the very best (in the top five!) we have produced to date.
Re/Sounding Jazz includes around 140 delegates, over 100 papers, with speakers coming from 30 countries, from Australia to South Africa, and from the US to Norway. We have two keynote speakers in the spirit of transatlantic dialogue, one each from the US and Europe, as well as representatives from dozens of different music institutions, archives and conservatories. All information about the conference is available here, and you’ll find the Conference Guide here.
Finally, before we begin, some words from our conference chair, Walter van de Leur.
Once again it is my great pleasure to welcome you to a Rhythm Changes international jazz conference at the Conservatory of Amsterdam. This is our third such conference in Amsterdam, the other two were held in Salford and Birmingham. You keep coming back, so we must be doing something right.
We are proud of the fact that we have organised five of these international conferences since 2011. Think of that for a moment-it is part of the effort we as a team of researchers from Europe have put into building a new community of jazz scholars across much of the globe. But it has also to do with the enthusiasm and desire which you have shown repeatedly, simply and generously to share your ideas and your company with us. To jazz research friends old and new I say: Welcome (back) to Amsterdam, and let’s have a ball.
