The ninth Rhythm Changes conference, Jazz Futures, will take place at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam (Amsterdam University of the Arts) from 28 to 31 August 2025, in conjunction with the University of Amsterdam and IMPRODECO (Improvised Music and Decolonisation, Utrecht University). This four-day multidisciplinary conference features keynotes, academic papers and panels and brings together researchers, writers, musicians, critics, and others interested in jazz studies.
From the moment it surfaced, jazz held a promise of progress, innovation, and novelty, embraced by modernists around the globe. At the same time, it was declared dead just a few years after it first appeared on record. With each new development and technology (from multi-tracking to AI), the nay-sayers have lamented that jazz had now taken a wrong turn, while others thought the latest direction would lead the music into a new and bright future. Neo- and retro-genres, next to fusions and crossovers, have triggered – and continue to trigger – similar debates. Jazz studies have moved with those shifting discourses, too, interrogating some of their premises but ignoring others. Inevitably, ideas about the future of jazz hold ideas about its past. At stake are the relevance and urgency of the music and, by extension, its future.
We welcome papers addressing the conference theme from multiple perspectives, including cultural studies, musicology, cultural theory, music analysis, jazz history, media studies, and practice-based research. We particularly welcome contributors who identify as women or gender diverse and from other under-represented groups and communities within jazz studies and academia more generally. Within the general theme of Jazz Futures, we have identified several sub-themes. Where relevant, please specify which sub-theme your proposal refers to.
Jazz Moves – When we play, jazz moves us. It connects us to all those who gather (and who have gathered) to make this music happen. When we move homes, cities, and countries, our music – records, CDs, instruments, bands, collaborations, gigs, our memories of music – moves with us. When jazz soundtracks our everyday lives, certain tunes force us to stop, pause, close our eyes, and just listen, focusing on something new that has grasped us or something familiar that takes us back. From insights into the experiences of displaced jazz musicians to the celebration of jazz on the dancefloor, or ‘jazz hands’ that can play, write and dance, this strand will draw together diverse explorations of how jazz moves us and how we may move with jazz.
Jazz Geographies – From migration to modernity, jazz has been shaped by multiple geographies. This strand invites papers that map the interplay of place and positionality, location and landscape, medium and movement, technologies and transport, home and homelessness, and scenes and cultures within jazz. We are interested in discussions exploring the many mythologies of place and space, especially jazz’s associations with specific cities, regions, communities, environments, venues and neighbourhoods. We also encourage contributions that consider how jazz relates to demographic changes, transformations in the spaces of global capitalism, new modes of communication, changing political geographies, the climate emergency and shifts in concepts of identity and subjectivity. Papers that problematise standard accounts of the music’s geographic meanings and question core assumptions about its past, present and future place in the world are particularly welcome.
Untold Stories and Alternate Takes – This strand invites papers that explore neglected areas of jazz scholarship. We welcome contributions that examine untold stories from various perspectives from encounters with jazz, for example, through the analysis of personal archives, explorations of contested family histories, and accounts of material interactions with music, time and place. The strand will engage with the weight of jazz history, the dominant narratives that continue to shape understandings and representations of the music and its past. What are the hidden histories and alternative pasts in jazz? How do personal encounters challenge dominant narratives? Why do apocryphal tales about jazz exist, and what does this say about the nature of the music and its cultures? Within this context, we are interested in research that offers alternate takes, disrupting and refreshing established understandings of jazz past and present.
Jazz and (De)Colonisation – This strand addresses the role of jazz in colonialism. Jazz has been a music of liberation, accompanying struggles against racism and imperialism. At the same time, it has been historically entangled with globalisation, military history, and Cold War diplomacy. This strand invites papers with a focus on jazz in the Global South, its role in the consolidation of colonial power as well as in anti-colonial independence movements, and processes of decolonisation and (post)colonial diasporas. Further, it invites critical reflections on jazz in Europe and the emergence of ‘free’ or ‘non-idiomatic’ improvisation. This strand hopes to inspire new reflections on global jazz studies, questions of race and racism, and critical musicological theories of improvisation.
From Jazz to JAIzz – Technology and the creative exploitation of technological innovation have always been important to jazz. Indeed, the history of this music and sonic technologies have often effectively developed alongside one another, unpickably interwoven even: from the Edison roll in early jazz to shifts in vocal and musical intimacy via microphone innovations in the 1920s and 1930s or from the inclusion in the sonic palette of synthesised sounds in the 1970s to more recent explorations of computer-based music-making in electro-acoustic realms. Jazz has always been generative (discuss). This strand invites contributions which consider technological innovations or resistances in jazz creativity and is particularly interested in papers that employ or interrogate the potential of machine-generated techniques. What is the current and future role of AI in generative or improvisatory practice?
Further information
Please submit your proposal (max. 250 words), including a short biography (max. 50 words) and institutional affiliation, as a Word document to Loes Rusch and Walter van de Leur (Conference directors): rhythmchanges@ahk.nl. Papers are 20 minutes long (with a 5-minute Q&A); panels contain three papers.
The deadline for proposals is 28 February 2025; we will communicate outcomes to authors by mid-April 2025. The conference committee comprises Christa Bruckner-Haring, Nicholas Gebhardt, Reïnda Hullij, George McKay, Sarah Raine, Loes Rusch, Walter van de Leur, and Tony Whyton.
Jazz Futures is hosted by the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. The conference continues to build on the legacy of the research project Rhythm Changes: Jazz Cultures and European Identities (2010–2013), funded as part of the Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA) Joint Research Programme. In the spirit of Rhythm Changes, the project team continues to develop networking opportunities and champion collaborative research in transnational jazz studies.
Financial support
In all our past conferences, we have supported early career delegates to cover some of their expenses. While our resources are modest, we invite applicants – specifically those from the aforementioned under-represented groups – to indicate whether they need support. As before, we will try to assist where possible.
Updates on the conference will be available on the Rhythm Changes website and Facebook.
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