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Or 2nd Edition download the PDF here.
ISBN 9798711770350

Book and cover design: Asia Pietrzyk /asiapietrzyk.com

Taking the Temperature
Crisis, Curating, and Musical Diversity
(Second Expanded Edition)

The caesura in musical production caused by recent global lockdowns has made contemporary music’s crisis of societal relevancy more apparent than ever. Bringing together interviews with music curators, musicians, activist networks and institutional leaders, this book details existing practices and approaches, showing that change is possible but only if the recent wave of interest in curatorial practices, diversity and divestment from a white, European bourgeois aesthetic are taken seriously by the musical establishment.

This expanded second edition of Taking the Temperature adds a new preface, five new interviews, as well as followups with previous interviewees. Radiating out from the Ultima Festival and Oslo, Norway, it includes interviews with key figures representing institutions in Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Iceland, as well as a number of important perspectives from the Canadian and Quebecois musical landscapes. This book documents the growing number of efforts to fundamentally reimagine our musical institutions in response to the challenges our society faces today, how these institutions have faced unprecedented challenges posed by a global pandemic, as well as how a growing chorus of voices are calling for fundamental change.

Includes interviews with
Fredrik Andersson (Konserthuset Stockholm), Anna Berit Asp Christensen (SPOR Festival), Sandeep Bhagwati (Concordia University Montreal), Myriam Boucher (Canadian Electroacoustic Community, Codes d’Accès), Dena Davida (independent curator, Montreal), Gabriel Dharmoo (artist, Montreal), Marta Forsberg (Konstmusiksystrar), Bjørnar Habbestad (NyMusikk), Juliana Hodkinson (composer, Nordic Countries), Siri Haugan Holden (Balensekunst), Pauline Hogstrand (Damkapellet), Kasper Holten (Det Kongelige Teater), Merja Hottinen (Music Finland), Terri Hron (Canadian New Music Network), Adele Kosman (Konstmusiksystrar), Astrid Kvalbein (Norwegian Academy of Music), Marcela Lucatelli (SKLASH+), Anne Margvardsen (SPOR Festival), Peter Meanwell (Borealis – a festival for experimental music), Alain Mongeau (MUTEK), Ung Nordisk Musik, Anne Hilde Neset (Kunstnernes Hus), Tanja Orning (Norwegian Academy of Music), Tine Rude (Borealis – a festival for experimental music), Barbara Scales (Latitude 45, Canadian Music Centre), Thorbjørn Tønder Hansen (Ultima Festival), Jennifer Torrence (Norwegian Academy of Music), Helena Wessman (Royal College of Music Stockholm), Anna Xambó (WoNoMute)

22 x 28 cm (US Letter), 187 pages, Text in English
Cover and book design by Asia Pietrzyk

Published by OnCurating.org

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.