Newsletter

Brussels Seminar

March, 2013

ARS MUSICA, Brussels

March, 2013

Meeting point: Flagey

Flagey’s mission is to restore the Art

Deco building to its past prestige as the

country’s radio and television HQ. Once

again, it is a world-class center run by

both language communities and

devoted to music and the moving

image.

Flagey is where different artistic

disciplines can meet, exchange ideas,

discover one another and work

together. Jazz, world, classical and

contemporary music are played here,

but film and video also feature

prominently, with frequent encounters

between these worlds.

The acoustic qualities of the building

make it a key player both in Brussels

and the whole of Belgium.

Flagey was born of a bold joint initiative

by representatives of the country’s

three communities with the aim of

creating a quality cultural institution

that is European in scope.

The Flagey ponds are surrounded by

grand townhouses, the building is also

part of a lively working-class area. Our

aim is to include everyone in our

programming, and make the success of

Flagey a bonus for the whole

neighbourhood.

(Source: http://www.flagey.be)

Programme Friday 8 March, 2013, at Flagey 14:30-16:00 Workshop on artistic audiences

Opening by Barbara Gessler, Head of Culture Unit, EACEA

“Adapting the musical supply to changing audiences” by Michel Hambersin (Université Libre de Bruxelles and Ars Musica)

“Are popular and classical listeners the same people?” by Victor Fenandez-Blanco and Juan Prieto-Rodriguez (Universidad de Oviedo)

“Musiq3 Festival and its audience” by Benoît Jacques de Dixmude (director of Musiq3 radio station)

16:00-16:30 Coffee break 16:30-18:00 Mega-events

“The impact of mega-events” by Beatriz Plaza (University of the Basque Country)

“Some Economics of Music Festivals” by Olivier Gergaud (Bordeaux Management School) and Victor Ginsburgh (ECARES, Brussels)

Saturday March 9, 2013 at Flagey

Do we need contemporary music? 9:30-10:15 “Contemporary music and its lay audience. A tale of benevolent asceticism” by Pierre-Michel Menger (Collège de France, Paris) 10:15-11:00 “Music embedded in the brain. What neuroscience and music can learn from each other” by Sylvie Nozaradan (Institute of NeuroScience, Université Catholique de Louvain) 11:00-11:30 Coffee break

11:30-12:45 Round table on contemporary music Chair: Michel Hambersin (Université Libre de Bruxelles and Ars Musica) Participants:

Tarquin Billet (General Manager, Ars Musica)

Jean-Luc Fafchamps (Composer and Professor, Conservatoire de Mons)

Harry Halbreich (Honorary Professor, Conservatoire de Mons)

Pierre-Michel Menger (Collège de France, Paris)

Sylvie Nozaradan (Institute of NeuroScience, Université Catholique de Louvain)

Record This workshop took place in March and was the third within the PUCK project. The structure of the seminars seems to be established. We started with a half-day session for PUCK members to cover work and administrative issues. At Flagey, on Friday morning, the internal meeting of the project opened with a presentation by Prof. Juan Prieto. He first thanked Victor Ginsburgh and Michel Hambersin and the Ars Musica festival, as hosts of the seminar, for their outstanding organization. Then, he informed the group about the current situation of the project. He specially focused on the reallocation of the original budget needed for the Brussels seminar and how this should be taken into account for future activities. These changes were possible after consulting the project manager. He also informed the group about two new associate partners of the PUCK project: Block T (Dublin, Ireland) and Magma Cultura (Barcelona, Spain). Subsequently, Prof. Roberto Cellini and Prof. Tiziana Cuccia advanced the schedule and the topics to be covered at the Catania seminar (10-11 June 2013): Cultural institutions as multi-product firms (first session) and Cultural production and participation in

peripheral areas (second session). The venue of the meeting is Zo-Centro Culture Contemporanee. We approved the proposal to contact other associate partners with a multiproduct activity in order to participate actively in the Catania seminar. Their presentations would lead to a specific section of the final book dealing with multiproduct cultural institutions. Next, Prof. John O’Hagan outlined the contents of the Dublin seminar (Trinity College Dublin, 20-21 September 2013). This seminar will target how cultural participation is currently measured in Europe, specifically in Italy, Spain and the UK. Finally, we discussed the contents and structure of the final book as the main output of the project. We agreed about the appropriateness of a refereeing process to ensure the quality of the contributions. The book should consist of 20 to 25 chapters grouped in 4-5 sections, each of them linked to the topics covered during the PUCK seminars and the overall objectives of the project. Each chapter will have a maximum of 5,000 words (or 10 to 15 printed pages, including all charts, references etc), targeting a transversal audience and, therefore, technical content should be avoided as much as possible. Miguel Lopez-Remiro, director of Museo Universidad de Navarra, took the opportunity to explain how the building works for the museum are going. Finally, Prof. John O’Hagan reminded us of the need to contract a professional copy-editor and indexer that was not included in the original budget of the project. This could cost around €10,000 he estimated.

After lunch, the Workshop on artistic audiences took place at Studio 2 of Flagey. This free access activity (program above) was opened by Barbara Gessler, Head of Culture Unit EACEA. She spoke about the importance of culture as a cohesion factor in the European Union and the financial and institutional commitment of the European Commission with the sector. She also introduced the new Creative Europe program that will start next year. Subsequently, Michel Hambersin, Victor Fernandez-Blanco and Juan Prieto-Rodriguez discussed the new profiles of music consumers and the relationship between classical and popular music tastes. Benoît Jacques de Dixmude concluded the session when he talked about the Musiq3 festival as a case study. Afterwards, Beatriz Plaza-Inchausti and Victor Ginsburgh presented their analysis on mega events. Prof. Plaza focused on the Guggenheim Bilbao effect and the importance of media in promoting mega events; while Prof. Ginsburgh concentrated on music festivals outlining the main methods to evaluate their economic impact. After the Friday session, most of the members of the PUCK project, including the associate partners, attended the world premiere of La Dispute within the activities of the Ars Musica festival. On Saturday morning, the second session of the PUCK seminar started with the presentation of two external

speakers. First, Pierre-Michel Menger gave a talk about the sociological aspects of the audiences for contemporary music and the difficulties in engaging broader publics. Following thisw, Sylvie Nozaradan spoke, from a neurological perspective, about the relationship between music training and other cognitive abilities. To end the programme, a round table on contemporary music took place. Panelists included Tarquin Billet, Jean-Luc Fafchamps and Harry Halbreich apart from the previous speakers. Each of them talked for about ten minutes posing their views on the importance of contemporary music. A recurrent point was the financial weakness of this creative activity given the problems to reach to new publics. The round table ended with Michel Hambersin’s intervention. He summarized the main conclusionsand brought together the main topics covered during the two-day seminar. During the afternoon, members of the PUCK project had the opportunity to participate in the activities organized by Ars Musica Festival at Fagley to commemorate the centenary of Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of the Spring. The workshop, in terms of attendees’ responses, more than fulfilled our expectations, especially due to the audience’s response and involvement. There were over fifty people attending the seminars and the presentations were followed by lively debates.

Victor A. Ginsburgh Victor A. Ginsburgh was born in Rwanda-Burundi in 1939. He left for Europe to study he was not sure exactly what, and eventually opted for a business degree. For better and not worse, he moved to a Ph.D. in economics, and moved to the economics of the arts some 20 years ago. He is honorary Professor of Economics at Université Libre de Bruxelles, and former co-director of the European Center for Advanced Research in Economics and Statistics (ECARES). He is also a member of the Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE), Université Catholique de Louvain since 1972. He was visitor at Yale University, University of Chicago, University of Virginia, University of Louvain, as well as in Marseilles, Paris, Strasbourg and Alexandria (Egypt).

He wrote and edited a dozen books (among which The Structure of Applied General Equilibrium, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1997, with M. Keyzer, How Many Languages Do We Need, Princeton University Press, 2011 with Shlomo Weber and edited with D. Throsby The Handbook of the Economics of Art and Culture, Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2006). He is the author or co-author of over 180 papers on topics in applied and theoretical economics, including industrial organization, general equilibrium analysis and the economics of art and culture.

Michel Hambersin Doctor in Law and Master in Economics (Université Libre de Bruxelles, ULB) Michel Hambersin is, since 1988, professor at the Faculty of Economics, Political and Social Sciences of the ULB. He joined the Banque Européenne de Crédit in 1974. In 1983, he moved to the International Credits department of Generale de Banque, where he managed the crisis of developing countries international debt. He then became Head of International Risks at the Central Credit Department. He has also been a member of various national and international think-tanks, such as the International Monetary Commission of the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris. Separately from his academic and financial responsibilities, he has been reviewer of classical music (“Revue des disques”, “Harmonie”, “L’Avant Scène Opéra” and “Diapason”) and, since 1982, the musical reviewer of “Le Soir”.

He has contributed to various broadcastings with Musiq3 in Belgium and France Music and Radio Classique in France. He is Chairman of the Belgian Music Press and of the Contemporary Festival Ars Musica. He has organized various colloquiums on culture economics about access to music, symphonic orchestras and contemporary music. He has contributed to various publications of the Belgian Council for Music. He is member of the “Technology and Society” of the Royal Academy of Belgium.

Jean-Luc Fafchamps Jean-Luc Fafchamps teaches musical analysis at the Mons Conservatory. He is a member of the Ensemble Ictus, he participated in numerous projects, both in the field of concert music (creation of works by Lindberg, Reich, Aperghis, Mernier, Leroux, Harada, Francesconi,...) and in the mixed experiences, especially with dance. He won the prize of the Tribune of Young Composers of UNESCO in 1992. First designed for theater and dance (with Theâtre Impopulaire, the company Bonté-Mossoux,...), his compositions gradually shifted to pure music. He was hailed by the International Rostrum Composers of the UNESCO (for Attrition for string octet) and earned him the Octave of Classical Music 2006. His works have been programmed in many international festivals such as Présence (Paris), Ars Musica (Brussels), Vilnius, Nancy, Dijon, Warsaw, Budapest, Venice

Biennale, Sidney, Berlin, Lima, Copenhagen. His works engraved on three monographic cd's on Sub Rosa (Attrition, 1993, Melencholia si ..., 2003 and WDGhZ2SA, a Six-letter Sufi Word, 2012), label for which he also engraved on the piano recordings of Morton Feldman, Berio, Liszt, Dallapicolla, Bowles, Scelsi, ... A disc devoted to his music for small ensembles, ... lines..., was published by Fuga Libera in 2008.

Harry Halbreich Harry Halbreich was born in 1931 in Berlin. He is a Belgian musicologist. He studied with Arthur Honegger and later with Olivier Messiaen at the Paris Conservatoire. From 1970 to 1976 he taught Musical Analysis at the Royal Conservatory in Mons. He worked on numerous radio broadcasts and co-founded the Belgian music magazine Crescendo. He is known for a number of books, articles and studies on modern and contemporary music, including monograph on Olivier Messiaen, Claude Debussy, Arthur Honegger and Bohuslav Martinů. He has prepared musical catalogues of the works of Honegger and Martinů. He assisted Nicolas Bacri in orchestrating Honegger's opera La morte de Sainte Alméenne, originally written in 1918; the new version was premiered in Utrecht on the 50th

anniversary of the composer's death (2005). Halbreich's interest in modern music has led to articles on composers including contemporary music, particularly Spectral music: Horațiu Rădulescu, Iancu Dumitrescu, Ana-Maria Avram, Gérard Grisey and Tristan Murail. But he has also written on composers of the past, including Iannis Xenakis, Giacinto Scelsi, György Ligeti, Edgard Varèse, George Enescu, Maurice Ohana, Ludwig van Beethoven and Johann Sebastian Bach.(Source: Wikipedia)

Pierre-Michel Menger Pierre-Michel Menger is currently senior researcher at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (Paris) and professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales where he teaches sociology of labor and sociology of art and culture. As of September 2013 he was elected as Professor of Sociology at the Collège de France. He also holds a position of Permanent Visiting Professor at the University of Quebec (Canada). He is the author or co-author of fourteen books, and has published numerous articles in journals such as Revue Française de Sociologie, Sociologie du Travail, L’Année Sociologique, Revue Européenne des Sciences Sociales, Annales, Annual Review of Sociology, Poetics. He is currently chief editor of the Revue Française de Sociologie and member of the editorial

board of the Revue Economique, Poetics, and Twentieth Century Music. Publications in English include “Profiles of the Unfinished: Rodin’s Work and the Varities of Incompleteness” in Art from Start to Finish, edited by H.S. Becker, R. Faulkner, B Kirschenblatt-Gimblett, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2006; “Artistic labor markets: Contingent Work, Excess Supply and Occupational Risk Management, in the Handbook of the Economics of Art and Culture, edited by V. Ginsburgh and D. Throsby, Amsterdam, Elsevier, 2006. His research interests include Sociology of art and culture, Sociology of labor markets; Sociology of occupations; economic sociology of careers and competition in higher education.

Sylvie Nozaradan She holds a Masters degree in piano performance and music writing, from the Conservatoire Royal Supérieur de Bruxelles (2005). She also has a medical doctor degree, from the Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL) with a specialization in neurology (2009). Under the co-supervision of Prof. Isabelle Peretz and Prof. André Mouraux (Institute of Neuroscience, UCL), she is writing a PhD in Neuroscience on musical rhythms perception, neuronal entrainment and sensorimotor synchronization. She developed an original approach based on EEG steady-state evoked potentials, to capture the neural mechanisms of beat and meter in the human brain. Through a frequency-tagging approach with steady-state evoked potentials,

she aims to capture the neural mechanisms of beat perception. She explores the specific sensorimotor binding occurring in the context of entrainment at the frequency range of music tempo. She also explores multisensory binding in the context of multisensory beats induction, and the neuronal correlates of this perceptual dynamic integration. She is the author or coauthor of papers published in international journals such as the Journal of Neuroscience, Neuroimage and Neuropsychologia.

This seminar has been funded with support from the European Commission. The opinions

expressed in the presentations reflect the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot

be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.