ESHCC hosts international conference on music: 'We Want More: Music / Sociology!’

In 2014, Rotterdam Popular Music Studies was a rather vanilla affair between Julian Schaap and Pauwke Berkers. Yet, something was brewing. Thomas Calkins – just out of his PhD – was attending and trying to have every single Dutch person sign a Shocking Blue record. Yosha Wijngaarden, a starting PhD student, snuck into the conference without paying the fee in true Holland Pop festival-style. Over the last twelve years, RPMS has a grown from a quarrelling couple into a proper family of more than 40 people, including members from other (Dutch) universities. They obviously wanted more.

The “We Want More: Music / Sociology!” conference was preceded by a Young Scholars workshop (hosted by Codarts Rotterdam and IASPM Benelux), where fifteen talented young (PhD) students received feedback on their work from senior scholars, exchanged ideas about a ‘good’ academic career, and received publishing advice by a co-editor of Poetics. In the evening, we opened the conference at Katoenhuis with a strong programme, including AI Robots on Stage (hosted by Thunderboom Records and Yosha Wijngaarden), a talk on utopian daydreaming, a panel From Dusk to Dawn: Social Justice in Night Spaces (hosted by Kristina Kolbe, Timo Koren and Miguel Neiva), and Julian Schaap announced the plan to launch their very own diamond open-access journal Sociology of Music.

The main conference was held 9 and 10 April with the tagline: No Gods, No Masters, No Keynotes. In two days, 140 attendees listened to 89 presentations by academics from leading research institutions from across the world as well as researchers from our friends at Keychange, Live DMA, Boekmanstichting, and Podiumkunst.net. Topics ranged from key complexity features of music ecosystems to the meaning of vinyl, from a comparative frame analysis of music internationalisation policies to Italo-disco’s post-ironisation, from music-based reform programs in India's correctional homes to usages of music for mood regulation, from the gendered working experiences of women stage managers to pluriversal pedagogy in the Planet Rap Project, and from protest music and the processes of affective polarisation to women strip club das Promoters and clout boosters. 

The evening programme – put together by music industry alumnus Frank Kimenai with support of Popunie – brought together the best what Rotterdam has to offer in terms of music. Petrecere Proletare started the evening with a manele cassette set (honestly, they need some practice), followed by Cinema Colombiana duo Mucha Doombia. Former Arts and Culture Studies colleague Juan Campos Escobar played some classic cumbia tunes. Rotterdam’s loudest – Bombstrap – tore the place down at this sold-out evening. ESHCC alumna Krismika closed the night with an electro set. We want more!