The Red Bull Music Academy will host its next month-long music workshop and festival series in Montreal in autumn of 2016. This will be the Academy’s 18th edition and first full return to Canada since Toronto hosted it in 2007. Applications for the Red Bull Music Academy will open globally on Jan. 18 and close March 7.
A global institution committed to fostering creativity in music, the Red Bull Music Academy has touched down in a different host city every year since 1998, bringing together a mindfully selected group of producers, vocalists, beatmakers, instrumentalists and DJs from around the world. They attend intimate lecture sessions with pioneering figures of the music world, and collaborate on music with them and with each other in a state-of-the-art studio environment. By night, the Academy presents a month-long festival of curated signature concerts and parties held in the city’s cult venues, cultural institutions and off-the-radar spaces, each showcasing a different element of the host city’s unique musical and cultural identity.
Exchange between genres and generations has always been central to programming, and former lecturers and performers have included everyone from Bob Moog, Brian Eno, Nile Rodgers, Steve Reich and Kim Gordon to Giorgio Moroder, Erykah Badu, Bootsy Collins, MF DOOM, Richie Hawtin, Tony Allen, Q-Tip, Sly & Robbie, Chuck D, M.I.A., James Murphy and Moodymann. Many Academy alumni have gone on to become leading forces in their fields, among them Flying Lotus, Hudson Mohawke, Nina Kraviz, Evian Christ, Mumdance, Natalia Lafourcade, Jamie Woon, Katy B and Jackmaster.
Why Montreal?
The city of Montreal has been at the epicenter of Canadian artistic experimentalism for decades. With a rich history rooted in disco, jazz, folk, hip hop and techno, Montreal is celebrated as a breeding ground for developing and sustaining the sounds of influential artists like Oscar Peterson, Leonard Cohen, Rufus Wainwright and Arcade Fire. Its multilingual makeup and multicultural vitality supports a thriving art scene, leading-edge contributions in video game design and animation, and fine filmmakers in the world. The city's unique architecture and diverse industrial landscape lends itself to many different forms of creativity and self-expression. A sprawling multitude of festivals, exhibitions, community gatherings and distinct neighborhoods have long cultivated and celebrated the city's thirst for expression and experimentation—and the Red Bull Music Academy team is proud to add its own curatorial voice to the choir.
Canada’s Red Bull Music Academy Legacy
The Red Bull Music Academy makes its first full return to Canada since the 2007 edition in Toronto. Over the past nine years, the Academy has taken on various shapes and sizes throughout the country. Through two annual Red Bull Music Academy Bass Camp programs in Montreal since 2014 (a weekend-long regional Academy edition), it has enabled dozens of Canadian artists to work alongside global music legends over extended weekend-long programs. More than 15 lectures and workshops have taken place across the country, alongside over 25 Red Bull Music Academy concerts and public events over recent years. Since 2012, the Academy has been joining forces yearly with Montreal’s leading electronic music festival MUTEK.
Canadian alumni of past Red Bull Music Academy editions include Lunice, Sinjin Hawke, Ango, Ekali, Exeter, Poirier and HomeSick.
Application Process
Starting Jan. 18, music makers from across the globe are invited to apply for the 2016 Red Bull Music Academy in Montreal. The application form can be downloaded from the Academy website, and must be mailed in by March 7, along with a CD of recorded material by each applicant. The Red Bull Music Academy jury will then select a group of participants from the submitted applications.
Since the 2015 Red Bull Music Academy in Paris was cut short due to the devastating events that took place in the city on Nov. 13, the 30 participants selected for the second term in Paris will join 40 newly-selected participants in Montreal. That means the total number of participants in Montreal will add up to 70, instead of the usual 60.
For more information, visit redbullmusicacademy.com.
