Organizers of music events may apply for next year operational grants from the Swedish Arts Council until 16 October 2014. Deadline for applications are 24:00 hours on 16/10. The Association of Swedish Music Festivals urge music festivals to apply. In January 2014, the Arts Council distributed SEK 28 million in operational grants to 67 organizations. Seven received operational support for the first time and 6 of them were festivals.
Lund Choral Festival - a biennial event - opens for the fifth time its doors to the largest choral festival in Sweden! A week containing more than 30 concerts, emphasizing the art form of choral singing, while gaining advantage from choral singing as a popular movement. " UPPBROTT", a tribute to Britt G Hallqvist on the occasion of her 100th anniversary, composed by Johan Magnus Sjöberg - a festival commission - opens Lund Choral Festival 2014. The Festival Artist is Kjell Lönnå.
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21-27 March 2015: apply until 31 October 2014! Are you part of the next generation of artistic festival directors? Do you want to broaden your programming skills and be inspired by colleagues and experienced leaders in the field? Do you want to join a new network of future festival leaders worldwide? |
While Alice Bah-Kuhnke becomes the new Minister for Culture and Democracy in Sweden, it is clear that Hungary's Tibor Navracsics will not be accepted by the European Parliament's Committee on Culture.
- I do not want to risk ending up in a situation like the one Orbán [Viktor Orbán, Hungarian Prime Minister] described the other day. He said that "now that our Navracsic get this portfolio, we will be able to more or less export Hungarian policies on the EU level." This should of course not happen, says Cecilia Wikström, Swedish MEP to Swedish Radio.
EFFE – Europe for Festivals, Festivals for Europe - is a new international festival platform in the making looking to connect festivals that are deeply committed to the arts and their communities. Launched by the European Festivals Association (EFA), the new pilot project of the European Commission opened a European-wide application process to gather interested festivals. The most innovative arts festivals are selected for the EFFE Festival Label and Award.
The Dalhalla Opera Festival makes a magnificent comeback 2015. The festival stages their own version of Turandot by Puccini with none other than Nina Stemme in the lead role. This year the Dalhalla Opera Festival got their dates stolen and could not stage any production. In 2015 they return with acclaim. The well known set designer Bengt Gomér direct and do the set design for Turandot and Bente Rolandsdotter creates the costumes. Tobias Ringborg conducts a full-scale orchestra compriced of the two orchestras: Dala Sinfonietta and Gävle Symphony Orchestra. Congratulation!
The Association of Swedish Music festivals have, during spring and early summer, launched a new target document. The document describes the background to the changes, the vision, goals and a plan of activities for the coming years. To attract more music festivals, but eventually also festivals with other art forms SMF halved its membership fee from 2015 onwards. The measure is designed to broaden the base, but it also underline the festival format as a crucial carrier of art now and in the future.
The collaboration between the Association of Swedish Music Festivals and the Swedish Society of Composers started as a trial project 2013. With the support of STIMs Promotionnämnd a number of festivals, artists and composer have also this year recieved support to programme new Swedish music on festivals. 2014 some 12 productions/concerts on 9 different festivals participate in the collaboration. The project is greatly appreciated by festivals, performes and composer. And we hope it will have a future in the coming years.
The Director of Swedish Music Festivals, Jan Ove Hafstad, held yesterday - August 14th - yet another presentation on the European Study of Festivals: FESTudy, this time with emphasis on the festival audience. The study is based on data from 390 European festivals during 2008-2011, that was published in Lille, Kortrijk and Tournai in November 2013.
The presentation took place in an open conference at the House of Culture in Stockholm, organised by INTERCULT in collaboration with the Stockholm Fringe Fest. The conference is part of the EU-project RIVERS OF OPPORTUNITIES.
