University of the West of Scotland (UWS) is presenting a unique event, which is aimed at anyone who has a passion for music and wants to develop a music-related business or creative activity, at the Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA) in Glasgow on Wednesday 11 May 2011, 10am-6pm.
Featuring key and emerging figures from across the creative Industries, ‘Music Without Sound’ will combine unique panel and performance events.
The event’s focus is music across all of the creative industries rather than simply ‘the music industry’. At the heart of the event is the creation of an environment that encourages everyone to ‘think again’.
The event will include a panel debate, comprising novelist Christopher Brookmyre, poet Sandy Hutchison and architects Ice Cream Architecture, on music’s influence on creative practice across other art forms from architecture to film, to sculpture.
Other panels on the day will include music’s relationship to hair, fashion and sex; entrepreneurship, technology and death; and therapy, rehabilitation and education. All panels will simultaneously contain an element of creative performance.
This event will provide participants with a taste of the types of topics covered in the University’s popular MA Music: Innovation and Entrepreneurship course – the first course of its kind in the UK.
The postgraduate degree, which was developed in response to the changes in the music industry in recent years and was launched last September, will produce highly-focused individuals immersed in the realities and practicalities of the emerging 21st century music business models.
Many traditional modes of thought in the music sector are quickly becoming obsolete, with larger, institutional processes now being superseded by more technologically democratic ways of conducting business. The rise of the ‘new artist model’ which places emphasis upon commercial autonomy by artists and managers within the music sector has also created the need for the development of a new music business skillset. As a result of these changes there are far greater entrepreneurial opportunities in the music sector and this course aims to produce employers rather than employees.
MA Music: Innovation & Entrepreneurship Programme Leader, Alan McCusker-Thompson of the School of Creative & Cultural Industries is co-ordinating the Music Without Sound event.
He said: ‘ The function of higher education has evolved from simply educating individuals to enable them to pursue traditional professional careers to the development of entrepreneurial capacities that enable students to create their own careers’.
“Developing the capacity to ‘think different’ is at the very heart of our Music Entrepreneurship course, which equips individuals with the skills to pursue any number of careers within the creative industries and beyond.”
As part of the event 100 members of the Scottish musical and creative community are being asked to create unique miniatures which will form a Lilliputian art exhibition exhibited at the CCA.
The canvases will be displayed anonymously and sold at a flat rate, with all proceeds going to Sense Scotland.
Sense Scotland has been working for over 20 years with children and adults who have communication support needs because of deafblindness, sensory impairment, learning and physical disabilities. One of their key areas of expertise is communication. Working closely with people, often on a one-to-one basis, they aim to find out what their aspirations are and how they want to live their lives.
For further information on the University’s Postgraduate MA Music: Innovation & Entrepreneurship email alan.mccusker-thompson@uws.ac.uk or call 01292 886 473
For further information on the Music Without Sound event visit www.musicwithoutsound.co.uk or Call the CCA Box Office on 0141 352 4900 to reserve a place.
