SONIC VISIONS SAYS THANK YOU AND SEE YOU NEXT YEAR!
The Music Conference: A successful 8th edition
With more than 300 delegates from Luxembourg and all over Europe and 50 speakers from 20 different countries, the 8th edition of the Sonic Visions Music Conference has once more been the place to be for music professionals, artists and music aficionados willing to develop and enhance their creative projects.
Introducing for the first time a day entirely dedicated to metal, the conference started on Thursday with the participation of music professionals from e.g. Bloodstock Festival, Wacken Open Air and Dragon Productions.
Nonetheless the conference saw on Friday and Saturday a wide range of topics that were not limited to some specific music genre: More than 15 panel discussions and workshops treated topics such as alternative revenue streams, digital release and promotion strategies for artists, touring, artist management and career development. Mostly discussed from the artist’s point of view, the panels and workshops have given participants the DIY resources they need to understand the fascinating « behind the scenes » world of music and the creative business opportunities linked to it. Highlights of the conference were the keynote speeches by international renowned professionals and experts like music stylist Jesper Gadeberg, the man behind the Jack & Jones and Nick Cave « Made from Cool » campaign with Christopher Walken, Torsten Mewes, Head of Artist and Label Services of Believe Digital Germany, Prof. Udo Dahmen, president of the Popakademie Baden-Württemberg and PledgeMusic CEO and Founder Benji Rodgers.
Important parts of the conference were also workshops covering the information needs of the participating local artists and bands like e.g. “Intermittence du spectacle & artiste professionnel indépendant – the independent professional artist and intermittent entertainment worker” in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture and the numerous networking opportunities with music professionals (labels, bookers, festivals) from the Greater Region and all over Europe.
Saturday saw also the 3rd edition of the VCAs, the Video Clip Awards initiated by Rockhal and Rocklab. The VCAs were born out of nowaday’s stringent necessity to consider video clips more than ever before as an extension of each band’s or artist’s creative universe and as an efficient promotional tool capable of generating potential revenue streams for the artist in an all digital world. They reward the best music videos made in Luxembourg:
Best Music Video (presented by Sacem Luxembourg)
“MKL JKSN” by Mutiny On The Bounty
Director(s): Raoul Henri, Stephen Korytko
Best Upcoming Young Director (presented by the stART-up fund (Oeuvre Nationale de Secours Grande-Duchesse Charlotte))
Raoul Henri & Stephen Korytko
for “MKL JKSN” by Mutiny On The Bounty
Audience Award (presented by RTL & Eldoradio)
“Life Goes On (feat. Maniak) by T the Boss
Director(s): Alphonse Hatz
The Music Festival: Overshadowed by the events in Paris
As the conference part also the first festival day presented a line-up 100% metal: With Scarred, Miles To Perdition and Retrace My Fragments from Luxembourg, Ichor from Trier, Deficiency from near France and international acts Caligula’s Horse (Australia) and Shining (Norway) it was a perfect celebration of this genre.
Friday saw a hand-picked line-up of 15 bands, to name a few: local bands like Seed To Tree, When ‘Airy Met Fairy and Heartbeat Parade played in packed venues, the festival crowd was fascinated by performances from Fickle Friends, Black Box Revelation and Rag ‘N’ Bone Man and Aaron and Death Cab For Cutie proved their status as headlining acts.
As the headliners were playing their sets the messages from the tragic incidents in Paris already reached the festival crowd. It was in the light of these events that it had been decided to continue the next day with the conference part of Sonic Visions but to cancel the festival shows as an act of solidarity with the victims, their families and the people at the Bataclan.
