2025 Call for Works

Updated 4 November 2024

Announcing the 2025 New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival

June 22-28, 2025

The New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival is now accepting submissions for its festival in June, 2025.  Now in its thirteenth year, NYCEMF is the largest annual showcase of electroacoustic music in New York City, and one of the largest festivals of its kind in the world. Full details are posted on our website, www.nycemf.org. 

Call for Works

This call is open to all composers and performers regardless of nationality, age, career state, style, or area of expertise.

All submissions must be entered online in the Conference Management Toolkit.

Music and Video

Composers or performers are invited to submit works in any style of electroacoustic music in any the following categories:

  • Electronic music for fixed media alone, with up to 16 channels of sound.
  • Works involving live electronics, including computer processing, laptop orchestras, or live coding, with up to 8 channels.
  • Works combining musical instruments or voice with live or fixed media electronics, with up to 8 channels.
  • Video and multimedia works with up to 8 channels
  1. This call is open to all composers and performers regardless of nationality, age, career stage, style, or area of expertise. Individuals may submit one or two works, provided that one submission is six minutes or less. Individuals may also submit a proposal for an installation, curated concert, or other track (paper or installation). Works of any length may be submitted, but, for practical reasons, we are more likely to be able to include shorter works than longer ones.  Any works longer than 20 minutes in duration must be submitted as part of a curated concert proposal.  Only one work per composer will be selected unless the submissions are part of a curated concert.
  2. Works in progress will be considered if a substantial portion of the work is complete. The accepted work cannot exceed the duration indicated at the time of submission, and the final versions cannot be substantially different from the work submitted.
  3. Both audio and video works must be submitted in compressed formats.  Multichannel works must be submitted as high-quality stereo mixes.
  4. Works involving instrumentalists are welcome, but if the submitter is unable to provide the performer(s), additional costs per performer will be incurred.
  5. Performers (artists who are not the composer of the work) may submit up to two works with the agreement that they will play them if selected.  If a performer wishes to submit more works, he or she may choose to propose a curated concert.
  6. A work is eligible to be submitted only if it has not been performed at a previous NYCEMF concert.
  7. Works must be submitted online through the Conference Management Toolkit (CMT).
  8. All submissions should be anonymous. Please make sure that no artist markings are recognizable. Works that are not anonymous will not be disqualified, however.
  9. The organizers will provide in each performance space a mixing console, speaker system, microphones, cables, and a computer and audio interface for the playback of fixed media audio/video. Composers of interactive works will be responsible for providing their own computer, audio interface, and any specialized peripherals.

Performers

The featured performers for NYCEMF 2025 will be cellist Madeleine Shapiro, clarinet and tarogató player Esther Lamneck, violinist Maja Cerar, clarinetist Marianne Gythfeldt, percussionist Patti Cudd, saxophonist Enzo Filippetti, flutist Beatrix Wagner, pianist Shiau-uen Ding, and soprano Eleonora Claps.

Instruments

Instruments can be rented, but we cannot provide ethnic, exotic, or Asian instruments. Any large instruments that need to be rented, such as harp, marimba, or vibraphone, will require an additional fee for rental and cartage.

Multichannel Works

All performance spaces will be equipped with at least eight loudspeakers in surround sound configuration.  We will also have a 16-channel performance space. Nevertheless, submitters of 16 channel works should be prepared to provide an 8-channel version if necessary. Stereo works can be diffused at the mixing console. Speaker configurations will be fixed and cannot be moved for individual works.

Curated Concerts

Proposals are also invited for the presentation half of a two-hour concert, not to exceed 54 minutes in duration of music. These concerts represent an opportunity for someone to put together an entire concert consisting of works of their choice. The concert may be organized around a composer, theme or idea, and it may include works of historical importance as well as more recent works. A performer may also propose a concert that he or she will play.

Timeline

Submission deadline: January 15, 2025.

Submission fee: none.

Anticipated notification date: March 15, 2025

Review of Submissions

All submissions will be subject to peer review.

Post-review

Final audio and video files must be submitted by May 15, 2025.

Papers

We encourage the submission of papers on research topics including but not limited to the following areas:

  • 3D Audio
  •  Acoustic Ecology
  • Acoustics of Music
  • Acoustics, Space, and Sound Distribution
  • Aesthetics, Theory, History and Philosophy
  • Algorithmic Composition
  • Analysis of Electroacoustic Music
  • AR & VR
  • Archiving & Preservation of Electro-acoustic Music
  • Artificial Intelligence and Music
  • Computational Musicology
  • Composition Systems and Techniques
  • Digital Audio Signal Processing and Audio Effects
  • Distributed, Telematic, and Mobile Music
  • History of Electroacoustic Music
  • Improvisation and Technology
  • Languages for Computer Music
  • Live Coding
  • Mathematical Music Theory
  • Music Education
  • Music Information Retrieval
  • New Interfaces for Musical Expression
  • Notation and Scores
  • Perception and Cognition
  • Piece plus Paper Presentations
  • Software and Hardware Systems
  • Sonification
  • Sound Synthesis
  • Studio Reports
  1. The call is open to all researchers regardless of nationality, age or career stage or area of expertise.
  2. Formats include long papers (4-6 pages) or short papers (4 pages) with optional demos.
  3. Works presented at previous NYCEMF events are not allowed unless significantly changed.
  4. All works must be submitted online as a PDF file through the Conference Management Toolkit (CMT).
  5. All submissions should be anonymous: please make sure that no author names are recognizable. Works that are not anonymous will not be disqualified, however.
  6. The reviews are anonymous: once accepted, camera-ready papers will need to include all author names.
  7. For conference presentations and publication proceedings, at least one author or co-author must register. A presenter only needs to register once if he or she will present more than one work at the festival.

Timeline

Submission deadline: January 15, 2025

Submission fee: none.

Anticipated notification date: March 15, 2025

Review

All submissions will be subject to peer review.

Post-review

Following notification of acceptance, authors will be requested to submit their camera-ready PDF files by May 15, 2025.

Installations

We invite submissions of installation works for exhibition at the conference.  Categories include but are not limited to:

  • Audience Participation Installations
  • Data-driven Installations
  • Happenings
  • Interactive Installations
  • Multimedia Installations
  • Performance-based installations
  1. The call is open to all artists/composers regardless of nationality, age or career stage.
  2. Works presented at previous NYCEMF events are not allowed unless significantly changed.
  3. Works must be submitted online, through the Conference Management Toolkit (CMT).
  4. Submissions should be anonymous: please make sure that no artist markings are recognizable. Works that are not anonymous will not be disqualified, however.
  5. For conference presentations, the artist or at least one of the collaborators must register. A presenter needs to register only once if making more than one presentation in different categories.  All necessary installation equipment must be provided by the artist.

Review of Works

Submissions will be subject to peer review.

Timeline

Submission deadline: January 15, 2025

Submission fee: none.

Anticipated notification date: March 15, 2025

Participation and Fees

Accepted works will require a registration fee: approximately $325. In addition, if you require NYCEMF to provide performers, there will be an additional fee of $150 each. This fee also applies if you require large instruments like harp, marimba or vibraphone. 

For a curated concert the registration fee will be approximately $850. 

Students will receive a 50% discount of the registration fees. In order to qualify for this, the student will be required to submit a copy of a student ID card that is valid for 2025.

Payment is required for all persons whose works are accepted. This fee covers free admission to all events at the festival. Attendance is not required, but even if persons submitting do not attend, the fee must still be paid. Submitters whose works are selected are required to confirm participation in the Festival by May 1, 2025.