The 15° episode dedicated to the discovery of Research Centers, Museums and Recording Studios where electronic music in all its forms is studied and practiced. First: Museo del Synt Marchigiano – Italy (here). Second: SMEM Swiss Museum for Electronic Music Instruments – Swiss (here). Third: MESS Melbourne Electronic Sound Studio – Austrialia (here). Fouth: Nakatsugawa Korg Museum – Japan (here). Fifth: Museo della Farfisa – Italy (here). Sixth: VSM Vintage Synthesizer Museum – USA (here). Seventh: CIM: Colloquio di Informatica Musicale XXIII – Italy (here). Eighth: SoundMit – International Synth Event – Italy (here). Nine: EMEAPP – Electronic Music Education and Preservation Project – USA (here). Ten: EMS Elektronmusik Studion – Sverige (here). Eleven: Institute for Computer Music and Sound Technology (ICST) – Swiss (here). Twelve: IEM Institute for Electronic Music and Acoustics, Austria (here). Thirteen: Center for New Music and Audio Technologies (CNMAT) – University of California, Berkeley – USA (here). Fourtheen: Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA) – Stanford – USA (here). Today is the turn of the interview with Rodrigo Sigal, founder and director of Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAS) – Morelia, Mexico. I invite you to read the interview
How did the Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAS) come about?
I started CMMAS in 2005, in Morelia, Mexico. It was an idea I was pursuing since I started my phd in Computer and Electroacustic Music Composition in London, at the end of 90’s. I always wanted to create a place in Mexico that supported working with sound technology so I started looking for founding. Took me about ten years to be able to actually find founding and the idea at the beginning was to create a center that worked with public founds, so artists and students can have access for free to studios and education in music technology, also the center can provide other the institutions like universities, with the space were students can also learn music technology, composition, and everything releated to sound, sound art and electroacustic music without them investing in equipment. A sort of provider of music technology knowledge.
How is it structured?
CMMAS has been changing quite a lot. It grows when we find more founding, and reduces when less founds are available. We need to adapt depending on the support we are able to get.
We work together with the National University of Mexico, UNAM, wich is the bigger university in the contry, we run an undegraduate program in Morelia called ‘Music and Artistic Technology’, and we have been doing that for a few years. The other side of CMMAS is the public part that was funded with support from the Ministry of Culture in Michoacan Morelia, Mexico and the National Center for the Arts. That is why we can have residencies and our programs for kids called ‘Encuentros Sonoros’. Through it we offer public schools to have access to our programs and exploring sound and technology. We also have an area dedicated as a non profit for our annual festival, to publish our journal, to release our cds, books, and everything available through our main web site, including our online educational platform called cmmas+
What equipment does the CMMAS Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras have?
We have a lot of equipment, we have multiple composition studios. You can see the details online where we have a list of equipment; basically we have two main compositions studios with eight channell sound sistems and with video capability. We have a multichannel auditorium with a nice piano were people can also compose or where we do our weekly Friday concerts. We have two 8 channel classrooms and we also have computers with a plenty of instruments. I would say that we have a very well equipment institution with excellent acoustic design that may be one of the best in Latin America.
What can you do at the CMMAS Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras?
We have different areas: we have permanent residency program where artists from all over the world come for work at the studio and of course we have to concert space for concerts. We have programs with Quebec, the UK, France, USA, Ibermusicas and many other funding bodies to support artists traveling to create new work at CMMAS. Also people can study form the undegraduate up to a doctorate and postdoc in our joint program with UNAM.
We also have a journal, that it’s called ‘Sonic Ideas’, people can participate to our festival ‘Visiones Sonoras’ in september. All is available at www.cmmas.org.
We offer an online diploma at www.cmmas.com and we also have a e-store, with plenty of free books, cds. So at CMMAS people can go and work, people can do research and we have audience coming every friday for our concerts. We are always open to new ideas and proposals by artists from all over the world.
Is it possible to do research at the CMMAS Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras?
We have residency, were we can also accept musicologists, performers, and people doing research, we have many people doing residencies. We have an archive called “Arcervo” wich is the archive of all the research and projects people have done in CMMAS in 20 years.
Is the CMMAS Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras on social media?
Yes we have our Instagram, Twitter, our Facebook pages, we have a website where you can see all our activities, industries, social media platforms…the web site is the best way to get to know CMMAS.
Does the CMMAS Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras care for the issue of gender in Electronic Music? And in Mexican Musical Culture?
Gender is something that many institutions all over the world are now taking in more into account. We belong to the ministry of culture of Mexico through the National Center For the Arts and because we work quite closely with the National Autonomous University of Mexico we have been developing programs that you can see on a our website. We work hard to offer diverse opportunities and be as inclusive as possible. We also have a lot of pieces created by women composers from Mexico, we have a couple of the very nice concerts on line curated by external artists that present interesting female composers in Mexico and Latin America. We still have a lot to improve but we try to listen so we can adapt as fast as possible.
What is your relationship with the Mexican government?
The Mexican Centre for Music and Sonic Arts (CMMAS) was created in 2006 in the City of Morelia, as the public institution aimed to promote, research and foster sound and music using new technologies. This came as a result of almost 20 years of investment growth in culture at a national level.
The Centre was response by the Ministry of Culture to the very active community of young and established artists working in the field of new music, computer music and sound art. It was created in September 2006 with the support of the National Council for Culture and Arts (CONACULTA), today Federal Secretary of Culture, through the National Center of Arts (CENART) and the Secretary of Culture of the State of Michoacán (SECUM). Today the Centre is a non-profit organization and a unique technological-musical space in Latin America.
Is the CMMAS Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras open to collaborations with institutions, associations, research centres?
If you go to our website you have list of about fifteen to twenty universities and institutions all over the world with whom we have a permanent exchanges. We have staff and students from Equador, from Argentina, from Costa Rica, from United States, a couple of university from Quebec in Canada, from the Uk and we have special project with Japan, with South Africa, with Spain, and also Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, we are working at now and we have a lot of exchange with multiple institutions in Mexico.
Ongoing projects and future projects?
In terms of projects CMMAS is a place that is constantly receiving artists proposals. In the website you can see who is working with us and an archive with all the previous residences. On september 24th we will be presenting the twenty anniversary festival ‘Visiones Sonoras’ where we showcase most of the work done recently at CMMAS. As members of the staff we are working in projects in Austria, the United States, (now I’m working in the university of New Mexico for a with a Fullbright grant), so to be honest the thing that I want to share with you is CMMAS is a very diverse and dynamic center.
Link: Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAS) Home Page
Link: Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAS) Facebook Page
Link: Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAS) Twitter Profile
Link: Centro Mexicano para la Música y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAS) Instagram Profile
