My wife Heidi (who speaks fluent French) and I are considering the possibility of moving to France. For that to work for me, since I am active in electroacoustic music as a composer, a software developer, and an organizer, I need to live near some electroacoustic music activity. That includes places where composers live, places with degrees in electroacoustic composition or music technology, and places with festivals and other venues for this kind of thing.
So, I’d appreciate anybody taking a few minutes to mention where such activity can be found in France. In fact, I’d also be interested in Portugal, Spain, or Italy.
Last I heard from Miller Puckette he was moving to Paris to work at IRCAM again.
Also, in Porto (and Aveiro) there is a thriving community where I have several contacts.
My wife Heidi (who speaks fluent French) and I are considering the possibility of moving to France. For that to work for me, since I am active in electroacoustic music as a composer, a software developer, and an organizer, I need to live near some electroacoustic music activity. That includes places where composers live, places with degrees in electroacoustic composition or music technology, and places with festivals and other venues for this kind of thing.
So, I’d appreciate anybody taking a few minutes to mention where such activity can be found in France. In fact, I’d also be interested in Portugal, Spain, or Italy.
France is very centralised. Bascially, most of the French life is in Paris (with the two poles of Ircam and Grm, the cradle of musique concrète). Miller Puckette just moved to Ircam after retiring from San Diego, in order to continue his development projects around PD in an intellectually stimulating environment (not that Miller needs any stimulation, he has so many directions he can develop alone…:-)!
In both centres, however, it will be hard to find a secure source of income. You might contact, at Ircam, Jean-Louis Giavitto (the developer of the language Antescofo) and ask for possibilities for someone like you (Jean-Louis.Giavitto@ircam.fr). Ircam is, however, not csound friendly (I’m probably the only person connected with Ircam that is using csound regularly).
There are other interesting places (that were mentioned, Lyon and Marseille, they both have a fesitval, and I would add Strasbourg (HEAR). The procedure, according to me, is the same one: find a name (on the website of the institution) and contact him or her.
Finally, there are many very small entities disseminated around the whole country, that deal with electronic music. But they are often built around one name and are probably too small and isolated, I believe.
I hope these lines might help. Good luck (and, if you come to Paris, hope to see you…!).
Marco
Thanks to everyone who responded to my questions about computer music in France. I should have mentioned that Heidi and I are both retired, and don’t need to look for jobs.
One possible advantage of especially Lyon: I think there is a direct train route to Barcelona, and thence to University Pompeu Fabra. They have significant history of activity in computer music, dsp, etc. They hosted ICMC back in 2005 or so. Of course, hot climate down there, which has to be taken into consideration. Catalonia especially is under ongoing water stress from droughts etc, which will only worsen over the years.
Richard Dobson
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My wife Heidi who speaks fluent French and I are considering the
possibility of moving to France. For that to work for me, since I am
active in electroacoustic music as a composer, a software developer,
and an organizer, I need to live near some electroacoustic music
activity. That includes places where composers live, places with
degrees in electroacoustic composition or music technology, and
places with festivals and other venues for this kind of thing.
So, I’d appreciate anybody taking a few minutes to mention where
such activity can be found in France. In fact, I’d also be
interested in Portugal, Spain, or Italy.