International Music Council elects Paul Dujardin as new President

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Recipients of the 2013 IMC Musical Rights Awards announced

Three programmes from the Arab region, Latin America and Oceania will receive the 2013 Musical Rights Awards, presented by the International Music Council, an international NGO in official partnership with UNESCO.

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The John Lennon Educational Tour Bus in Bonn

In the frame of the EMC's 40+10 anniversary, the EMC hosted the John Lennon Educational Tour Bus at its office in Bonn, Germany.

The John Lennon Educational Tour Bus is a state-of-the-art audio and HD video recording and production facility. Plans for Lennon Bus Europe have been evolving since the first U.S. Lennon Bus hit the road in 1998 with a mission to provide young people with access to state of the art production studios. Staffed by a crew of three producer/engineers, the Bus is dedicated to providing the young people of Europe with free hands-on opportunities to produce original music, video, photo, game app and broadcast projects reflective of their ideas, values, and creativity.

All projects created on board can be viewed at lennonbus.org, YouTube, and Facebook.

The student recording sessions took place on Monday, September 30th with the Realschule Bonn-Beuel and on Tuesday, October 1st with the Münsterschule Bonn.

IMC joins the Arab Academy of Music in mourning Dr. Ratiba Al-Hefny

The International Music Council has learned with great sorrow about the death of the President of the Arab Academy of Music (League of Arab States), Dr. Ratiba Al-Hefny, on Monday 16 September 2013 following a lengthy illness. We publish below the obituary received from AAM Secretary General Kifah Fakhouri. 

Dr. Al-Hefny will be remembered as a pioneer in the contemporary musical movement of the Arab region. She presided the Arab Academy of Music (AAM) since 1997 and was the first female to hold this prestigious position. In 1993, she joined the Executive Board of the AAM as representative of Egypt and remained until her death.

Her musical career was full of action, creativity, and initiatives. Among the numerous positions she held was the post of Artistic Advisor to the President of Cairo Opera House and the Secretary General and Rapporteur of the annual Arab Music Conference and Festival which she established in 1992. In spite of her severe illness , she successfully organized the last Arab Music Conference and Festival, November 2012. In 1988, she was appointed as the first President of the new Cairo Opera House and stayed in this post until retirement. Before that, she was the Dean of the Egyptian Higher Institute of Arab Music and the Artistic President of the Egyptian Music and Opera House. She took as well a major role in the establishment of the Higher Institute of Musical Arts in Kuwait.

Music circles in Egypt and abroad knew Dr. Al-Hefny as the founder of the first children choir in Egypt . She also established Umm Kulthum Ensemble for Arab Music and Al-Hefny Centre for Musical Studies in memory of her father, Dr. Mahmoud Al-Hefny, the first Arab musicologist.

Furthermore, Dr. Ratiba Al-Hefny was known as a renowned soprano opera singer with a long list of opera appearances in Egypt and worldwide. As a first class media figure, Arab TV viewers knew her through her weekly TV program "With Arab Music" which ran non-top for 22 years.

Dr. Al-Hefny studied opera singing at Munich College of Music and Theatre and Choral Conducting and Vocal Pedagogy in Augsburg College . She completed her post graduate work in Folk Music at Humboldt University.

As an author and music researcher, she left behind quite a number of notable publications.

Few years ago, Egypt honored her by giving her the State Award.

Surely, her death will be a great loss to all those who knew her.

Dr. Kifah Fakhouri
General Secretary
Arab Academy of Music

Symposium de musique africaine au FESPAM 2013

Il s'est tenu à Brazzaville du 15 au 18 juillet 2013, au Palais des Congrès, dans le cadre de la IXe édition du Festival Panafricain de Musique, le Symposium de Musique Africaine sur le thème : « Les musiques africaines, vecteur d'authenticité et facteur d'émergence. » Lire le communiqué final ici.

IMC launches International Music Fellow programme

Paris, 15 February 2013. - The International Music Council (IMC) is pleased to announce the establishment of a new recognition programme: the International Music Fellow.  This programme is designed to honour deserving individuals whilst at the same time supporting the efforts of the International Music Council through a donation. Candidates may be nominated by any individual, group of individuals, organisation, NGO, public authority or private company, which contribute €1,000 or more to the IMC in the name of their candidate.

Guidelines for nomination as well as the nomination form are available on the IMC website. The form requests biographical information as well as a statement regarding the nominee’s commitment to the IMC’s Five Musical Rights. Nominations will be reviewed by the IMC Directorate in consultation with IMC Regional Music Councils. Once a positive decision has been reached, the nominees will be notified of the honour conferred upon them by the donor(s) and the IMC.

New International Music Fellows will be recognized at the IMC World Forum on Music, which is held biennially at different locations around the world. On this occasion, Fellows will receive an International Music Fellow certificate and an honorary pin. As part of a distinctive society within the IMC, International Music Fellows will also be prominently recognized on the IMC website. The name of each Fellow will be inscribed on a commemorative plaque located at the IMC Headquarters in Paris.

Nominations for recognition at the 5th World Forum on Music in Brisbane (21-24 November 2013) should be received on or before 15th August 2013.

“The IMC International Music Fellow programme provides a meaningful way to honour significant individuals and at the same time support the important work of the International Music Council itself.  All of us have been enriched over the years by extraordinary persons who should be recognized for the impact they have made.  I hope that especially our member organisations and their members will take advantage of this unique opportunity to honour them and to sustain the mission of the IMC”, underlines Frans de Ruiter, IMC President.

IMC launches Global Friends initiative

Do you enjoy musical diversity? 

Do you believe that music education should be available for everybody? 

Do you feel that music should play an important role in a country's development?

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IMC welcomes two new National Music Councils

Paris - During its last meeting in Puerto Rico, the IMC Executive Board has decided to admit the Music Council of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (CO.NA.MU.) and the Music Council of Ivory Coast (CONSIM) as IMC's National Music Councils.

These two organisations will join the other 45 National Music Councils which represents IMC and its 5 Music Rights around the globe.

In the admission letter addressed to the two councils, the president of the IMC, Frans de Ruiter, expresses satisfaction and hope for this new collaboration.

The presence of the IMC in Africa, coordinated by the regional group African Music Council, is of strategic significance in the development of partnerships and projects that support music and musicians of the continent.