NewAud – developing audiences for new music in Europe

About NewAud

Contemporary music is often characterized by a quest to meet its audience in new ways. The music frequently incorporates other art forms such as performance, video or lighting design. It is played not only in traditional concert halls but also in other – an often unusual – venues. Sometimes the musicians enter into a direct dialogue with the audience, and sometimes the concert form is as much a work of art as the scores performed.

NewAud focuses on the way that contemporary music and audience meet. The aim of NewAud is to test and demonstrate the future concert formats of contemporary music in a direct cooperation between music ensembles from 17 countries.

NewAud is a network consisting of 31 ensembles, composers’ associations, music information centres and rights associations. With support of the Cultural Programme of the EU the network was formed in 2012, and for two years the ensembles in the network worked closely together on developing new concert formats, discussing and finding solutions to the many challenges they met on the way.

Audience engagement was the core of the two-year project and the ensembles dealt with many different aspects of audience engagement; music for children, trying out new venues, working with online media, the social context of the concert and more. You can read more about the different themes and the learning gained here and you can read the final project evaluation report here.

The 31 ensembles, counting some of Europe's most talented musicians, engaged in more than 60 concerts, prepared in close artistic collaboration between the ensembles when they met in workshops twice a year throughout the project. The learning and experience gained in the project is available on this website to everyone with an interest in audience engagement.

NewAud is - in a nutshell - a learning and experience project, but it is also a living, active and growing network of European ensembles and music institution all with a passion for contemporary music and the way that the music meets an audience.