Call for applications: Mophradat residency programme in Berlin

Artists are required to work collaboratively with the Berlin-based Ensemble Adapter on new work to be presented at MaerzMusik festival in 2024. The residency, which takes place in Berlin and remotely, offers the musician and Ensemble Adapter flexibility as they work together, encouraging innovative creation processes beyond the borders of notation and conventional presentation formats, as well as engagement with experimental and dialogical approaches to artistic work.

The invited resident will receive a monthly stipend for four-and-a-half months for the period in which they are in residence and conceiving a new work with Ensemble Adapter.

With the support of German Academic Exchange Service DAAD, the festival will host the resident in Berlin for two working sessions with the ensemble from 15 November to 15 December in 2023 and 1 February to 25 March in 2024. The musician will be provided with a living and working space in Berlin during their on-site stays, access to various studios and sites, and be introduced to peers in the city. The residency will also cover the costs of return economy travel for both trips, visa, and travel insurance, and the festival will provide the composer with a fee for the commission and concert.

Specific eligibility criteria

• Applicants must be composers from or living in the Arab world.
• Applicants must have at least five years of professional work experience in the field of music and/or composition locally and/or internationally.
• Applicants must primarily engage with artistic concerns and aim towards high artistic merit.
• Applicants must be interested in research into forms of compositional modality, including developing new notation systems, experimental dialogical music composition processes, and experimental participatory actions with the audience.

Process

• The resident will be selected by Mophradat in collaboration with MaerzMusik.
• All applicants, whether selected or not, will receive a response to their applications by 1 September 2023.
• Due to the high volume of applications received and the confidentiality of the selection process, Mophradat cannot provide individual feedback explaining the reason an application was not selected.
• Upon selection, the resident will sign separate contracts with Mophradat and MaerzMusik.
• A narrative summary of what was achieved must be submitted to Mophradat within two weeks of the end of the residency.

Application

• In order to prepare the application, applicants should check out the questions here.
• Applicants can apply here before 23 July.
• Any material sent by email will not be considered.
• All applicants, whether selected or not, will receive a response to their applications by 1 September 2023.

Based in Berlin, Ensemble Adapter is an experimental music group led by its founders Matthias Engler (percussion) and Gunnhildur Einarsdóttir (harp). Treating music as a contemporary art form, Ensemble Adapter creates, curates, produces, workshops, and performs – both onstage and online, and focuses on collaborative work with partners of various artistic backgrounds worldwide. 

Founded in 2002 by Berliner Festspiele, MaerzMusik is a festival interested in challenging the traditional dichotomy often found between “composer” and “implementer” to create a more deconstructed space of co-authoring processes of conceiving an artistic work. The festival’s programming encourages interdisciplinary approaches and cross-pollination of artistic practices that engage with and beyond the body, technology and form. It also focuses on developing new creative strategies that engage with participatory processes with the audience, questioning habitual listening and inviting new ways of experiencing music.

View the original call here.