May 6-10, 2025

Oregon Bach Festival Musicking Conference:
Culturally Informed Performance Practices

The Oregon Bach Festival is happy to present the tenth annual Musicking Conference, “Musicking: Culturally Informed Performance Practices,” to be held in person at the University of Oregon School of Music and Dance on Tuesday, May 6 through Saturday, May 10, 2025. The 2025 conference will bring together research, education, and performance by considering performance practice studies through a cultural lens, related to the theme, “Resonant Alliances: Sound as Collaboration.” What role do partnerships and collaboration play in the creation of musical artifacts, music composition, and performance? How do partnerships enable or inhibit creativity? What power structures are at play? How does collaboration enforce or subvert social hierarchies?

This year’s conference will feature a residency with celebrated vocal and instrumental ensemble Cappella Artemisia, who explores the musical world of women in 16th- and 17th-century Italian convents. Cappella Artemisia’s residency will include lectures, rehearsals, and masterclasses that will be open to conference participants and the public. The 2025 Conference will also feature lecture-recitals and academic papers presented by selected scholars from our call for proposals in relation to this year’s theme.

 

 

 

“Holy cow! What an amazing performance to be a part of after an incredible week of learning about performance practice. The Musicking Conference this year at the UO completely changed how I thought of the conductor’s role, as well as the performance of early Renaissance polyphony. Topped off by a rhetorically informed and extremely musical rendition of Mozart’s Requiem, how it would’ve been performed in the 19th century, with the choir in front of the orchestra. My mind is blown.”

– Evan Miles, 2018 Musicking Conference Participant