eFlash! 2005-11

Assemblée générale annuelle 2005 Annual General Meeting

Report For AGM 2005

The CEC Board:

President: Ian Stewart (2004-2006)
Vice-President: Laurie Radford (2004-2006)
Secretary: Jean Routhier (2004-2006)
Treasurer: Mark Hanneson (2004-2006)
Members-at-Large: Kevin Austin (1998-2006), Nicolas Basques (2001-2005), Pierre Alexandre Tremblay (2004-2006)

As most members will know, there have been some important changes to CEC personnel over the past year. Ian Chuprun, who ran all of the CEC's successful projects for almost a decade, has stepped down as Special Projects Manager. On behalf of the board, I wish to extend a sincere thank you to Ian for his invaluable work on behalf of the Canadian and international electroacoustic community. I also wish to welcome jef chippewa who will be taking over the administration of CEC projects. Fortunately, the transition has been almost seamless, and jef's vision and energy should prove very positive for the CEC. jef and I have discussed CEC development at length, and in particular we are looking into making the CEC's web resources more accessible and user-friendly.

I also wish to congratulate CEC Vice-President Laurie Radford, who has taken up a new lectureship at City University, London, and CEC board member Pierre Alexandre Tremblay, new lecturer at the University of Huddersfield.

Despite all of these changes, the CEC has had another productive and eventful year. To report on the CEC's projects:

eContact

eContact continues to receive support from the Canada Council for the Arts, publishing section, and four issues are planned for this year. Edition 8.1, our annual Jeu de temps profile, is already on site, and there will also be issues on Women in Electroacoustics, Educational Resources, and the 2005 Harvest Moon Symposium.

Jeu de temps/Times Play 2005

The 2005 Jeu de temps project is now available online. Congratulations to James Duhamel, whose work 'Le Radeau' was selected first prize winner by the international jury. This year again features many interesting and innovative pieces by young and emerging Canadian artists. I am grateful to all who donated their time and expertise to serve on the jury, and to all the composers who participated. The Cache 2005 CD should be available in the new year, and will be sent to all paid members.

Sonus

Sonus now includes almost 1600 pieces. Further Sonus developments, in particular the gallery and profile section, have proceeded more slowly than anticipated, in part because of the volunteer time required. Katharine Norman has prepared a wonderful gallery which is available in the Curators section of Sonus, and further galleries will be added. I intend to make Sonus improvements a priority in the coming months, and we are actively exploring funding opportunities to further develop the site.

Funding

The CEC's funding for eContact (from the Canada Council for the Arts, publishing section) has been renewed again this year. In addition, the CEC has received a core funding grant from the SOCAN Foundation for the second straight year. The CEC's application to the CCO Partnership Funding scheme to archive historically important Canadian EA works, which was shortlisted for final round consideration, was not successful because the government discontinued the funding programme. The CEC is grateful to the Canada Council for the Arts and the SOCAN Foundation for their invaluable support.

Upcoming Projects

There are a few areas the CEC intends to explore in the near future:
For the past two years, the ISCM Canadian Section has requested that the CEC select an electroacoustic work as part of the official Canadian selection for the ISCM World Music Days. This came about as part of an overhaul of the selection process. Prior to 2004, a jury was convened annually to select works; in the new system, selected works are either chosen by national associations or by juries in composition competitions. The CEC intends to review the new process to assess whether it is beneficial to Canadian electroacoustic composers, and further, to introduce a more formal mechanism for selecting a Canadian electroacoustic work.

Discussion continues about planning a national CEC conference. The board is exploring ways to produce a conference which will not only bring together Canadian EA practitioners from across the country, but also bring together artists, listeners, educators and researchers from the broad spectrum of EA, from sound art to acousmatics to live improv to microsound and beyond.

Finally, considering the rate of development of the Internet as a whole, it may be a fruitful time to review the CEC's webpages. Yves Gigon and jef have already begun working to make information in eContact more accessible and readable, and jef and I have discussed design and navigation issues with the site as a whole. The CEC's production team, PeP, has recently expanded to include new web and design specialists, and I am hopeful that PeP will be able to look into these questions in the near future, in order to make the wealth of information on the CEC website more useful to the wider electroacoustic community.

With my very best wishes,

Ian Stewart
President of the CEC Board