+ What does “Call For______” mean?

During a conversation about redesigning the open call process with the new music community, there was a desire to humanize the process and focus on the process of collaboration with artists. We also want to move away from possible restricting identifiers such as composer, improviser, sound artist, performer, etc., understanding that many creative artists work across and in-between these markers. And so...the blank is for you to decide! This is meant to be open and inclusive to proposals, ideas, sketches, etc. that relate to creating a new work with the Ensemble.

+ What if I live outside of NYC and Minnesota?

Please apply! We are welcoming applications from all geographic locations. Two of the selected artists must come from New York City or Minnesota as per Jerome Foundation guidelines.

+ I’m from NYC or Minnesota, but due to COVID I’m living elsewhere. Am I eligible?

Yes. Please indicate clearly if a) you plan to move back to NYC or Minnesota or b) you’ve moved permanently. This will not disqualify you from applying – it will simply help us understand if you’re eligible for the Jerome Foundation-funded commission.

+ Who is an “early-career” artist?

According to the Jerome Foundation, early-career artists “typically have a track record of generating and publicly presenting full work over which they have ultimate creative control in the discipline in which they are applying, but are not yet at a point in their careers where they receive consistent development and production opportunities and significant recognition, awards, and acclaim.” This category does not relate to an artist’s age.

+ How many artists will be accepted? How many people outside of NYC and Minnesota?

This is an annual open call alongside our fundraising efforts for commissions. Depending on funding, we expect to commission 3-5 artists per year, including the 2 through the Jerome Foundation who come from New York City or Minnesota.

+ Could you help and give direction on how to write a good artistic statement?

What we're looking for is your distinctive creative voice in the artistic statements. What is it that motivates you to create and how might that manifest in a collaboration with us? It’s not a specific proposal. What is the way that you've always wanted to collaborate but never have been able to? How does that define your goals as an artist? Aim it more toward goals and aspirations, than anything else. The biography is where you can speak to your experiences. The artist statement might be places where you speak to what you'd like to do as an artist.

+ Is this for artists only if they compose?

What we mean by artists here are people who make work in sound. We’re trying to be as broad and inclusive as possible. If you find yourself creating an expressive work in sound, and you would like collaborators, then this is the right thing for you to apply to. So names that people sort of put in their byline is not as important to us, but sometimes that means you might be a composer, a performer, a sound artist, a performance artist, people for whom sound is their precious medium, but also interdisciplinary artists who work in sound and other things are welcome as well.
We don't want to prescribe the traditional practice of composing as the only person to whom we're inviting. So instead, if you are a performer, and you have always wanted to compose this might be a place for you. If you are a performer who works in devised work like devised theatre (so you want to create a project in real time with the artists, without scores) that’s great! The whole purpose of this is that every artist should feel welcome in this process, because so many artists have felt unwelcome despite not considering themselves a capital "C" composer. But also those composers are welcome too!
We welcome people from lots of different disciplines and affiliations with artistic craft.

+ How about multimedia projects, like for example, a person who creates sound pieces that are designed with video in mind?

Love it. We have several people in our Ensemble who create visual media in the temporal way – filmmakers, visual artists – and we have an entire collaborative group, a collective called the digitice media team, who are filmmakers and video artists in and of themselves specializing in projection design. So that can be another aspect of your work.

+ If I’m applying as an artist collective, does each person get $4,000 or is it $4,000 for the group? How should we fill out the form? How large can the artist collective be?

$4,000 for the group or artist. Please note collaborators in the bio field. You may also submit three separate proposals – each individual + collective proposal. If you have a project you’re especially interested in working on with us and a larger collective, please email us at icicle@iceorg.org to discuss.

+ What instrumentation can I write for?

The Ensemble members focus on the following instruments. Many also have multi-disciplinary, electro-acoustic, and intermedia practices.
voice, flute, clarinet, oboe, saxophone, bassoon, horn, trumpet, trombone, tuba, guitar, percussion, harp, piano, violin, viola, violoncello, double bass, electronics

+ What is the timeline for working with the Ensemble? When/where will my work be premiered?

The precise timeline is created collaboratively with the artist and the Ensemble production team but the goal is to workshop, compose/create, and realize/perform/record these works between April 2021 and September of 2022.

+ What is the COVID plan for developing and performing new works?

COVID may alter the workshopping process to an online collaboration platform such as Zoom and Sonobus. It may restrict travel possibilities. Similarly, the performance may become an audio-video livestream if a live audience premiere isn’t possible.

+ If I submitted my work in previous icecommons calls for scores, will my work be considered again this time?

Yes! All work samples carry forward from one year to the next. Your most recent submissions will be considered your most representative. Feel free to resubmit if you have any questions or doubts as the icecommons database is still under construction.

+ Can I apply for the "Call For ___" program and Ensemble Evolution with the same form?

You can apply for both (and be accepted for both) but you have to complete both forms separately.

+ I am filling out the form in one language but my work samples (scores) are in a different language – will this be an issue for review by the panel?

No. Please fill out the form/submit work samples in any language that best works for you. Works will be assessed on the work itself, not on the language they are in. For example, if the score is in Spanish, the review panel will be able to have a translation.

+ What work samples should I include?

Which ones represent where you'd like to go? Which ones would you like to have our help in expanding or our collaboration to realize in a more expanded way or over a longer period of time? The list goes on for the reasons why you might be interested in that. So specifically, these fields are not for project proposals. But they could be for partially completed work. So you have a sketch, something you're not quite done with, but you are really excited about, feel free to share a screen capture of it or a sound sample of it. Project proposals are not required in this application.

+ What if your work samples no longer indicate where you’re going because your artistry is experiencing a paradigm shift or new inspiration? Most of my work samples have web links. Do we have to submit the original format?

We would love to know about your goals in an artistic paradigm shift. If possible, please describe those in your artist statement. Your work samples can be submitted as a link and be accompanied by any explanatory text at that same link; public or private.

+ Can the work samples be of completed works that I just want performed live? And are the work samples what I want performed or any other?

The work samples are just examples of your working process. They aren't necessarily the art works that we might be performing later, they are works that we will become aware of and then consider for future programming. But we're looking for these work samples as a kind of example of the kind of work that you would like to do and the kind of work you'd like to expand with our collaboration and help.

+ Is there a length limitation to the work submissions? How do you judge works that have a long slow build or form in the application process?

No, it's a link. So if you want to submit a link to a perpetual infinite drone for soundscape, we welcome that as well. So anywhere between one second of sound and infinite seconds of sound, welcome.

Please feel free to describe that in the submission form in regaard to works that have a have a long, slow build or form. What we recommend is to make a note of that for listeners in the SoundCloud entry or you submit a google document with a link to a SoundCloud entry that says, “pay specific attention to the development that happens over this period of time.”

+ Are midi work samples looked down upon as a substitute for live performance?

No, they are not looked down upon.

+ Can I submit work samples where I am a co-creator, not the sole creator? Can I send collaborations with other musicians to show my process?

Yes and yes.

+ What is the scope/scale of a $4,000 commission for the International Contemporary Ensemble?

For us, a $4,000 commission is a solo piece with electronics, about 12 minutes long or less. It could also mean that a $4,000 commission is for an instrumental duo. And maybe you are one of the players in that duo, around seven to nine minutes in length. Anything larger in scale than that will be a larger commission.

+ What makes someone successfully stand out to you?

What we're looking for specifically, is ultimately going to be adjudicated by a panel of members and outside panels. So it might shift from year to year. We advise the panel to look for artists who have a distinctive voice, and for whom a collaboration with the International Contemporary Ensemble would expand their artistry. That's what we're looking for. So the projects that stand out really speak to that – a really distinctive artistic voice and for whom this would be really valuable experience.

+ For artists outside the U.S., will the Ensemble offer any travel and lodging funding outside of the commission fee?

Yes, but not for several visits. Instead, we'll do a lot of our work remotely. We try to reserve as many resources for artists fees, and not so much for logistics. To that end we have built a really robust way of collaborating remotely. And it's been quite successful.

+ Can the whole 18 month collaboration process be made remotely? Not only due to the pandemic, but also for any other “life happens” circumstances?

Yes, definitely.

+ Since you are looking to expand forms and possibilities of collaboration I wonder how you appoint the panel that eventually decides on who is chosen?

The panel will be artists, practitioners, who at least come from a performer/composer background, and some of them will have interdisciplinary experiences as well. That's true of our panelists last year from the outside and the inside of our group included video artists and filmmakers, electro acoustic musicians, and also the composers Marcos Balter and Wang Lu, both of whom work in interdisciplinary projects. Those were the outside panelists last time.

+ How do you accommodate artists whose work takes time to grow in your application process?

For this particular process, that time to grow is only limited by this rough 18 month guideline, it's not a restriction. So if something needs further time to grow, it might not be this particular project where we collaborate, but something further down the road. So for example, working with Tyshawn Sorey, back in 2012, wrote pieces over that span of a year or so. And then we've also done projects with Tyshawn that spanned several years. So it's really about meeting in this way and then expanding for future projects.

+ Are projects that are by-design meant to be performed remotely of interest, or is there a requirement that the work happen in a specific location? How about installations?

No requirement. Diving into both of those things – one location specific or site determined work. So in other words, the venue, and you write specifically for the acoustic properties, the spatial properties, the layout of the audience. The other is digital site specificity, which means we're writing work that is created digitally and it's performed digitally. We're looking for proposals and are here as collaborators to work in both of those realms.

Regarding installations and site-specific works, it will be something that needs to be scaled and we need to think about how we'd work together to translate the concept of that site specificity into a site that is a part of our relationships with venues. Other examples are works that have outdoor performance for a digital performance practice. So we welcome all of those, you can get specific if you'd like in your submission in your application. But again, the specificity will come by way of conversation with the Ensemble after the selection.

+ Is it okay to bring in a narrative/theatrical component — i.e. avant-garde performers, puppet-makers, opera singers?

Yes, there will be a scale at some point. However, this isn't a project to create a full opera with a librettist, scene designer, and production and stage managers. That's not what these projects are going to scale to be. That being said, we'd love to hear about it! If you have a specific idea, we can talk through it. And maybe that's just something that gets produced through a different mechanism of our organization.

+ Do you have committed venues/concerts that would limit what kind of submissions would/wouldn’t work?

We're not going to let the venue limit that so much. We scale projects to different venues in partnership with the artists. So no matter what venue you have in mind, as you're dreaming, and being creative, there's a way that we can help make it work with venues that are part of our big network of partnerships in New York City and beyond. And similarly, working in a recording studio, to realize the work for an album is a venue that we can always work on.

+ Is the application review limited to the information and materials included in the form or will there be other evaluations made (website, media, name recognition, etc.)?

There is an opportunity for you to put your website and or social media handles into the application. It's not the primary point of adjudication as we don't want to limit this to only people who have a web presence, but nevertheless you can add it and it will be taken under consideration.

+ Is it appropriate to propose a piece for a specific ensemble member?

You absolute may, no problem. We just can't necessarily guarantee the timeline, because then it becomes a process of mutual availability and working with that specific person to realize the work on the timeline that makes sense for them, but that sounds totally doable. We don't have control over any individual’s schedule, so we'll just work together on that.

+ Can you elaborate on what you listed as support for instrument design? Would that also include helping instrument construction or is that just a sort of design process?

In many cases it's a combination of fabrication by the composer themselves, or by members of our staff/team, and artists. Ultimately, we don't want the limit of your creativity to stop at instruments of the orchestra. But if you have an idea for modifying instruments or creating something from scratch – Sabrina Schroeder and Ashley Fure’s projects have had really substantial fabrication related to them – sometimes that means that the scale of the project has to increase and so we have to work together to also raise more money for the project, but we're not afraid of doing that.

+ Can you elaborate about receiving “Production, scenographic, lighting, video, and instrument-design support” - Does that mean collaborating with other artists from those fields? Does it mean that the commissioned artist has to come up with visual ideas?

There's no obligation to create a visual component to your work. First, if you decide you'd like to do that but you don't know the artists we can help to try and find that person. It's not necessarily the case that every project should have that. We don't, for example, add visual layers to the projects just for superficial reasons. But if it 's core to your work, the projection design or lighting design, then we'll support that in our group in the collective of our 36 musicians and artists. There are already people working in visual media, lighting design, sound electronics, and instrument design.