2011 dB CONFERENCE
SEPTEMBER 28TH - 30TH AT FRED WILDLIFE REFUGE
presented by Windows 7
In addition to the festival program, each year Decibel produces a concurrent three-day symposium (dB Conference) that hosts discussion panels, product demonstrations, seminars and workshops. These events, which will be free to the public, serve both as an educational and networking opportunity for some of today's leading-edge artists, students, technologists and industry professionals. The 2010 dB Conference was a resounding success (capacity crowd of over 700 per day). The 2011 dB Conference will once again provide our partners with a platform to showcase emerging technologies, new products, collaborations and ideas. This year's conference is by far out largest program to date and includes 13 panel discussions, 7 workshops and over 50 participants.
Participating partners include Windows 7, Ableton, Serato, Rane, Native Instruments and Dubspot.
Participating artists include Pezzner, Christopher Willits, DJ Rupture, Mike Huckaby, Steve Nalepa, Joro-Boro and more.
Windows will be presenting a full range of conferences and showcases that will focus on what you can do on Windows 7 to enhance your creative musical spirit. Whether you're a DJ running Serato or a Producer working on Pro Tools or Ableton Live, Windows 7 offers Performance, Choice and Simplicity so you can start creating today. Windows believes that creativity is a vital part of the human experience.
The Decibel Festival is a showcase of creativity and expression and Windows is proud to be a Platinum sponsor of the 2011 event.
This year's dB Conference will be held at Fred Wildlife Refuge (see schedule below for details)
For complete and up to date information on the 2011 dB Conference, visit:
http://bit.ly/dBConference
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
WEDNESDAY : Sept 28th at Fred Wildlife Refuge : 12pm - 7pm
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
12pm : PANEL 1 : The History of Electronic Music in Seattle
Way before Sub Pop made a dent in the history of music, electronic music was already showing its seeds in the Seattle scene. This panel features true Seattle veterans that have seen decades of electronic music in Seattle. They'll bring us through the story of the Seattle electronic music scene, year by year sharing a perspective that explains how we got to where we are today.
1pm : PANEL 2 : Navigating Genres: A Hands-On Explanation of Labels And Their Meaning
Ever wanted to articulate the differences between house, tech house and deep house but found yourself at a loss for words? This session will bring you through genre differences along with musical examples.
3pm : PANEL 4 : Youth In Music: The Obstacles and Overcoming Them
So you're young, you can barely (or can't) get into bars, but you still love to make crowds move. How do you start or strengthen your musical career? This youth panel from accomplished DJs under the age of 22 shows you how, and will feature a well known guest moderator to keep the conversation flowing.
4pm : PANEL 5 : Lessons Learned: Running Music Shows, Parties, Events & Conferences In A Digitized World
The magic behind the scenes: Conference organizers from some of the largest music conferences in the world share some of their biggest highs and lows, and share insight on how you can better enjoys shows, festivals and parties in what ever way you want to.
5pm : Workshop 1 : The Rane Sixty Eight in Action - hosted by Shaun Witchner and Zach Stone (Rane - Seattle)
Workshop Description: Rane/Serato experts Shaun Witchner and Zach Stone will be walking you through the ins and outs of the Rane Sixty Eight -DJ Mag’s 2010 Tech Award for the “Ultimate Club DJ Mixer.” The Sixty Eight is the first professional DJ mixer with two USB 2.0 high-speed ports with support for real-time connection of two computers. This workshop with walk attendees through the various features as well has how DJs can work in parallel and/or seamlessly transition from one DJ to another.
6pm : Workshop 2 : Advance Real-time Performance with Serato, Ableton & Reaktor - hosted by DJ Rupture (Windows 7 / Mudd Up! / Soot Records - NYC)
Workshop Description: Rupture's presentation will open with a behind-the-scenes look at the tech and ideas involved in his 3-turntable Serato Scratch DJ set-up. Then he'll demonstrate his rig for concerts with his live band Nettle (their new album will be released on Sub Rosa this month). For Nettle, Rupture uses Ableton, Serato, Reaktor, and a variety of MIDI controllers, as well as taking feeds from violin, cello, and voice for real-time processing.
About the host: DJ /rupture is a Brooklyn-based artist known for dynamic live sets and several critically acclaimed albums such as Uproot and Minesweeper Suite. Rupture has DJ’ed in a band with Norah Jones, done two John Peel Sessions, and was turntable soloist with the 80-member Barcelona Symphony Orchestra. Recent collaborators include guitarist Andy Moor (The Ex) and filmmaker Jem Cohen. He maintains a blog, Mudd Up!, and hosts a weekly radio show on WFMU, which is re-broadcast on several European stations. Rupture maintains a busy international schedule performing in clubs around the world as well as venues such as The Whitney Museum, The Apollo Theater, Pitchfork Festival and Spain’s SONAR.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
THURSDAY : Sept 29th at Fred Wildlife Refuge : 1pm - 7pm
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
1pm : PANEL 6 : Cover Your Ass: 10 Legal and Insurance Music Horror Stories And The Lessons We Can Learn From Them
So, you're touring to another country and a border guard has his hands down your pants? Just lost all of your gear and wondering what to do? If neither of these scenarios appeal to you, come to this session to hear how to avoid the common pitfalls artists can make when touring & performing.
2pm : PANEL 7 : Publicity and Press: How to Present Your Music Effectively for Maximum Exposure
Why do some albums make it to the front page of Pitchfork while others languish in the depths of SoundCloud without so much as a blog post? Learn what the press wants and how to give it to them with tactical instructions plus tips on describing your music.
3pm : PANEL 8 : Social Media in Music: How Do Musicians Benefit From The Large Networks
How do you engage your fans and followers in social media with so many competing voices? Learn from the horses mouth as we hear employees of the largest social network in the world explain how they see their platform being utilized for the benefit of the aspiring or established musician.
4pm : PANEL 9 : The Future of Music Licensing
With licensing trying to keep up with the rate at which music distribution is changing, it’s hard for artists and consumers to understand how they’re being affected. This talk will cover existing issues of licensing, and propose ways in which the industry will need to keep up in order to remain relevant.
5pm : Workshop 3 : Designing Process : Max for Live Workshop - hosted by Christopher Willits (Ableton / Ghostly International - San Francisco)
Workshop Description: Max for Live is a tool kit for building new devices for Ableton Live. Offering unlimited customization potential, Max for Live is backed by an inspired community who share their creations. Christopher Willits will demonstrate live signal processing with Max for Live devices, including some of Christopher's own custom patches.
About the host: Christopher Willits is an artist, musician, guitarist, producer, photographer, and filmmaker all-in-one. Willits occupies a unique corner of the electronic-art-music universe; hovering above the intersection of electronic production’s nuts and bolts, new media art, and a wide-open creative mind. Willits has been instrumental in redefining the guitar in the digital age using custom-built software to morph melodic guitar loops and photo/video experiments into folded rhythms of harmony, memory, color and texture.
6pm : Workshop 4 : Remixing 101 : Remixing in Live From the Ground Up - hosted by Joro Boro (Windows 7 / WNYE 91.5FM - NYC)
Workshop Description: For this workshop Joro-Boro will show how to build a remix in Ableton Live from the ground up. It is intended to be an introductory session with emphasis on workflow - one of the most important aspects of music production. It will include a brief overview of club music beats and tempos and will focus on a particular track beginning with the selection and processing of the samples, building a beat, and concluding with the organization of the track structure
About the host: Joro-Boro is a producer and DJ who promotes entoteck, glitch-folk and post-national bass. He is primarily interested in musical genres that circuit bend the archaic and futuristic and short circuit cultural flows. This aesthetic informs his work resulting in dirty hybrids of local musics: crunk cumbia, capoeira moombahcore, Balkan brass juke, etc. As a DJ, Joro-Boro has performed with Ana Sia, An-Ten-Nae, Balkan Beat Box, Bassnectar, Boban Markovic, David Starfire, DJ Spooky, Filastine, Gogol Bordello, Kraddy, M-1 (Dead Prez), Maga Bo, Marty Party, MC Zulu, Method Man, Omar Souleyman, Prefuse 73, Radiohiro, Tinariwen and others.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
FRIDAY : Sept 30th at Fred Wildlife Refuge : 1pm - 8pm
-------------------------------------------------------------------
1pm : PANEL 10 : Changing Landscapes: How Will The Record Label Look in 2020
The entire music industry is going through a transformation, and record labels need to keep up. As a digitized, cloud-based world begins to take over, come listen to founders of some of the most innovative record labels talk about how their companies will look like in the next decade.
2pm : PANEL 11 : Music-as-a-Service: How The Music Stack Looks In 2011
There are many bits and pieces that make a successful music business, from distribution, marketing/promotion, direct sales and sales channels. This session explores the music stack of 2011 with founders of some of the most successful startups in the business.
3pm : PANEL 12 : Lessons Learned: A Music Startup on Launch Day to Success
When a launch goes better than your wildest dreams, how does it look like? What are the positives, and how do you deal with the flood of inevitable naysayers? We'll learn from one of this year's hottest startups this year, along with a play-by-play from funding, to launch, to pivot, to win.
4pm PANEL 13 : Women Composers and Performers in Music
The democratization of content creation through art (be it a piece of music or a business supporting the industry) through technology should be liberating, but is that just a myth or did it break the glass ceiling? You'll hear the points of view of women who predominantly perform, compose or support the industry in some way in a candid discussion about these topics.
5pm : Workshop 5 : Ableton Live in the Studio - hosted by Professor Steve Nalepa (Dubspot / 1320 - Los Angeles) Workshop Description: This session is about learning Ableton Live by going through the entire process of being an artist, by developing your own sound through a series of sketches and experimentation. You will also learn the ins and outs of this powerful software through a series of exercises designed to help you master the steps involved in producing your own music.
About the host: Los Angeles-based Steve Nalepa is a producer, composer, DJ, professor and mad scientist collector revered in avant-garde circles for his studio alchemy and genre bending. As a professor, Steve has worked with a diverse and talented group of musicians, each with their own unique sound and approach to composing and performing. He’s worked with artists such as Photek, Nosaj Thing, The Glitch Mob, the L.A. Philharmonic and Adam Freeland to help them actualize ideas in Ableton Live. Dubspot is proud to have Professor Nalepa on staff as Curriculum Designer of their Ableton Live program.
6pm : Workshop 6 : Maschine in the Studio - hosted by Mike Huckaby (Dubspot / NI / Deep Transportation / S N Y T H - Detroit) Workshop Description: Watch and learn, as Detroit house producer Mike Huckaby creates a deep house track from scratch within minutes, using only Native Instruments flexible Maschine hardware/software.
About the host: Mike Huckaby is a dance music purist extraordinaire. Being an integral part of the Detroit dance scene, he was the man behind the legendary Record Time store and as such gathered an encyclopedic knowledge of music. Huckaby also produced for labels like Rick Wade’s renowned Harmonie Park outfit, London’s Cross Section or his own ventures Deep Transportation resp. Synth. Apart from his activities as a DJ and producer, he also works as a sound designer and a tutor for the software company Native Instruments, and Ableton teaching Reaktor and Live around the world, as well as for a special Detroit youth foundation project called “YouthVille”.
7pm : Workshop 7 : Remixing 201 : Advance Remixing Techniques - hosted by Dave Pezzner (Windows 7 / Freerange - Seattle)
Workshop Description: You know how to make some basic beats and use loops, but it’s time for something “more”. Here’s the chance to see David Pezzner deconstruct one of his songs live with all the work that goes on in the background. He’ll walk you through it and take questions along the way.
About the host: To all but the most literate of electronic music buffs, Seattle’s Dave Pezzner may seem like a relative newcomer to the house and techno community. His debut Pezzner album, the much heralded ‘The Tracks Are Alive’ dropped on Freerange in 2010, following a spate of releases on the label since 2008. Subsequent releases on Om Records and Urbantorque, as well as remixes for American staple labels Mothership and Ghostly International have projected Pezzner once again on to the worldwide stage.
