Symposium 2024 – New Roles for Concert Halls in a Technologised Society

Prof. Dr. Gesa Birnkraut studied business administration, cultural management and completed her doctorate on the topic of „Volunteering in cultural institutions in comparison with the USA and Germany“. She holds a professorship for strategic management in the non-profit sector at Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences and is the managing partner of the cultural consultancy BIRNKRAUT|Consulting and the chairwoman of the board of the Institut für Kulturkonzepte Hamburg e.V.. She is deputy chairwoman of the board of trustees of the kulturpalast Hamburg Foundation. She is also a member of the scientific network of the Federal Competence Center for Culture and Creative Industries. Her research and consulting focuses on the topics of evaluation and impact measurement and volunteer management.

Dr. Carsten Brosda is Senator for Culture and Media of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg and Chairman of the Cultural Forum of Social Democrats. He has also been Co-Chairman of the Media and Network Policy Commission of the SPD Party Executive Committee since 2018 and President of the German Stage Association since the end of 2020. He studied journalism and politics at the University of Dortmund and regularly publishes on socio-political topics. His most recent book „Mehr Zuversicht wagen“ was published by Hoffmann und Campe in 2023.

Immersed in the Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality ecosystem since 2012, Laurent Chrétien is an expert in the new applications of immersive technologies and the metaverse. He is an engineer from the École Polytechnique, the École des Ponts et Chaussées, and the Escuela de Caminos Canales y Puertos. For ten years, he served as the director of the Laval Virtual association, which organized the first European VR/AR exhibition. In July 2022, he left the association to establish Komodal: a service and consulting company specializing in virtual worlds and the metaverse. The agency provides its expertise to organizations aiming to position themselves in the future metaverse and use virtual worlds in a meaningful and effective manner. Komodal offers comprehensive and tailor-made support by authentically deploying the best services for appropriating, investing, gathering, working, and learning through virtual worlds.

Born in 1958, Lothar Dittmer studied History, German Language & Literature and Educational Science at Hamburg University, after which he received his doctorate in History. He was Assistant Professor and Deputy Director at Biggesee Political Academy from 1989 to 1994. Since 1994 Lothar Dittmer has worked for the Körber-Stiftung, since 2008 as a Board Member and since 2015 as Chairman of the Board. He is among others also Chairman of the Board of the Herbert and Elsbeth Weichmann Foundation, a Member of the Foundation Board of the German Children and Youth Foundation and a Member of the Advisory Council of the Association of German Foundations.

Asya Fateyeva, born in Crimea, is an award-winning saxophonist who presents a wide repertoire from baroque to jazz and world music in innovative projects. She performs worldwide with renowned orchestras and musicians, including the German Symphony Orchestra Berlin and the Moscow Virtuosi. In 2014, she became the first woman to reach the final of the International Adolphe Sax Competition in Belgium. Fateyeva teaches classical saxophone at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg and the Musikhochschule Lübeck.

Beat Fehlmann has been the director of the German State Philharmonic of Rhineland-Palatinate in Ludwigshafen since September 2018. The Swiss native previously held the position of artistic director for the Southwest German Philharmonic in Konstanz, following roles with the Chamber Philharmonic of Graubünden and the Philharmonie der Nationen. Beat Fehlmann holds degrees in clarinet, conducting, and composition from music conservatories, as well as an Executive Master in Arts Administration from the University of Zurich. Since 2020, he has also been teaching orchestral management at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Frankfurt. In 2022, he was honored with the Cultural Prize of German Orchestras for his innovative contributions, and in 2023, he received the Innovation Prize.

Ashley Fell is a social researcher, TEDx speaker and Director of Advisory at the Australian agency McCrindle. She is the author of books on generational knowledge and leadership and host of the McCrindle podcast The Future Report. Ashley Fell guides and analyses national research study and delivers talks and training on Generation Alpha, the impact of modern technologies, demographic shifts and global megatrends in different industries.

Stefan Göllner is the Innovation Manager at the KI-Campus. After studying Communication Design, he gained experience at prestigious institutions such as the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, the Technical University, and the University of the Arts Berlin. As a freelance consultant, he worked on European R+D projects and was involved in the BMWi program Mittelstand Digital. Since 2016, he has been the founder of place/making Berlin, advocating for the open use of civil society data.
At the KI-Campus, he leads the AI ExpertLabs in the fields of Medicine, Industry 4.0, and Entrepreneurship. Göllner shapes communication formats and creates interfaces between the community team, learning offerings, and product development.

Diana Huth is a psychologist and media producer with over 20 years of moderation experience. She is the managing director of the digital learning platform ACTitude, which offers psychological online courses. Diana Huth is also the host of the podcast „Artificial Intelligence and Music“ for the Körber Foundation.

Dr. Jasmina Idler, Community Manager at the KI-Campus Hub in Baden-Württemberg, studied Musicology, Medieval History, and Romance Philology in Freiburg and Bologna. Her preference for forward-thinking concepts led her to the Bavarian State Library, the State Archives of Baden-Württemberg, and as a digital coach for integrating digital elements into teaching at the University of Hohenheim.
At the KI-Campus, she coordinates networking and visibility for the Baden-Württemberg Hub. Her responsibilities include the development and implementation of regional events and programs. Through various formats, she promotes information exchange and cooperative relationships with regional stakeholders for creative collaboration.

Franz Krämer (*1986) works as a PostDoc at the Chair of Education with a focus on culture and aesthetic education at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. Since January 2024, he has been researching in the metaproject of the BMBF funding priority „Cultural Education in Times of Social Transformation“, before that he worked for the metaproject of the BMBF funding priority „Research on Digitalisation in Cultural Education“. From 2018 to 2020, he headed a diversity education project in Munich. His interests lie at the intersection of education, digitalisation and digitality with close links to cultural education and the implicit education of adults within digitalised everyday worlds.

Born in London in 1994, Robert Laidlow read Music at Cambridge University before studying Composition with David Sawer at the Royal Academy of Music. From 2018-22 he was the RNCM PRiSM (Centre for Practice & Research in Science & Music) PhD Researcher in Artificial Intelligence with the BBC Philharmonic. This resulted in a number of orchestral and ensemble works, including ‘Warp’ for piano and orchestra and ‘Three Entistatios’ for chamber ensemble. He is currently a Fellow at Jesus College, Oxford University. Recent publications have focussed on notions of truth, authenticity, fakeness, bias, and structuralism in technology and music. He also lectures in Composition at the Faculty of Music, Oxford, is an Associate of RNCM PRiSM, and is a member of the Governing Body of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Rebecca Leger conducts research on human-AI interaction and works as a consultant to the division management at the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits. Since 2021, she has been one of the organizers of the AI Song Contest, an international music competition for human-AI co-creation, and serves as one of the directors of the associated foundation. Together with the Elbjazz Festival, she launched the annual jazzKI Award in 2023 to give AI projects a stage, especially in jazz.

Dr. Britta Leusing is the Deputy Head of the KI-Campus at the Stifterverband Berlin. She studied International Management at Europa-Universität Flensburg and completed her doctorate in 2013 on the topic of Academic Franchising. As an expert, she held positions, among others, at the German Rectors’ Conference (Hochschulrektorenkonferenz) and the German Council of Science and Humanities (Wissenschaftsrat). From 2012 to 2021, she served as Chancellor at various private universities. Her journey into AI began as a project manager at the „Regional Future Center North“ with the goal of making AI accessible to small and medium-sized enterprises.
At the KI-Campus, her main focuses are on community management and establishing the regional hub in Baden-Württemberg as part of the emerging AI ecosystem in the Innovation Park for AI (Ipai) there.

Christoph Lieben-Seutter is General Director of the Elbphilharmonie and the Laeiszhalle in Hamburg. Born in Vienna in 1964, he initially worked in the computer industry for several years after graduating from high school until Alexander Pereira hired him at the Vienna Konzerthaus in 1988. After a stint at the Zurich Opera House, he took over the management of the Wiener Konzerthausgesellschaft and the Wien Modern Festival in 1996. In 2007, he moved to Hamburg to prepare the operation of the Elbphilharmonie. Since its opening in 2017, it has quickly become a cultural landmark. With a diverse and top-class concert programme in over 1,200 events per season in the Elbphilharmonie and Laeiszhalle as well as a uniquely extensive music education programme, Hamburg has sustainably positioned itself in the premier league of international music cities.

Ronald Lowijs gained his knowledge and experience from various positions in the fields of organizational development and HRM.

His motivation is to keep people and organizations future-proof.

Over 25 years he has been working as a consultant in the consultancy world and the last ten years in various positions within SPOT Groningen.

Together with the general director of SPOT he is the founder of CrossWise. This is a program line in which four knowledge institutions (education) and SPOT work on future-proof organization(s) and a well-connected labor market for the cultural sector.

Seán McFadden is a recent graduate with honours at the Technical University of Munich in the Elite-Master’s programme for Neuroengineering. His background is in theoretical physics, where he worked in the areas of machine learning, as well as astrophysics of black holes. Throughout his academic career, Seán has spent time as a research intern at the Center for Future of Intelligence (now part of the Cambridge Institute for Humanity and Technology) and the Cambridge Psychometrics Centre (Leading in Deep Learning applied to user data). He also ran the TUM documentary production „Neurofutures“ and recently founded the startup Ontoworks which develops generative AI-based solutions to enable artists to visualise and animate their music productions.

Maurice Mersinger is the Creative Director and Head of Production at kling klang klong. This award-winning creative studio combines sound and code to craft auditory experiences for artistic projects and commissioned works. Comprising a high-performance team of composers, sound designers, creative thinkers, scientists, and technologists, kling klang klong is driven by the passion to explore new avenues to touch and move people through the impact of sound.

As a result, kling klang klong designs and shapes narratives within the realm of sound scenography and new media art. The works of this creative studio can be found internationally in real and virtual environments, art spaces, museums, and events.

Federico Rinaldi believes that the arts are the best way to promote social progress. He comes from the Mediterranean region, is European and speaks seven languages. Before taking over the management of ECHO (European Concert Hall Organisation), he developed audience-centred music projects for the audience engagement department at BOZAR. He was coordinator of the European Early Music Network and led the European expansion of the Early Music Centre of the Fondazione Ghislieri. Federico holds Master’s degrees (with honours) from the London School of Economics, Sciences Po Paris, University of Pavia and has extensive musical training in piano, cello, voice and as a choral and orchestral conductor.

Matt Robinson is an internationally touring Community Musician who has worked with a vast array of people: orchestras, young people in poverty, emerging artists, refugees, culture ministers, concert halls, teachers, and more. He has worked in one of the first Community Music projects in Hong Kong and co-created an inclusive music performance for Norwegian children that now tours internationally.
Now Matt leads the Community Music Team at Konzerthaus Dortmund – the first community music team and programme in Germany, working with thousands of people every year from every walk of life under the motto “Musik für Alle”.

Sebó is a musician, singer, rapper, author and speaker from Hamburg. The father of two is currently on tour with children’s songs from his current album „Schokkoli & Brokolade“. As a pop and soul artist, he has already performed on many stages in Germany and abroad. Since 2003, he has been successfully giving songwriting workshops in schools (alcohol prevention, language promotion, etc.) and other settings around the world. Whether early musical education, projects with young people or adults, Sebó has connections everywhere. This also applies to the „WORD UP!“ rap course, which takes place regularly under his direction at the Jugendkunsthaus Esche in Altona. A save space for young, creative and open-minded people who want to further develop their own creativity and exchange ideas under the motto „Each One Teach One“. As part of WORD UP, Sebó got to know Oscar Whyman, whose project they are presenting at TAOME 2024.

Journalist Andrea Thilo studied communication at the University of Arts in Berlin. After a traineeship with the NDR, she worked as a reporter, editor, and host for ARD and private TV channels. Following her award-winning work as a documentary producer (among other things of RHYTHM IS IT!), she is now working as a freelance journalist, host, and trainer, in particular in the areas of education and culture mediation, sustainability, and digital transformation.

Sebastian Trump is an Assistant Professor of Artificial Creativity and Music Interaction at Nuremberg University of Music. He studied saxophone at Nuremberg University of Music Nuremberg and Sound Studies at the University of the Arts Berlin, earning his doctorate in evolutionary algorithms as an improvisation model. His digital musical instrument, Orphion, garnered global interest and was exhibited at venues such as the Media Museum of ZKM Karlsruhe (2012) and the Canadian Science and Technology Museum in Ottawa (2013). He conducts research at the intersections of technology and performance, with a particular focus on musical human-machine interaction and collaborative creativity

Johannes Voit is Professor of Music Education and Music Mediation at Bielefeld University, where he heads the interdisciplinary Master’s degree program in Cultural Education. He previously worked as a freelance musician and music educator, as a music education officer at the Cologne Philharmonic Orchestra and as a junior professor at the Karlsruhe University of Education and the Max Reger Institute. He develops educational projects on behalf of renowned concert halls, festivals and ensembles and was awarded the Junge Ohren Prize in 2015. He is co-founder of the „Forum Musikvermittlung an Hochschulen und Universitäten“ and editor of the publication series „Forum Musikvermittlung – Perspektiven aus Forschung und Praxis“ published by transcript-Verlag

Oscar Whyman does not speak in the usual sense. Born with a rare muscle disease, the 21-year-old from Hamburg is now in a wheelchair and is on a ventilator. However, as he still has a lot to say, he has found another way to communicate. Whymann has been speaking with the help of a speech computer since he was a small child. He attended a school specialising in physical and motor development, which even integrated training on the speech computer as part of the curriculum. Here Whymann also learnt to program new words on the speech computer and quickly became completely independent in his use of the software. He now takes on the role of teacher himself and supports other people with this life-changing technology. Together with Sebó, Oscar Whyman tells TAOME about his experiences in the music project WORD UP.

Portrait XO (she/they) is an independent researcher and transdisciplinary artist. Recently awarded jazzki award by ELBJAZZ (June 2023), she’s been recognized over the years for her work in sonic innovation with AI audio pioneers Dadabots. They won ‘Best Experiment’ award at VUT Indie Awards 2021, and Eurovision AI Song Contest Jury Vote for ‘most creative use of AI’ in 2020. Her development into AI audiovisual art evolved through several artist residencies. She researches computational creativity, human-machine collaboration, and explores new formats & applications for forward-thinking art and sound. To expand the community of sound artists and creative technologists, she founded SOUND OBSESSED – sonic innovation archive, celebrating the journey and milestones of new innovation in sound.

Prof. Sandra Wachter, Oxford Internet Institute, Oxford University. Research: AI, Big Data ethics, platform regulation, profiling, robotics and governmental surveillance. She leads the Governance of Emerging Technologies Program that investigates legal, ethical, and technical aspects of AI, machine learning, and other emerging technologies. Wachter is a policy advisor at the global level, working at the World Economic Forum, Harvard, UNESCO and numerous other institutions. Her awards include O2RB Excellence in Impact, Privacy Law Scholar, CognitionX Outstanding Achievements and numerous others.

Cathy Wilkinson, Deputy Head of Artistic Planning at HamburgMusik, is responsible for a planning department that covers everything from chamber music to organ recitals, from up-and-coming artists to jazz, world music and electronic music. She finds selected artists and programmes for the Blind Date concerts in the Elbphilharmonie.