26th CHIME CONFERENCE
Sustainability and Chinese Music
University of Music, Drama and Media Hannover, Germany
Center for World Music, University of Hildesheim, Germany
Leibniz-Konfuzius-Institut Hannover e.V. 德国汉诺威莱布尼茨孔子学院
3-6 October 2024

26th CHIME Conference
Sustainability and Chinese Music
University of Music, Drama and Media Hannover, Germany
Center for World Music, University of Hildesheim, Germany
Leibniz-Konfuzius-Institut Hannover e.V. 德国汉诺威莱布尼茨孔子学院
3-6 October 2024
This conference is supported by a ‘zukunft.niedersachsen’ grant from the Ministry of Science and Culture of Lower Saxony
THIS CALL FOR PAPERS IS CLOSED
All speakers have been notified and are registered for the event. Please double-check if your name is on the list of participants. People planning to attend the conference as listeners are kindly asked to register with the conference organizer Du Yongfei (chime.music.info@gmail.com).
Call for Papers
Sustainability and Chinese Music
Urgent contemporary challenges have brought sustainability (可持续性) into sharp focus as a basic concern across musical worlds and research into music and sound. What are the historical and contemporary threats to the vibrancy of traditions and practices in Chinese music (technological, economic, political developments) and how have people acted to secure dynamic futures (heritage work, education, advocacy)? How has Chinese music been affected by the acute climate and environmental crisis, and can it become a potent force for change? Against these backdrops, how do individual musicians and researchers build lasting careers?
We welcome the following forms of proposal engaging with the broad theme of sustainability and Chinese music:
1. Individual paper (20 minutes plus 10 minutes for questions): submit an abstract of max. 250 words
2. Panel sessions of three to four papers: submit a panel abstract of max. 250 words plus abstracts of max. 200 words for each contribution
3. Performances, workshops, film screenings or roundtable discussions: submit an abstract of 250 words; please indicate the length of the contribution.
Abstracts should include name(s), affiliation(s) and contact details of all participants.
The primary languages of our meeting are English and Chinese. We encourage speakers to bring summaries or translations of their presentations to be made available to all conference participants.
The best student paper presented at the conference will be awarded with the CHIME Award, a prize of 500 Euros and (subject to standard procedures of editing and peer review) publication of the finalized version of the paper in the CHIME Journal.
Submission
Please send the information requested to the programme committee at chime@zo.uni-heidelberg.de by 5 May 2024. (Note: this mail address includes ‘Heidelberg’, but the actual meeting will definitely take place in Hannover and Hildesheim.)
Acceptance notifications will be sent by the end of May 2024, along with confirmation of the conference registration fee and other preliminary details.
Programme Committee
Du Yongfei (Chair), University of Music Drama and Media Hannover/Center for World Music – University of Hildesheim
Michael Fuhr, University of Music Drama and Media Hannover/University of Hildesheim
Samuel Horlor, Music Dept, University of Durham, UK
Li Shuqin, Central Conservatory of Music, Beijing, China
Raimund Vogels, Center for World Music – University of Hildesheim
Zhang Boyu, School of Music, Chin Univerity of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, China
You can download the programme here.
You can download the full conference brochure here. Please note: ad hoc changes will only be made to the programme above.




Images: Jin Xiangjing 金祥婧, Hildesheim, Oct. 2024
The CHIME prize for the best student paper presented at the 26th CHIME meeting (on Sustainability in Chinese Music) in Hannover and Hildesheim (3 to 6 October 2024) has been awarded to Li Ziyunfei 李梓芸菲, of the Xinghai Conservatory of Music in Guangdong. Her paper ‘A Home Constructed by Cantonese Opera: A Case Study of Singapore Cantonese Opera Group OperaWorks Singapore’ was awarded for its clarity and its insightful presentation of how Cantonese opera first took hold in Singapore through migration, and then developed among amateur Cantonese opera groups there. In her talk, Li Ziyunfei focused on three successive generations within one artistic family, and how they met the challenges of maintaining their art in a foreign and fairly diverse environment, ultimately successful in building meaningful links between Singapore and China. She showed how her research fitted into wider scholarship on migrant traditions and the Chinese diaspora in Singapore, and argued convincingly that the specific activities of OperaWorks Singapore showcase a clear potential for further development of Cantonese opera among overseas Chinese communities, strengthening local people’s cohesion and sustaining the art.

Jury member Jun Feng (on the left) congratulates Li Ziyunfei.
The CHIME student prize consists of 500 Euros, publication of the research in the CHIME journal, and (as a special extra) free participation and coverage of travel and accommodation in the upcoming edition of Lisbon conferences on Chinese music and musical instruments, in May 2025.
The Jury for this year’s prize consisted of Feng Jun (Music Department at SOAS), who made the announcement, Samuel Horlor (Music Department, Durham University, UK), Frank Kouwenhoven (CHIME Foundation, Leiden, The Netherlands), Annie Li Huan (School of Humanities and Social Sciences, the Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen, PRC) and Yang Kuang-Tze (Institute of Culture and Media Aesthetics, University of Hildesheim, Germany). (FK)