The annual conference of the Irish International Council for Traditional Music (ICTM) will take place at the University of Ulster’s Derry campus on 18–20 February. This will be the first time the conference has been held in Northern Ireland. With over twenty scholarly papers on Irish traditional music, the conference will focus on the theme of ‘listening’.

The conference’s keynote speaker will be Thomas Turino, a professor of musicology and anthropology at the University of Illinois. Author of the book Music as Social Life: the Politics of Participation, Turino has previously conducted extensive research into the musical culture of Zimbabwe. Other contributors to the keynote event include Dr Suzel Reilly from Queen’s University, Belfast, and Dr Caroline Bithell from the University of Manchester.

www.ictm.ie