Music Hackspace, The MIDI Association and NAMM are excited to announce a stellar jury for this year’s MIDI Innovation Awards. Winners will be decided by a six-person team who, together, bring an unparalleled wealth of experience and expertise to their judgements.
The Jury
Jean-Michel Jarre is a French composer, performer, and record producer known for his pioneering work in electronic music. He gained international acclaim with the 1976 release of his album "Oxygène," which established him as a trailblazer in synthesizer-based music. Throughout his career, Jarre has been recognised for his spectacular live performances, featuring cutting-edge visuals and innovative technology. With over 80 million albums sold worldwide, he continues to inspire new generations of electronic musicians and push the boundaries of the genre. In recent years, Jean-Michel Jarre has continued to explore new sonic territories, collaborating with various artists and utilising emerging technologies, such as virtual reality and 3D audio, to create immersive and groundbreaking musical experiences.
Roger Linn, is an American engineer, musician, and inventor renowned for his innovative electronic music instruments. He founded Linn Electronics in 1979 and introduced the LM-1 Drum Computer, the first drum machine to use digital samples of acoustic drums. In 1984, Linn released the Linn 9000, a pioneering drum machine and MIDI sequencer that influenced the development of the Akai MPC series in the late 1980s. Linn's contributions have earned him a Technical Grammy in 2011 and recognition for shaping the contemporary music landscape. In recent years, Roger Linn has developed the LinnStrument, an expressive MIDI controller which contributed to the definition of MPE.
Nina Richards is both an electronic musician and synth hardware designer based in the UK. Nina has been making electronic music for most of her life, in recent years with modular synths. She designed the electronics hardware for the Stepper Acid sequencer module to scratch a modular performance itch, a unit which can now be found in the Eurorack modular rig of many electronic music artists.
Michele Darling is an accomplished sound designer, composer and educator with a rich background in electronic music and sound creation. As the first ever assistant chair of the Electronic Production and Design Department at Berklee College of Music, she has worked with Emmy Award-winning teams and contributed to notable animated television shows like Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh!. A member of the Ableton sound design team, Darling is also a founding member of Aerostatic and the founder of Girls Like Bass, a New York-based performance collective.
Woodwind virtuoso Pedro Eustache is a composer, lecturer, educator, researcher, and instrument-maker who has carried out extensive academic studies and accrued over 45 years of professional experience. He is a first-call world winds soloist who has performed on over 150 film, TV and video game soundtracks including ‘Dune’, ‘Munich’, ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ and ‘World of Warcraft’. He is also a lifelong explorer of new technologies, and is known for his wind synthesis programming and performances.
Bian Liunian is a Chinese composer, multi-instrumentalist and new Chinese folk music pioneer, known for integrating technology into music production in China. With a career spanning over 30 years, Bian has served as music director for large-scale events, including the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Olympic Games. A champion of MIDI technology, he has contributed to the digital sampling of traditional Chinese instruments and developed patented synchronisation control systems.
The Awards
The competition welcomes entries from a wide range of applications, including but not limited to MIDI instruments, controllers, software, art installations, MIDI peripherals, I/O boxes, lighting systems, automated systems and more, in the following 5 categories:
- Commercial Hardware Products
- Commercial Software Products
- Prototypes and non-commercial hardware products
- Prototypes and non-commercial software products
- Artistic/Visual Project or Installation
The key dates for the MIDI Innovation Awards 2023 are:
- May 23rd: Registrations close
- May 30th: Voting starts
- July 21st: Voting closes, jury deliberation starts
- August 16th: Finalists announced
- September 16th: Live show online – winners revealed
Entering the competition is free, and the registration is open until 23 May 2023. Innovators are invited to submit their entry by visiting the following link:
www.midi.org/innovation-awards
Sound On Sound are proud to be an official Media Partner of this year’s MIDI Innovation Awards. Prize partners who will be showcasing the winner’s products include NAMM, Music China and SynthFest UK.
