CoMA Contemporary Music for All: The Open Fund for Organisations
Established in 2016 as a national biennial event the Festival of Contemporary Music for All offers an opportunity for music organisations, ensembles and composers to come together in a partnership that represents the whole kaleidoscope of amateur and professional new music makers.
Working together, the aim is to use the Festival as a powerful means of demonstrating a fundamental belief and purpose: that new music is life enhancing and should have a bigger place in peoples lives and the repertoires of the whole range of musical producers, promoters and performers.
This goal is being realised to large degree through a celebration and exploration of CoMA’s unique repertoire, a huge range of commissions for mixed ability and mixed instrument ensembles, and in particular through its trailblazing Open Score project.
This approach lies at the core of the 2020 Festival too with the creation and performance of many new new works including commissions from Kate Whitley, Larry Goves, Tim Parkinson, Cevanne Horrocks-Hopayian, Matthew Sergeant, Joanna Baillie , Sarah Hennies, Lola de la Mata, Blasio Kavuma, Yfat Soul Zisso and Daniel Potter.
In 2018 the Festival took place in 17 UK regions and extended its reach to include partners in Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands. With its focus on participation, the Festival programme of concerts, workshops, seminars, pop-up performances, installations and interventions aims to serve as a catalyst and a challenge for what happens next in new music.