News
Feedback Loop: Critical Studies in Improvisation Student Exhibition
Beginning April 9th, Silence will be locked in a Feedback Loop, a two-month installation and soundscape created in partnership with the University of Guelph’s 2021-2022 Critical Studies In Improvisation class. Feedback Loop begins on Market Day, April 9 at Silence, 46 Essex Street. Doors open at 11:00. Artists from the Critical Studies in Improvisation program present a live collaborative performance…
New Publication: Genetic Choir’s “The House of Song and Sound”
The multi-national vocal improvisation group Genetic Choir is proud to announce the release of a new publication: The House of Song and Sound: The Stem & Luister Method. This booklet provides insights into a project, started by Genetic Choir, that involves using improvisation as a tool in the context of working with people with verbal disabilities, including…
New Book: “From Fruit to Root”
IICSI is proud to announce the publication of a new book from our partners at Onassis Foundation! From Fruit to Root, Medea Electronique’s Interactive Archive of New Media Art is available as a free download on the Onassis website. This eBook focuses on the theory and practice behind the creation of the Medea Electronique digital…
Welcoming our new Project Manager: Dr. Sheetal Lodhia
We are thrilled to introduce IICSI’s new Project Manager, Dr. Sheetal Lodhia! Sheetal Lodhia has worked in the public and private sectors at the intersections of strategic management, production (radio, print, video), research (qualitative, ethnographic, table), and community engagement. She is a voracious consumer of pop culture, and, as an Allophone, comfortable working in multilingual…
Apply Now: MA / PhD in Critical Studies in Improvisation
Come research—and practice—arts-based community-making with us in the Fall of 2022!
McGill Colloquium This Weekend: Livestream “Echoes of a Distance” Nov. 19-20
The International Institute for Critical Studies in Improvisation (IICSI) at McGill University invites you to an event (papers and performances, live and livestreamed) on the ways the relations between sound, music and politics have been affected by the confinements. You can tune in to the livestream via the IICSI Facebook page through this link, or,…
IF Encore Installation at U of G Arboretum
This fall, we invite you to the University of Guelph Arboretum to visit IF Encore, a series of signpost installations throughout the Arboretum. These signposts each feature a distinct QR code, which you can scan with your phone to relive incredible improvisational performances filmed in those locations and originally shown at previous iterations of the…
Ajay Heble Announced as U Michigan Scholar-In-Residence
Congratulations to our director, Dr. Ajay Heble, who was selected as the Scholar-in-Residence at The University of Michigan Center for World Performance Studies for fall 2021! Drawing upon his experience as as author, scholar, and musician who has served as both a faculty member at University of Guelph and as the Founder and former Artistic…
Celebratory Concert for “IF Encore” Installation Launch
This Saturday, October 16th, IICSI is thrilled to be hosting live music in the Arboretum to celebrate the launch of a new installation project! Join us at 1 pm on the Memorial Forest boardwalk (see directions below) for a pop-up, physically distanced, improvised musical performance by Richard Burrows and Daniel Morphy of TorQ Percussion Quartet,…
IICSI profiled in the Globe & Mail
Our Institute is making headlines! Thanks to Guy Dixon at The Globe and Mail for a fantastic article published this past week on the role of improvisation in society, highlighting IICSI’s work. The piece, which discusses how “improvisational music offers a blueprint in creative collaboration far beyond the artistic realm,” is an excellent introduction to the…
