Creative Tech Roundup: The Best of May
Portfolio company news, festivals galore, and the National Endowment for the Arts’ Spring Grant Announcement
Jammcard & ElectroSpit Make Waves in Music Tech
NBC hosted the Billboard Music Awards (BBMAs) in Las Vegas on May 20, and it was, as expected, a who’s who of the biggest names and brightest stars in the music business. Behind the scenes, one of our newest portfolio companies, Jammcard, was helping more musicians shine by providing them with a platform to book their dream gigs. Using Jammcard, Zedd’s manager was able to find “the best players in the game” for Zedd and Maren Morris’ performance of “The Middle.” Warning: It’s quite catchy.
Meanwhile, ElectroSpit was busy making a splash on the hardware side of things with a big feature by music technology giants Native Instruments (NI). Aside from an interview, founders “Bosko and Maya [Kante] teamed up with Native Instruments to create a sample pack of talkbox sounds for NI’s recently launched Sounds.com music sample subscription service.”
The Kantes are gearing up for a Kickstarter campaign that launches on June 5, bringing them one step closer to unlocking the full potential of the ElectroSpit Talkbox.
Festivals Sónar+D, Codame ART+TECH, and Creative Tech Week Bring Art and Technology Together
The buzz has been building for Sónar+D, Barcelona’s International Congress of Digital Culture and Creative Technologies. Come mid-June, they’ll be covering five key topics with talks, exhibitions, and more:
I. The future of space exploration
II. The future of music
III. The future of audiovisual experiences & storytelling
IV. The future of Internet
V. The future of knowledge: collective & artificial intelligence(s)
Count us in and get tickets here.
Hopping back over the pond, San Francisco-based Codame will be hosting its own ART+TECH festival at The Midway in early June. Their mission:
I. Drive innovation and engagement by embracing play
II. Share the value of art in the technology community
III. Demystify and make technology accessible to artists
To attend Codame’s inspiring night of workshops, speakers, performances, and installations, click here.
In early May, Creative Tech Week took over New York City with “a crowdsourced festival created to bring together a talented professional community of expert creative technologists with the people interested in their work.” From CryptoCreative: A Symposium on Blockchain’s Impact on Creativity, Arts, and Music to a VR/AR/Mixed Reality Party and a number of other conferences, the 10-day event is an exciting convergence of the most creative minds in tech right now.
Mark it on your calendars for 2019.
The NEA Invests in Arts and Tech
Let’s hear it for government funding of projects and organizations at the intersection of art and technology! From educational applications to game design, ballet, and new media, the NEA’s latest grant announcement demonstrates a promising development: They’re bringing creative tech to the fore and lifting up underserved communities in the process.
So, here’s to hoping the NEA makes it through the next two and a half years unscathed.
Check out our Creative Tech Roundup from April and stay tuned for more in June!
