Musician, improviser, collaborator, singer, songwriter and principally an electric violin player, Xani approaches music making from so many levels the outcome is something distinct, venturing into the spaces between pop, jazz, electronic and improvisation. With electronic effect pedals and live looping charging her highly improvised live sets, Xani’s is a repertoire coloured by the ferocity of her instrumental output and shaded by a deep creativity, her earnest voice, and pure joy.

Independent label director, artist manager, producer intersecting art and commerce. Focused on artist development, record and concert production and strategic partnerships. Australia / UK, now London based, delivered top 20 charting album (classical) in multiple markets.

Formerly digital strategy consultant delivering digital transformation programs plus design / deliver development curriculum for a range of clients including international trade bodies, retail, and major UK Media.

Prior life as a session musician, Perth and Brisbane.

Cath has worked with for some of Australia’s most successful artists in management and record labels. In 2021 she stepped into the role of CEO at the Australian Music Centre; a national not for profit service organisation supporting and amplifying art music creators.

Prior to this, she was Executive Director of the Association of Artist Managers (AAM), and Chairperson of the organisation and is a current Board Member. She’s also a founding Director of the Music Producers and Engineers Guild (MPEG).

Cath is also a former Board member of Music Victoria, Support Act and the Community Broadcasting Foundation.

Highly respected performance artist, violinist, and session musician, Christa Powell is as comfortable in the theatre pit as she is in character wardrobe on stage, or playing choreographed violin solos for the many dance companies she collaborates with. Christa Powell is a uniquely talented woman whose technical skill and innate musicality is a major source of inspiration to those she collaborates with.

Christa is a founding member and Creative Director of Topology, one of Australia’s leading creative arts organisations. As well as establishing the award-winning Topology Creative Academy, Christa has been the steadying influence and strong driving force of the organisation for over 25 years, collaborating and touring internationally and throughout Australia.

When she’s not playing with Topology or for theatre, Christa performs a wide range of contemporary chamber music, her long-held passion. For the past decade, Christa and Topology pianist Therese Milanovic have been dedicated to championing music by women. Establishing Muses Piano Trio in 2013, Christa and Therese source, commission and perform music by women from across the globe.

Claire is Australia’s ‘sorceress of percussion’ (City News, Canberra) and the only Australian to win the ‘APRA Art Music Luminary Award’ four times, Claire leaps between her role as Ensemble Offspring’s Artistic Director (Australia’s new music ensemble and winners of the 2022 Classical Next Innovation Award with Ngarra-Burria) and concerto performances with Sydney Symphony at the Sydney Opera House and Radio Chamber Orchestra at the Concertgebouw.

In 2022 Claire Edwardes was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for her commitment to Australian music and in 2023 was the recipient of the Australian Women in Music Award for Creative Leadership. Well known for her genre-spanning solo concerts and commissioning and premiering hundreds of new works, she passionately advocates for gender equity and diversity in all that she undertakes. As a true trailblazer Claire breaks down barriers between art music and audiences with her famous on-stage infectious enthusiasm for bringing new music to new audiences. Claire is a ‘an invigorating musical life force.’ The Age.

With 20 years of composing across concert halls, and festivals to her name, composer and sound artist Corrina Bonshek has a deep passion for crafting listening experiences that provoke wonder at the beauty of nature, the cosmos and the human. Her collaborations in Asia, have been a major influence on her compositional voice. Corrina has created music for Taipei International Festival of the Arts (2017), Rainforest Fringe Festival Sarawak Malaysia (2019), Singapore Arts in Your Neighbourhood Festival (2022), Bleach Festival (2018, 2022, 2023), and many more. In 2021, she co-founded Corrina Bonshek and Collaborators to create and tour immersive music experiences including RISE supported touring for her large-cast Song to the Earth / Song to the Ocean with DeepBlue. Corrina Bonshek and Collaborators is supported by the City of Gold Coast.

Emily Tulloch is an arts leader and musician working as an artistic director, facilitator, violinist, and composer-arranger, with a passion for the creation, instigation, and support of contemporary music in Adelaide/Tarntanya, and beyond. Emily is CEO and Artistic Director at Nexus Arts, where she leads the organisation in their presentation and development work with culturally and linguistically diverse and First Nations artists, promoting an intercultural vision of Australian contemporary arts.

She was a member of Zephyr Quartet from 2005 to 2020, and with the ensemble created critically acclaimed, award-winning shows; performed internationally and across Australia; received two Ruby Awards for Innovation and three APRA/AMCOS Australian Art Music Awards. Recent projects include co-composition and recording the score for Restless Dance Theatre’s ‘Exposed’ and cocreation of the show ‘Needle in the Hay: the music of Elliott Smith’. She has acted as assessor and juror for national assessment panels including the APRA Art Music Awards, the Australian Women in Music Awards, and for many funding bodies, and is a member of the Adelaide UNESCO City of Music Artistic Advisory Committee.

As founding artistic director of Speak Percussion and upcoming artistic director of the Canberra International Music Festival Eugene has been at the forefront of Australian art music for over two decades. He has tackled complex projects and collaborations as director, composer and percussionist all over the globe.

Felicity Wilcox is an award-winning Australian composer described as ‘one of Australia’s most versatile and prolific composers’ (Limelight 2023) and ‘an important voice in contemporary classical music’ (Daily Telegraph 2021). Felicity’s concert music has been commissioned by many leading ensembles and programmed widely in Australia, the USA, UK, France, Germany, South Korea, and Finland. She was composer and Assistant Music Director for the 2000 Paralympic Games in Sydney, has composed soundtracks for over 60 screen productions, and station themes for ABC Radio National. Felicity holds a Doctorate in Composition from Sydney Conservatorium of Music (2013) and is a Senior Lecturer in Music and Sound Design at the University of Technology Sydney. She was awarded a Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (2023-26) from the Australian Research Council to compose her own contemporary opera, EMERGENC/y, currently in development with acclaimed Australian librettist Alana Valentine. She publishes research on, and advocates for gender diversity in music, co-authoring the Women and Minority Genders in Music report on the music industries of Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand in 2023.

Jane Arnison is a European based Australian sonic artist and collaborator. Her experience in sound traverses the popular and reaches out into the experimental. Her sonic works are often immersive and tackle themes of belonging and connection. Jane utilises technology as a means of translation, attempting to bind together the participants and forge collective experiences. Jane has a background as a mix engineer in both stereo and immersive formats and this has led to a fascination with the relationship that sound has with space and by extension time. Thus contemplations of the nature of space(s) is always present in her works.

As a collaborator Jane’s fascination with sound in all its forms and her technical savy has lead to many diverse opportunities. Apart from the aforementioned mixing, Jane has composed for film and tv scores, developed interactive sound design components for art installations, and performed under many guises. Her collaborations range from individual artists, to labels and brand partnerships, to mentoring and education. Jane is a leading voice tackling the structural barriers that restrict opportunities for diverse expression within the music industry.

Dr Louise Devenish is a percussionist whose creative practice blends performance, artistic research and collaboration with composers, visual artists, designers and improvisors. As a soloist, collaborator, and ensemble musician (Decibel, The Sound Collectors, and others), she performs internationally at festivals such as MONA FOMA, Nagoya and Shanghai World Expos, Tage für Neue Musik, Darmstädter Ferienkurse, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, and Tongyeong International Music Festival.

Louise’s ‘interpretive flair and technical brilliance’ is recognised by APRA AMCOS Art Music Performance of the Year awards and Luminary Award, Churchill Fellowship, and an Australian Research Council Fellowship. Her performances can be heard on international labels HatArt, ezz-thetics, Immediata, Navona, Tall Poppies, Huddersfield Contemporary Records, and room40. Louise is Convenor of Classical Music at Monash University, where she is director of artistic research lab The Sound Collectors Lab. Her writing on music is published in books, journals, and zines, encompassing Australian music, new performance practices, virtuosity, digital notation, music and gender.

Margaret is Professor and Head of the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music and Performance. Her research investigates music learning and engagement across the lifespan, artistic citizenship and the ecopolitics of music education. Recent publications include the Oxford Handbook of Early Childhood Learning and Development in Music (OUP, 2023 with Graham F. Welch) and Music Education, Ecopolitical Professionalism and Public Pedagogy: Towards Systems Change (Springer, 2024 with Heidi Westerlund).

Marshall McGuire is one of Australia’s leading performers, with a special interest in baroque and contemporary music. In 2021, the album ‘Bower’ recorded with Genevieve Lacey, was awarded the ARIA Award for Best Classical Album.

He’s commissioned and premiered more than 100 new works for harp, and has been a member of the ELISION ensemble since 1988. Marshall has performed in caves, on the beach at Orpheus Island, at the Chateau de Chantilly, in shearing sheds, and in a 12th century chapel in Wales. Playing music in exotic and beautiful locations is his passion.

Marshall studied at the Victorian College of the Arts, the Royal College of Music, London, and in Paris. His London debut recital was presented at the Purcell Room for the Park Lane Group.

He has performed with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, English String Orchestra, Les Talens Lyriques, Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, Melbourne Symphony and Australia Ensemble and has appeared at international festivals including Aldeburgh, Melbourne, Milan, Geneva, Brighton, Moscow, Vienna, Huddersfield, Huntington and Adelaide.

Marshall is Director of Programming at Melbourne Recital Centre, and is Chair of the Australian Music

Martel Ollerenshaw has a wide portfolio of skills and interests, and leads her own company, Arts & Parts. Working internationally with artists, organisations and festivals to create and produce work that is pioneering, and often genre blurring, current clients include: Genevieve Lacey (AUS), Tania Giannouli (GR), John Surman (UK), Jan Bang and Punkt Festival (NO), Melbourne International Jazz Festival (AU) and NICA artist development/Stadtgarten, Köln (DE). She is a board member of hcmf// and the Australian Music Centre, and was previously vice president of the Europe Jazz Network (2018-2022), and an associate director at Serious International Music Producers (2002–2017).

Paul Mason is specialist music consultant, with experience in music, broadcasting and government. From 2009 – 2019 Paul was Director, Music the Australia Council, leading the design and implementation of strategies and funding programs for music.

Since 2019 he has worked independently advising artists, organisations, government and industry clients on strategy, project management and business planning. In addition Paul is the manager of composer, performer and cultural leader David Bridie.

Paul is a director of the City Recital Hall Sydney which presents over 200 performances per year; and Chair of the Peggy Glanville Hicks Composers House Trust which offers 12 month residencies for composers.

Paul was a board member of Sydney’s Radio FBi 94.5 from its establishment to the year 2000 when the station was awarded its permanent broadcast licence. Between 2004 – 2007 he was President of Music NSW, the state based contemporary music service organisation.

Philippa has worked internationally both as a performing musician and as a manager of projects and artists. She has lived in Berlin for over 20 years, returning regularly to Australia. As a violinist, she toured, recorded and performed internationally with orchestras and chamber music formations, including the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, and the Australian Chamber Orchestra. Ever keen to venture off the beaten track, she explored contemporary classical music early on.

Philippa made the move to artist management in 2007 and worked at a prominent international agency for several years and later at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, before moving on to found Real Arts in early 2019, which was inspired by her desire to more closely connect the artistic scenes of Australia and Europe. Alongside its activities today in the realm of opera/chamber/orchestral concerts, Philippa’s company takes special interest in contemporary and improvised music, interdisciplinary projects, and listening for voices which might otherwise be missed within the confines of existing traditional structures in the music industry.

Richard Pike is an Australian-British composer, producer and label owner. An AACTA-nominated composer he has scored Australian drama series including Romper Stomper, Australian Gangster, Les Norton and Year Of. Touring the world with his band PVT (aka Pivot) he has released on Warp Records UK, performs with his jazz-inspired new-age trio Forgiveness on Gondwana Records UK, made publicly engaging art installations with United Visual Artists and healing music for psychedelic therapy with Wavepaths, London.

Sally Greenaway’s music delights audiences and musicians alike through its expression of our most intimate to grandiose experiences of our world, often with a strong focus on nature and our humanity.

“The most striking qualities of Greenaway’s works is that feeling for landscape which also characterises the music of Peter Sculthorpe or Nigel Westlake, the spacious scoring and meandering melodiousness contributing to a sense of sublime restfulness” – Gramophone Magazine.

She has an extensive catalogue of works spanning instrumental, chamber and orchestral, jazz big band, film, advertising and documentary soundtracks.

>Her music has been performed by the Melbourne Symphony, Canberra Symphony, Brno Philharmonic, Budapest Symphony, BBC Scottish Symphony and Royal Scottish National orchestras; the US Navy Big Band, Seattle Women’s Jazz Orchestra and Jazzgroove Mothership Orchestra; chamber music ensembles Muses Trio, PLEXUS and Syzygy; and by numerous community groups and school music ensembles internationally.

Accolades include: APRA Art Music Award, two Canberra Critics Circle Awards, National Big Band Composition Award among many others.

Dr Xenia Hanusiak is a festival director & curator of international music, writers, ideas, interdisciplinary festivals, forums & frolics. In 2022 she co-curated Salzburg Global Seminar’s Arts program ”Currents of Change.” Her current festival “Songlines for a New World” made its world tour debut at National Sawdust (New York) in 2018. She’s a cultural diplomat for the Netherlands & is recognised as a cultural commentator published in The Guardian, London Financial Times, Music & Literature, New York Times.