Call for Contributions

The call for contributions is now closed!

Call for contributions

We are pleased to announce the call for contributions for the 16th International Conference of Students of Systematic Musicology (SysMus23)! SysMus is a series of international conferences organised annually by postgraduate students and early career researchers in the broad field of systematic musicology. This year's event will be hosted by the University of Sheffield in Sheffield, UK, on October 18-20, 2023. We invite presentations in the form of live or virtual talks or posters. 

SysMus is dedicated to representing the diversity of topics and methods that are summarised under the umbrella term ‘systematic musicology’. Therefore, submissions addressing any of the following subjects are welcome, but not limited to: Music perception, music cognition, music therapy, music and well-being, music modelling, music information retrieval, music sociology, music education, music technology, music and culture, music philosophy, music theory and analysis, composition, and performance.

What to submit

Abstracts should be no more than 300-500 words in length excluding references and keywords. Submissions should include headings and follow a format appropriate to the research, for example:

For empirical research

1. Background

2. Aims

3. Methods

4. Results

5. Conclusions

For theoretical research/reviews

1. Background

2. Aims

3. Main Contribution

4. Implications

We are also encouraging submissions from composers who wish to share and discuss their work. We cannot accommodate any performances, unfortunately, but presenters are welcome to include audio and video recordings in their presentation.

The author can choose to indicate a preference for either spoken (live or virtual) or poster presentation in the submission form.

Authors should avoid referring to their own names within the submitted abstracts, as acceptance will be determined by anonymous peer review.

To submit your abstract, follow this link.

After the reviewing process, authors will be given the opportunity to revise their abstracts based on the feedback received. 

Talks and posters

Live and virtual presentations will be allocated slots of 20 minutes, with 12 minutes for the presentation, 5 minutes for discussion, and 3 minutes to prepare for the next talk. 

Poster presentations will have designated time slots and presentation spaces that will not overlap with any other activity. All poster presentations will be hosted on an online virtual platform to accommodate both onsite and online participants (and save paper and printing costs!).

Important dates

1st May 2023: Submission deadline for abstracts

7th May 2023: EXTENDED SUBMISSION DEADLINE for abstracts

1st July 2023: Notification of acceptance & early bird registration open

18th September 2023: Deadline for revised abstracts and poster submission

1st October 2023: EXTENDED DEADLINE for revised abstracts and poster submission

18-20 October 2023: SysMus23 in Sheffield!