Globally renowned tech innovator and award-winning recording artist Imogen Heap, recognized for creative works including Hide and Seek and Tiny Human, has announced her first world tour in eight years, which will bring together content creators, fans and the industry in a unique and innovative format.
After a vibrant and successful 2018 around Europe, Mycelia is embarking on its 9-city North American leg of its world tour from April - June of 2019. The tour kicks off in Miami and will pass through Washington, DC, New York, Chicago, Toronto, Boston, Austin, Seattle and San Francisco. Additional dates in New York City, Toronto and Washington D.C. have been announced today. Imogen will also make stops at the eMerge Americas in Miami and conferences, delivering a keynote talk about Mycelia with showcase of the MI.MU gloves.
Comprising of concerts, talks and workshops, the 40-city tour will be used as a platform to officially launch Mycelia's 'Creative Passport' - realising a vision of the future which sees music makers connected through a verified and decentralised ecosystem, promoting artist-led, fair and sustainable operating practices.
Using emergent blockchain technology, the 'Creative Passport' - which is unique to each music maker and empowers them to be 'open for business' - contains personal information, existing IDs, acknowledgements, works and business partners. Featuring template 'smart contracts', it enables quick and easy direct payments to simplify and democratise collaboration from meaningful commercial partnerships to creativity.
Events in each city will feature some or all of these elements:
Imogen shares: "For years now we've been complaining about the state of the music industry and how it has been held back by old ways of thinking, negatively impacting music makers - a major pain point being that we are the first to put in any of the work, and the last to see any financial reward or even payment. Through Mycelia and its 'Creative Passport', as music makers we now have no excuse but to put our best foot forward and become open for business, decentralising the ecosystem so that it will ultimately benefit everyone. I am excited to be going on the road to bring this to life, in addition to showcasing other new technologies which will add to transforming the music industry into a fair, flourishing and vibrant place".
About Mycelia
Founded by Imogen Heap, Mycelia is a research and development hub whose mission, through technology, is to bring to life a music maker database which will help realise a fair, sustainable and vibrant music ecosystem. To the non-music folks, this ultimately means fairer payments to artists and a richer marketplace from which to build their careers by easing collaboration creatively and commercially. Fundamentally it's about building ethical, technical and commercial standards to elevate the music industry from what it is today to a place which we all deeply value and care for in our everyday lives.
About Imogen
Self-produced, independent, engaged, Imogen Heap blurs the boundaries between pure art form and creative entrepreneurship. Writing and producing 4 solo albums, Heap has developed a strong collaboration with her loyal following. Creating tracks for movies, TV and, most recently, the entire score for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child play, in addition to collaborating with artists including Ariana Grande, Mika, Nitin Sawhney, Josh Groban and Deadmau5, Heap's been nominated for 5 Grammys, winning one for engineering and another for her Taylor Swift's contribution on the album 1989. She has also won an Ivor Novello award, The Artist and Manager Pioneer award, the MPG Inspiration Award and an honorary Doctorate of Technology.
As part of her involvement in making music, Heap has pioneered technologies to humanise the technology surrounding creation, performance business operations for her 20+ year career in music and better reward artists for their work. These include her MI.MU gloves, a gestural music making system, and Mycelia's 'Creative Passport'.
North America 2019 Tour Dates:
4/28: Miami, FL @ Fillmore
5/3: Washington, DC @ Lincoln (SOLD OUT)
5/4: Washington, DC @ Lincoln Theatre
5/7: New York, NY @ Town Hall Theatre
5/8: New York, NY @ Town Hall Theatre (SOLD OUT)
5/14: Chicago, IL @ The Vic Theatre
5/16: Toronto, ON @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre
5/17: Toronto, ON @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre
5/24: Boston, MA @ Emerson Colonial Theatre
6/1: Austin, TX @ The Moody Theatre
6/5: Seattle, WA @ The Moore Theatre
6/8: San Francisco, CA @ The Masonic
Photo Credit: Jeremy Cowarts
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