Co-write project is organised by TAMK, Hanze University of Applied Sciences (Netherlands) and PXL University of Applied Sciences and Arts (Belgium). The project started already in 2014 and over the years the students who have participated in the project have over 200 million streams in Spotify and over 100 million streams in Youtube.
Every year, nine students from each university come together three times for a weeklong co-write sessions. The first session was organised in December in Leeuwarden (Netherlands), second one in February in Hasselt (Belgium) and third one in March in Tampere (Finland). During the week students are working in groups of three writing songs under a specific subject or leads coming from the music industry.
Tasks last one or two days and after the task students change groups for a new assignment. This allows students to learn working in an international environment and create networks for future career. Project´s highlight is a pitching session at the end of the week where best songs are pitched to industry professionals. Pitching sessions will offer students straight connection to the industry professionals in all participating countries.
There were three different assignments: finding common ground, sync assignment (writing music for films or advertisements) and creating songs of themes money, love, violence, fate and future. Students came up with 27 songs and nine of them were selected to the industry pitch by teachers from universities.
This year the industry panel included: Emilie Kannekens, Senior Licensing Manager from Massive Music, Sjaak Thisse, Senior Producer from Massive Music, Rob Peters, Freelance Music Producer and Composer for film and TV and Jord Brinkhuis, Top liner and Producer.
The feedback from the panelists was very constructive and they were also surprised by how the students were able to finish the songs with such a short timeframe. Two of the pitched songs are already being released, so stay tuned! Next stop Hasselt!
Text: Janne Tauriainen M.A.
Senior Lecturer / Team Leader of Music Production Study Path
Degree Program in Media and Arts
Picture: Patries van Iterson
