Medieval and Renaissance Music Conference 2020

So close to 400 now... if anyone has gullible relatives they can persuade to register, that would be great. We like a nice round number.

MedRen starts tomorrow and, somewhat extraordinarily, we have 350 delegates registered for what will be our first entirely virtual conference.

It still isn't too late to register to join us! Take a look at the website (https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/medrenconference/) to see what's going on. We have over 100 papers, a keynote by Laurie Stras, concerts by Musica Secreta and the Binchois Consort, numerous live discussion sessions, and even some virtual drinks receptions.

You can register at this link (https://www.epay.ed.ac.uk/conferences-and-events/college-of-humanities-and-social-science/edinburgh-college-of-art/music/medieval-renaissance-conference?fbclid=IwAR3heaq2LB-gEvoSX1gicLYfs0-yVe3GABjaaz69vnvTGib6XIkZtR7FGf4).

We're very excited indeed to see you all - the papers we've seen so far are looking amazing!

www.epay.ed.ac.uk

So nearly at 300 delegates! We are very much looking forward to seeing you all in a few days.

Almost 250 delegates registered, and still a week to go!

More than 200 registered so far for this year's MedRen!

If you are yet to submit your recorded paper and haven't yet been in touch for an extension, please do get it to us as soon as possible. We may not have time to upload papers received after June 24th.

Dear MedRen Presenters:

Many thanks to the speakers who have already uploaded their papers and to those who have asked for extensions. We already have a significant number of excellent papers embedded in the website and ready to go! Please can anyone else who hasn't uploaded yet or been in touch, either to ask for an extension or to withdraw their paper, make sure that they have submitted by 24th June, at the absolute latest. Anything submitted after this date is very unlikely to be uploaded in time and may have to be removed from the programme.

Uploading well over 100 papers without the benefit of fast university internet is immensely time consuming and if there are a significant number of papers left unsubmitted close to the start of the conference, we simply cannot guarantee to get them all up in time.

Best,

The MedRen Team

Almost 100 registered for MedRen already in the first 36 hours! Passwords on their way in the next few days to those who have registered.

Registration is now open. You can access it through the MedRen website or direct through this link:

https://www.epay.ed.ac.uk/conferences-and-events/college-of-humanities-and-social-science/edinburgh-college-of-art/music/medieval-renaissance-conference

Once you have registered, the MedRen Team will be sent a notification and they will send the password through to access the site. The process is not automoatic, so do not be unduly worried if it takes a day or so for the password to come through.

www.epay.ed.ac.uk

MedRen Presenters: A friendly reminder that your presentations are due today! And thank you to those who have sent their presentations in.

Registration is not yet open--we are working on it!--and we will make an announcement when it is!

Dear all,

We are delighted to announce the final version of the programme for virtual MedRen . Beyond withdrawing your paper, no changes can be made to the final programme. Please go to https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/medrenconference/ to view the programme, register and access the virtual conference. We are still waiting onone final link for the new ePay registration system, so please do check back afew times this week if registration is not immediately available. Registration is £20, or free for PhDs, PostDocs, unwaged, or those badly affected by Covid-19. Once you have registered, you will be given a password to access the portal.

FAQs:

How do I record my paper for MedRen?
If you are a speaker, you should have just been emailed a document for help and advice onrecording a presentation.

How will MedRen work?
You can watch the papers for MedRen in your own time. Just follow the links through the portal and watch where and when you like. You can also leave questions in the comments box at the bottom of each session andthe speakers will be encouraged to respond to these in the same way. These are open for the whole conference, so do keeping checking back throughout. Many ofthe papers also have a live Q&A session (see programme). Obviously, it is helpful to have watched the relevant paper(s) before the live Q&A session. Here, you will be able to have a live discussion with the panel members about their sessions.

We have a number of receptions planned throughout which will allow for more informal face-to-face conversation. These will work by havingeveryone together in one large live session, but then divided into smaller ‘breakout rooms’. These will be randomly assigned initially but people are thenable to move about these rooms to talk to different people.

For more details, see the website.

I’m a chair – what do I do?
You will be chairing both the asynchronous comments-based questions and the live voice and live-chat based questions. Please continue to check on the comments section for the recorded videos throughout theconference, even if they live Q&A has already passed. You might like to start things off here with your own written questions. If you feel any questionsare unfair or need to be removed, please contact the medren email address ([email protected]) so one of the conference team can moderate. Everyone’s first comment will be moderated by the conference team before it is posted (all subsequent are automatically accepted) so you should not need to deal with spam in this feed.

For the live Q&A, a member of the conference team will make sure that you are designated as the chair of the meeting – this means that you can call on people to speak, allow certain people to screen-share and, if necessary, remove people from the room. There should be a member of the conference team on-hand should anything go wrong. You and the speakers will be sent a calendar invite to your email address for the Q&A session, and will be able to join through clicking on that. At the start, you might like to welcome people to the virtual room and introduce each of the speakers. Some of the audience may be using mic and we**am – others might just be listening and typing. The audience do have the facility to raise a hand in order to answer aquestion. You might like to use this in order to control the discussion. There is a live text-chat feature which works simultaneously with the video and mic. It might be easier, if the audience struggle with the hand raising, to use this for people to ask questions.

For any other questions, do get in touch.

This email will go out through the usual MedRen Jisc, AMS-Announce, Musicology-all etc., but please do help us to share this email around through your own networks to ensure that it reaches everyone.

Best,

The MedRen Team

Dear MedRen Delegates,

We are very pleased to be able to release the draft programme of Virtual MedRen 2020! As with the previous version, the separate days are marked as sheets on the Excel spreadsheet, and appear as small tabs at the bottom of the page. All times are given in GMT+1/BST. We are still working to finalize some of our virtual events, but these will occur in the evenings - probably after 18.00.

As we are sure you can imagine, organizing live Q&A panels for over 85 delegates, spread over 18 time zones, all with different commitments and constraints, was incredibly challenging. As such, there is very little room for manoeuvre within the programme. Given that the maximum time commitment is only one hour, and your own slot 15 minutes, we hope that this will be workable.

We realize that many of you will have questions, which we have tried to preemptively answer.

Q. Is it possible to change my slot?
A. Only if there is a completely unworkable conflict. We are not able to take into account preferences for morning, afternoon, or day.

Q. I filled out the Google Form, but my name is not on the programme - what should I do?
A. We had periodic problems with the form. Please e-mail us.

Q. I forgot to fill out the Google Form! Can I still deliver a paper at MedRen 2020?
A. We regret that due to the complexity of the programming, we cannot add further names. We announced our participation deadline previously via email and all our social media channels.

Q. I have had to withdraw my paper. Do I have an automatic acceptance to MedRen 2021?
A. All of the Medieval and Renaissance Music Conferences are organized separately. The 2021 Organizing Committee has informed us that you can resubmit your abstract with a note mentioning that you could not deliver your paper due to the Covid-19 Pandemic. They will take this into account during the assessment.

Q. I am suffering financial hardship due to the Covid-19 Pandemic, and am not sure whether I can cover registration.
A. Registration for MedRen 2020 is free for students, unwaged, and postdocs. This category includes those whose incomes have been adversely affected due to the Covid-19 Pandemic.

Q. I am not sure how to make a video. Can you help?
A. We will post a document with tips to our website (https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/medrenconference/) by 1 June 2020.

Q. Is it possible to attend MedRen 2020 without giving a paper?
A. Yes! This has always been the case, and it isn't changing.

Q. When does registration open?
A. Registration opens on 1 June 2020.

We would like to thank you all for your support of Virtual MedRen 2020. As you will see from the programme, we have much exciting scholarship to look forward to this July! Thank you for working with us to ensure that our annual meeting, which means so much to us all, can go ahead. We look forward to receiving your paper-presentations via e-mail by 12 June 2020.

With all best wishes for your health and safety,

The MedRen Organizing Committee

Medieval and Renaissance Music Conference 2020 – The website of the Edinburgh Medieval and Renaissance Music conference.

MedRen delegates, today is the final day to let us know whether you are able to participate in our virtual conference!

MedRen 2020, Online Please fill in this form in order to let us know if you still want to participate in virtual MedRen and to give us the information we need to re-programme the conference. If you are involved in multiple papers/panels, please answer for each of these.

Three more days to let us know whether you can participate in Virtual MedRen2020! Thank you to all of the delegates who have contacted us so far!

MedRen 2020, Online Please fill in this form in order to let us know if you still want to participate in virtual MedRen and to give us the information we need to re-programme the conference. If you are involved in multiple papers/panels, please answer for each of these.

Dear MedRen Delegates,

This is a reminder that the deadline for letting us know whether you wish to participate in Virtual MedRen2020 passed on Friday, April 24.

As we are working on very tight deadlines, we ask that you confirm your participation or withdrawal via the following google form (https://forms.gle/h4AhvnCF1JJfVJri9), by this Friday, May 1 at the latest. Should we not hear from you by Friday, we will assume that you cannot give a paper at the virtual conference and will withdraw your name accordingly.

Many thanks and all best wishes,

The MedRen Committee

MedRen 2020, Online Please fill in this form in order to let us know if you still want to participate in virtual MedRen and to give us the information we need to re-programme the conference. If you are involved in multiple papers/panels, please answer for each of these.

Today's the day! MedRen delegates, please let us know whether you are still able to take part in our exciting virtual conference! And please do share this post. :) Thank you!

MedRen 2020, Online Please fill in this form in order to let us know if you still want to participate in virtual MedRen and to give us the information we need to re-programme the conference. If you are involved in multiple papers/panels, please answer for each of these.

Friendly reminder to MedRen delegates: Please fill in this form by FRIDAY 24 APRIL to let us know if you would still like to participate in virtual MedRen!

MedRen 2020, Online Please fill in this form in order to let us know if you still want to participate in virtual MedRen and to give us the information we need to re-programme the conference. If you are involved in multiple papers/panels, please answer for each of these.

MedRen 2020, Online Please fill in this form in order to let us know if you still want to participate in virtual MedRen and to give us the information we need to re-programme the conference. If you are involved in multiple papers/panels, please answer for each of these.

Dear all,

Thank you for your expressions of support as we move to turn MedRen 2020 into a virtual conference. The work involved has led to a delay in responding to questions over the last few weeks. We now have more concrete information, which will answer a number of the queries we received. Any remaining matters will be responded to after the new deadlines given below.

Virtual MedRen:

We are now able to offer a more concrete description of the virtual MedRen. The conference will be an exciting mix of live and pre-recorded elements, so as to enable us to deal with challenges presented by time zones, software, privacy concerns, and internet connections, whilst also allowing us to keep the social elements and sense of occasion that MedRen offers.

What this means:

We are asking that all papers are pre-recorded and emailed to the conference email address, as MP4s (details of additional video formats that also work will be released later). We will then upload these to the University’s secure ‘media hopper’ channel in playlists named by the session title. It will not be possible to download these videos, and we will delete all of them after the conference is over. Each paper will be available here to watch for approximately 36 hours (i.e. any time on the date of the paper being given, with a spread that allows for watching in other time zones). Questions can be asked and answered in the comments section underneath each video. You will be able to watch single papers within a session, if desired, and can watch multiple papers that would otherwise be programmed against each other.

We are also inviting all speakers to take part in live question-and-answer sessions, via scheduled blackboard collaborate sessions, programmed in parallel, on the same day that their paper is made available to watch. Attendees will be able to ask questions within these small rooms by using any combination of microphone, video, and typed questions. These sessions will be timetabled as groups of approximately 3 or 4 speakers with thematically linked papers, considering time zones for programming, but allowing for interaction between scholars in different parts of the world.

Alongside this, we will still be running our whisky reception digitally (though it is now a bring your own bottle event…) each day, at different times to account for time zones. This will run on blackboard collaborate, allowing for small break-out rooms. This means that people can circulate virtually and talk to different groups (either through typing, video, or microphone), rather than needing to speak over 200 other delegates.

We will also still be including several recorded concerts and other events – details to follow. We will be asking those who watch the concert to make a contribution to the performers, if they feel able, through a system such as Paytron.

Deadlines:

Please let us know by April 24th, through the following Google Form (https://forms.gle/h4AhvnCF1JJfVJri9), whether you will be able to give your paper virtually, whether you need to change your abstract, what timezone you will be in during MedRen, any other constraints on programming, and if you would be happy to participate as a virtual chair for some sessions. If you were initially in a themed session for which other speakers have pulled out, you are still welcome to give your paper as a single paper. We will rework the programme, including the new live discussion sessions, by May 15th. Please ensure that you have sent your paper to the Gmail address (either as an attachment, a dropbox link, or something like wetransfer) by June 12th since it will take a very long time for us to upload all of the files.

Registration:

Registration will be free for students, postdoctoral researchers, and unwaged, and £20 for delegates in post. Any funds raised through this that are in excess of our expenses will be given to our concert musicians. Details of how to register will be finalised shortly.

We appreciate that the requirements of presenting in the new virtual format may create additional work in a time when many of us are already overwhelmed. However, after long consultation, we feel that this is the best way forward. Thank you for your understanding and support, and for working together with us to make sure that this conference that we all care about deeply can still go forward!

Could panel proposers/chairs please spread the word to the rest of their panel? We are having some issues with spam filters blocking our emails to some delegates so any help spreading the word is much appreciated.

Best wishes to all,

The MedRen Committee

MedRen 2020, Online Please fill in this form in order to let us know if you still want to participate in virtual MedRen and to give us the information we need to re-programme the conference. If you are involved in multiple papers/panels, please answer for each of these.

https://twitter.com/MedRen2020/status/1240229772099301377

MedRen2020 on Twitter “Early Musos are a great bunch of people (we knew that already but this has confirmed it). Thank you all for your understanding, and your encouraging emails, comments, and messages.🥰 Virtual is going to be AMAZING! https://t.co/sDvPj7w5tp”

Dear delegates and friends of MedRen,

You will probably be unsurprised to hear that, like many other conferences this summer, the physical MedRen conference will have to be cancelled. There is, of course, every chance that things will have improved by July, but the current government advice is suggesting that those in at-risk groups will need to be isolated at least until the end of June, which takes us uncomfortably close to MedRen. The University is now starting to close its buildings for an unspecified period and move online; it may indeed not be open again by July. Rather than risk cancelling the conference at the last minute, potentially costing delegates and organisers a lot of money, we have instead decided to cancel pre-emptively. Even if we were able to run the conference, it would seem too great a risk to the very many of our usual cohort who occupy groups currently considered at risk.

All is not lost, however. We are determined that MedRen will go ahead in some way, come hell or highwater (or indeed global pandemic). For this reason, MedRen will be moving to an online conference over the same dates. We have been working on this as a contingency for some time and details of the practicalities of this will be announced over the coming weeks. For now, if speakers are still happy to take part in the conference virtually (please rest-assured we have a practical plan to deal with different time-zones), could they please let us know by April 17th? We won’t be offended if people do not wish to take part in the digital conference since much of the joy of MedRen is indeed meeting friends and colleagues in person. That said, we intend still to be able to include our keynote, some concert performances, and opportunities for socialising – albeit in different formats. We are still happy for people to say that their paper was accepted for MedRen on their CVs even if they withdraw from the digital conference.

Practically speaking, those who have already registered for the conference and for university accommodation can of course get a full refund. We may charge a nominal fee for the digital conference (something like £10-£20), but this will be confirmed at a later date.

Please bear with us over the next few weeks as we organise these changes. The programme will no-doubt need to be adjusted and we may be a bit slow in responding over this time.

Best,

James (on behalf of the MedRen Committee)

MedRen in Tempus Pestis

We realise that many of our attendees will be concerned given the recent news of the Covid-19 outbreak. Please rest assured that anyone who feels the need to cancel their registration and university accommodation due to this can do so before the end of April without any cost, so there is no need for immediate action by any of our delegates. The conference team have been working on our contingency planning and will give further updates in due course.

MedRen Presenters, please check your inboxes! We have now circulated the draft programme as an excel spreadsheet (the days are listed as tabs at the bottom).

We have done our best to accommodate requests for particular timings - do let us know if any of these have been missed and if there are any other errors/omissions. As ever, programming MedRen resembles a giant game of 3D Tetris, but we will do our best to meet any other requests that people might have. Please do try to let us know in good time as small movements can have a large knock-on effect.

Could session chairs/contacts for themed panels please let the rest of their panel know about the draft programme? Once we are sure that all speakers are comfortable with their timing, we will release the final programme publicly.

Do also remember to book registration soon in order to get the early bird rate and to ensure you get the conference accommodation before we release it (other accommodation will be available in the city). You should now be able to access the registration website on any browser as the issue with safari has been fixed.

https://twitter.com/MedRen2020/status/1234172740376068096

MedRen2020 on Twitter “Reminder to Register for ! Our early bird rates are valid through 30 April; standard rates apply from 1 May; registration closes on 17 June. Also, our registration website *does not work* on Safari, but loads on other browsers: https://t.co/K6vcNZHqH2 [1/2] https://t.co/USwGpdJolE”

Registration is now open for MedRen 2020 here: https://www.efdelegates.ed.ac.uk/MedRen2020 or by following the link in the conference website. We look forward to you joining us in July.

Medieval and Renaissance Music Conference 2020 - Welcome If you wish to book campus accommodation at our Po***ck Halls Campus, please select the nights you wish to book during the registration process.

Thank you to everyone who submitted a proposal to MedRen2020! The Programme Committee is reviewing the abstracts, and we will be in contact in February!

https://twitter.com/MedRen2020/status/1212837822165422081

MedRen2020 on Twitter “Was your to submit a proposal to but you discovered you missed the deadline? Never fear! Contact us by email or Facebook before January 6 and we’ll see what can be done! https://t.co/HWTgluxCgz”

https://twitter.com/MedRen2020/status/1212259527514456064

MedRen2020 on Twitter “ from all of us at ! We hope this year brings you peace, happiness, music, and to Edinburgh for our fabulous conference! If you missed the deadline but wish to submit a proposal please contact us by email or Facebook message! https://t.co/6YX...

https://twitter.com/MedRen2020/status/1212065977191452677

MedRen2020 on Twitter “Did you know that according to Pacific Standard Time it is not even 10 am? You still have an entire day to get your abstract in! 😄 https://t.co/ZRwwXkh2wt”

https://twitter.com/MedRen2020/status/1211882515872403456

MedRen2020 on Twitter “Sound the bells! Proposals for are due TODAY - December 31! Thank you to everyone who has submitted an abstract so far! If you have questions, please email us or contact us on our page. We look forward to receiving your proposals! https://t.co/HWTgluxCgz http...

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all from the MedRen team. Do remember to submit your abstracts to [email protected] before December 31st.