This year, we share the subtitle “(Contra) Natura” with the 2024-2025 season of L’Auditori / Museu de la Música. On one hand, the theme “(Contra) Natura” allows us to continue exploring—through a gendered and intersectional lens—the sonic relationships between humans and nature. On the other hand, within the specific context of our event, this phrase, which has often been used in discriminatory discourses, enables us to showcase works that challenge outdated prejudices and reclaim authors, works, spaces, forms, identities, expressions, bodies, and behaviors that defy normative standards in musical and sonic creation.

The title of the event, Gender Sounds, can be interpreted in two ways: “the sounds of gender” and “gender sounds.” This dual interpretation reflects, on the one hand, our intent to break silences around marginalized creations and voices and, on the other, to explore the sonic world through a gendered perspective.

We understand both “Gender” and “Sounds” in the most inclusive way. Gender is seen as a social construct and an individually perceived identity, which does not have to conform to a binary framework. Therefore, the proposals for Gender Sounds encompass femininities, masculinities, and queer/non-normative/dissident identities. Additionally, gender is approached intersectionally, considering other biological, social, and cultural factors that may lead to discrimination, such as age, sexual orientation, socioeconomic class, (dis)ability, nationality, ethnicity, religion, or culture. The scope of these sessions is equally open, encouraging and welcoming transdisciplinary approaches.