NIME 2023 - MEXICO CITY

New Interfaces for Musical Expression
31 May — 2 June, 2023
Mexico City, Mexico

The International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME) gathers researchers and musicians from all over the world to share their knowledge and late-breaking work on new musical interface design. The conference started out as a workshop at the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) in 2001. Since then, an annual series of international conferences have been held around the world, hosted by research groups dedicated to interface design, human-computer interaction, and computer music.

In 2023, NIME will be back in North America, back in Latin America and back to its physical format in Mexico City. However, we will also provide hybrid support for those who cannot attend the conference in person.

Theme: "Frugal Music Innovation"

Since the early years of the foundation of Tenochtitlán (present day Mexico City) around 1325, the Mexicas or Aztecs increased the amount of cultivable land by the use of Chinampas, artificial islands that were created by interweaving reeds with stakes beneath the lake's surface, creating underwater fences. This attitude of solving problems with the available resources became common among Mexico City's inhabitants after the different floods, pandemics, wars and economic crisis that have hit the city along its history. That is probably why the Hacker & Maker movements have been well-received by Mexican young generations.

Because of this, the selection of "Frugal Music Innovation" as the Theme for NIME 2023 is an invitation to all researchers, technologists, musicians, artists and people with a cross-disciplinary background worldwide to show how innovation can be possible and replicable by anybody (and ideally by everybody) with resources that can be easily affordable and available, and that this frugal innovation can also be possible in the creation of New Interfaces for Musical Expression. We encourage everyone to propose topics where there are some (ideally most) of the Core Competencies of the Frugal Innovation Hub adopted by the Frugal Innovation Latin American Network(Spanish version) & the Frugal Innovation Hub from Santa Clara University (English version).

These competencies/characteristics are:

  • Human-Centric

  • Simple

  • Rugged

  • Mobile

  • Last-mile distribution

  • Local

  • Affordable

  • Green

  • Adaptable

  • Lightweight


Besides the aforementioned characteristics, original contributions are encouraged in, but not limited to the following topics:

  • Novel controllers, interfaces or instruments for musical expression

  • Augmented, embedded and hyper instruments

  • Technologies or systems for collaborative music-making

  • New performance paradigms for mobile music-making

  • Music-related human-computer interaction

  • Sensor and actuator technologies, including haptics and force feedback devices

  • Musical mapping strategies

  • Explorations of relationships between motion, gesture and music

  • Evaluation and user studies of new interfaces for musical expression

  • Evaluation and user studies of commercially available “off the shelf” interfaces

  • Interfaces for musical expression for people with special needs

  • Musical applications of robotics

  • Interactive sound art and installations

  • Performance rendering and generative algorithms

  • Machine learning in musical performance

  • Web-based music performance

  • Software frameworks, interface protocols, and data formats, for supporting musical interaction

  • Historical, theoretical or philosophical discussions about designing or performing with new interfaces

  • Discussions about the artistic, cultural, and social impact of NIME technology

  • Sonic interaction design

  • Pedagogical perspectives or reports on student projects in the framework of NIME-related courses

  • Practice-based research approaches/methodologies/criticism

  • Music-related human-computer interaction

  • User studies and evaluations of NIMEs

  • Interactive sound art and sound installations

  • New music performance paradigms

  • Gesture to sound mapping

  • Sonic interaction design

  • Musical robotics

  • Sensor and actuator technologies for NIMEs

  • Interface protocols and data formats supporting musical interaction

  • Machine learning and artificial intelligence in NIMEs

  • Pedagogical perspectives and/or student projects in NIME-related courses