City Shapes, Streets, Layers, and Ecosystems

Innovating Music

Kwende Kefentse, both DJ Memetic and Music Lead for the City of Ottawa, and our host dig into the urban terrain, urban fabric, and politics of the city and music. He speaks deeply about urban terrain, urban fabric, and music, with the lens of "urban morphology" from his architecture studies in London and work with the city. He talks about topics as wide-ranging as the origins of hip hop in the South Bronx, trends in music cities where industry and community connect, distribution of music assets in neighborhoods, the music industry as intermediator, city metabolisms for music, missing dynamic models, and the role of media in a city. He brings the conversation back to his work with TIMEKODE, one of Canada’s most established independent dance parties, and the documentary in progress about its community impact.

Guest: Kwende Kefentse, Cultural Industries Development Officer and Music Lead, City of Ottawa; DJ Memetic; Host and Creative Director, TIMEKODE

Kwende Kefentse is the Cultural Industries Development Officer and Music Lead for the City of Ottawa. His work at the intersection of culture, space, public policy and the economy has been featured in outlets like CityLab, Spacing Magazine and Monocle Radio to name a few. Prior to completing a Masters of Research from UCL’s Bartlett School of Architecture in Space Syntax Architecture and Cities (2017 - 2018), focussed on the spatial configuration of music industry value chains, Kwende played a leading role developing the council-approved Renewed Action Plan for Arts, Heritage, and Culture (2013 - 2018). Following from that, he led the development of the Ottawa Music Industry Coalition - a not-for-profit organization focussed on industry development, and the Ottawa Music Strategy (2018 - 2020) - a council-approved strategy for investing in, and developing the music industry. He now works on day-to-day implementation of the strategy while developing other cultural industry initiatives. Kwende serves on the boards of the Carleton University Art Gallery and FACTOR (Diversity and Inclusion observer) respectively. He is also the locally and internationally renowned producer and performer DJ Memetic, and the host + creative director of TIMEKODE, one of Canada’s most established independent dance parties. Over nearly 15 years of monthly events TIMEKODE has become a beacon of progressive pluralism in Ottawa. His solo + TIMEKODE original productions and remixes have received critical acclaim from international outlets like Vice Thump, Radio Nov and Wax Poetics.

Links Mentioned:

• LinkedIn
• Twitter @kwendeismemetic
• City of Ottawa
• Ottawa Music Industry Coalition
• Space Syntax: Architecture and Cities @ UCL's Bartlett School of Architecture
• TIMEKODE: http://timekode.com / http://timekode.tv
• Richard Florida - Rise of the Creative Class (on Amazon)
• Creative Index
• Music Policy Forum website and Facebook
• Santa Fe Institute
• Urban Morphology
• NOW Institute

Full transcripts can be found at innovatingmusic.org