After announcing the complete lineup for the Opening: Tránsitos Atlánticos, Showcase Festival, entire Film Programme and revealing all the recipients for the WOMEX Awards for this year, the organisers, Piranha Arts, today confirmed the full Conference Programme including the Network Meetings, offWOMEX Presentations and the Mentoring Programme hence concluding the full programme for WOMEX 18.Over the course of three days, the 24th edition of WOMEX 18, will host more than 60 musical acts with more than 300 artists representing over 50 countries, 16 films from across the globe, 30 conference sessions, mentoring opportunities with more than 60 experts including 4 roundtable and 5 one-to-one mentoring sessions, 18 network meetings and offWOMEX presentations.

With the last four conferences announced today, the final conference programme now stands complete with topics covering all areas of the world music scene, from industry – to geographically-focused.Equal Opportunity will focus on women, ethnic diversity and other gender minorities, chaired by Sonya Mazumdar (India). Sync Your Sound, chaired by Christin Kunick (Germany), will introduce you to the music supervisors from two different fields – films and ads. This will be the playground where you can – meet, greet and network with two global players of sync – Pia Hoffmann (movies) and Markus Linde (ads). Out on a Limb will inject relevance into global club music, chaired by Benjamin Lebrave (France/Ghana), bringing together players from both sides of the divide, at three crucial levels of the industry: live, digital and PR.

The Network Meetings which are a part of WOMEX conferences encourage and offer an opportunity for new and pre-existing worldwide networks of world music professionals to come together, connect, discuss, share, network and work together.Completing this year’s 18 network meetings are IMMF Network Meeting where one gets to meet the International Music Managers’ Forum (IMMF) and their national country chapters. DIY Network Meeting sharing smart strategies from the DIY music community. WOMEX Education Network Meeting, a meeting place for all WOMEX delegates with interest in music education. Networking for the Classically-Inclinedis a network meeting powered by Classical:NEXT. African Network Meetingfocusses on working with African music and finding out more about the African continent. The complete list is available on the website.

Two offWOMEX presentations confirmed are Time to Act: The European Agenda for Music and Creativity as Vectors for Job creation and Identity Building. The former presentation will advocate for a strong, fair, innovative and diverse music sector while the latter will discuss the new EU Programmes for creative and music industries in the PALOP+ACP areas.

Roundtable mentoring brings free personalised advice from the specialists and allows to exchange with peers in 45-minute Roundtable sessions. And, one-to-one mentoring allows 15-minute consultation with any of the five expert mentors from a variety of fields and occupations, free of any charge.Some of the topics featured this year are The Need and Success of Mentorship Among (female) Peers, Artists Without Borders: A Guide to Touring North America, Creating a Platform for your Audience, How to Connect with the Chinese Music Market?, How to Develop Yourself as a Professional Artist/Band?, Your Head Is on Fire! – Burnout and Coming Back. The complete list is available online.