History

DIEM was founded in 1986 as the Danish national center for electronic music in Aarhus. DIEM’s goal was to support production, teaching, research and presentation in the field of electronic music.

At the time of opening DIEM consisted of two large electronic music studios located in the Concert Hall Aarhus. The founding idea was stylistically very broad, and DIEM opened its doors to composers of all genres of electronic music, from computer-jazz to tape music, from interactive installations to electronica. DIEM’s studios were made available to composers and over the years many works were produced in DIEM’s studios. In 2003 DIEM became part of the Royal Academy of Music, Aarhus with status as a center of excellence for electronic music and with Denmark’s first professor of electronic music.

In the1980’s and 1990’s DIEM produced a series of concerts and festivals of electronic music, among these the Aarhus Computer Music Festival and the Nordic Electronic Music Festival. In September 1994 DIEM hosted teh 19th International Computer Music Conference (ICMC94), where leading composers and researchers from around the world met in Aarhus for five days. In 2001 the MIX-Festival was established. Concert series included the Cinema for the Ears, a presentation platform for Danish electronic music that was organized in Aarhus, Copenhagen, Paris, Vienna, Budapest, Barcelona, Riga and Montreal.

DIEM has functioned as a production studio through the years; a place where visiting artists could work with the lates technological tools and benefit form expertise of the institute’s staff. Especially Danish composers were frequent visitors, but also a long list of international artists held residencies for shorter or longer periods to create works of electronic music. Included in the list of early users are Per Nørgaard, Fuzzy, Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen, Palle Mikkelborg, Lars H.U.G., Kenneth Knudsen, Ivar Frounberg, Svend Aaquist Johansen, Wayne Siegel, Gunner Møller Pedersen, Peter Bastian, Morten Carlsen, Lars Graugaard, Bo Holten, Goodiepal, Denis Smalley, Stephen Montague, Adrian Moore and Bjørn Svin. Numerous releases were produced at DIEM. In 2012 a CD with electronic music produced at DIEM 1987-2012 was released on the Dacapo Records label.

DIEM has also conducted research in the field of electronic music. Much of this research has focused on interactive music. Read more about the various research projects under Research.

These activities together with a lively local electronic music milieu have given Aarhus a unique position in electronic music.