46th Annual Conference of the Society for American Music
16 - 18 July, 2020
Due to concerns over COVID-19 and the safety and well-being of our members and attendees, the annual Society for American Music Conference to be held in March 2020 in Minneapolis was canceled. Click
here to read President Kernodle’s message about that cancellation.
In the spirit of intellectual engagement, the Society is hosting its 2020 conference in a virtual format via Zoom, July 16-18, 2020. Information regarding the program and registration
will be posted on this page and distributed through email and social media.
How the Conference Will Work
The Society for American Music will be hosting its first-ever virtual conference using the Webinar feature of Zoom. The conference will be structured as four concurrent sessions, each taking place in its own Zoom webinar. The sessions will be from approximately
10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Central (US) Time each day. Special events will take place at the end of each day.
The program includes the standard paper presentations with Q&A, as well as poster sessions, workshops, interest group sessions, Minneapolis-themed sessions, a new member reception, the business meeting, and even a happy hour.
After you register for the program, you will receive information on how to access the links for each of the sessions on Zoom. If you have concerns about using Zoom for the conference, feel free to email us at SAMConferenceHelp@gmail.com. During the conference, you are free to join a scheduled session and watch a presentation then leave that session and join
another, in the same manner that you do when attending the live conference.
Preliminary Program
The preliminary program is available here. Note that this is a working document and subject to change. All times given in the program
are Central (US) Time. The program abstracts are available here.
To access the web preview version of the program, click the links below:
A link to the final program with the active Zoom links will be sent to registered attendees approximately 24-48 hours before the start of the conference.
Registration
Registration will open on June 1, 2020. The registration fee is $15 for members, $45 for non-members. Click here to begin the registration process.
**Note: When you finish the registration process, the link to the main conference page will show up on the thank you page. Use that link. If that page does not show up, please email SAMConferenceHelp@gmail.com and we will send you the link.
Please note that registration fees will be used to cover administrative costs associated with the conference.
If you donated your Minneapolis registration fee, you are entitled to a free registration for the new conference. We will be manually registering you prior to the conference. If you have not received notification of your registration by July 14, please contact us at SAMConferenceHelp@gmail.com.
Information for Presenters
We have prepared guidelines for preparing your materials for the conference and information on how to submit your materials. You can find that here.
SAM Program Committee
Marian Wilson Kimber (chair), Nancy Rao, Anthony Bushard, Drew Edward Davies, Rosita Sands, Megan Murph
SAM Local Arrangements Committee
Andrew Flory (chair), Ron Rodman, Melinda Russell, Peter Mercer-Taylor, Louis Epstein, Sarah Schmalenberger, Jonas Westover
SAM Associate Conference Manager
Joice Waterhouse Gibson, Assisted by Paula Bishop
SAM Staff
Megan MacDonald, Executive Director
