Our profile

The Huygens Fokker Foundation is a center for microtonality where both historical and contemporary styles of music which use alternatively divided octaves have a home. See below for our mission, vision, goals and strategy.

Mission

The Huygens Fokker Foundation seeks to develop and present knowledge about microtonality. In order to achieve this the Foundation organizes diverse activities available to various different segments of the music world and general public.

Vision

The Huygens Fokker Foundation seeks to enlighten the community about the differences between the equal tempered and other tuning systems.

Goals

The Huygens Fokker Foundation aims to present an average of 10 concerts and four concert introductions per year. One goal is also to collaborate with various different ensembles and in the coming years the Foundation will also make contact and organize lectures about microtonality at conservatories and other institutions.

The Foundation is currently developing study programs for basic education, middle school and university levels. Every four years the Foundation will organize an international festival for microtonality.

The new archive system should be ready in 2010 so that the Foundation can operate more successfully function as a knowledge and visitor center.

Strategy

The Huygens-Fokker Foundation organizes concerts with solely microtonal music on the program.

In the coming years the Foundation will organize various sorts of concerts, such as concerts played by musicians and ensembles specializing in microtonality and concerts performed solo on the Fokker organ or in combination with other instruments. Additionally there will be separate concerts organized. The musical styles will be diverse and also the intended public. The Huygens Fokker Foundation would like to spread the knowledge about microtonality and therefore organize lectures about both the basics and specialist topics within microtonality, often accompanied with performances. In order to promote the practicality of microtonality, the Foundation will organize workshops where a combination of theory and practice is given, aimed for performers from various stylistic backgrounds, such as classical, jazz and pop. Our website and the publishing of both a newsletter and a journal are powerful means to share this knowledge to an international network. The performance of microtonal music is also stimulated through the building of new microtonal instruments and also by the publishing of music and the releasing of cd's. By combining artistic and scientific knowledge, information about microtonal music and microtonal systems will be spread on both national and international fields. This is made possible by the existence of a documentation center and archive, the maintenance of a large database of contacts, the assistance in publishing microtonal music and by organizing educational projects with microtonal music.