Full Conference Programme for MENT 2026

After months of planning, rethinking, debating, emailing, and exploring, we are proud to present the full programme of the MENT 2026 Conference. This year’s gathering brings together a wide range of debates, interviews, mentoring sessions, networking events, listening sessions, receptions, and presentations – all with the shared goal of highlighting diverse scenes, ideas, and stories, exploring how music organisations operate across different countries, and above all connecting music activists, workers, artists, and audiences.

The conference unfolds in a strong independent spirit, driven by a curiosity about new musical adventures, from local and regional perspectives to European and global contexts.

See the full programme HERE.

We are announcing more than 30 newly confirmed guests, completing the lineup of conference speakers, moderators, and mentors for 2026. More than 70% of all speakers will appear at the MENT Conference for the very first time. In total, this year’s programme features more than 80 speakers, 25 panels, presentations, and interviews, 8 mentoring sessions, 7 official networking events, and 6 receptions.

Bob van Heur from Le Guess Who? festival in Utrecht will join us for a special interview in the year of the festival’s 20th anniversary. Guided by the motto “Listening is the Way Forward,” Le Guess Who? is widely regarded as one of the most forward-thinking festivals today, dedicated to promoting sounds that are often overlooked and offering fresh perspectives on what music can be. The interview will be moderated by Darek Mazzone from KEXP.

On Saturday, ahead of his performance with aya at Kino Šiška, Marcel Weber, aka MFO, will speak about his work as a visual artist and director for lighting and visuals. He is the director of light and visuals at Berlin Atonal and a long-time collaborator of Unsound Festival in Kraków, Adelaide, and Toronto. Recent projects include work with Caterina Barbieri and Lyra Pramuk. He has also toured extensively with sound artists such as Aisha Devi, Ben Frost, and Tim Hecker.

Both Bob van Heur and MFO join the series of interviews alongside the already announced guests Valentina Magaletti, Mo Dafa (Café OTO), and DJ and label head Rey Colino.

Shawn Reynaldo curates the panel Music & Politics: The Calculus of Speaking Up, bringing together Yuko Asanuma (agent and journalist, setten), Jaymie Silk (producer and DJ), ABADIR (producer and DJ), and music journalist Ed Gillett. As discourse around music becomes increasingly politicised, artists, fans, and industry professionals are facing growing pressure to speak out, and even boycott events in response to issues ranging from genocide and colonialism to systemic discrimination, environmental degradation, and the expanding role of investment capital in culture.

Carin Abdulá (Outer Agency) will moderate a panel on adventurous electronic music festivals, featuring Olgica Perić (DJ Olgica), who started the ISKRA festival in Serbia, Bruno Abreu from the Portuguese Mucho Flow festival, and Shilla Strelka, who is involved in the Viennese projects Unsafe+Sounds and Struma+Iodine.

Media researcher Miloš Hroch will present a talk based on the article Playlisting the Periphery, co-written with Petr Szczepanik. The research focuses on local intermediaries, such as digital distributors, major labels, and artists/content creators, examining how they attempt to leverage inequalities stemming from “asymmetrical geographies” while simultaneously reproducing them.

This year’s local focus is on the legendary venue MKNŽ in Ilirska Bistrica, which celebrated its 60th anniversary in 2025. Damjan Manevski, a long-time MKNŽ regular and musician known for his work with Lelee and Rush to Relax, will guide us through decades of resistance alongside people who have worked at the venue across different eras: Jan Surina, Martin Stadler, Nina Petrač, and Simon Grbec.

At the Sounds from Below panel, we will explore regional venues and promoters with Club Pave (Bulgaria), Defy Them (Kosovo), Inverted Spectrum (Hungary), Mrtov Konj (North Macedonia), and Slayvenija (Slovenia). The shared aim of the initiative is to support mobility, creativity, and networking among artists and collectives working in contemporary music.

A strong presence of European venues is also expected this year, partly due to the Liveurope meeting taking place at MENT. The Liveurope platform brings together 24 concert venues from across Europe, strengthening cross-border collaboration and artist mobility.

MENT will also host a meeting of UPBEAT – the European Showcase Platform for World Music. In its first three years, UPBEAT supported over 550 bands and 1,000 music professionals through a network of 20 members and 14 associated partners. 

Additional guests from the festival world include Mateusz Jakielski from Good Taste Production, the Polish company behind festivals such as BITTERSWEET, Letnie Brzmienia (Summer Sounds), Salt Wave Festival, and NEXT FEST Music Showcase & Conference in Poznań. Natasja Alers from the Dutch Grauzone Festival will participate at a listening session; Katrin Pröll from Austria’s Salam Music will contribute to the UPBEAT listening session; and Luca Jacob from WOMEX will present their work at a panel on global sounds.

Together, the MENT 2026 Conference offers a space to listen, question, exchange, and connect. We invite you to dive into the programme and join us in Ljubljana!