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London celebrates 4 years as a UNESCO City of Music!!

London joined the world’s largest cultural network by being named Canada’s UNESCO City of Music. The UNESCO Creative Cities Network promotes cooperation with and among cities that have identified creativity as a way to make positive social and economic change. Through this UNESCO City of Music designation, the City of London is working with others around the world to place creativity and cultural industries at the heart of London’s development plans while helping to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

London’s UNESCO City of Music Designation played a critical role in creating new opportunities and rejuvenating programs. Here are a few projects we’ve highlighted.

🎵With a generous donation in Apil from the Paul Seed Fund, facilitated by the London Community Foundation, we have been able to provide consistent programming through events such as XUUX Artists Open Mics, Juice Jams at Poacher’s Arms, Industry Nights hosted by London’s Pretty Cool Podcast, local opener program at Canada Day in Harris Park, Tunes @ Noon at The Aeolian, LPL Live and VENUExVENUE.

🎵We hosted industry and artist educational programs with partners such as Canada's Music Incubator (CMI) who hosted the inaugural Sunfest Music Production Mentorship Program and the Global Export Music Program (GEM). 2025 saw a return of the Music Talks series that intends to elevate folks in the music community.

🎵Together with partners we have ensured the availability of accessible and free live music programming with events such as the City of Music Concerts, RBC Place Tunes on the Encore Terrace, Punk Rock Flea Market and many more.

🎵We have facilitated City of Music exchanges with several cities in the UNESCO network including exports to South Korea, Italy, England, Sweden and Scotland. Imports to London included Poland and Northern Ireland.

🎵The collaborative Canadian UNESCO Creative Cities project Celestia was welcomed to the courtyard at 100 Kellogg in June, mixing art mediums to create one spectacular experience.

🎵We were delighted to host a City of Music Stage at Sunfest for the second year in a row that had local musicians perform at London’s biggest music festival. The revival of Home County Music & Art Festival in 2025 was welcomed by music lovers in July.

In 2025 so far, we have supported 108 events, 220 artists (singles, duos, groups) and 7 UNESCO City of Music exchanges.

🎉The celebrations kick off on November 6 with Words & Music with 5 artists performing and giving the behind the scenes to their songs! Join us on November 6 & 7 for the now extended City of Music Conference that features incredible presentations and panels from local, national and international speakers. One wristband gets you all the action on November 6-8 as VENUExVENUE returns to showcase over 50 artists across multiple venues.

We can't wait to see what the next year brings in Canada's UNESCO City of Music!