This is a multiple choice question where you can only choose one option.

The options are:

• Less than 5 years

• 5-7 years

• 7-10 years

• 10+ years

To apply for the Audio Artist Pathway, you should have a minimum of five years experience working in the audio industry.  By 5+ years, we mean 5 or more years of experience.

This could be five years experience spread over a longer period (for example, if you’ve been working part time in audio and part time in another field).

The five years can also be spread across different fields within audio e.g. sound post-production, theatre or TV sound recording or design, station sound production, radio documentary, podcast production, music radio, etc. 

The Audio Artist Pathway is open to people who are from backgrounds that are underrepresented in the industry, on the basis of socioeconomic background, race or disability.

This is a multiple choice question which asks you to select all the option/s that apply to you, out of the following:

• Low socioeconomic background

• Race

• Disability 

• None of the above

Here is how we define each of those categories:

Socioeconomic background

The Audio Artist Pathway is open to people who are from a low socioeconomic background. 

Here’s how we define that: 

• If you qualified for free school meals.

• If, when you were age 14, your highest earning parent or guardian was not self-employed or in senior management, and was employed in one of the following categories:

  • Technical and craft occupations such as: motor mechanic, fitter, inspector, plumber, printer, tool maker, electrician, gardener, train driver

  • Semi-routine manual and service occupations such as: postal worker, machine operative, security guard, caretaker, farm worker, catering assistant, receptionist, sales assistant

  • Routine manual and service occupations such as: HGV driver, van driver, cleaner, porter, packer, sewing machinist, messenger, labourer, waiter/waitress, bar staff

• If, when you were age 14, your parent or guardian was long term unemployed

Note: these are broad categories that may not exactly fit your family situation – e.g. if you’re a carer or if a family divorce changed your financial position. Please use your judgment when self-identifying.

Race or ethnicity

The Audio Artist Pathway is open to people who are:

• Asian/British Asian

• Black/African/Caribbean/Black British

• Mixed/Multiple ethnic groups

• From another minority ethnic group

Disability

The Audio Artist Pathway is open to people who are disabled, neurodivergent or have a long term health condition (defined as a condition lasting or expected to last 12 months or more). 

You can self-identify this and you won’t need to show a diagnosis. 

This is a multiple choice question where you tick all answers that apply, and you can also write in answers under ‘Other’.

The options are:

• Reaper

• Adobe Audition

• Avid ProTools

• Hindenburg

• Logic Pro

• Ableton Live

• SADiE

• GarageBand

• Other (please specify)

This really doesn’t need to be exhaustive or unduly detailed - just an overview so we understand the tools you know how to use. Think mics, handheld recorders, etc.

The purpose of this question is to help us understand your skill level with audio equipment, as part of checking that you have the baseline skills needed to get the most from this opportunity.

This question is there in case there’s anything else relevant to add around your technical knowledge, which wasn’t covered by the previous couple of questions.

You won’t be penalised for not answering this! It’s just there as a failsafe to make sure we capture everything.

This question asks you to paste a link to an example of your professional work. There is a space to state your role/credit in creating the piece.

We will ask you for an example of your creative work later in the application - this question is there as part of us verifying your experience and skill level. Therefore, you should choose a piece here which helps us see the kind of work you’re already proficient at in your day to day work in the audio industry.

We are about to look at your CV so we only need an ‘at a glance’ summary here.

This question requires you to upload a PDF or Word document, with your most up to date CV.

The reason we’re asking for a CV is to help us verify your experience level.

This is one of two key questions in the application - this and question 10 are the main places to tell us why you are a brilliant candidate for this opportunity.

The kind of things it’d be helpful for us to understand in your answer to question 9 are; 

• What would the Audio Artist Pathway allow you to do that would be difficult to achieve without it?

• Why (and how) is this opportunity right for you, given where you currently are in your life and career?

• Do your circumstances make it difficult to pursue your ideas otherwise?

• Have you seen, heard or experienced something that has motivated you to explore audio art?

The above bullet points are just examples - you don’t need to answer all of these, and this is a non-exhaustive list of ideas. But we hope these give you a steer on how you could approach your answer to this question.

Take the space you need to express yourself (short or long),  but please try not to exceed 500 words. 

This is the main place where you can tell us how you would like to use the Pathway.

We want to feel that you are really excited by this and that this opportunity is going to help you get where you want to go. Use this question to show us what that might look like. 

Each person will be different so think about how this opportunity relates to you and where you are in your practice. 

Think about: 

• Wanting to research an area of the arts you feel inspired by 

• A loose idea you already have that you are interested exploring 

• Themes you want to explore

• Techniques you might like to explore

• New ways of working or exploring/expanding your creative practice 

You don’t need to answer all of these questions - these are just examples of the types of things you might want to tell us. 

Take the space you need to express yourself (short or long), but please try not to exceed 500 words.  

This question is your opportunity show us an example of your creative work.

This can be something you’ve made in your spare time or something made for a paid / funded project. For example, it could be a live performance you’ve done which included creative audio, or events or activities that bring sound into physical space in a creative way.

It doesn’t have to be perfect or professionally executed - we’re looking to get a sense for your creativity, and to see evidence of your interest in audio art. 

You’ll be asked to provide a publicly viewable link to the work and a description of it, including when it was made. 

Judges will listen/view a maximum of 5 minutes: if you want to specify a timestamp, please do so.

Please ensure the link goes directly to the content you want the judges to receive  (or give them very clear guidance about where it appears on a webpage).

You can link to a website or file. Private SoundCloud links or Google Drive links are fine. Please don’t use any link that might expire (such as WeTransfer), or might require a judge to sign up or have a particular account in order to access it (like Dropbox). 

If you’re using Google Drive links, please ensure the sharing settings are public/ ‘anyone with the link can access’.

If the work was ephemeral and/or you prefer to upload images and documents for additional context, you can write the context here, and upload the files in the next question. 

If you'd like to upload supporting documentation of the example work mentioned above, you can do so here. This is optional. 

Please ensure you name the file like this;  YOUR NAME_Supporting Info.

This will help us keep track of your files during the judging process.

This is limited to one file of 100MB max. Acceptable formats are; 

Documents: PDF (.pdf), DOC, DOCX, TXT, ODT, HTML, RTF, HWP.

Images: JPEG, PNG, GIF, BMP, TIFF, SVG.

Presentations: PPT, PPTX.

Audio/Video: MP3, WAV, M4A, WebM, MPEG4, MOV, AVI, OGG.

This question requires you to tick a box saying you’ve read the information below:

There are limited spaces on this programme and we're looking for those able to get the most out of this opportunity. 

By ticking yes, you’re agreeing that you have read the FAQ and have fully considered how this programme would fit around any anticipated work/life or caring commitments for the year ahead before applying.  

The expected time commitments are as follows; 

Participants should expect to commit around 25 days across the year, although outside of the contact time, it will be up to you to decide how much time you want to spend working on your ideas during the Pathway. 

The contact time will include:

• 25th-27th September 2026 - attendance of XMTRFestival, Hastings/St Leonards

• A half-day session each month - this includes masterclasses and group mentoring

• Five in-person meet-ups across the UK  (these are included in the monthly sessions, not additional to them) 

• From month 6-12 of the scheme - additional monthly hour long one-to-one mentoring sessions

Most scheduled sessions will take place on Saturdays to help participants take part alongside other work or caring commitments.

There may be the requirement to travel or stay over in order to attend the sessions at XMTR Festival and the other in-person meet-ups.