Funding is awarded through Musicboard Berlin GmbH upon recommendation of an independent jury of Berlin-based pop experts and in consultation with the Senate Department for Culture and Community. Jury members are usually appointed for a period of three years. The following jury is currently appointed to the Festival Funding as well as the funding programmes Karrieresprungbrett Berlin and Pop im Kiez:
CHRISTOPH REIMANN
Christoph Reimann is a radio journalist. At Deutschlandfunk he presents the program ›Corso – Kunst & Pop‹, while at Deutschlandfunk Kultur he mainly contributes to the music magazine ›Tonart‹ as editor and author. For ByteFM he produces the program ›Regler auf, Regler runter‹. His work focuses on pop and gender.
EDNA MARTINEZ
Edna Martinez is an artist, DJ, and curator. Her musical selection is inspired by Picó Sound System culture. Martinez’s sound incorporates African and Caribbean rhythms, jazz basses, tribal polyrhythms, and Arabic melodies. She also produces radio shows and has created different projects in Berlin such as El Volcán, Picó Soundsystem Culture from the Colombian Caribbean, 2018.
MELISSA KOLUKISAGIL
Melissa Kolukisagil has been involved in the music scene for several years, taking on a wide variety of roles, from curation to production at festivals, concerts and clubs. In August 2019, she was selected for the vut association’s mentoring programme for women, trans and non-binary people in the music business. That same year, she launched her own passion project İç İçe, a festival dedicated to new Anatolian music, which has meanwhile has succeeded beyond Berlin, touring in Heidelberg, Vienna, Hamburg, and Munich. Since August 2020, she has also been running the project Diversitygerechtes Ausgehen in Berlin, a cooperation between the association Eine Welt der Vielfalt and the Clubcommission, where she pushes for structural change within the nightlife industry, making it less discriminatory while also increasing the visibility of diversity in the cultural sector.
ULRICH HARTMANN
Ulrich Hartmann studied drums and performs under the name Ullamatombak with his solo setup of organ, drums and loop station. He regularly works as a musical director and stage artist at theaters across Germany. Since 2018, he has been project director of luftsprung live, the funding programme for chronically ill musicians of the Frankfurt-based aktion luftsprung foundation. He has been a member of the board of trustees of the luftsprung campus scholarship since 2015. Between 2021 and 2022, he co-hosted the inclusive online talk show ›Der Mach Dein Ding Talk‹ with activist Raul Krauthausen.
WIELAND KRÄMER
Wieland Krämer studied sociology and political science in Marburg – but never worked in academia. In Berlin, he has been organising international tours with Powerline Agency since the early 90s, founded the music publishing company Flirt99, and served as manager for Stereo Total – but never really wanted to work in the music business. Playing bass in several Hamburg punk and post-punk bands, he recorded a few albums and toured through clubs big and small – but never considered himself a musician. He is a supporting member of Flüchtlingsrat Berlin e. V. and Kontakt- und Beratungsstelle für Flüchtlinge und Migrant_innen e. V. and plays basketball on Mondays.
