SynAmp – Synergy Amplified: Innovating the Classical Music Ecosystem is a 34-month European cooperation project co-funded by the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union. It connects eight partner organisations from Montenegro, Croatia, Italy, Sweden, Hungary, Serbia, Kosovo*, and Albania, with an associated partner in Bosnia and Herzegovina, forming a strong transnational alliance committed to strengthening and innovating the classical music sector.
The project is coordinated by DBS Foundation (Montenegro), executive producer of the KotorArt International Festival — a Festival of National Importance by the Government of Montenegro and a recipient of the EFFE Label. The Foundation develops projects at the intersection of culture, education, heritage, sustainable development, and tourism, and has extensive experience managing EU, UNESCO, and bilateral cultural grants.
What we are doing
SynAmp has three core goals: to support the capacity building and career development of emerging cultural professionals, composers, multimedia artists, and performers through hands-on, transnational experience; to enhance transnational artistic collaboration and circulation by producing and performing 8 commissioned multimedia works across 9 Western Balkans and EU countries; and to foster artistic innovation and sustainability by designing new production models that integrate digital tools, inclusive approaches, and sustainable practices.
Over the 34-month project lifetime, eight creative duos — each consisting of a composer and a multimedia artist — will develop eight newly commissioned works through mentorship, residencies, and an intensive collaborative process guided by a five-member Creative Council. Up to forty emerging classical music performers will then bring these works to life at Montage Week in Sweden, before performing them on the SynAmp Tour — fifteen concerts in eight cities across nine countries.
In parallel, sixteen emerging cultural professionals from all eight partner countries will receive structured training through the Capacity Building Labs — two full cycles combining online webinars, job shadowing, international internships, and the Performing Arts Academy held in Kotor during the KotorArt International Festival.
Key figures
8 partners · 9 countries · 34 months · March 2026 – December 2028
8 creative duos · 8 commissioned multimedia works
Up to 40 emerging performers · 16 emerging cultural professionals
15 concerts across 8 cities · 100+ artists and professionals involved
Why this matters
Contemporary classical music faces a structural challenge: it operates in national silos, with limited resources for cross-border collaboration, insufficient opportunities for emerging talent to gain international experience, and a growing disconnect between the music being created and the audiences it aims to reach. SynAmp directly addresses these gaps — not through competition, but through sustained, structured cooperation between institutions, creators, performers, and cultural managers who share a commitment to making classical music more innovative, accessible, and sustainable.
The Western Balkans dimension is central to SynAmp’s identity. Montenegro, Albania, Kosovo*, and Serbia are EU candidate countries — culturally rich, artistically vibrant, but structurally underrepresented in European cultural networks. SynAmp treats Western Balkans and EU partners as equals in every aspect of the project: equal voice, equal responsibility, equal visibility.