Yet another year of Amsterdam Dance Event has come and gone in the blink of an eye. In its 24th year, the 5-day conference and festival spread across the beautiful canals of Amsterdam and brought together attendees from 146 countries around the globe.
One of our favorite parts about the event is their citywide takeover and cultural spread across Amsterdam. They activate 200 locations and bring together a massively diverse crowd, offering over 1,000 events of all kinds. With a combination of captivating panels, musically inclined mixers & gatherings, late-night shows in creative venues, and tech-galore gadget rooms filled with the latest synths, samplers, CDJs and more, there was something for everyone – and we loved it all.
This event continues to be an ever-evolving experience that provides a completely unique engagement each year. This was our third year attending and even then, we kept finding ourselves pleasantly surprised at new places, faces and music we were able to discover. You could attend a panel at the Sound Lab within the De Brakke Grond, stop by a record store for a label takeover with some of your favorite artists, and shoot across the canal to watch the sunrise from the iconic A’dam loft all in a day. The possibilities were truly endless, and we continually found ourselves wishing we had more time to do everything.
A few of our favorite highlights, of course, was Floorplan’s Wednesday night set at Shelter, the Keinemusik sunrise takeover with &me, Rampa and more at the A’dam loft, Dr. Rubenstein’s early morning set at the legendary De School elementary-school-turned-industrial-club, and the Hot Since 82 set at the beautiful Muziekgebouw aan t’ IJ location. A notable talk was also a conversation around “making it” as an artist – and how you never really truly “make it”, but rather, are always continuing to work hard and grow – with Eats Everything, Bart B More and Firas Waez of Waze & Odyssey. And, lastly, we’re pretty big gear geeks over here – so having the opportunity to see the Museum of Modern Instruments with an array of brands like Moog, Roland, and Ableton displaying their gear was truly one-of-a-kind.
On the heels of another successful year, Amsterdam Dance Event has announced its 2020 dates for October 21-25 of next year. This will be its 25th anniversary, so we can imagine that they’ll have quite a few surprises up their sleeves to celebrate.
Tickets for the 2020 event are on-sale now. We’re looking forward to returning already!
