It is not a campaign for free downloading of music – it is about advocating that everyone should be free to express oneself through music. Annually, the first Saturday in March, is announced by the international organisation Freemuse to be the 'Music Freedom Day' of the year. "It is a day which can serve as a focus point for the media – an occasion to take a closer look at the subject of banned music, and the lives of blacklisted musicians," explains executive director of Freemuse, Marie Korpe.

This year, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has dedicated one week of programming, involving 17 programmes, and on the day, 3 March, will broadcast a music documentary called Censor-This!. Another Canadian radio station is involved in the project as well, as are national and local radio stations in Norway, Denmark, England, Pakistan and Iraq.

On the internet, the international music magazine MondoMix is preparing a site devoted to music & censorship leading up to 3 March, and on print, magazines such as Songlines from United Kingdom and Djembe from Denmark are publishing articles and editorials which address music censorship in their February-March issues.

P R I N T

• Songlines Magazine (UK): addresses music censorship in their February-March issue. Editor Simon Broughton writes about the Istanbul conference in his opening editorial, and there is an article on Simon Bikindi. 

• Djembe Magazine (Denmark): publishes an article about 'forbidden music' in relation to an event in Copenhagen (debate and film screening) about music and Islam on 1 March, and also writes about it in the magazine's opening editorial.