Since the first conference in 2009, KMC has established itself as a global annual event that musicians look forward to joining, a year or more in advance.
This year also featured the English rakugo performance, and cited additional support from the Hard Rock Cafe and the Japan Foundation.
[15] The annual music conference was not held in 2014 in order to make structural changes and work on building sponsorships.
However, KMC Africa Day was held on 17 May in the Osaka Museum of History and featured a performance by King Mensah from Togo as well as an African Bazaar.
However, due to budget restraints, it was the held simply as a 3-day music festival featuring live performances with no conference sessions.
Featured artists included Gina Williams[17] from Canada, Stellar Addiction from Australia and Tokyolite from Indonesia.
[18] KMC 2017 was held from 15–17 September in the main areas of Hommachi and Kitahorie in Osaka and Sannomiya in Kobe, with 18 performing artists participating.
A total of 21 performing acts joined and the conference section was again held at Business Innovation Center Osaka with an interactive session and networking session as well as a panel discussion featuring singer/songwriter, Jett Edwards as a panelist on the topic of playing live performances in Japan.
[20] KMC 2019 was held from 14–16 September, with all venues in the Kitahorie area, with exception of Hard Rock Café Osaka in Hommachi.
The conference was moved to a venue in Kitahorie, Covent Garden, that provided more of a relaxed atmosphere for both the networking session and panel discussion.
[21] Due to the COVID-19 pandemic KMC 2020 was held 18–20 September as a completely online event using social network streaming platforms to show performances and to do presentations and webinars, which were all shown through the top page on the conference website.
[23] In June, the Japanese government lifted travel restrictions for tourists to enter the country, [24] so KMC 2022 was able to be held as an in-person event from September 16 – 18.
Another connection was made when American hip hop artist, Legrand, met with a professor at Temple University Japan Campus in Tokyo to collaborate on a project with college students to create a character in Second Life.
[28] Canadian singer-songwriter Katie Rox has commented on her success at KMC in an interview with Canadian music news site North By East West, saying, “I have noticed CD sales, twitter and Facebook followers have increased since the trip, so I would say it was a success!”[29] Rox explained the value of the conference in her view, saying further that the conference is especially valuable to independent musicians that lack the support of a major label.
According to Levi, “It’s amazing how artists with such talent are practicing and performing with almost no attention from the music industry… It’s almost impossible for independent musicians in Japan to move up to the next level without help from a major company.