The management of the International Council for Traditional Music is vested in the Executive Board, consisting of a President, one or two Vice Presidents (Officers), and nine Ordinary Members, all of whom are elected by the membership of the Council. 

Officers are elected for a term lasting until the second Ordinary Meeting of the General Assembly following their election (typically four years), while Ordinary Members are elected for a term lasting until the third Ordinary Meeting of the General Assembly after their election (typically six years). All Executive Board members are eligible for re-election only once. The Executive Board may also co-opt up to three additional Ordinary Members, who retire at the General Assembly immediately following their appointment, and who are eligible for re-appointment.

The ICTM elections are held every two years. Every election is overseen by a Nomination Committee formed by three members, two of whom are appointed by the Assembly of National and Regional Representatives and one by the Executive Board. The next elections will be conducted in 2021, as the following positions on the ICTM Executive Board will become vacant at the time of the next General Assembly of Members, to be held online on 24 July 2021.

• The President
• 1 Vice President
• 3 Ordinary Members

Salwa El-Shawan Castelo-Branco (Portugal) will complete her term as President; Svanibor Pettan (Slovenia) will complete his as Vice President; and Tan Sooi Beng (Malaysia) and J. Lawrence Witzleben (USA) will complete theirs as Ordinary Members. There is also an additional Ordinary Member position, which was made vacant when the occupant was elected as an Officer. João Soeiro de Carvalho (Portugal) and Silvia Citro (Argentina) will have completed their co-options to the Executive Board, and will be eligible for nomination.

Proposals should be sent to to two of the members of the Nomination Committee (see below). All those proposed should be current paid-up members of ICTM. The committee has received sufficient nominations for all positions except for the President, and as such will now extend the deadline for nominations for that position only until 15 February 2021.

In April 2021, once the roster of candidates will be finalized, all ICTM members in good standing will be invited to vote via a secure, anonymous, third-party online voting platform. The results of the election will be announced at the 45th General Assembly of ICTM Members, to be held online on 24 July 2021.

The Nomination Committee for the 2021 ICTM Elections is formed by Helen Lawlor (Convener, Ireland), Marie Agatha Ozah (Nigeria), and Cara Stacey (Eswatini).

For more information about the ICTM Executive Board, please see ICTM Statute 7.2 and by the Memorandum on procedural rules of the ICTM Executive Board. For more information about the ICTM Elections, please see the Memorandum on Nominations and Elections.