New Music USA Announces 2025 Organization Fund Grantees

Written By

Kate Dreyfuss

$584,000 Awarded to 83 Organizations Across the US

In order of appearance: Roots in the Sky, credit: Blair Speed; Opera Saratoga, credit: NUA Photography Co.; Creative Music Studio, credit: Ariella Villefranche; The Harlem Chamber Players, credit: Bob Curtis; Wild Up, credit: Farah Sosa

New Music USA is proud to announce the 83 awardees for the 2025 New Music Organization Fund, which provides grants to outstanding organizations that work regularly with and support the development of music creators and artists, offering crucial resources to their community. Totaling $584,000 in awards, the program funds organizations working in a variety of genres to help them sustain their programming of new music, nurturing of music creators, and other services.

This year’s awardees have demonstrated a deep and consistent impact on their community, and include music organizations, performance groups, dance organizations, festivals, presenters, and venues that span 17 states and Washington, D.C. The geographic diversity of the selected organizations reflects New Music USA’s commitment to expanding its national reach through its grant programs.  

For this grant cycle, which attracted 488 applications, applicants were asked to select their preferred funding strand from one of the following categories: General Operating Support, Creation of New Work, or Live Music for Dance projects. General Operating Support awardees constitute 63%; Creation of New Work awardees, 14%; and Live Music for Dance awardees, 23%.

See the full list of awardees below and on the New Music Organization Fund program page, and discover their work on these playlists:

2025 Organization Fund Spotify Playlist 

2025 Organization Fund YouTube Playlist 

General Operating Support 

  • American Composers Orchestra – New York, NY 
  • Ars Nova Workshop – Philadelphia, PA 
  • Art of Elan – San Diego, CA 
  • Audium – San Francisco, CA
  • Bergamot Quartet – New York, NY
  • Black Pearl Chamber Orchestra – Philadelphia, PA
  • Bloomingdale School of Music – New York, NY
  • Bowerbird – Philadelphia, PA
  • Brooklyn Americana Music Festival – Brooklyn, NY
  • ChamberQUEER – Brooklyn, NY
  • Choral Arts Initiative – Irvine, CA
  • Continuum Culture & Arts, Inc. – Brooklyn, NY
  • Copland House – Peekskill, NY
  • Creative Music Studio – Woodstock, NY
  • Del Sol Quartet – San Francisco, CA
  • Earshot Jazz – Seattle, WA
  • Ensemble Decipher – Kingston, NY
  • Ethel’s Foundation for the Arts – New York, NY
  • Experiential Orchestra – New York, NY
  • Experimental Sound Studio – Chicago, IL
  • Experiments in Opera – Brooklyn, NY
  • Found Sound Nation – Brooklyn, NY
  • FREER Records – New York, NY
  • Grand Canyon Music Festival – Grand Canyon, AZ
  • Hyde Park Jazz Festival – Chicago, IL
  • Imani Winds – New York, NY
  • Le Mondo – Baltimore, MD
  • LiberArte – Jackson Heights, NY
  • Looking Glass Arts – West Fulton, NY
  • Luna Composition Lab – New York, NY
  • Music for Everyone – Lancaster, PA
  • Mutual Mentorship for Musicians (M3) – New York, NY
  • New Amsterdam Presents – Brooklyn, NY
  • New York Youth Symphony – New York, NY
  • NON:op Arts and Humanities – Oak Park, IL
  • PARTCH Ensemble – Venice, CA
  • Pathos Trio – Brooklyn, NY
  • Pique-nique – Brooklyn, NY
  • Present Music – Milwaukee, WI
  • PS21: Center for Contemporary Performance – Chatham, NY
  • PUBLIQuartet – Sunnyside, NY
  • Recording Fund – Polson, MT
  • Roots in the Sky – Bozeman, MT
  • Street Symphony – Los Angeles, CA
  • The Industry – Los Angeles, CA
  • The Resonance Collective – Los Angeles, CA
  • Third Coast Percussion – Chicago, IL
  • Unheard-of//Ensemble – Brooklyn, NY
  • Watson-Ellison Foundation – Vallejo, CA
  • Wild Up – Los Angeles, CA
  • Yarn/Wire – Ridgewood, NY
  • Yellow Pine Harmonica Festival – Meridian, ID 

Creation of New Work 

  • Caborca – Brooklyn, NY
  • Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia – Philadelphia, PA
  • Documentary Songwriters – Rockport, ME
  • Friends of Chamber Music of Troy, New York – Albany, NY
  • Laptopera Productions – Kensington, CA
  • New Music Chicago – Chicago, IL
  • Opera Saratoga – Saratoga Springs, NY
  • San Francisco Contemporary Music Players – San Francisco, CA
  • Sounds of Saving – Brooklyn, NY
  • Sparks & Wiry Cries – Lansing, NY
  • The Harlem Chamber Players – New York, NY
  • White Snake Projects – Brookline, MA 

Live Music for Dance 

  • a canary torsi – Brooklyn, NY
  • A.I.M by Kyle Abraham – Brooklyn, NY  
  • Attack Theatre – Pittsburgh, PA
  • Chamber Dance Project – Washington, D.C.
  • Company SBB – New York, NY
  • Dance Kaleidoscope – Indianapolis, IN
  • Flyaway Productions – San Francisco, CA
  • Heidi Duckler Dance – Los Angeles, CA
  • José Limón Dance Foundation – New York, NY
  • Leslie Parker Dance Project – St. Paul, MN
  • Music From the Sole – Brooklyn, NY
  • National Center for Choreography-Akron (NCCAkron) – Akron, OH
  • New Chamber Ballet – New York, NY
  • NobleMotion Dance – Houston, TX
  • ShaLeigh Dance Works – Rougemont, NC
  • slowdanger – Pittsburgh, PA
  • Ted Hearne for Movement Without Borders – New York, NY
  • TheEraFootwork – Chicago, IL
  • Works & Process, Inc. – New York, NY 

New Music USA is committed to making all its grant programs equitable, by removing barriers in the application process and by elevating all artists and organizations who receive our support. The main criteria for this fund were: artistry, impact, and need. In addition, applicants were asked to submit a statement of endorsement from an artist or member of their community to highlight the impact of their work. 

Scott Winship, Director of Grantmaking Programs at New Music USA, says,

“We are proud to support 83 organizations across 17 US states and D.C. through our 2025 Organization Fund. The work created and supported by this year’s grantees is inspiring and speaks to the deep impact that these organizations have on their local communities and the new music community at large. The quality of the applicants continues to be extraordinarily high, and we regret that we were not able to support more of the incredible organizations that applied. We are deeply inspired by the work being undertaken by all the awardees and applicants across the country in the service of today’s music creators.”

Judd Greenstein, Co-Director of New Amsterdam Presents (Brooklyn, NY) shares:

“This support comes at a critical time for New Amsterdam Presents, as we are working to grow our operations and present more live concerts and educational programs in addition to the records we release via New Amsterdam Records. With federal funding for new music disappearing and other foundations shifting their priorities away from the arts, New Music USA plays a more vital role than ever for our arts community.”

Clare Hoffman, Co-Founder and Artistic Director of the Grand Canyon Music Festival (Grand Canyon, AZ) adds: 

“The Grand Canyon Music Festival serves some of the most rural and under-served communities in the U.S. We are so very excited and grateful to New Music USA for their support of our vision and mission to bring the voices of new and exciting musicians and composers to these communities, and to continue to nurture and support the creative voices of Native youth through the GCMF’s Native American Composer Apprentice Project.”

Thank You to Our Panelists  

New Music USA extends warm thanks to the 34 panelists from across the US who reviewed Organization Fund applications this year: Salar Ansari, Sidra Bell, Theo Bleckmann, miss al boogie, Samantha Boshnack, James Budinich, Alexa Burrell, James Danner, Ismaeel Dhul-Qarnayn, Teresa Fellion, Abby Fisher, Josh Graham, Brittany Green, Kelly Hall-Tompkins, Andy Hudson, Erika Tazawa Jenkins, Gabriel Jenks, Juliette Jones, Galen Joseph-Hunter, JooWan Kim, Laurie San Martin, André Matos, Laura Ortman, Oscar Peñas, Forrest Pierce, Raymond Pinto, Kian Ravaei, Jane Rigler, Roshni Samlal, Jamie Lee Sampson, Vid Smooke, Cristina Spinei, Hans Tammen, Todd Tarantino, Wayne Wallace, Dai Wei, Youngyun Zhang, and Evan Ziporyn.

Funding Transparency

Both the New Music Creator Fund and the New Music Organization Fund are made possible by the generous funders who either donated to our endowment or donate to New Music USA annually. Some of these funders had or have specific requests regarding the kinds of work we support, which includes around 50% of our funds going to New York-based artists or organizations. Please find more detailed breakdown info in our program FAQs.

Thank You to Our Funders

Support for New Music USA and its many programs and activities is provided by foundations, corporations, government agencies, and hundreds of individual contributors. The Organization Fund is funded in part by Fifth House Ensemble; support for organizations in New York State are made possible in part by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; support for organizations in New York City are funded in part by public funds form the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and with support from the Howard Gilman Foundation.

New Music USA acknowledges and is grateful for the support of its endowment donors, including the Mellon Foundation, Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, Helen F. Whitaker Fund, Baisley Powell Elebash Fund, Hewlett Foundation, Fidelity Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, and Francis Goelet Charitable Lead Trusts.

About New Music USA

New Music USA is a national non-profit organization dedicated to advancing new music in all its forms. Our mission is to nurture a vibrant and inclusive community for artists and listeners by supporting the creation, performance, and appreciation of new music throughout the United States. Through responsive grant-making; skill-building; mentorship and convenings for creators from all backgrounds; and platforms designed to connect music-makers with organizations and their audiences, New Music USA works to ensure a thriving, connected, and equitable ecosystem for the music of our time. newmusicusa.org 

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