Tag: awards

New Music USA’s Project Grants Are Now Open

NMUSA Project Grants

New Music USA’s model project gallery

Get ready to get creative. As announced last May, New Music USA (publisher of NewMusicBox) has reconfigured five of its funding programs into a single stream of support for new music, and you can now apply by creating a project. Individual performers, composers, organizations, presenters, and other artists can all request funding on behalf of their projects simply and at no cost. The first deadline is November 4.

The new system boasts a streamlined process for applicants, designed to allow music makers to showcase their work and ask for the support they need in a succinct and efficient manner. No more mailing (sorry, USPS) hard copies of media and commitment letters! Work samples can be shared through services such as Vimeo, YouTube, and SoundCloud; collaborators can confirm their commitments with the click of a button. Funded projects will be showcased on New Music USA’s website and will be easily shared among patrons and fans.
Explore New Music USA’s project gallery, and read through the complete guidelines now on New Music USA.

April 2013 Composer Assistance Program Awardees Announced

NewMusicUSA
New Music USA has announced grant awards totaling $33,245 to 28 composers through the April 2013 round of the Composer Assistance Program (CAP). The grants are intended to help composers take full advantage of performance opportunities that will enhance their careers. The ensembles and organizations premiering or featuring public readings in this round’s CAP-supported works include: Jonathan Biss and the Elias String Quartet, the Los Angeles Dance Project, Talea Emsemble, New York Youth Symphony First Music Program, and the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra.

The Composer Assistance Program will be part of New Music USA’s new approach to supporting new music, a reconfiguration of five preexisting grant programs into one, comprehensive program. Through this new strategy, composers—alongside organizations, presenters, and musicians—will be able to apply for an even wider range of activity to help realize their envisioned artistic endeavors.

The April 2013 CAP awardees are:
Timothy Andres
Gustavo Casenave
Christopher Cerrone
Alan Chan
Anthony Cheung
Gene Coleman
David Coll
Paul Dooley</a
Ryan Edwards
Keith Fitch
Michael-Thomas Foumai
Geoffrey Gordon
Christopher Jentsch
Ben Johnston
Michael Gilbertson
Amy Beth Kirsten
Angel Lam
Hugh Livingston
Michelle Lou
Peri Mauer
Jeffrey Nytch
Kala Pierson
Judith Sante Croix
Daniel Sonenberg
Seth Stewart
Alex Weiser
Conrad Winslow
Scott Wollschleger
For more details, visit the
CAP Awards announcement on the New Music USA site.

NEA Announces the 2014 Jazz Masters

The National Endowment for the Arts has announced the 2014 NEA Jazz Masters. They are:
Educator, saxophonist, pianist, bassist, and banjo player Jamey Aebersold (Aebersold is the recipient of the 2014 A.B. Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy)

Composer, saxophonist, clarinetist, flutist, pianist, and educator Anthony Braxton
Bassist and educator Richard Davis
Pianist and composer Keith Jarrett

2014 NEA Jazz Masters

Jamey Aebersold (Photo by John Nation); Anthony Braxton (Photo by Carolyn Wachnicki); Richard Davis (Photo by Ken Halfmann); and Keith Jarrett (Photo by Rose Anne Colavito)

Full profiles of the 2014 NEA Jazz Masters are located on the NEA’s website. These musicians and educators are recognized for their lifetime achievements and exceptional contributions to the advancement of jazz. They will each receive a one-time award of $25,000.
Jazz Masters Poster
NEA Acting Chairman Joan Shigekawa said, “On behalf of the National Endowment for the Arts, I am proud to announce the newest class of NEA Jazz Masters. The NEA is committed to supporting this uniquely American art form, whether it’s through educational materials such as NEA Jazz in the Schools, supporting performance and educational activities by the Jazz Masters through Jazz Masters Live, or in this case, honoring the individuals who have devoted their lives and careers to mastering, sharing, and expanding this music.”

The NEA will again partner with Jazz at Lincoln Center to produce an awards ceremony and concert in honor of the 2014 NEA Jazz Masters, that will be webcast live on January 13, 2014 on arts.gov and jalc.org/live. A limited number of free tickets will be available for the public. More information about the awards ceremony and concert and how to obtain tickets will be released this fall.

The NEA is currently accepting nominations for the 2015 class of NEA Jazz Masters. The deadline is October 1, 2013. Fellowships are awarded to living individuals on the basis of nominations from the public including the music community. Nominees must demonstrate a significant contribution to the art form through their publicly recognized and accessible body of work in the field of jazz. Visit the NEA’s website for more information and to submit a nomination.

(—from the press release)

2012-13 ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Orchestra Programming Announced

League of American Orchestras’ 68th National Conference

Welcome to the League of American Orchestras’ 68th National Conference in St. Louis

Nineteen American orchestras have been recognized with 2012-13 ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Programming at the League of American Orchestras’ 68th National Conference in St. Louis. ASCAP and the League present the awards each year to orchestras of all sizes for programs that challenge the audience, build the repertoire, and increase interest in the music of our time. Approximately $725,000 has been bestowed on orchestras since the awards were established in 1947. Below is a complete list of the winning orchestras and their music directors.

John S. Edwards Award for Strongest Commitment to New American Music
Albany Symphony Orchestra – David Alan Miller, Music Director and Conductor

Morton Gould Award for Innovative Programming
South Dakota Symphony Orchestra – Delta David Gier, Music Director

Leonard Bernstein Award for Educational Programming
New York Philharmonic – Alan Gilbert, Music Director

Award for American Programming on Foreign Tours
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra

Awards for Programming of Contemporary Music:
Group 1 Orchestras
1st Place: Los Angeles Philharmonic – Gustavo Dudamel, Music Director
2nd Place: Seattle Symphony Orchestra – Ludovic Morlot, Music Director
3rd Place: Nashville Symphony – Giancarlo Guerrero, Music Director

Group 2 Orchestras
1st Place: Orpheus Chamber Orchestra
2nd Place: Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra – Jeffrey Kahane, Artistic Director
3rd Place: Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra – JoAnn Falletta, Music Director

Group 3/4 Orchestras
1st Place: Santa Rosa Symphony – Bruno Ferrandis, Music Director and Conductor

Group 5/6 Orchestras

1st Place: Berkeley Symphony – Joana Carneiro, Music Director
2nd Place: Boston Modern Orchestra Project – Gil Rose, Artistic Director
3rd Place: San José Chamber Orchestra – Barbara Day Turner, Music Director/Conductor

Group 7/8 Orchestras
1st Place: Lexington Symphony – Jonathan McPhee, Music Director
2nd Place: Michigan Philharmonic – Nan Washburn, Music Director and Conductor
3rd Place: New England Philharmonic – Richard Pittman, Music Director

Collegiate Orchestras
1st Place: Ithaca College Symphony Orchestra – Jeffery Meyer, Director of Orchestras

Youth Orchestras
1st Place: Youth Orchestras of San Antonio – Troy Peters, Music Director

Festivals
1st Place: Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, Marin Alsop, Music Director and Conductor

Orchestras are evaluated for these awards based on the amount of music composed during the last 25 years performed. A complete list of qualifying repertoire performed during the 2012-2013 season by this year’s award-winning orchestras is available as a PDF on the League of American Orchestras’ website.

(—from the League of American Orchestras press release)

Scores by Adams, Dorff, Fairouz, and Rouse Top 2013 Paul Revere Awards

MPA Logo
Robert Sutherland, chief librarian for The Metropolitan Opera, announced the 2013 Paul Revere Awards for Graphic Excellence during the 2013 annual meeting of the Music Publishers Association at the 3 West Club in New York City. Among the first-prize winners in 12 separate award categories (ranging from educational folios to piano and guitar solos to choral and full orchestra scores) were publications containing music by John Adams (I Was Looking at the Ceiling and then I Saw the Sky), Daniel Dorff (The Kiss), Mohammed Fairouz (Concert Arias from Sumeida’s Song), Jimi Hendrix (Winterland), Christopher Rouse (Karolju), and Kurt Weill (Johnny Johnson). Two scores by Richard Danielpour (Spirits in the Well and Sweet Talk) were awarded second prize. (The awards are named in honor of American Revolutionary War hero Paul Revere who was a printer by profession.) A complete list of the 2013 winners appears below.

The Cover Design Featuring Photography
1st Prize (tie)—
Insights and Essays on the Music Performance Library (Meredith Music Publications)
Mohammed Fairuz: Concert Arias from Sumeida’s Song (Peermusic Classical)
2nd Prize—My Big & Easy Five-Finger Scale Book (The FJH Music Company Inc.)
3rd Prize—Music of Bing & Ruth (Mel Bay)

Cover Design Featuring Graphic Elements
1st Prize—On the Outside Looking Out: 5-String Banjo Beyond Bluegrass (Mel Bay)
2nd Prize—Killer Technique: Mandolin (Mel Bay)
3rd Prize—Learn to Burn: Drum Set (Mel Bay)

Book Design in Folios
1st Prize—Kurt Weill: Johnny Johnson (European American Music)
2nd Prize—William Bolcom: Theatrical Songs for High Voice and Piano (E.B. Marks)
3rd Prize—Difibulators Songbook (Mel Bay)

Book Design in Educational Folios
1st Prize—Insights and Essays on the Music Performance Library (Meredith Music Publications)
2nd Prize (tie)—
The Art of Instrumental Accompanying (Carl Fischer)
Tuning for Wind Instruments (Meredith Music Publications)

Publications for Electronic Distribution
1st Prize—Franz Liszt: III. La Campanella, S. 141 (Musicnotes, Inc.)
2nd Prize—Anton Rubinstein: Melody in F, Op.3, No. 1 (Musicnotes, Inc.)

Choral Music
1st Prize—Christopher Rouse Karolju (Boosey & Hawkes)
2nd Prize—Tony Alonso: Music for the Rites of Initiation (World Library Publications)
3rd Prize—Chen Yi: I Hear the Siren’s Call (Theodore Presser Company)

Keyboard Music
1st Prize—Artur Schnabel: Drei Fantasiestücke (Peermusic Classical)
2nd Prize—Charles Ives: Complete Organ Music (Theodore Presser Company)
3rd Prize—Bernard Rands: Three Pieces for Piano (Schott Helicon Music Corp.)

Guitar Music
1st Prize—Jimi Hendrix: Winterland (Hal Leonard Corporation)
2nd Prize: Neil Young: Everybody Knows this is Nowhere (Hal Leonard Corporation)

Full Scores
1st Prize—Daniel Dorff : The Kiss (Theodore Presser Company)

Piano-Vocal Music
1st Prize—John Adams: I Was Looking at the Ceiling and then I Saw the Sky (Boosey & Hawkes)
2nd Prize (tie)—
Richard Danielpour: Spirits in the Well (Associated Music Publishers)
Tobias Picker: The Seine Moves Like a Melody (Schott Helicon Music Corp.)

Solos (with or without accompaniment)
First Prize— Bottesini: Two Elegies (International Music Company)
Second Prize—Karel Husa: Suite for Viola and Piano, Opus 5 (Associated Music Publishers)
Third Prize—Skipping Stones (Marimba Productions, Inc.)

Chamber Ensembles
1st Prize—W.A. Mozart: Three German Dances, K. 605 (International Music Company)
2nd Prize— Richard Danielpour: Sweet Talk (Associated Music Publishers)
3rd Prize—Felix Mendelssohn: Six Christmas Pieces (International Music Company)

 

 Some of the 2013 Paul Revere Award winning scores on display during the MPA Annual Meeting.


Some of the 2013 Paul Revere Award winning scores on display during the MPA Annual Meeting.

A total of 123 entries were submitted in consideration for the 2013 Paul Revere Awards. The 2013 judges were George Boziwick, Denis Suplina, Bruc Taub, and Ronald Whitaker. Robert Sutherland serves as the awards committee chair. The Paul Revere Awards were established by the Music Publishers Association in 1964. During the 2012-13 season, an exhibition of the 2012 Paul Revere Award-winning scores was mounted in nine libraries across the United States.

2013 BMI Student Composer Awards Announced

2013 BMI Award Winning Scores

As in previous years, the 2013 BMI Student Composer Award-winning scores are available for perusal at the awards ceremony.

Ten young composers received cash prizes totaling $20,000 during the 61st Annual BMI Student Composer Awards, an invitation-only event held in the Grand Salon of the JW Marriott Essex House Hotel in New York City on Monday, May 20, 2013. As per the guidelines on the BMI website, the prizes, which range from $500 to $5,000, are “awarded to student composers under the age of 28 who are citizens of the Western Hemisphere (North, South, and Central America, the Caribbean Island Nations, and the Hawaiian Islands).” Awards are determined by panels consisting of BMI composers and are judged from scores which are submitted under pseudonyms. There are no limitations as to instrumentation, style, or length of work submitted, and the 2013 award winning works range from a string quartet and a composition for piano four-hands to music for SATB chorus, orchestra, and wind ensemble plus fixed media.

Composer Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, who serves as chair of the Student Composer Awards, announced each of the winners after introductory speeches by BMI’s President and CEO Del Bryant and Deirdre Chadwick, BMI’s executive director for classical music. During the course of her remarks, Chadwick announced that BMI has established the Ralph N. Jackson Fund for New Music, in honor of retired BMI Foundation President Ralph Jackson, who served for many years as director of these awards.

Twenty-five-year-old Mexican-born composer Juan Pablo Contreras, who recently completed a master’s degree in composition at the Manhattan School of Music, was awarded the 2013 William Schuman Prize (for the score judged the best in the competition) for his orchestral composition El Laberinto de la Soledad. The work will be performed next season by three different orchestras in Latin America.


Seventeen-year-old Michael D. Parsons received his second consecutive Carlos Surinach Prize, awarded each year to the youngest winner in the competition, for his Trio for flute, bass clarinet, and piano. The same composition earned him the 2013 Charlotte V. Bergen Scholarship, given to the top ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Award winner aged 18 or younger.


Another 2013 BMI Student Composer Award winner Michael Gilbertson, whose BMI award-winning work is Concerto for guitar and strings, was also a recipient of a 2013 ASCAP Young Composer Award for his Who Remembers Day for amplified soprano and chamber orchestra. Gilbertson, who originally hails from Dubuque, Iowa, just graduated from the Yale School of Music and already has had compositions published by Boosey & Hawkes, G. Schirmer, and the Theodore Presser Company.


The other seven 2013 award-winning composers and their works are:
Christopher Chandler (b. 1986 in Savannah, GA): deep in liquid indigo for chamber ensemble
Stefan Cwik (b. 1987 in Chicago, IL): Acrobats – Etude Variations for piano four-hands
William Dougherty (b. 1988 in Philadelphia, PA): Winded for wind ensemble and fixed media
Michael-Thomas Foumai (b. 1987 in Honolulu, HI): Scat for chamber ensemble
Kurt Isaacson (b. 1986, Batavia, IL): on an internal structure of the hemispherical body for string quartet
Chris Rogerson (b. 1988 in Buffalo, NY): Summer Night Music for piano quartet
Michael Schachter (b. 1987 in Boston, MA): Three Wallace Stevens Songs for SATB chorus

 


The BMI Student Composer Awards competition is co-sponsored by BMI and the BMI Foundation, Inc. The preliminary judges for the 2013 BMI Student Composer Awards were Alexandra du Bois, Shafer Mahoney, David Schober, and Sean Shepherd. The final jury, which determines the award winners from the scores submitted for consideration by the preliminary judges, were Margaret Brouwer, Richard Danielpour, Mario Davidovsky, Aaron Jay Kernis, and Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez with Ellen Taaffe Zwilich overseeing the proceedings.

2013 ASCAP Concert Music Awards Honor León, Deak, Smith, Gould, and 28 Young Composers

ASCAP Concert Music Awards
Tania León, Jon Deak, Steve Smith, the late Morton Gould, and 28 young composers were honored by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) during its 14th Annual Concert Music Awards, an invitation-only event held at Merkin Concert Hall at the Kaufman Center in New York City on Friday, May 17, 2013. ASCAP member, composer, musician, and author Peter Schickele served as the master of ceremonies. Other presenters were Derek Bermel, Claire Chase, David Del Tredici, Douglas Geers, James M. Kendrick, Stephen Paulus, and Alex Shapiro, plus ASCAP’s CEO John LoFrumento, Frances Richard, Michael Spudic, and Cia Toscanini.

Tania León, the founder and artistic director of the Composers Now Festival and distinguished professor at the City University of New York, received the Victor Herbert Award in celebration of her 70th year and for her achievements as composer, conductor, educator, mentor, composer advocate, and exemplary musical citizen. [Ed. note: Click here to read a 1999 NewMusicBox conversation with Tania León.]


Jon Deak, founder and director of Very Young Composers International, received the Arnold Broido Award to in celebration of his 70th year and for his distinguished contribution to American music as composer, bassist, and educator.


ASCAP also honored journalist, editor and broadcaster Steve Smith, the music editor of Time Out New York and a contributor to The New York Times for his vision and courageous contributions as advocate for American music and composers. [Ed. note: One of Steve Smith’s earliest articles was written for the second issue of NewMusicBox in June 1999.]


In addition, there was a special centenary tribute to the late composer Morton Gould (1913-1996), who served as ASCAP’s President from 1986 until 1994 and in whose memory the ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Awards were named after his death. Pianist Simon Mulligan performed Gould’s exciting Boogie Woogie Etude and several members of Gould’s family came to the stage to receive a commemorative plaque from ASCAP honoring Gould’s legacy.
The 2013 ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Awards were also presented to 28 composers who share in cash prizes totaling approximately $45,000. Award winners this year additionally received complimentary copies of Sibelius notation software, donated by Avid, and a free one-year subscription to ScoreStreet, a new self-publishing web platform that will launch this summer. Brief audio excerpts of recordings of each of the award-winning works were played during the ceremony. (For works that have not yet been performed, a MIDI mock-up was featured.)
Sky Macklay, age 24 of New York, NY (born in Waseca, MN), received the Leo Kaplan Award, the top prize in the Young Composer Awards (which is named in memory of the distinguished attorney who served as ASCAP special distribution advisor), for her thirteen-minute orchestral composition Dissolving Bands. Macklay spoke briefly with us about her neo-Ivesian piece which was inspired by the American Revolution.


Michael D. Parsons, age 17 (NJ), was awarded the Charlotte V. Bergen Scholarship, which is given to the top Young Composer Award winner aged 18 or younger, for his nine-minute Trio for flute, bass clarinet and piano. The Palisades Virtuosi, which commissioned the work, will present its world premiere performance during the 2013-14 season.


The other 2013 Morton Gould Young Composer Award winners are listed with their age, current residence, and place of origin followed by the name and duration of their award-winning compositions:
Samuel Carl Adams, 27 of Brooklyn, NY (San Francisco, CA): Drift and Providence for orchestra [19′]
Timo Andres, 27 of Brooklyn, NY (Palo Alto, CA): Old Keys for piano and chamber orchestra [13′]
Tyler Capp, 30 of Kansas City, MO (Harrisburg, PA): Cryptogram for wind ensemble [9′]
Ryan Chase, 25 of Bloomington, IN (Port Jefferson, NY): Stargazer for ensemble [8′]
Yie Eun Chun, 27 of Bloomington, IN (South Korea): A Little Puppet Play for ensemble [8′]
Francisco Cortés-Álvarez, 29 of Bloomington, IN (Mexico City, Mexico): No Llores for 16 instruments [10’30”]
Viet Cuong, 22 of Princeton, NJ (West Hills, CA): Suite for 2 oboes and English horn [12′]
Tamzin Elliott, 20 of Annandale on Hudson, NY (Beverly Hills, CA): Fixation for 2 violins and piano [14′]
Stephen Feigenbaum, 24 of Winchester, MA (Cambridge, MA): Dances for string quartet [22′]
Michael Gilbertson, 25 of New Haven, CT (Dubuque, IA): Who Remembers Day for amplified soprano and chamber orchestra [11′]
Takuma Itoh, 28 of Honolulu, HI (Japan): Afterimage for solo cello [8′]
John Liberatore, 28 of Rochester, NY (Auburn, NY): Nemo sleeps for solo piano [8′]
Loren Loiacono, 23 of Ithaca, NY (Port Jefferson, NY): The Awakening for soprano, chorus, and ensemble [11′]
Yangzhi Ma, 25 of New York, NY (China): Off for soprano and ensemble [6’30”]
Maxwell McKee, 21 of Redhook, NY (Hackensack, NJ): Half-Life for solo piano [4’30”]
Garth Neustadter, 26 of Pasadena, CA (Green Bay, WI): Bar talk for violin and piano [3’30”]
Brendon Randall-Myers, 26 of New Haven, CT (Northampton, MA): Making Good Choices for guitar trio [13′]
Matthew Ricketts, 27 of New York, NY (Victoria, British Columbia, Canada): Burrowed Time for 15 instruments [17′]
Gabriella Smith, 21 of El Cerrito, CA (Berkeley, CA): Tidalwave Kitchen for orchestra [8’30”]
Gabriel Zucker, 22 of Boston, MA (New York, NY): Universal at Midnight for orchestra and jazz band [12′]
The other youngest award recipients, who range in age from 9 to 18, are listed by state of residence followed by the titles and durations of their award-winning compositions:
Jaehyuck Choi, age 18 (MA): Horizon, concerto for violoncello and orchestra, op. 10 [5’30”]
Stella Gitelman-Willoughby, age 12 (MA): Prayers for clarinet and piano [5′]
Huang Tiange, age 9 (NY): Four Tang Poems for soprano and ensemble [5′]
Grant Luhmann, age 18 (MN): Music for 4 Winds, Percussion and Piano [7’30”]
Lawrence Suh, age 17 (MD): …Of that which I have seen for flute, clarinet, and violin [3′]
Renata Vallecillo, age 13 (AZ): Loca’s Heaven for piano and cello [6′]
The following composers received Honorable Mention: Douglas Buchanan of Cockeysville, MD (Westfield, NY) for his 105-minute piano solo composition Colonnades; Melody Eotvos of Bloomington, IN (Australia); Paul Frucht of New York, NY; Ian Gottlieb of Los Angeles, CA (Santa Monica, CA); Michael Ippolito of New York, NY (Tampa, FL); Matthew Peterson of Stockholm, Sweden (Grand Forks, ND); John W. Snyder of Santa Monica, CA (Temple City, CA); Fay (Feinan) Wang of Boston, MA (Beijing, China); Alex Weston of New York, NY (Chatham, NJ) and Conrad Winslow of Brooklyn, NY (Homer, AK). Honorable Mention in the youngest category: Graham Cohen, age 14 (NJ) for his 22-minute Symphony No. 10; Isaac Allen, age 16 (CO); Noah Kahrs, age 18 (PA); Jae Lee, age 18 (GA); Nicholas McConnell, age 14 (NJ); and J.P. Redmond, age 13 (NY).
The 2013 ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Award judges were ASCAP member composers Derek Bermel, Lisa Bielawa, Steven Burke, Chen Yi, Douglas Geers, Yotam Haber, and Aleksandra Vrebalov.

(—including material culled from the press release)

Caroline Shaw Wins 2013 Pulitzer Prize

Caroline Shaw
Partita for 8 Voices by Caroline Shaw has been awarded the 2013 Pulitzer Prize in Music. The 26-minute four-movement work composed between 2009-2012 was recorded by the vocal ensemble Roomful of Teeth for New Amsterdam Records (released on October 30, 2012). The prize is for a “distinguished musical composition by an American that has had its first performance or recording in the United States” during the previous calendar year and comes with a cash award of ten thousand dollars. The jury described Shaw’s composition as “a highly polished and inventive a cappella work uniquely embracing speech, whispers, sighs, murmurs, wordless melodies and novel vocal effects.”


The fourth and final movement (Passacaglia) of Caroline Shaw’s Partita for 8 Voices performed by A Roomful of Teeth from the June 2009 premiere at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art.

Also nominated as finalists in this category were Aaron Jay Kernis’s Pieces of Winter Sky (published by Associated Music Publishers, Inc.), premiered on November 15, 2012 at Lincoln Theater, University of Hartford, CT, a luminous work that takes listeners into a mystical realm marked by taut expressive control and extraordinarily subtle changes of tone, texture and nuance; and Wadada Leo Smith’s Ten Freedom Summers, recording released May 22, 2012 on Cuneiform Records, an expansive jazz work that memorializes 10 key moments in the history of civil rights in America, fusing composed and improvised passages into powerful, eloquent music.

Pulitzer Prizes have been awarded annually since 1919. The Music Prize was added in 1943 when William Schuman’s Secular Cantata No. 2, “A Free Song” received the first honor. Past prize winning works include Aaron Copland’s Appalachian Spring (1945), Charles Ives’s Symphony No. 3 (1947, awarded 30 years after its composition), Samuel Barber’s opera Vanessa (1958), Elliott Carter’s String Quartets Nos. 2 (1960) and 3 (1973), Charles Wuorinen’s electronic music composition Time’s Encomium, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich’s Symphony No. 1 – Three Movements for Orchestra (1983), Wynton Marsalis’s oratorio Blood on the Fields (1997), John Adams’s On The Transmigration of Souls (2003), Ornette Coleman’s recording Sound Grammar (2007), and Jennifer Higdon’s Violin Concerto (2010).

As is the case with all Pulitzer prize-winners, the awarded pieces of music are chosen through a two panel process. Each year a different jury (consisting of five professionals in the field and which usually includes at least one previous winner of the award) is convened and selects a total of three finalists from works received for consideration. (Anyone–not only the composer or publisher of the work–can submit a work provided it is accompanied by a $50 entry fee and meets the qualifications of being composed by an American and having had its first performance or recording in the United States during the previous calendar year.) The three finalists are then submitted to the 20-member Pulitzer board, consisting mostly of major newspaper editors and executives as well as a few academics. (The board elects its own members who individually serve three-year terms.) The winner is determined by a majority vote of the board. It is possible for the jury not to choose any of the finalists–as was the case for the Music award in the years 1964, 1965, and 1981 resulting in no prize being given. The board can also demand that the jury selects a different work, as was the case in 1992 when the only work the jury submitted to the board was Ralph Shapey’s Concerto Fantastique. (The work which was ultimately awarded the prize that year was Wayne Peterson’s The Face of the Night.)

The jurors for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize in Music were: Jeremy Geffen, director, artistic planning, Carnegie Hall, New York City (Chair); Muhal Richard Abrams, pianist and composer, New York City; Gerald Levinson, Jane Lang Professor of Music, department of music and dance, Swarthmore College; Carol Oja, William Powell Mason Professor of Music, Harvard University; and Howard Reich, jazz critic, Chicago Tribune.

MAP Fund Awards $1.4M to Support 41 Live Performance Projects

2013 MAP Fund Awardee Bang On A Can's roving 12-player Asphalt Orchestra.

2013 MAP Fund Awardee Bang On A Can’s roving 12-player Asphalt Orchestra

The MAP Fund, a program of Creative Capital supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, has announced its 2013 grants. The Fund will underwrite 41 new projects in the disciplines of dance, theater, and music, all works that in some way explore the boundaries of contemporary performance practices.

A panel of peers selected the grantees from more than 800 submissions, and the projects will be supported with grants ranging from $15,000 to $40,000. In addition to project grants, an additional $200,000 total in general operating grants is available to all applicant organizations and artists.

The 2013 grantees include:

Alarm Will Sound, Inc. (NY) for The Hunger, a new opera by Irish composer Donnacha Dennehy about the inequities that led to the Great Famine in Ireland which will be performed by Dawn Upshaw and Iarla O’Lionáird with Alarm Will Sound.
Bang On A Can (NY) Bulgarian Asphalt, a new commission for Bang on a Can’s Asphalt Orchestra, including music by Ivo Papasov and movement by Parker Lutz.

Kronos Quartet (CA) for a new work for string quartet and film in commemoration of the centennial of the outbreak of World War I, created in collaboration between Kronos Quartet and composer Aleksandra Vrebalov.

Providence Productions International, Inc. (CA) for Mediation, a new live performance where pre-recorded sound, video, and text form the basis for improvisational collaboration between lead artists “Blue” Gene Tyranny, Hisao Ihara, and Mary Griffin.
Harlem Stage (NY) for The Idea(s) of Harlem, a song cycle conceived by musician/composer/visual artist STEW, which explores both the reality and myth of Harlem through the lens of writer James Baldwin.
For a complete list of the 2013 grantees, please visit the MAP Fund site.

Harlem Stage receives MAP Funding the year for The Idea(s) of Harlem, a song cycle conceived by musician/composer/visual artist STEW, which explores both the reality and myth of Harlem through the lens of writer James Baldwin.

Harlem Stage receives MAP Funding the year for The Idea(s) of Harlem, a song cycle conceived by musician/composer/visual artist STEW, which explores both the reality and myth of Harlem through the lens of writer James Baldwin.

Panelists who served the MAP Fund this year included Bill Bragin (Director of Public Programming, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York), Don Byron (independent composer, New Jersey), Jess Curtis (choreographer/director, Artistic Director, Jess Curtis/Gravity, San Francisco/Berlin), Cathy Edwards (Director of Programming, International Festival of Arts and Ideas, New Haven, CT), Gayle Isa (Executive Director, Asian Arts Initiative, Philadelphia), Jaamil Olawale Kosoko (Producing Associate, New York Live Arts, Co-Director of anonymous bodies II art colllective, Philadelphia), Tommy Kriegsmann (President, ArKtype, New York), Mark Murphy (Executive Director, REDCAT, Los Angeles), and Susan Narucki (soprano and professor of music, University of California at San Diego).

The MAP Fund is supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The program, which was established by the Rockefeller Foundation in 1988, has supported innovation and cross-cultural exploration in theater, dance, and music for more than two decades. To date, MAP has disbursed over $24 million dollars to over 1,000 projects. Since 2001, the program has been administered by Creative Capital, a national nonprofit organization founded in 1999 which is dedicated to providing integrated financial and advisory support to artists pursuing adventurous projects in five disciplines: Emerging Fields, Film/Video, Literature, Performing Arts, and Visual Arts.

(-from the press release)

2013 Guggenheim Fellows Announced

Guggenheim
In its 89th annual competition for the United States and Canada, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation has awarded 175 fellowships to artists, scientists, and scholars. The successful candidates were chosen from a group of some 3,000 applicants.

In the category of “Creative Arts: Music Composition,” this year’s awardees are:

Kati Agócs
Marcos Balter
Benjamin Broening
Aaron Einbond
Myra Melford
Carman Moore
Paul Moravec
Jean-Michel Pilc
Narong Prangcharoen
Mathew Rosenblum
Sheila Silver
Guggenheim Fellows are appointed “on the basis of achievement and exceptional promise.” Since its establishment in 1925, the foundation has granted over $281 million in fellowships to more than 17,000 individuals.

(—from the website)