Art Music Fund projects see light of day as applications open for 2018

As a number of projects generated by the $100,000 APRA AMCOS Art Music Fund come to light, applications have opened for the 2018 version.

APRA AMCOS Head of Member Services Dean Ormston says “It is greatly rewarding to see the Art Music Fund now in its third year and to have the work of previous recipients coming to fruition.

“APRA AMCOS is proud to support the innovative Australian and New Zealand composers of the art music sector and we look forward to seeing what comes next.”

Previous recipients have come from a range of art music backgrounds, from improvisational jazz to sound art to children’s opera.

The association explains on its website, “The funding pool of $100,000 is available for the creation of commissioned work that is innovative, displays professional compositional craft and represents a benchmark of excellence in its field. The intention is to support composers to create works with a long artistic life.”

Applications close 5pm February 20, 2018 AEDT.

Lisa Illean’s piece Cantor (After Willa Cather), for voice and ensemble, was performed at Carriageworks in Sydney on September 23, and will now be presented in the Netherlands, the UK (where Sydney-born Illean is currently studying her doctorate at the Royal College of Music in London), China and Canada.

James Hullick’s electro-acoustic CityTopias will premiere at Melbourne Music Week,

Eve Klein’s Vocal Womb, a sound installation and operatic performance work, will have its world premiere at MOFO in Tasmania at MONA 2018. 

It externalises the working of the voice from inside the opera singer’s body. Audiences enter a reverberant dome where they manipulate real-time audio and video feeds taken from inside the body of a singer who is performing an intimate work composed for the dome.

"The Art Music Fund is important because it provides an avenue for contemporary art music to flourish," says Klein.

2016 recipient Hullick adds, "The Art Music Fund is a moment in Australian history where composers working outside the square finally get some kind acknowledgement of their incredible contribution to our diverse and technologized 21st century culture."

Recipients this year are Natasha Anderson for the 30-minute Suppression, an ensemble work for 12 players and spatialised electronics to be performed in Australia, the USA and Germany.

Newton Armstrong’s new ensemble work engaged with the dynamics activated by the paintings of Warlimpirrnga Tjapaltjarri, recorded in London and released on the Another Timbre label.

Lisa Cheney’s 40 minute operatic work for children was based on Edward Lear’s poem The Owl and the Pussycat.

Erik Griswold (pictured) created Action Music 2, for performances in Australia, USA, Canada, France and Ireland.

Annie Hui-Hsin Hsieh is currently working on a piece for an octet lineup of the ELISION ensemble, to premiere in early 2019 and performed in the USA and China.

Dylan Lardelli’s Musikfabrik, is set to play Germany, New Zealand, and Japan.

Kate Moore’s composition of Eximia (Bloodwood) is a song cycle about the history, heritage, environment and women’s culture of the lower Hunter Valley using the personified metaphor of Eucalyptus trees native to the Hunter Valley dry sclerophyll forest.

It is a 60-minute set of short compositions for two sopranos, violin, percussion, electronics and sound engineer designed for touring in Australia and the USA.

Eugene Ughetti’s Polar Force combines custom built ice instruments with Antarctic field recordings, set within a chilled inflatable performance space. Polar Force is a phenomenological investigation of extreme wind and temperature through hyper-realistic art.