Published: 28 Feb 2019
New Music Scotland are pleased to announce that nominations for The Scottish Awards for New Music 2019 open from Thursday 28 February until Friday 22 March. The Awards event takes place on Monday 13 May 2019 at the Drygate Brewery in Glasgow.
These are the third annual Scottish Awards for New Music, which celebrate the depth and breadth of Scotland’s vibrant contemporary music scene. The awards champion the work of Scotland’s composers, musicians, sound artists, programmers, producers and ensembles, and showcase the innovative, experimental and ground-breaking work taking place in Scotland.
As well as a call for new music nominations, the Scottish Awards for New Music are looking for design proposals from artists and sculptors at an early stage in their careers to create the 2019 physical awards which will be presented to the winners. The full brief is available on the New Music Scotland website and the deadline for design submissions is Thursday 14 March.
New Music Scotland’s Co-Chairs Andy Saunders and Oliver Searle said: “Over the past 2 years, it has been both eye-opening and incredibly exciting to see the quantity, high quality, and sheer inventiveness of the new music and projects that people have nominated. With national companies, individual artists, festivals, ensembles, producers, composers, organisations of every size, traditional and jazz music, education and community projects, and the whole gamut of music making from acoustic through to sound art all represented, New Music Scotland are looking forward to celebrating and shining a spotlight on a year's worth of creative, innovative music making here in Scotland at The Scottish Awards for New Music 2019.”
Alan Morrison, Head of Music, Creative Scotland said: "The Scottish Awards for New Music are living proof that sparks fly when the worlds of classical, jazz, sonic art, electronica and experimentation come together. This event celebrates some of the most breath-taking music being made in Scotland today by an array of creatively ambitious composers and performers. It also sets an incredibly high bar for the music of tomorrow, as Scotland’s new music scene captures the eyes, ears and imagination of the world.”
There are twelve award categories, including a new category for 2019 of ‘Making It Happen’, which aims to celebrate emerging talent within new music. The 2019 categories are:
EVM Award for Electroacoustic/Sound Art Work
The Dorico Award for Small Scale New Work sponsored by Steinberg (1-10 performers)
Large Scale New Work (11+ performers)
Recorded New Word
Collaboration in New Music
Community/Education Project
Contribution to New Music in Scotland
New Music Performer(s) of the Year
Creative Programming
The Good Spirits Company Award for Innovation in New Folk Music
Innovation in New Jazz Music
Making It Happen
Nominations can be made by anyone on the New Music Scotland website where full details, and eligibility and submission criteria are also available .
The Awards are created by New Music Scotland with support from the National Lottery through Creative Scotland’s Open Project Fund. Award sponsors include EVM, Dorico Steinberg and The Good Spirits company.
These are the third annual Scottish Awards for New Music. The inaugural Awards were in 2017. An international panel of composers, performers, programmers and music industry experts including Eleanor Wilson (NMC Records) and Gunnar Karel (Dark Music Days), will discuss the nominations, following which a shortlist will be announced on 16 April 2019. The full panel will be announced in due course.
Profiles of the shortlisted entries will be available on New Music Scotland’s website in the weeks leading up to the awards evening on Monday 13 May 2019. New Music Scotland is a network of composers, performers, programmers, producers, educators, funders and audience. NMS facilitates the creation, production and promotion of experimental, innovative and imaginative new music. We believe that new music comes from many different cultural traditions and musical practices; what brings us all together is our passion for and belief in the intrinsic value of new music creation for individuals and society as a whole.
