Call-for-Composers: New Music Collective

Applications are now closed

Royal Holloway Department of Music and New Music Collective are delighted to announce a College Call-for-Composers. We invite composers who are currently enrolled at Royal Holloway, at any stage of education, to apply for the opportunity to collaborate on a new work with the Royal Holloway New Music Collective and conductor Nathan James Dearden.

Ten selected composers will be given the opportunity to collaborate on a new work with the New Music Collective, for premiere as part of the College's International Concert Series. The ten new works will be workshopped, rehearsed and performed between January and March 2020. The project will be overseen by Visiting Lecturer in Music Composition and College conductor, Nathan James Dearden, in which successful applicants will receive guidance and support in rehearsal and through one-to-one tuition. 

The aim of the project is for composers and musicians to collaborate on a new work with an open score / flexible instrumentation format. All of the new music created will be flexibly scored, which means that each part is provided in a number of transpositions so that you can select an orchestration that is appropriate to your ensemble. Through a series of workshops in January 2020, each composer will have the opportunity to experiment with instrumentation and timbre through the freedom that open score allows.

How to apply

Please complete the online application by 23:59pm on Monday 14 October 2019. Applicants are asked to submit two existing works (one must feature 3 or more instruments) that represent your recent or best work. Applications will be discussed and selections will be made by Nathan James Dearden (Composer and Project Curator) and Dr Nina Whitman (Lecturer in Music Composition). 

All applicants and any potential applicants are strongly encouraged to attend an Introductory Session on Monday 7 October at 7.00pm in Wettons Annexe A to learn more about open score writing, and to meet the musicians of New Music Collective. This will also be an opportunity to ask questions about the project and the application process. 

Successful applicants will be notified by Monday 21 October 2019.

Project Schedule

Introductory Session for applicants and musicians (recommended): Monday 7 October 2019, 7.00pm
Closing date for applications: Monday 14 October 2019, 11.59pm
Notification of successful applicants: Monday 21 October 2019, 5.00pm
First submission of complete work: Monday 9 December 2019, 12:00pm
First formal rehearsal: Monday 13 January 2019, 19:00pm onwards
Premiere of works: Thursday 12 March 2019 

Important information 

• To apply you must currently be enrolled onto any degree programme at Royal Holloway, University of London.
• If you are unfamiliar with the work of CoMA's Open Score Project, please familiarise yourself with any of the 100s of works written for flexible ensemble.  
• The project will be split into two phases: the writing period (October - December 2019) and the collaboration phase (January - March 2020)
• Selected composers will have the opportunity to assign a key or principal instrument within their flexible ensemble during the workshop process, although this is not essential.
• Formal rehearsals will begin on Monday 13th January 2020 (schedule will be sent out), however, the composer and performers of New Music Collective may wish to collaborate informally after their introductory session from Monday 7 October 2019, during the writing period.
• The final work must be between 4 - 6 minutes in duration. 

The premiere

Successful applicants will be invited to the Windsor Building Auditorium (Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, Surrey, TW20 0EX) on Thursday 12 March 2019. The event will also feature seminal works of the Open Score Project; Donnacha Dennehy's A Fatal Optimist and Philip Cashian's Mechanik.

For more information on this event, please CLICK HERE.

Please contact NathanJames.Dearden@royalholloway.ac.uk if you require any further information about the application process or the project itself.