ACTIVATE Young Composer Program

Call for submissions Deadline: November 15, 2020 (11:59 PST)

The Alliance for Canadian New Music Projects (ACNMP) and Canadian Music Centre (CMC) are inviting young Canadian composers to apply for ACTIVATE, an adjudicated composition program and reading session.

ACTIVATE is an early entry point for young artists exploring composition and sound: in particular those who are not working/studying in a professional context, and would therefore want to access different forms of mentorship and opportunities to hear their music performed by professional musicians. ACTIVATE participants will gain new skills, and have opportunities to connect with a peer group from across Canada.

We are pleased to welcome adjudicator and composer mentor Anna Höstman for this year’s program. We have also invited violinist and composer Aline Homzy to participate in the adjudication process.

Program experience: ACTIVATE consists of two components:

Adjudicated composition class:

Each composer who applies will receive written remarks from Anna Höstman in response to a submitted piece of music (addressing technical and artistic aspects of your work, with some recommendations for further development in your practice)
Anna Höstman will select one promising applicant as the winner of the Louise MacPherson Memorial Award ($400 CAD). The adjudicator may choose to select another applicant who will receive an honourable mention ($100) at which point the Award prize would be $300.

Reading session with guest musicians:

Anna Höstman, along with ACNMP and CMC organizers, will select up to six (6) of the adjudicated works to be included in a professional reading session with guest musicians. Composers would access the reading session remotely using an unlisted livestream link, and a video conferencing application to facilitate real-time interaction.
Composers selected for the reading session will receive a professional audio recording for personal reference
Every applicant from the adjudication stage will be invited to audit the reading session.

Program Eligibility:

An applicant must be:

a Canadian citizen, permanent resident of Canada, refugee, or in the process of applying for refugee or PR status while in Canada
25 years of age or younger as of December 31, 2020.

Submission Criteria

All applications will be submitted through an online form (submissions will include basic personal information, along with all support material relating to your piece)
Adjudicated pieces may be in any medium (for any instrumentation, including electronics), and have a duration from 2 to 10 minutes
To be considered for the reading session, composers should submit solo or duo works, or fixed electronic pieces for stereo playback, that meet the duration criteria. If a piece is written for solo or duo instruments with fixed electronics (stereo playback) it will be considered for the reading. It is possible for a piece to be awarded the Louise MacPherson Memorial Award in the adjudication round, but not included in the reading.
Works can be unperformed or previously performed. We discourage composers from submitting pieces that have been awarded prizes in other juried competitions.
Composers are welcome to submit up to two pieces, but these must be submitted separately.
There is a $5 CAD application fee per submitted work, paid by credit card through the submission form.

Project Timeline

November 15, Deadline for applications, adjudication begins
Mid-December, Adjudication summaries are shared, award results announced, and works for reading session are finalized
Mid-January, scores and parts for reading session are submitted to organizers
Late February, reading session takes place (precise date will be determined and communicated to participants)

About Anna Höstman

Anna’s compositions seek out tactile encounters with the world while extending into history, memory, and landscape. Performed throughout Canada and internationally, her works have been described as “suggestive, elegant”(Andriessen) and “hauntingly beautiful.” (Barcza) Alongside pieces for the concert stage, she has composed for opera, dance, performance installation, theatre, experimental film and video, and created music for the National Film Board.

Anna has held artist residencies at the Matralab (Concordia University, Montréal), Artspring (Saltspring Island) and Outvert Artspace (Ísafjörður, Iceland). From 2005-8, she was composer-in-residence of the Victoria Symphony. Her opera What Time is it Now? based on an original libretto by P.K. Page was premiered by the Victoria Symphony and recorded and broadcast by CBC radio.

Anna’s music has been performed by Brompton String Quartet, Red Shift Ensemble, Carla Huhtanen, Heather Roche, Mira Benjamin, Standing Wave Ensemble, FAWN, Thin Edge, Continuum Contemporary Ensemble, Quatuor Bozzini, Victoria Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, Lafayette Quartet, Roger Admiral, Moritz Ernst, Wesley Shen, and Blythwood Winds, amongst others.

“Harbour”, a CD of solo piano works, has been recently released by Toronto pianist, Cheryl Duvall on Redshift Records (Vancouver) and was featured on CBC’s In Concert with Paolo Pietropaolo (29 Mar, 2020).

Anna’s harpsichord solo for Wesley Shen, “Small Meadows in Spring,” was selected as a finalist for the Prix Annelie de Man festival in Amsterdam (2020). Her compositions have been supported by numerous grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, BC Arts Council, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, K.M. Hunter Foundation, the Koerner Foundation, the SOCAN Foundation, and private donors. She has received the K.M. Hunter Award, Canadian Music Centre’s Toronto Emerging Composer Award, and an Ontario Arts Council Chalmers Professional Grant.

In 2013, Anna completed a Doctor of Musical Arts in music composition at the University of Toronto with Gary Kulesha. She holds a Master of Music degree from the University of Victoria, where she studied composition with John Celona, Christopher Butterfield and Gordon Mumma.

Anna currently teaches composition at the University of Victoria.

About Aline Homzy

Aline Homzy is a classical and jazz award-winning violinist and composer. From Montréal but living in Toronto, Aline is in high-demand as a violinist, arranger/composer and educator around the world. Aline has played her original music at the Daigu International Jazz Festival (South Korea), the Stockholm International Jazz Festival, the TD Toronto Jazz Festival and the Edinburgh Festival. Her original piece for big band, entitled Douce Rose, won the “prix ville de Provins” at the International Laurent Mignard-Duke Ellington composition competition.

Aline has also performed and/or recorded with international artists such as Munir Hossn (Brazil), Emma Smith (Edinburgh), Jake Sherman (USA), Ed Sheeran (Great Britain), Danilo Perez (Panama), Cho Yongwon (South Korea), Mikko Hildèn (Sweden), Allison Au (Canada), David Occhipinti (Canada), Andrew Downing (Canada), and more. Her group, Aline’s étoile magique, is set to release a record in 2021 and has received funding from the Canada Council for the Arts as well as the Toronto Arts Council.