WINNERS of the 2018 Scottish Awards for New Music (SAFNM) were announced last week at an event at the Drygate Brewery in Glasgow.
It marks the second year of the awards, which are run by New Music Scotland, a co-operative network of artists, ensembles, composers, educators, producers, promoters and “anyone who believes in the importance and value of creating new music in Scotland”.
Live performances at the Musicians’ Union-supported event included double award-winners Red Note Ensemble, who performed a A Real Force by Grange Academy pupil Angus Docherty. The young composer was part of Red Note Ensemble’s New Music Makers project which was joint winner of the community and education award alongside Kaleidoscope, a collaboration between Drake Music Scotland, Scottish Ensemble, Colin Currie and the Cumnock Tryst Music Festival. That festival’s artistic director, composer Sir James MacMillan, was the recipient of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Award for Contribution to New Music in Scotland.
Also performing was Scottish Opera’s principal trumpet Jason Lewis, who played a piece by John Maxwell Geddes in a tribute to the late composer and educator. Works he composed shortly before his death in September 2017 at the age of 76 feature on The Last Island, which won the Hebrides Ensemble award for recorded new work.
Other winners include Pippa Murphy and Karine Polwart for A Pocket of Wind Resistance, Matthew Grouse’s 10 Seconds, the Sonica Festival and Mr McFall’s Chamber.
Andy Saunders, vice-chair of New Music Scotland, says the awards, which aim to showcase the best innovative and experimental music being made in contemporary Scotland, are about more than winning, however.
“It really is about the cheesy thing your teacher would say to you at school; that it’s not about winning, it’s about the taking part,” says Saunders, who performs as a horn soloist, as well as being a member of Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Scottish Opera.
“Part of the point was to get some of the people on the panel to listen to 50 Scottish composers that they had never heard of, or had a chance to listen to their music, or never had to listen to their music and really think about it.”
Chosen by a 10-strong panel including BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio Scotland producer Laura Metcalfe, Creative Scotland music head Alan Morrison and BBC Proms director David Pickard, the 2018 awards featured 11 categories, up from seven in 2017.
Expanding the range, Saunders says, was about increasing the potential of composers and musicians to reach audiences they may not otherwise connect with – a principal aim of the awards themselves.
“What we want to do is inspire people to be more confident that what they are doing will be listened to; that we don’t place one person or one genre above anyone else. This is one of the reasons why the panel this year was completely different to the panel we had last year. We’ll do the same next year so that it’s always a fresh viewpoint.
Saunders continues: “Also, the majority of the people on the panel were external to Scotland, so they don’t have preconceptions about the composers and the pieces. It’s about the fact that, if you’re good at what you write, if it’s well-crafted, if it’s a genuinely original voice, that there’ll be people who will listen to it and they will take it seriously. From those eight people who will listen to it, to however many thousands of people go on to listen to it; that’s the ultimate aim.”
That ethos of craft and originality is reflected in the actual physical award themselves, qualities which saw New Music Scotland’s call for proposals going to recent Glasgow School of Art graduate Daisy Chetwin. Each of her 12 bronze pieces, including the two made for the joint winners of the community and education award, were inspired by and are specific to each of the eleven categories.
“We were after something that would fit the music,” says Saunders. “Something that was unique, of high quality and had a lot of thought behind it. We had some really strong candidates, so it was a really difficult decision to make.”
The full list of the winners is at www.newmusicscotland.co.uk
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