Notes from Scotland – composition competition

A new national composition competition for 12 – 18 year olds from the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and National Trust for Scotland.

“This is a fantastic idea to engage young people in composition and to bring them together with existing composers and musicians to pass on their knowledge and skills. I’m sure it will be an invaluable experience for all concerned.”

Craig Armstrong, Composer (The Great Gatsby, Romeo +Juliet, Moulin Rouge)

Get your entries in now for feedback from Scotland’s most famous composers.

Compositions should be for trio, quartet or quintet with any combination of Orchestral instruments allowed. As a guide, we have recommended each piece to be roughly 2 – 3 minutes long, but this is just a suggestion, and the final length of the piece is up to the entrant, within reason. Your five movement symphony can wait!

Any submissions will be considered works in progress until the deadline date of May 31st and can be replaced at any point before that date. These work-in-progress submissions will then be shown to one of the professionals involved with the project for comment. This is an excellent and rare opportunity to get feedback on your music from one of Scotland’s eminent composers. Submissions can also be in various formats: sheet music, as PDF or Sibelius / Finale / Notion project file; audio recording of a piece of music; Figure notes sheet music file.

We’ve now held workshops at three out of the five properties involved in the project, with two more scheduled in the run up to the submission deadline.

Glasgow /w composer Stuart McCrae – January 25th, Pollok House, 2pm – 4pm

Edinburgh /w composer Matilda Brown – March 7th, Georgian House, 2pm – 4pm

Of course, you don’t need to have been at a workshop to enter, we have a whole host of tips from Scotland’s composers and introductions to each of the NTS properties involved in the project up on the Notes from Scotland site: www.notesfromscotland.co.uk <http://www.notesfromscotland.co.uk/>

To come along to one of the workshops, or for any enquiries about the competition in general, please email neil.cullen@rsno.org.uk.

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