We are excited to be working with the eight composers and creative artists who will be our New Voices 2020.
New Voices is Sound and Music's major artist development programme, lasting 18 months with an annual intake. Spanning a broad range of genres and practice, all eight New Voices want to make changes to, and effect development within, their work. We are hugely excited they have joined the programme and look forward to working alongside them on this next step in their creative practice.
The New Voices 2020 composers are: Alice Boyd, Georgia Denham, Tamsin Elliott, Cassandra Gurling, Elijah Maja, Frazer Merrick, Shirley Tetteh and Melanie Wilson.
Composers
Alice Boyd is a London and Bristol based composer, theatre maker and environmental campaigner. Her work uses the voice, everyday sounds and electronic textures to tell stories about the world around us.
Georgia is a composer and is actively involved in new experimental and contemporary music as a singer. She is interested in the intrinsic relationship between composition and the voice, more recently using electronics to explore this.
Tamsin is a multi-instrumentalist, composer and film-maker based in Bristol, UK. With roots in the folk music of the British Isles, her interests and playing styles extend to the musics of Eastern Europe, the Mediterranean and the Middle East as well as experimental and classical.
Cassandra Gurling is a London-based Brummy-born singer, composer and producer. AGAMA is her music project and alter ego, whose raw, soulful and operatic voice sits within jazzy, electronic instrumentation.
Elijah Maja is an artist, composer and researcher from London, interested in experimental sound and visual narratives that capture landscapes from quotidian life, and how these meld to inform ritual process.
Frazer uses field recordings, circuit bending and synthesis to create experiences which explore the act of play, encouraging the audience to become a curious performer and embrace play through interactivity, improvisation and collaboration.
Shirley is a guitarist, who began her journey into jazz with Tomorrow’s Warriors. She is keen to explore ways of combining jazz and left field pop, while forging ahead with bands Nerija and Maisha, who present high-quality original improvised music to a younger, wider audience.
Melanie is a multi-disciplinary performance maker. Her acclaimed work is founded on the contemporary interplay between sound art, experimental forms of composition, language and live performance, and is under-pinned by political interest.
The panellists
Sound and Music would like to thank our New Voices panel for the work they put into the process of shortlisting 18 candidates from 206 applicants to the programme.
The panel consisted of Sound and Music Co-Head of Artist Development Will Dutta alongside Lloyd Coleman, Cooly G, Laura Jurd, Supriya Nagarajan and Tadeo Sendon.
In line with our Fair Access Principles, we want to have an open and transparent selection process and this year, as in previous rounds, we have rotated the external selection panellists to refresh and renew the process.
Seed Award 2020
All applicants for New Voices 2020 who were shortlisted to the final stage of the application process were eligible for the Seed Award. This year's Seed Award was given to Amy Beeston, Kim Carnie, Leon Clowes, Aaron Diaz, Kathy Hinde, Cassie Kinoshi, Jack McNeill, Kim Moore, and Neil Smith.
The composers received a targeted package of support including:
- £100 contribution to support the research and development of a particular project
- A coaching session with an accredited coach
- Two strategic thinking sessions with our team
Thanks to our funders
See also
Composer-Curator is a composer-led and curated national touring programme which supports outstanding live and digital music projects and events.
Adopt a Music Creator is a unique scheme that pairs composers with leisure time music ensembles and groups to collaborate on the creation of a new piece.
Lisa Busby, Mella Faye, Jamie Hamilton, Sharon Gal, Emily Levy, Marv Radio, Max Syedtollan and Otto Willberg.