PYO Continues Young Composer Competition in the 2018/19 Season - PYO Music Institute

The PYO Music Institute (PYO) has opened another year of opportunity for talented young composers to participate in the Third Annual Young Composers Competition for the 2018-2019 season. PYO is calling on gifted composers, between the ages of 18 to 24, to submit an original orchestral piece. The winner will receive the honor of having the composition performed by the highly esteemed PYO Music Institute and recorded for a possible future broadcast on WRTI.   

Composers born between September 1, 1994 and September 1, 2000, are invited to apply. The deadline for submission of scores is November 15, 2018. All scores submitted are not to have been previously professionally recorded or published with no performance history of any kind. Works should be between five and twelve minutes in duration.

The winning composer will be selected collaboratively by Maestro Louis Scaglione, and the director of the Young Composers Competition, Sheridan Seyfried, who is a Philadelphia-based composer. The work will be performed at the 79th Annual PYO Festival Concert on Sunday, June 2, 2019 in Verizon Hall of Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center. The grand prize winner will receive a cash prize of $2,000. All details are available on the PYO website – www.pyos.org.

A PYO alumnus, Seyfried is a graduate of The Curtis Institute of Music where he studied with Richard Danielpour, Jennifer Higdon and Ned Rorem. When asked about why he’s looking forward to a third year of competition, Seyfried said, “We had a wonderful time collaborating with talented young composers over the last two years and bringing their pieces to life in Verizon Hall. This type of mentorship and development is an invaluable opportunity offered by PYO to these young musicians. It gives them a high-profile showcase for their work and impacts all subsequent writing they do for orchestra .”

There are additional prizes for the second place and third place winners. The second-place winner will receive a cash prize of $1,000.  The third-place winner will receive a cash prize of $500.

Submissions should be made electronically as an e-mail to YCC@pyos.org and should contain the following information:

1. Composer’s name, address, telephone number, e-mail address

2. Composer’s age (required), country of citizenship and gender (optional)

3. Composer’s current school with address and phone number

4. Resume and bio

5. A cover letter and/or statement explaining the composer’s work is optional

6.  A brief description of how the composer heard about this competition