The Rosalie Coopman Music Foundation in partnership with Trinity Laban

Background

Unlike almost all other composition competitions this one celebrates composers who are over 40 years of age. Rosalie herself returned to composing in later life and produced her most vibrant work. This competition celebrates lifelong development of composers and provides a rare opportunity to have a piece professionally rehearsed, performed and recorded.

There will be a composition award and two honorary mentions.

The winning composition and honorary mentions will be performed by the Rosalie Ensemble at the world-renown Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in Greenwich London during the spring/summer concert season. The winner will be awarded £ 2,000.00, and both honorary mentions will receive a certificate and a recorded play-through of their works.

The contest guidelines

* Only one submission per composer is allowed.

* The contest is open to composers of forty years of age and over by the submission date (i.e. born before 1984), of any nationality, but must be resident in the U.K.

* Open to any gender or identification.

* The work must be for trio or duo (no doublings) from a choice of the following instruments;

Flute or piccolo

Bb Clarinet or Bass Clarinet

Piano

Violin or viola

Cello

* The work must be between 5 and 10 minutes in length; complete works only. Works outside the duration parameters will not be considered though the judges will use their own judgement on this matter if needs be.

* The work can be of any style or aesthetic direction. * The work may have been performed previously but must have been written in the last five years. Must not have received an award previously. * The submissions must be anonymous (score and audio files should have no references at all to the composer’s identity).

* The winning composer must arrange to travel to London for the performance at their own expense. * The Rosalie Coopman Music Foundation reserves the right to give no award if in the opinion of the judges the required expectations have not been met. The decision will be final and the Foundation will not engage in correspondence or produce commentary on individual works.

Application procedure

The following materials are required for submission (all materials are to be submitted electronically):

Email the submission to 40plus@trinitylaban.ac.uk 

1. Please write the following in the body of the email

* Name

* email address

* phone number

* home address

* Proof of identity (passport scan, driving license etc.)

* Title of submitted work

* Instrumentation

* Duration

2. Attach a pdf of the score using the following file name: TITLE_INITIALS_DOB (DD/MM/YYYY) [parts to be followed upon request shortly after].

3. Link to sound file mp3 format (MIDI recording acceptable): TITLE_INITIALS_DOB (date of birth DD/MM/YYYY) Please ensure that the link you provide is accessible to anyone with the link. There are several readers for this competition, and so the link must be accessible to anyone with it. Submissions whose links are not accessible will not be accepted.

4. Attach a second pdf with the following information

* Short biography

* Comments or program note of the submitted work (max. 150 words)

* Declaration the work has not received an award previously

* Good quality portrait photo

There is no application fee

The closing date for submissions is 1st March 2025. Our panel of judges, consisting of professional musicians and composers, will review the entries; the winning composer will be announced shortly after 1st April 2025. For queries, please contact 40plus@trinitylaban.ac.uk