Page 42 - RPS Awards 2024 Coverage Book
P. 42
nominations for Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus, Aldeburgh
Festival, Derbyshire’s Derwent Brass, and Huddersfield
Contemporary Music Festival.
Composer Kaija Saariaho, an icon of contemporary music who
sadly died in 2023, is recognised in two categories for her opera
Innocence: for Large-Scale Composition, and in the Opera and
Music Theatre category for its UK premiere at The Royal Opera.
Of the 19 individual performers and composers shortlisted, 42%
represent the global majority, including cellist Ayanna Witter-
Johnson, Music Director of the Birmingham Opera Company
Alpesh Chauhan, and sitar player Jasdeep Singh Degun. A
number of the nominated organisations also celebrate diversity
including Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective and Olympias Music
Foundation.
Disabled artists are also celebrated, with nominations for
composer Ben Lunn’s History needs…, written for left-handed
pianist Nicholas McCarthy, and Call of the Mountains by Drake
Music Scotland, dedicated to enabling disabled musicians to fulfil
their potential.
The UK’s constellation of amateur groups is also recognised with
the Inspiration Award, the winner of which is decided by public
vote from a shortlist comprising Derwent Brass, Glasgow
Madrigirls, Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus and The Sunday Boys.
