San Francisco Chronicle
https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/music/sf-conservatory-and-sf-symphony-launch-program-to-commission-black-composers
August 13, 2020 Updated: August 14, 2020
The San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the San Francisco Symphony will join forces for a 10-year commissioning project aimed at fostering new musical works by developing Black composers, the two companies announced Thursday, Aug. 13.
The initiative, called the Emerging Black Composers Project, is supported by a $250,000 donation to the Conservatory. Winning composers will each receive a $15,000 commissioning fee and musical mentorship from three Bay Area music directors: Oakland Symphony Music Director Michael Morgan, S.F. Conservatory Music Director Edwin Outwater and incoming San Francisco Symphony Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen.
The selected pieces will be workshopped at the Conservatory in preparation for a premiere with one of the participating organizations.
“There are so many talented composers of color rising these days that it’s great someone is making a deliberate path for them, because these things don’t happen accidentally,” Morgan told The Chronicle. “I’m happy to be involved in shepherding those works to a wider audience.”
The judging panel includes composers Elinor Armer, Anthony Davis, Germaine Franco and John Adams, jazz vocalist Carmen Bradford and Berkeley Symphony Music Director Joseph Young, as well as the three mentors.
Applications are open now at www.sfcm.edu/EBCApplication with a deadline of Dec. 31.
A key part of the competition, Outwater said, will be the chance for composers to work on their pieces over an extended period.
“My intention is to give composers plenty of time and multiple exposures for their piece to develop, from the initial conservations through repeated performances and revisions. We want to give it a proper gestation,” he said. “This is something that many composers don’t get.”
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