NOMINATION: Performance of the Year - Notated Composition
For the performance of a single Australian work, showcasing the performer(s)’ success in revealing the nature and intention of a composition with clear notated instructions for the performer. Works with significant improvisatory aspects should instead be submitted for Performance of the Year: Jazz / Improvised Music.
A work is defined as a single complete musical composition, or expression. This includes music with movements or sub-works (i.e. song cycles), installations, and real-time compositions (improvised music).
If you believe your performance to be nominated in the wrong category or the details of your nomination to be incorrect, please contact the AMC via email at awards@australianmusiccentre.com.au before proceeding with the nomination.
Art Music Award guidelines →
Nominee
The Consort of Melbourne
Nominee email
theconsortofmelbourne@gmail.com
Title of the work
Electric Cathedral
Composer(s) of the work
Kevin March
Librettist(s) or source author(s)
Kylie Supski, ReVerse Butcher
Performance Date
3/10/2024
Venue
The Bluestone Church Arts Space, 8A Hyde St, Footscray VIC
Nominator Statement
I would like to nominate The Consort of Melbourne for Performance of the Year: Notated Composition, for their exquisite premiere performance of Electric Cathedral during the 2024 Melbourne Fringe Festival, October 3, 4, and 5. Their precision, musical expressiveness, and ability to lead the audience on a journey of discovery through the premiere of a new work made these performances worthy of Performance of the Year.
Electric Cathedral is an hour-long work for six a capella voices with digital environments. A large, demanding, and virtuosic work, it requires of the performers non-stop focus, a high degree of individual musicianship, vocal skill, and stamina, as well as the highest level of ensemble work. Its tight harmonies require skilled ears and confidence. Its colourful texts (by Kylie Supski and ReVerse Butcher) are dramatically varied with topics ranging from love and beauty, to DNA and death, requiring of the singers a wide dramatic range, musical sensitivity and expressiveness and an ability to shift dramatic gears (as well as tempos, vocal techniques, and registers) quickly. This is important with any dramatic work but doubly so when its a world premiere as this performance was.
The Consort navigated these challenges with a commitment and musical prowess seldom seen. They delivered the imposing work with precision and an intimate, expressive musicality. Their performance was at times hypnotic and ethereal, at times forceful and incisive, and at other times, unashamedly gorgeous. Overall, they were mesmerizing, expertly navigating the full dramatic range of the work, from the most intimate, fragile moments to the most epic, and all with a clarity that enabled the audience to discover and experience the full landscape of the piece. Their commitment to the score, the performance, and the audience, was among the best Ive experienced.
Nominee
The Consort of Melbourne
Nominee email
theconsortofmelbourne@gmail.com
Title of the work
Electric Cathedral
Composer(s) of the work
Kevin March
Librettist(s) or source author(s)
Kylie Supski, ReVerse Butcher
Performance Date
3/10/2024
Venue
The Bluestone Church Arts Space, 8A Hyde St, Footscray VIC
Electric Cathedral is an hour-long work for six a capella voices with digital environments. A large, demanding, and virtuosic work, it requires of the performers non-stop focus, a high degree of individual musicianship, vocal skill, and stamina, as well as the highest level of ensemble work. Its tight harmonies require skilled ears and confidence. Its colourful texts (by Kylie Supski and ReVerse Butcher) are dramatically varied with topics ranging from love and beauty, to DNA and death, requiring of the singers a wide dramatic range, musical sensitivity and expressiveness and an ability to shift dramatic gears (as well as tempos, vocal techniques, and registers) quickly. This is important with any dramatic work but doubly so when its a world premiere as this performance was.
The Consort navigated these challenges with a commitment and musical prowess seldom seen. They delivered the imposing work with precision and an intimate, expressive musicality. Their performance was at times hypnotic and ethereal, at times forceful and incisive, and at other times, unashamedly gorgeous. Overall, they were mesmerizing, expertly navigating the full dramatic range of the work, from the most intimate, fragile moments to the most epic, and all with a clarity that enabled the audience to discover and experience the full landscape of the piece. Their commitment to the score, the performance, and the audience, was among the best Ive experienced.