calls

Call for Scores – Fall 2019 Chamber Music @ AEIVA

  • Concert date: September 14, 2019, time TBD
  • Submission deadline: August 10, 2019
  • Concert location: Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts
  • Instrumentation: Any combination of string quartet, piano, mezzo-soprano, and soprano
  • Duration: No specific duration, though the concert will last one hour

Overview: BAMA is partnering with the UAB series “Chamber Music @ AEIVA” and the Alys Stephens Center’s “EMERGE Fest” to present a concert featuring “emerging artists” that connects chamber music with the art on display at the Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts.

Eligible composers: This call is open to students and composers in the early stages of their careers. Submitting composers (1) must be full-time students or (2) must have had no commercial recordings, publications of their works, or ticketed performance by an orchestra or other large ensemble.

Art exhibit: Compositions must relate in some way to one or more of the following exhibits: Mary Frances Whitfiled “Why?”; Quention Morris “Meditations on Black”; Christina West “Unscene”. See below for descriptions of each exhibit and visit https://www.dropbox.com/sh/8ppdxvu0vcrzy8a/AABk1e_NA5A4B8H2sFD8ITHda?dl=0 for visual examples. The West and Morris images aren’t necessarily what will be displayed, but they give a sense of the artists’ work. The Whitfield is what will be on display.

Submissions: Send a PDF of your score plus parts to lusiskin@gmail.com or mail a hard copy to:

Laura Usiskin
950 13th Street South, HC 231
Birmingham, AL 35294

Recordings are welcome but not required.

Submissions must include the following information:

  • Composer
  • Title
  • Duration
  • Date of composition
  • Instrumentation
  • Brief description of how the piece relates to the art

Questions? Contact:

Exhibit descriptions:

Mary Frances Whitfield: Why?

https://www.uab.edu/news/arts/item/10218-why-by-alabama-artist-mary-frances-whitfield-presented-by-uab-s-aeiva-may-31-nov-23

Exhibition Description:  

Co-curated by AEIVA Curator John Fields and Dr. Brandon Wolfe, Assistant VP of Campus and Community Engagement in the Office of the Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at UAB, Mary Frances Whitfield: Why? is a collaborative exhibition between UAB’s Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute.

This exhibition was developed in conjunction with the Jefferson County Memorial Project (JCMP), a grassroots coalition of community leaders working with the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) to retrieve Jefferson County’s memorial from the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama. The mission of the JCMP is to bear witness to the country’s painful past and change the historical memory of Jefferson County to better include its history of racial terror and the legacies of racial injustice.

One of the most significant of Alabama’s ‘Outsider Artists’, Mary Frances Whitfield uses painting to create intimate windows into her cultural past. Inspired by the rich and illuminative ancestral history offered in the stories told by her grandmother, Whitfield’s paintings present an affecting portrayal of daily existence for African Americans living in the Southern United States during the 18th and 19thcentury.

WHY? presents paintings inspired by the artist’s first visit to the BCRI. These works graphically depict horrific racial terror lynching perpetrated against African Americans. This is the first time these works have been exhibited in Whitfield’s hometown of Birmingham, Alabama

Quentin Morris: Meditations on Black

Exhibition Description: Philadelphia-based artist Quentin Morris uses a variety of mediums to explore issues surrounding identity, race, spirituality, and cultural mythologies. What’s most interesting about this work is that for nearly 60 years, Morris has explored these themes through an astoundingly focused and prolific series of black monochrome paintings. These paintings are wonderfully subversive and deceptive in their depth. This will be Quentin Morris’ first major exhibition in the South.

Christina West: Unscene

Exhibition Description:

Christina West is an Associate Professor of Art at Georgia State University. West creates immersive sculptural installations that utilize figurative sculptures and the alteration of space to create psychologically charged environments. These installations explore notions of what the artist refers to as “individual subjectivity in our experience of reality, and the ways our physical encounters with spaces and with representations of bodies can affect perceptions of our own bodies.“

BAMA Players – Spring 2019

Overview: The BAMA Players, along with a guest oboist, will present their spring concert.

Concert date: Tuesday, April 30, 2019

Submission deadline: Sunday, March 10, 2019

Concert location: TBD

Instrumentation: Any combination of flute, oboe, clarinet, 2 violins, viola, cello, piano

Duration: No maximum duration, though the concert will last approximately one hour

How to Subit: Send a PDF of your score plus any parts to Laura Usiskin (see below). Recordings are welcome but not required. Please include the following information with your submission:

  • Composer
  • Title
  • Duration
  • Date of composition
  • Instrumentation

Contact:

Click here to download this call as a PDF.

UAB Chamber Trio

Overview: BAMA will present a concert featuring the UAB Chamber Trio at UAB’s Hulsey Recital Hall. There will be two guest performers, but they are not included in the instrumentation for this call. You must be a current, submitting BAMA member for the 2018-2019 season to submit to this call.

Event Date: Sunday, April 7, 2019, 4:00pm
Submission deadline: Sunday, March 3, 2019 (completed scores required with submissions)
Event Venue: Hulsey Recital Hall at UAB
Instrumentation: Trios for one clarinet (Bb clarinet and bass clarinet will be available), one trumpet (Bb trumpet, piccolo trumpet, and flugelhorn will be available), one piano. No duets or solos. No electronics. Preference for traditional notation without extended techniques.
Duration: No specific maximum duration, though the concert will last one hour

How to Submit: Send a PDF of your score plus any parts to steelec@uab.edu or hard copy to Chris Steele, 950 13th Street South, HC 231, Birmingham, AL 35294. Recordings are welcome but not required. Include the following information with submission:

  • Composer
  • Title
  • Duration
  • Date of composition
  • Instrumentation

Contact:

Chamber Music @ AEIVA – February 2019

Overview: BAMA is partnering for a fourth year with the UAB series “Chamber Music @ AEIVA” to present a concert that connects chamber music with the art on display at the Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts. You must be a current, submitting BAMA member for the 2018-2019 season to submit to this call.

Event Date: February 21, 2019. 5:00pm reception, 5:30pm concert
Submission deadline: January 10, 2019 (completed scores required with submissions)
Event Venue: Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts
Instrumentation: Any combination of two violins, one viola, one cello, and one piano
Duration: No specific maximum duration, though the concert will last one hour

Art exhibit: Compositions must relate in some way to the art either in “Stitching History from the Holocaust” (http://stitchinghistory.org/) or the contemporary Spanish artist Irene Grau (http://www.irenegrau.com/ or view this PDF). However, submissions need not be newly composed for this exhibit, you may submit existing works as long as the composition relates in some way to the art.

How to Submit: Closed for submissions

Contact:

Click here to download a PDF version of this call.

New York Composers Circle

Deadline for Submissions: August 25, 2018
Deadline for Scores: TBD
Event Date: TBD
Event Venue: New York Composers Circle
Instruments: See details below

BAMA is planning an exchange program with the New York Composers Circle, to be implemented this year with two compositions from each organization.

BAMA members with current membership may submit one piece to be considered for performance during the NYCC 2018-2019 season. Of necessity, the deadline is short. By Saturday, August 25th, provide title, instrumentation, and precise duration. Links to score and recording are also accepted but not required at this time.

How to submit: Email to calls@artmusic.org with subject “[your last name] – NYCC Call”

See instrumentation and concert info below from the NYCC program director. BAMA will likely select works for fixed media, solos, and/or small groups for the festival — thus similar forces are recommended for your submission.

-=-=-

Here is an idea of our forces across the coming regular-concert season. I’ll fill in solid info where presently known. The dates should hold.

  • 11/13 – (Mixed, piano. Electronics possible.)
  • 1/15 – (String quartet and divisions, hand percussion)
  • 3/19 – (Mixed, piano. Electronics possible.)
  • 4/23 – (Wind quintet and divisions, plus one extra oboe (English horn may be possible here).)
  • 5/21 – (Mixed, piano. Electronics possible.)

Where I say “mixed,” these concerts between them would use the following instruments (impossible at this point to say which one to which dates):
fl, corA (ob), cl (b cl), bsn (possibly), vn (2 possibly), vla, vc, db, mezzo-sop. This in addition to piano and electronics.

BNMF 2018 – Call for Student Piano Pieces

Deadline for Submissions: Completed scores due by Monday, May 14, 2018
Event Date: Saturday, October 20, 2018 (2018 BNMF)
Event Venue: Alabama Piano Gallery
Instruments: Piano (for students of different levels)
Duration: Depends on Level

For the Birmingham New Music Festival 2018 we will continue our partnership with Birmingham Metro Music Forum through which BAMA composers will write new music for performance by Birmingham-area private piano students. The piano pieces from last year will be included in a folder with any new submissions from which piano teachers will be picking music to be performed.

PLEASE NOTE: Since we have a wide selection of music from last year, there is no need to pick a specific difficulty level to write for prior to submitting. However, submitting composers should be aware that there is a chance that not every submission (from this year, or prior year submissions) will have the ability to be performed by students. The piano teachers will be provided with a folder containing all submissions from which they will pick a composition at the appropriate level for their student(s).

To ensure that we write music of appropriate difficulty, the teachers of BMMF have also provided us with a guide to difficulty levels (click here to view “Examples of Piano Rep Levels”). Please make sure that your music is difficulty level is noted in the file name, as explained below.

How to Submit: PDF scores should be emailed to calls@artmusic.org with “2018 BNMF-Piano Students” as the subject.  The PDF should be named “StudentLevel-Composer-Title.pdf”  For example, a composition written for a level 3 student should be “3-Moon-CompositionTitle.pdf.”  Submissions will be considered incomplete if they don’t include:

  • A PDF score
  • A level specification in the file name, as detailed above

BAMA members in current standing can submit up to 3 new pieces for piano students.

2018 BAMA Piano Call (General)

Deadline for Submissions: June 24, 2018
Deadline for Scores: June 24, 2018
Event Date: TBD, variable
Event Venue: TBD, variable
Instruments: Solo piano, or solo piano with electronics

Requirements:
Alliance members in good standing are invited to submit up to three works for various piano concerts to be held during the 2018-2019 season.

Details:
Affiliated pianists in different regions plan to perform separate concerts featuring Alliance composers, drawn from a pool of scores. Most details of concert production will be handled together by the performer and the venue, with some assistance by BAMA and programmed composers.

Please submit up to three works for solo piano, with or without electronics. Be advised that some pianists may only select acoustic pieces.

The deadline for submissions is June 24, 2018.

How to submit:
For each work, provide the following to calls@artmusic.org with the subject heading “BAMA Piano Call – Your Name.”

  • Link to score(s) in PDF format
  • Link to PDF document containing name of composer, title(s), duration(s), short bio, and program notes.
  • Link to recording(s) or demo(s) (optional)

Links must remain active during the selection process. If reliable file sharing is not possible, scores and info documents, but not audio files, may be sent as attachments.