165 grants totalling over £350,000 were awarded by the Foundation in 2023 - our first year of operation. Grants were made to festivals; for composer career development; composer-led projects; recording projects; commissioning, student bursaries as well as projects celebrating the legacy of Ralph Vaughan Williams.

Just a sample of the projects supported are listed below:

FESTIVALS
UK Regional 2023 Festivals:

Berwick Educational Association, Bangor Music Festival, Cheltenham Music Festival, Cross Currents Birmingham, Deal Music and Arts, English Music Festival, hcmf//, London Song Festival, Oxford International Song Festival, Presteigne Festival, Sound Festival Scotland, Spitalfields Music, Three Choirs, Vale of Glamorgan, Whiddon Autumn Festival, York Late Music.

A major Festival of RVW’s music at Bard College Annandale on Hudson NY: Vaughan Williams and his World

CAREER DEVELOPMENT

Sheffield Music in the Round: WeCompose, a project providing developmental opportunities for composers, supporting them to develop the tools to inspire young music-makers and empower potential future professional composers.

Bursaries for young Composers to attend the Dartington Summer School.

London Sinfonietta Musicians of Tomorrow concerts in London and Folkstone.

LPO Young Composers, Royal Philharmonic Society Young Composers,.

COMMISSIONING

Commissioning projects for Leeds Lieder, Ligeti Quartet, horn player Ben Goldscheider, baritone Jeremy Huw Williams, Ora Choir to commission Odaline de la Martinez, Ensemble Renard, Laefer Quartet, International Guitar Foundation, GSMD to commission a chamber opera from Stephen McNeff, 40th Anniversary Commission from Howard Skempton for His Majesty’s Sackbuts and Cornetts, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Zeitgeist Online Gallery.

COMPOSER-LED PROJECTS

House of Silence - a new music-driven puppet show led by composer Neil Tòmas Smith, in collaboration with Twelfth Day Duo, and puppeteer/musician Jemima Thewes.

Stephen Crowe to record the music for his animated film about Rabelais's renaissance novel Gargantua and Pantagruel which he describes as “a book that reads like a food fight at a philosophers' convention".

Performance of Phoenix Rousiamanis’s Songs of Descent at Tête à Tête festival

Score revision to enable the London premiere and additional performances of Shadows pass the morning ‘gins to break by Sam Salem

Jack Sheen to write for Apartment House

RECORDING PROJECTS

Portrait CDs: for Helen Grime, Alex Mills, Arlene Sierra, Joseph Phibbs, John Pickard

ensembles Nordic Viola; The Glasgow Barons

oboist Mark Baigent

clarinettists Ron Woodley; Robert Plane (a second disk of works by Pamela Harrison)

SUPPORT FOR AMATEUR GROUPS

Bridgnorth Sinfonia, Hayes Symphony Orchestra, Helensburgh Oratorio Choir, North London Chorus, St Barts Hospital Choral Society, Overgate Hospice Choir, Halifax (all putting on major RVW works)

And for the Royal Leamington Spa Bach Choir to publish a song book of works written for them over the 80+ years of their existence.

1 February 2024