 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2010-06-29 15:38
skygardener wrote:
> These are standard fees for high level competitions.
I know - it keeps out the riff-raff - but it's still a bit much.
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2010-06-29 17:17
IMHO, fees for composition competitions should be only enough to cover administration and logistics of running the competition itself. Unfortunately, they seem to be treated as some sort of fundraiser for the sponsoring organization, with a bunch of composers footing the bill, most of whom get nothing in return. Composing concert music isn't exactly a lucrative activity, and a composer could easily go bankrupt applying for contests.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go start a composition competition of my own...
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2010-06-29 17:26
As for keeping out the riff-raff, they're the ones I'd MOST like to see in the competition. The up-and-comers, experimentalists, the ones who try random bizarre stuff and maybe don't have the funds or confidence to shell out $200 on a long shot. I know some great student musicians who make a point of going to one gas station over another because it's 5 cents less per gallon.
Maybe a $20 fee to keep people from submitting 300 bogus pieces, but that's about the most I'd find acceptable.
This isn't even going into the political, often heavily biased (even rigged, or so I've heard), nature of composition contests. Not to say this one in particular is like that, but I've heard way too much about how that happens.
If it was $20, and if I wasn't publishing my new piece in the next few weeks, I might apply.
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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Author: mrn
Date: 2010-06-29 19:05
I think $200 is very high, particularly when you consider the size the awards and the level of prestige of the competition itself and the fact that somebody's going to do many, many hours of free work to enter.
When I was in high school I entered BMI's Student Composer competition. I think the entry fee was about $25 or so. The "pot" of award money was twice as much as in this competition and the competition itself had a lot of prestige associated with it--it was (and still is) chaired by Milton Babbitt and was instrumental in launching the careers of several well known composers, including Donald Martino. (although I didn't know that at the time--I was just anxious to try my hand at an ambitious project)
It was a lot of work (of course, I was nuts enough to try writing for a full orchestra). And I just barely got it all written out in time to mail (this was before most people had software to do that sort of thing). I didn't win anything, of course, but it was a great learning experience, nonetheless.
I can guarantee you that I would not have shelled out $200 to enter it, though. And despite being a high schooler, I wasn't riff-raff. I had taken lessons from a teacher with a DMA in composition, and I even had her look it over and give me a critique before I sent it in. That's just a lot of money to fork over on a long shot, especially for a student.
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2010-06-30 12:34
I'm probably going to be the riff-raff kept out of this one, although any competition without age-discrimination looks mighty tempting. (And then there's my July 31 deadline on an article series, and then there's the short story I thought I could write quickly until it . . . metastasized.)
>>That's just a lot of money to fork over on a long shot, especially for a student.
>>
That's a lot of money to fork over for an old fart like me, too.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2010-06-30 14:48
I don't see the problem. It is not to keep the "riff-raff" out. It is to help cover the funds of the prize and the judge's and performer's time. The judges are leading composers and performers
The entry fee for all competitions that have larger prizes are about same. Munich, Van Cliburn, etc...
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To MRN-
I looked at the BMI competition. I noticed the discrimination set fourth in the first sentence of the "Eligibility" Section. http://www.bmi.com/pdfs/foundation/sca2010.pdf
Germans, Italians, and Russians, etc are not allowed to enter the BMI competition.
I thought those things were supposed to be illegal.
Post Edited (2010-06-30 14:50)
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2010-06-30 15:09
I guess it's just a difference in philosophy, whether a composition contest should be funded by the sponsoring organization, or by the entrants. There are a lot of dirt poor composers out there, and there are also a lot of composers who are desperate to make a name for themselves.
$200 is probably more than most composers will ever earn on the piece they submit for this contest. But I guess if you treat it as an expensive lottery...
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2010-07-01 11:56
"I guess it's just a difference in philosophy, whether a composition contest should be funded by the sponsoring organization, or by the entrants. There are a lot of dirt poor composers out there, and there are also a lot of composers who are desperate to make a name for themselves."
---
If you want something, you will find a way to get the money together for it. How much money have I made with my music so far? Not as much as I have put into it since I started.
However, I have checked the BMI again to be sure. They openly discriminate upon nationality. I am not sure why they find that to be necessary.
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Author: mrn
Date: 2010-07-01 16:03
skygardener wrote:
Quote:
However, I have checked the BMI again to be sure. They openly discriminate upon nationality. I am not sure why they find that to be necessary.
I didn't realize that about the BMI competition. Of course it was almost 20 years ago that I entered.
I don't practice this area of law, so don't quote me on this, but I don't think there is a legal impediment to this sort of contest. While we have laws that prohibit discrimination with regard to employment in this country, this is a contest and not an employment opportunity. That's also why having an age requirement is OK.
It's a bit like the various scholarships different organizations offer to college students. There are scholarships specifically for ethnic minorities, for foreign students, for women, for residents of particular communities, for members of religious or other eleemosynary institutions, etc., which all have their own eligibility requirements. These scholarships are generally intended to encourage members of particular communities/demographics to attend college.
The purpose of the BMI competition seems to be to promote American classical music, as is the purpose behind the Aaron Copland Fund for Music.
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2010-07-01 16:07
"If you want something, you will find a way to get the money together for it."
I suppose. I just never considered entering a composition contest to be something worth finding a way to get the money together for. It's not like all participants' works are put in some sort of showcase, just the winners. For $200, I can get my piece performed next week and put it up on YouTube. Heck, if I ask a good friend, I can get it in exchange for lunch!
In essence, while I could scrape together $200 ($225-250 with the international wire transfer), I consider it a very poor value. I also have no intention of holding off for the better part of a year before publishing. So I'll pass.
Whether or not it's *intended* to keep the riff-raff out, it does have that effect.
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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