A competition of Musical Composition for the Moving Image
2020

The Edison Studio collective, with the collaboration of Romaeuropa Festival 2020 and the support of the Cineteca di Bologna (Film Archive of Bologna), announces the 5th edition of the “Sounds of Silences” International Competition of Musical Composition for the Moving Image. The aim of the competition is to stimulate musical creativity in its interaction with the audiovisual media, particularly for the reinterpretation of historical silent films and the creation of new soundtracks, with a special concern for timbres as in today’s instrumental, electronic and electroacoustic music.

In the preliminary stage of the competition entrants must submit an audiovisual work the musical part of which they themselves have composed, by May 20th 2020. An international jury will then select three finalists among the entrants, who will be invited to create a soundtrack for a medium-length movie from the silent film era chosen by Edison Studio in collaboration with the Cineteca di Bologna. This work must be completed and sent by 1st of October 2020.

The jury for this edition is composed by

• Simon Atkinson (composer and lecturer at Media School, DMU University Leicester, U.K.).
• Emanuele Casale (composer and professor of electroacoustic music – Conservatory of Palermo)
• Giulio Colangelo (composer and professor of electroacoustic music – Conservatory of Lecce – Artistic co-director of MAIN Matera Intermedia Festival)
• Francesco Giomi (composer, director of Tempo Reale – Center for Research, Production and Music Education, Florence and professor of Electroacoustic Composition at Conservatory of Bologna)
• Gabriele Manca (composer, professor at Conservatory of Milan)
• Elio Martusciello (composer, professor of Electroacoustic Composition at Conservatory of Naples)
• Per Anders Nilsson (composer, PhD/Professor Academy of Music and Drama – University of Gothenburg)
• Marco Russo (musicologist – University of Trento)
• Michele Tadini (composer, coordinator at Irmus-Institute of Music Research, Milan, professor of composition and music informatics at Conservatoire National Supérieur Musique et Danse de Lyon)
• Barry Truax (composer and professor at Simon Fraser University Vancouver, Canada).
• Roberta Vacca (composer, professor at Conservatory of L’Aquila).

A second international jury will award cash prizes to the finalists during a public event scheduled for October-November 2020, in Rome, as part of Romaeuropa Festival 2020.

The total prize money to be awarded amounts to € 3,000. The competition is open to all composers of any nationality born after 31/12/1984. Participation in the competition can be either individual or collective.
All members of any group must be born after the above indicated date. Any composers who received an award or prize in the last edition of the competition (2019) are not allowed to participate.

Sounds of Silences organizers’aim is to stimulate the finalists to make a valid contribution towards redefining the meaning, aesthetics and conceptual structures of cinema before the advent of soundtracks, not simply by “accompanying” the images on the screen, but by revealing their original hidden content, thereby giving a new voice to what was previously silent.

For more information: soundsofsilences@edisonstudio.it

competition regulations 2020