The Royal Philharmonic Society had its annual awards ceremony on Thursday, with winners including Mark-Anthony Turnage for recent opera Festen. John Wilson took home the RPS Conductor Award.
Others to collect awards include trombonist Peter Moore, the first ever trombonist to win the RPS Instrumentalist Award. The Royal Scottish National Orchestra picked up the Ensemble Award, the first professional orchestra to do so since 2014. Meanwhile the Kirkaldy Orchestral Society, who celebrate their 150th anniversary this year, picked up the Inspiration Award, decided by public vote.
Multi-instrumentalist and YouTube star Jacob Collier picked up the Gamechanger Award, with the award for Impact going to charity Orchestras for All, who enable young people from across the UK to engage with orchestral music. Glyndebourne also took home the award for Opera and Music Theatre, for Jonathan Dove’s community opera Uprising. Soprano Louise Alder, herself known to Glyndebourne audiences, took the Singer Award.
As well as Turnage’s large-scale composition award, the chamber-scale award went to Claudia Molitor for Fever for eight trumpets, performed at Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival.
BBC Radio 3’s presenter Elizabeth Alker took the Storytelling Award for her book Everything We Do is Music, with the award for Series and Events going to Southbank’s Multitudes festival.
The RPS also gives an award to a young artist, this year honouring trumpeter Matilda Lloyd. Both her and Peter Moore were recognised in particular for their work with Buckinghamshire’s Amersham Band and Wales’ Tredegar Town Band. York’s Shepherd Brass Band and its Deaf Principal Cornet player Sean Chandler received a nomination for the Inspiration Award, which celebrates non-professional ensembles.
The awards ceremony will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 at 7.30pm.
