13 young composers compete at the Asia-Europe New Music Festival

The contest aims to recognize and encourage young authors to explore and write music in the new language of contemporary music.

On the morning of October 15, within the framework of the 2016 Asia-Europe New Music Festival, the ACL (Asian Composers Association) Young Composers' Competition took place at the Vietnam National Academy of Music, with 13 works by young composers from 13 countries: Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Israel, Japan, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, Malaysia, Tatarstan and the host country Vietnam.

13 young composers brought their latest works.

The competition aims to recognize and encourage young composers to explore and write music in the new language of contemporary music. At the same time, they create and develop the techniques of musical instruments, especially in chamber music.

The 13 young composers are all excellent representatives of the countries participating in this Music Festival. All are under 30 years old, of which composer Nguyen Minh Nhat representing Vietnam is the youngest, born in 1997. However, according to the assessment of the President of the Vietnam Musicians Association - Do Hong Quan, they are all composers with the ability to write music, have a deep understanding of musical instruments. They have contributed significantly to the development of performing arts in classical classical music.

Performance of "Wind Quintet" by Reuben Jelleyman from New Zealand.

The works submitted to the Organizing Committee are all new works, arranged and performed by musicians mostly from Vietnam. As a member of the Jury, musician Do Hong Quan commented: “Regarding the quality of the competition, it can be seen that all 13 works were written at a very high level. The performance level is very good. Especially the musicians, playing new works, with little practice time but very hard, playing very effectively. The competition has shown us a picture of the world of musical language that is completely different from the first decades of the 20th century and before”.

Vietnam representative - author Nguyen Minh Nhat is currently a student at the National Academy of Music. He brought to the competition his string quartet No. 1 titled “Emotion”. Musician Do Hong Quan believes that Minh Nhat is a young author with the ability to keep up with the music trends of the region and the world.

The work “Emotions” wants to convey that human emotions are not just absolute happiness or sadness, anxiety or excitement, but in fact they are mixed together. That is because modern life makes us think about things at the same time, such as work at the company, taking care of the family... Therefore, we will have many mixed emotions because we react differently to each event.

The awards of the ACL Young Composers' Competition will be announced on the Closing Night of the Asia-Europe New Music Festival, October 18 at the Vietnam National Academy of Music.

According to VOV