Eamonn Quinn Awarded Belmont Prize for Contemporary Music

Eamonn Quinn (Image © Alannagh Brennan)

Eamonn Quinn Awarded Belmont Prize for Contemporary Music

Previous winners include composer and clarinetist Jörg Widmann, New Yorker music critic Alex Ross, and Serbian composer Milica Djordjević.

Eamonn Quinn, co-founder and curator of Louth Contemporary Music Society, has been announced as the winner of the 2018 Belmont Prize for contemporary music by the Forberg Schneider Foundation in Munich.

The Belmont Prize honours ‘innovation, daring, and courage’ in music and is awarded every two years. It is one of Europe’s largest artistic awards, with a prize of €20,000. Previous winners include composer and clarinetist Jörg Widmann, New Yorker music critic Alex Ross, and Serbian composer Milica Djordjević.

Louth Contemporary Music Centre, founded by Quinn with Gemma Murray in 2006, presents contemporary music by both Irish and international artists and has commissioned works from a remarkable range of internationally renowned composers, including Arvo Pärt, Terry Riley, John Tavener, David Lang, John Zorn and more. Quinn curates all LCMS concerts, albums and new commissions

Commenting on the award, British music critic Paul Griffiths wrote,

The LCMS is the brainchild of someone whose knowledge and sensitivity in the area of contemporary music is completely extraordinary. I have met many people professionally involved in contemporary music, whether as composers, performers, critics, administrators or university professors, but nobody more attuned than Mr Quinn to what is going on. Not only that, Mr Quinn has a remarkable degree of acumen in detecting what combination of repertory, performers and venue will create the unique events he goes on presenting, time and again.

Quinn will receive the award in 2018.

Upcoming LCMS concerts include the world premiere of The Louth Work by James Dillon on 29 April, followed by Silenzio, a two-day festival focusing on the work of Salvatore Sciarrino, who will visit Ireland for the first time. The festival also includes the world premiere of a work by Jürg Frey. For further details on these events, visit https://goo.gl/2t0by5.

For more on the Belmont Award, visit https://goo.gl/LhteuN

Read Garrett Sholdice’s article on Louth Contemporary Music Society’s album releases.

Published on 3 April 2017

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