AGO Student Commissioning Project with Composer J.P. Redmond

The AGO Student Commissioning Project is the AGO’s most recent new music initiative. Each year, grants of $1,000 are awarded to four collaborative composer-and-organist pairs for the composition and performance of four new works for the organ. In the fall, as the academic year begins, a student pair submits a joint application describing a proposed work and its performance. There are no restrictions with regard to a work’s compositional style; however, all composers and organists must be enrolled as full- or part-time students at an accredited U.S. college, university, or conservatory. After the new work is approved by the AGO Committee on New Music, the organist must premiere the work and provide a video recording. 2021-2022 Project Guidelines

Award: Four grants of $1,000 will be awarded each year to four composer and organist pairs by the AGO Committee on New Music.

2021-2022 Projects

Four composer-organist student pairs were selected in the fall of 2021: Kylar Gardner (composer) and Nicholas Halbert (organist) from Arizona State University; Eric Pickford (composer) from the College of Charleston and Carson Hayes (organist) from the University of North Carolina School of the Arts; J.P. Redmond (composer) and Eddie Zheng (organist) from Juilliard; and Alvin Tam (composer) from Indiana University and Zoe Lei (organist) from the University of Michigan.

Eddie Zheng plays Ricercar by J.P. Redmond

J.P. and I worked together over the course of several months in preparation of writing and performing a new work for organ. Meeting at the organs at Juilliard, we discussed how to best write for the nuances of the instrument, what would work well and what was to be avoided, and what our overall idea for the piece might be. What came out of this process was ‘Ricercar’ – a piece featuring three sections. Initially presented are the imaginative, dream-like beginnings of a toccata with weaving hand figurations, which then gives way to an intricate dialogue of hocket figures, with a background of shifting meters. The two sections and their themes collide in the final, hopeful conclusion.

https://www.agohq.org/ago-student-commissioning-project/