Winners of Young Sacred Music Competition Announced

Monday July 22 2024 

Canongate Kirk. Picture by Kim Traynor

Young composers from as near as Edinburgh and as far as New Zealand are among the prizewinners in the first Sacred Music Young Composers competition, run by the Edinburgh Sacred Arts Foundation.

The competition was established following a successful event for young composers in the 2023 Edinburgh Festival of the Sacred Arts. The three prizewinning pieces and three that were awarded distinctions will be performed by the Sacred Arts Festival Singers in Edinburgh’s Canongate Kirk on Thursday August 15 as part of the 2024 Festival.

First prize for his setting of ‘An Art of Poetry’ by the Australian poet James McAuley, went to Jonathan Love, a student of Music and Computing at the University of Aberdeen. A native of New Zealand, Jonathan has had a keen interest in composition since school, and previous compositions have been performed in the UK and France.

Zoe Watkins won Second prize with ‘The Doubter’s Prayer’, a setting of Anne Bronte’s poem ‘While faith is with me, I am blest’. Zoe is an Edinburgh resident and entering her second year at Edinburgh College with classical piano as a first-study. She began composing at the age of 12, originally electronic and film music, but now focusing primarily on music for the concert hall. The "The Doubter's Prayer" is her first choral composition.

Third Prize, for a setting of verses from the prophet Isaiah, goes to Michael Chamberlain, Campbell Waterson Organ Scholar at St Andrews University, currently Musical Director of St Andrews Madrigal Group, and runner-up in the 2020 Milton Keynes ‘Young Musician of the Year’ competition. A keen composer, in July 2021 he won the Northampton & District Organists’ Association’s Centenary Composition Competition.

Alexander McNamee submitted two pieces – a setting of Christina Rosetti’s ‘Easter Monday’ and ‘I myself will Search’, words from the prophet Ezekiel.  Both were awarded Distinctions. A native of Edinburgh, Alexander is studying music at St Hilda’s College Oxford. His choral compositions have been performed across the UK and in America.

The third Distinction went to Magnus Graham for his setting of a medieval carol ‘When Christ was Born of Mary Free’. Magnus is entering S6 at George Watson’s College in Edinburgh. He plays French Horn in the Edinburgh Youth Orchestra, and keyboard for George Watson’s Big Band.

Supported by grants from the Christian Arts Trust, the Edinburgh Society of Organists, and the Royal College of Organists, the competition was open to anyone aged 21 or under and resident, studying or working in Scotland. Competitors were invited to set one or two texts, either from a selection of four provided, or of other texts that had prior approval.

The competition attracted a lot of interest. Entries were initially scrutinized by a small number of judges who determined the top 10. These were then sent to the Principal Adjudicator Dame Judith Weir, Master of the King’s Music, who made the final decision.

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