The Homophonic! Pride Prize
Niki Johnson by Ian Whitney
Applications for The Homophonic! Pride Prize 2027 are now open!
The Homophonic! Pride Prize acknowledges and celebrates the art and achievement of queer-identifying composers from across Australia.
The Homophonic! Pride Prize is a unique opportunity for LGBTQIA+ Australian Composers to work with amazing soloists to create a new work to be performed at Homophonic! as part of the Midsumma Festival.
Composers from across Australia can submit their work for the award. The winning composer is awarded $2500, and a guaranteed performance and documentation of the performance.
2027's award is to write for Niki Johnson, a composer-performer percussionist based in Sydney, Australia who works across the fields of sculptural percussion, contemporary classical music, and performance art. Her practice involves creating experimental and playful works for uncommon materials-as-instruments including glass, mycelium, bread, concrete, rock, wood, and water. She has been commissioned to compose and perform solo percussion works for the Sydney Powerhouse Museum and Art Gallery of New South Wales, and has recorded percussion for the ABC, Sydney Opera House, Phoenix Central Park, and Trackdown Fox studios.
The winner of the award in 2027 will have their new work premiere as part of the Midsumma Festival where the Homophonic! theme will be "JOY"
I am so excited to work with Homophonic! and meet new creative and innovative composers and musicians! I love how Homophonic! champions new voices, and brings to the limelight incredible works. It is an honour to get to work with this organisation and be a part of their positive innovation and fresh breeze into contemporary classical music in Australia.
- Niki Johnson
I am so excited to have Niki Johnson as the Pride Prize performer. An icon of contemporary performance, exploration, and explosive musicality. Reading and listening to the Pride Prize applications is one of my favourite times of the year, and I'm so excited to get to hear the music of today's LGBTIQA+ composers, and their ideas for the amazing Niki!
- Miranda Hill
Apply for The Homophonic! Pride Prize 2027 here
All Australian composers who identify as LGBTIQ+ are encouraged to apply.
There are no age limits, career stages, or entry fees.
The work: 7-10 minutes for percussion, one performer. The theme of the 2027 show is "JOY".
For: Vibraphone, with option for small percussion and/or fixed electronics
The Prize:
$2500 and performance at Homophonic! in February 2027
Live video and audio from the performance.
3 workshopping sessions with Niki Johnson (in person or online)
Tickets to the premiere, (no flights or accomodation can be provided)
Key Dates:
Applications open: Friday 5 June 2026
Applications close: Friday 26 June 2026
Completed work delivered: 8 November 2026 (Negotiable)
Performance: February, 2027 (exact date, time and location TBA)
Judging Panel:
Artistic Director, Soloist: Miranda Hill
Soloist: Niki Johnson
Percussionist and Educator: Rebecca Lloyd-Jones.
Pianist and composer: Ronan Apcar
NIKI JOHNSON is a composer-performer percussionist based in Sydney, Australia, who works across the fields of sculptural percussion, contemporary classical music, and performance art. Her practice involves creating experimental and playful works for uncommon materialls-as-instruments including glass, mycelium, bread, concrete, rock, wood, and water. She has been commissioned to compose and perform solo percussion works for the Sydney Powerhouse Museum and Art Gallery of New South Wales, and has recorded percussion for the ABC, Sydney Opera House, Phoenix Central Park, and Trackdown Fox studios.
Image by Ian Whitney
Led by Artistic Director Miranda Hill, Homophonic! is a leading voice in queer classical music since 2011.
Through performance, regional touring, and commissioning, the Homophonic! Pride Prize Composition Competition and the RESPECT project telling the stories of LGBTIQA+ elders in music.
For all enquires contact [email protected]
Homophonic! is a magically unique experience which produces nothing less than a musical utopia. It features all Australian composers and illuminates the diversity of the collective musical voice. It’s a yearly celebration of new music written by queer composers.
Miranda Hill brings classical chamber music into focus, telling our queer stories in a joyous and immersive manner. Celebrating queer lives while drawing artistic lineages through the generations.
Midsumma and Homophonic! are thrilled to announce Sam Carrick as the winner of The Homophonic! Pride Prize 2026!
Their piece will be performed by Homophonic!'s Artistic Director and Founder, Miranda Hill at Theatre Works during the 2026 festival.
Image by Marek Rygielski
“I am so incredibly excited and honoured to have won the Homophonic Pride Prize. I feel so lucky to be able to explore these themes of spatialised queer resistance and bring these queer stories down south. I love the double bass and I feel so lucky to be able to work with Miranda on this piece - its gonna be a hoot!”
-Sam Carrick
Sam Carrick is a Meanjin-based composer, producer, performer and music technologist working across a range of mediums. Sam combines their classical training with music technology and live electronics to explore the sounds of electronica, ambient, dance, neo-classical and chamber music. Sam’s work forges unique and transgressive narratives across genres, drawing from their experience with some of Australia’s finest ensembles to inform their work for dance, theatre, choir, chamber ensemble, and studio releases.
2026's award is to write for double bassist Miranda Hill. Artistic Director and Founder of Homophonic!. Miranda is known for her energetic and exploratory musical prowess, and expertise from the renaissance to free jazz improv. Winner of the APRA/AMCOS "Victorian Luminary" award in 2023, finalist in the Melbourne Awards and the Globe awards for services to the LGBTIQ+ and arts communities, and a sought after performer, curator, and director of musical and cross art performances and experiences.
The winner of the award in 2026 had their new work premiered at Theatre Works in St Kilda as part of Midsumma Festival.
Midsumma is pleased to announce Ashleigh Hazel as the recipient of the 2025 Homophonic! Pride Prize, presented by Midsumma and Homophonic!
Ashleigh will write for the trailblazing keyboardist, Jacob Abela, which will premiere at Homophonic! as part of Midsumma Festival in February 2025.
“I am very grateful to have been chosen as the winner of the Homophonic Pride Prize. I admire so many of the previous winners and it is an honour to be counted among them. I’m thrilled to have an opportunity to work on a piece that examines the nature of continuous identity, memory and replication through the use of old and new technologies, and to be doing this with Jacob Abela makes the prospect all the more exciting!”
-Ashleigh Hazel
Ashleigh Hazel has a broad range of experience in the music industry, from being in a nearly nearly famous pop punk band, to writing music for international new music ensembles, to contributing to massive group improvising using household objects in a house conveniently reconfigured into a venue for an evening. They have always been fascinated by sound and its ability to reconfigure memory and recontextualise space. From an early age, they had a copy of Cubase installed on their family’s computer which they used to teach themself to dissect and sequence audio. They completed a Bachelor of Music from the ANU School of Music in 2017 and an honours year at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music in 2020. During their academic career they received several scholarships and awards. They currently work as a producer for several local artists and have written music for art installations, theater and dance productions. Their practise also expands beyond music into installation with works like Knotts (2023), Blankets (2019), and Pieces for Cars Tunnel and Hexagonal Vents (2017).
“I am thrilled to announce Ashleigh Hazel as the winner of the Midsumma presents: The Homophonic! Pride Prize. Ashleigh is a bold musical voice working in a liminal and post-genre artistic space, and I am so excited to be supporting their new work for Jacob Abela. This new work will be grappling with concepts of (re)generation, ecosystems, and symbiosis between performer, performance, and composer. It's going to be amazing, and every performance is its own unique journey.”
– Miranda Hill
Midsumma is thrilled to announce Sophie Rose as the recipient of the 2024 Homophonic! Pride Prize, presented by Midsumma and Homophonic.
Sophie will write for Soprano Judith Dodsworth, presenting the unforgettable performances in Moya Henderson's "Stubble" and Thomas Adès' "Life Story". Her commitment to new music has earned her a reputation in Australia and abroad as one of Australia’s leading exponents of contemporary classical vocal music.
"I’m overjoyed to have won the Homophonic! Pride Prize and to have the opportunity to write for soprano Judith Dodsworth. I can’t wait to start working on a piece that encapsulates individual and collective power, analogous to women and LGBTQIA+ activism, and explore hidden and vulnerable aspects of our lives as a statement of Pride and joyful rebellion." - Sophie Rose
Sophie Rose is a singer, multi-instrumentalist, extended technique enthusiast, composer, improvisor, researcher, multi-media artist, and maker. She is currently undertaking a PhD Interactive Composition sonifiying gestural data to represent trauma-induced mental states. Her work explores creative practice, interactive technologies, new instrument design, phenomenology, feminism, embodiment, time, and space. In performance works, Rose mixes technology and technical proficiency to explore the nexus of human potential and the affordances of machines. She most enjoys being immersed in the unfolding exploration of sounds in liminal spaces. In addition to her artistic practice, Sophie is an enthusiastic teacher and mentor.
"I am so excited to have Sophie Rose winning the Midsumma-Homophonic! Pride Prize! We were all blown away by her depth of creative vision, strong authentic musical voice, and the concept of 'joyful rebellion' as an intrinsic part of ageing as queer people. I'm already filled with anticipation for the premiere of this new work by soprano Judith Dodsworth at Homophonic! 2024!" - Miranda Hall
Homophonic! and Midsumma are thrilled to present the 2024 Homophonic! Pride Prize: The Composer Award.
The Homophonic! Pride Prize acknowledges and celebrates the art and achievement of queer-identifying composers from across Australia.
Composers from across Australia can submit their work for the award. The winning composer is awarded $2500, and guaranteed performance and live video of the performance.
Judith Dodsworth, Soprano
Sophie Rose
(credit to ReVerse Butcher and Kylie Supski)
Winner:
Invs Belmn
Solo Oboe and fixed Media
Written by James Rushford
Performed by Ben Opie.
With finalists selected from across the country, the 2023 winner, James Rushford, received a commission of $2,500 to compose a work in collaboration with Ben Opie, and a premiere performance at the next Homophonic! in Midsumma Festival.
James Rushford
James Rushford is an Australian composer-performer, whose work draws from concrète, improvised, avant-garde and collagist musical languages, staking out an idiosyncratic stylistic space that has been described as ‘electro-acoustic experimentation with a beating heart’ (Boomkat) and ‘haunted Jacobean ASMR’ (The Wire). Investigating the creases, cracks, and folds in traditions ranging from early music to new age, Rushford’s work subtly exaggerates seemingly liminal aspects such as atmosphere and the bodily presence of the performer until these take on a weight equal to musical elements such as pitch, rhythm and timbre.
James has created original work for BBC Scottish Symphony, Melbourne Symphony, Ensemble Neon (Oslo), Speak Percussion (Melbourne), Ensemble Vortex (Geneva), MONA FOMA, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne International Arts Festival, Norway Ultima Festival, Unsound Festival, Tectonics Festival, Send and Receive Festival (Winnipeg), Adelaide Festival and Liquid Architecture (Melbourne). As well as previous projects with Klaus Lang, Annea Lockwood, David Behrman, Tashi Wada, Haroon Mirza and Dennis Cooper, he works regularly with Golden Fur (his trio with Sam Dunscombe & Judith Hamann), Joe Talia, Ora Clementi (with crys cole), Oren Ambarchi, Kassel Jaeger, Anthony Pateras, Will Guthrie, Graham Lambkin and Francis Plagne.
His music has been published by a variety of international labels including Unseen Worlds (US), Pogus (US), Penultimate Press (UK), Another Timbre (UK), Holidays (IT), Black Truffle (AUS), KYE (US) and Shelter Press (Fr).
In 2017, James completed a Doctorate from the California Institute of the Arts.
Ben Opie
Co-Artistic Director of Inventi Ensemble,
Artistic Director of The Peninsula Festival, and
general legend of the Australian new music community.
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