Third International Film Music Competition

[PierreFunck]

I'd like to share the information about the third edition of the film music competition -- I'm one of the organisers...

Participants are invited to score a 6-minute short film for symphony orchestra. The five best compositions will be world-premiered by the Tonhalle Orchestra on October 1st, 2014, in Zurich. On the same evening, the winner will be chosen by an international jury and awarded the Golden Eye “Best International Film Music” endowed with CHF 10000.

The terms and conditions of the competition and the film to be scored can be downloaded on the competition website.

Cheers

Pitt

P.S. Good news: there is no more age limitation!

[Errikos]

Congratulations on dropping the age limit in your competition; I hope this is something other organizers will come to their senses and emulate.

I would like to to ask two questions, first a quasi-semantic one: How important a role will the sound/simulation quality of the mock-up entry play in the selection for the finals? That is, are you really looking for the best composers, or the best programmers? Great big difference! In my humble opinion, if an aural simulation of the score is required for a Composition competition, a simple rendering of the Sibelius/Finale Play engines should be more than adequate these days. After all, a score will be provided, and the non-musician members of the jury perhaps should not have a say - or have less of a say at least, in the 1st Round of selection, and subsequently, only after they have heard the selected works played by an orchestra. 

Remember, a lot of token dime-a-billion self-proclaimed composers out there can provide you with a decent virtual rendering of their banal, derivative and unoriginal sounds. Perhaps the next Williams or Morricone cannot, since they are spending most of their time bettering their art, rather than learning more software than they have to, or spending whatever money they have buying self-composing libraries.

Are you looking for the best all-rounder maybe? Then this should be clearly stated. It depends on whom you are after and spending your money to find... But, again in my humble opinion, it should be much more important to discern and give voice to the best artist out there - after all, they can always get programming assistants when they get a contract - that will give us glorious music again in film, rather than the jack of all trades; you don't need a competition for that, they are all around us. It would be such a crime to miss out on a truly gifted musician, only to reward somebody for riding the Mod. wheel better - i.e. the better engineer, or merely the owner of a better studio (again, engineer).

And the second question: Who are the jury this year?

Best of luck, and again congratulations on organizing this competition.

[PierreFunck]

I fully understand your concern and I can assure you that the organising committee of the competition definitely aims to nominate the five best scores, i.e. the five compositions that sound best when performed live with a top-class orchestra. As it's stated in the FAQ, the jury is supposed to "judge the quality of your score and not the quality of your mockup".

The jury will probably consist of five persons, three of which will be musicians, and two will be filmmakers. One of the three musicians will be Frank Strobel, the conductor, one will probably be Marcel Barsotti, a top-ranking, classically trained German film music composer, and the third one is yet to be determined, but Forum Filmmusik, one of the organisers of the competition, will insist that this person be a classically trained, score-reading-capable musician, too.

Concerning the two filmmakers in the jury, one of them will be Axel Tillement, one of the co-directors of the competition film, and the other one will be one of the yet-to-be-determined special guests of Zurich Film Festival. Yes, I'm afraid these two people won't probably be able to read scores and must rely on the mockup. When participants ask me how good the mockup has to be, I tell them to make it as good as possible, as if they submitted it to a film director... So, yes, the competition actually demands old-school skills (orchestration) as well as new-school skills (riding the mod, as you put it). It has always been that way: even if you are a genius, you must be able to sell yourself if you want to be successful. I think all of us are interested in making good mockups, otherwise we wouldn't be on this forum...

But since the musicians are a majority in the jury, there is a good chance that they prevail if there is an argument over a well-written submission with a mediocre mockup (or a poorly-orchestrated one that sounds unrealistically good in the mockup).

All the best

Pierre Funck

[Errikos]

Thank you for answering these concerns both here and through e-mail privately. I am happy to hear that selection of the successful works will depend heavily on the purely musical qualities of the submitted scores. It is comforting to hear in some corner of the commercial world someone is looking to reward actual musicians.

Since the competition is interdisciplinary in character - i.e. underscoring a film, I fully agree that film-makers should be involved in the jury, for they will be "hearing" and experiencing the music differently to ourselves. I was hoping that theirs would be a minority vote, and you have confirmed this.

As far as the mock-up goes, I do agree that in today's - decayed in my opinion - professional climate, one must be able to provide a simulated score as close to the final realization as possible, if only to be able to compete professionally. Competitions are supposed to be purer affairs in general (not that they are oftentimes), and I was thinking not only of good composers with very average studio skills (whom I would hate to see disqualified due to ignorance), but also of young people out there with all the inspiration and technique in the world, but without the money to be able to practically afford a great mock-up. I would hate for them to be discriminated against for this...

It is for these reasons that I proposed that an as-good-as-possible rendering of the Sibelius/Finale Play engines should be more than acceptable in your preliminary round - as an audio output of the score is required for this competition.

Again, best wishes and good luck. Unfortunately I am too busy to compete myself this year, maybe in 2015...