The Contemporary Music Centre and RTE LyricFM participated in the recent International Rostrum of Composers in Vienna.

Organised by the International Music Council and hosted by Austrian Radio (ORF) in collaboration with the Austrian Music Information Centre (MICA), the Rostrum, which took place in June, gathered representatives from some 30 national radio networks from four continents.

Fifty-seven works composed within the five years preceding the Rostrum were presented. These included two Irish works, Benjamin Dwyer’s Voces Criticas (2004) for guitar and Rachel Holstead’s Roses for Icarus (2004) for string quartet, both RTE commissions and jointly submitted by CMC and LyricFM.

Unfortunately neither work made it onto the very competitive shortlist of selected works which all members of the Rostrum agree to broadcast. However they were very well received and it is anticipated that both works will receive multiple broadcasts around the world in the coming months.

The main objective of the Rostrum of Composers is to foster the exchange of performances of contemporary music between broadcasting organizations. Works chosen at last year’s Rostrum were given over 500 broadcasts by participating networks and affiliates of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU).

The Contemporary Music Centre and RTE Lyric FM have cooperated in making joint submissions to the Rostrum in recent years. In 2003 Deirdre Gribbin's orchestral work Empire States was chosen for the shortlist of nine recommended works.

Posted: 29 June 2005