A long journey behind the Nordic Music Prize

Fimmtudagur, 29 Október 2009 00:00

The Finnish clarinettist Kari Kriiku is this year’s winner of the Nordic Council Music Prize. The prize was presented during the Nordic Council's Session in Stockholm at the end of October. The ceremony was the final step in a long process for finding the winner, a process coordinated by the Nordic House in the Faroe Islands.

 
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The Music Prize has a long tradition in the Nordic cooperation. Today’s prize is a successor of an earlier prize for creative tone arts, awarded first time in 1965.

The Nordic Music Prize is awarded “for a creative and performing tone art” and was established in 1989. Every second year it is awarded to a composer, and every second to a performer or an ensemble of performers.

The committee selects
An evaluation committee selects the winner. All the Nordic countries and autonomous areas are represented in the committee. The Nordic House in Torshavn, Faroe Islands, is the secretariat for the committee.

“The members of the committee are designated from their home countries and autonomous areas, one member and one deputy member from each”, says Urd Johannesen. She is a project manager in the Nordic house and responsible for coordinating the committee work.

“The music scene in the North is wide, and there are many genres. Every year in January the committee starts with determining a theme for the prize of the year. The members think timeliness: What is happening here and now on the music scene in the North? They also discuss the way forward to a theme they can agree on. “

This year the committee decided to define the theme as “forms of expression across different genres, or groundbreaking in its own genre with an innovative musical expression”.

Maximum 13 nominees
“When the theme is defined, the members of the committee discuss with the music scene in their home countries. The five countries nominate two candidates each, and the three autonomous areas one each. The maximum number of nominees is thus 13. The committee discusses the candidates, asking questions and considering the arguments behind the nominations”, says Johannesen.

Prize statutes require emphasis on continuity of operations. The statutes also require that the winner’s work will be considered innovative in the current music area.

“Then follows the part of the process that takes most time for me: To contact all the nominees and collect relevant material. It may be CD's, DVD's, score, articles or other things. We submit the material to the members of the evaluation committee, and then they have between four and six weeks to listen and read.”

In May, the committee comes together for a voting meeting. In the first round they vote six of the nominee who qualify to the second round. In this first round, they are not allowed to vote for candidates from their own country. In a second round the committee selects three of the six to go further, and now the members also may vote for candidates from their own country. The committee then selects the winner among the remaining three candidates. This year the election of Kari Kriiku was made public on 1 June.

“We work a lot for creating awareness for the prize. It is a challenge, because the struggle for attention in the cultural life is so hard, and it is easy to drown”, says Urd Johannesen.

Multimedia package
A novelty for this year is a multimedia package which presents the winner and all the nominees in words, sound and images. It also has links to their websites and allows you to buy their CD's.

“We have received very good feedback on this package. It was made available via e-mail, and based upon the numbers who have used it we can see that many of those who received the e-mail have passed it on. In this way we spread information about the prize”, says Urd Johannesen.

“Does it happen that somone wants to nominate him or herself for the prize?”

“Yes, it happens that someone calls and asks about it.”

“What do you answer?“

“That it is not possible!”

Read more:

Multimedia package on this year’s winner and nominees

Former winners and nominees

Statutes for Nordic Council Music Prize