Since 1987, the Princeton-based chorus, VOICES, has sponsored the Young Composers Project for children ages five through twelve, designed to stimulate playing with musical sounds and words. Children are encouraged to write a song and send it to VOICES. Entries will be accepted through March 15, 2016.
The Young Composers Program is a unique opportunity for young children to develop their musical abilities by creating their own music and sharing it with other children who have been doing the same, working with an established composer on their composition, and having their piece performed by members of VOICES Chorale in a family concert in April 2016.
Children ages five through twelve are invited to compose a song for a soloist or chorus, either unaccompanied, or with instrumental accompaniment. The music can be written down in any kind of notation, formal or invented. This may be as simple as the words to the song and the child’s line drawing of “how the music goes.” Older children may want to try music notation. In addition, children are asked to make a simple recording, even a cell-phone recording, of the piece to send in with it. This allows undergraduate music students from the College of New Jersey to listen to the songs and set them in standard music notation. Parents, piano teachers and music teachers are invited to support, but not edit, the child’s composition, as children hear things in their own imaginations differently from adults. Many young children write a song with no accompaniment; others write a solo with piano, drum, or guitar accompaniment. Still others, primarily those who have been part of the program before, write for chorus.
Music teachers or parents can help children submit a recording (CD or DVD) and three written copies of the child’s music (with the child’s name and age, assisting adult’s name, phone number, address, and child’s background in music), together with a $12 processing fee, to: VOICES Young Composers Project, P.O. Box 404, Pennington, NJ 08534.
For additional information on submitting a song electronically and on the workshop for children and their parents, contact Susan Evans at (609) 291-7456, or email drsevans@comcast.net. For more information about VOICES, visit VOICESChorale.org.
