2023 AWARDS
$20,000 Johnny Dennis Music Awards
Applications have now closed for the 2023 Johnny Dennis Music Awards. Further details will be provided for the 2025 Awards in due course.
The Awards carry four (4) cash prizes of $5,000 each. Entries are invited from composers working at all levels of the industry – from entry level to established composers, in the category of ‘Light Music’ (see definition below).
The Awards aim to provide the winning recipients with the financial and creative freedom to receive appropriate recognition for their work. This can take any form, such as mentorship, study, or travel.
Requirements
- Applicants must submit a CV and proposal (up to two pages) via the Nomination Form
- The Awards are open to Australian composers who nominate a light music project (see definition for ‘Light Music’ below)
If you have any questions, please contact the Australian Guild of Screen Composers via email (jdmusicawards@agsc.org.au).
About the Johnny Dennis Music Awards
About Johnny Dennis
English-born and christened Dennis John Mole, Johnny Dennis migrated to Australia in the late 1940s and got his first musical break on the late Jim “Woody” Wood’s talent search program on Melbourne 3AW playing and singing ‘Chattanooga Shoe Shine Boy’. Soon after he became band pianist for three years at the Ritz Hotel, St. Kilda, before moving to the Gold Coast where, this time doubling on electric organ, for over three years he was the keyboard man at the Palm Lounge of the Grand Hotel, Coolangatta, with Art Lunden as compere. A confirmed traveller, who enjoyed living out of a suitcase, Johnny spent time working in Melbourne and Sydney, as well as the USA, England and Scotland.
Finally settling on the Gold Coast in 1989, he died suddenly from a heart attack on his way to a rehearsal — a trouper to the end, or, putting it with far more justice —the essential entertainer who loved an audience.
About the Awards
The Johnny Dennis Music Awards were established in perpetuity through the will of Dennis John Mole, who bequeathed his entire estate to a suitable trust for the purposes of achieving appropriate recognition for composers of light music. As executor of his will, the late Trustee Mr. Malcolm Harrison founded the trust in 1989 and appointed Perpetual Limited as co-trustee. Perpetual Trustee Company Limited are now sole trustee of the awards. The Awards are administered by the Australian Guild of Screen Composers (AGSC), on behalf of Perpetual Trustee Company Limited and held every two years. They are open to Australian composers who nominate a project of light music and submit an application that is assessed by a panel of judges for the Awards.
Definition of ‘Light Music’
The AGSC has determined the definition of Light Music to be predominantly in line with the definition of Art Music as defined by APRA AMCOS and the Australian Music Centre. That is, contemporary classical, contemporary jazz and improvised music, with the following additional considerations as defined by the estate:
“The music can include music for dance and theatre performances, TV, radio and film scoring. The compositions are to be of melodious nature. It shall not include music of a primarily percussive nature where melody is dominated by rhythm nor shall it include music of an operatic nature”.
The activities that the Award will fund are:
- Creation of new work
- Presentation of work, including audience development; and
- Research and development of a new work.
Read about the 2021 Johnny Dennis Music Award winners below.
2021 AWARDS
2021 Winners clockwise from top left: Chiara Cimilio (Mami Baby), Robbie Melville, Kate Lucas (Coda Chroma) and David Megarrity (Tyrone and Lesley)
Four talented composers have been chosen as the 2021 winners for the biennial Johnny Dennis Music Award. They join a talented roll call of Australian composer recipients of the legacy left by the late Dennis John Mole, known as Johnny Dennis, over the past three decades the awards have been held.
Cash awards of $5,000 each will be bestowed on Kate Lucas, Robbie Melville, Chiara Cimilio and David Megarrity. These composers work across diverse areas of music composition and performance and have used the time over the past 2 years to develop their composing work while performances, tours and creative collaborations have been put on hold.
AGSC President, Antony Partos said of the winners: “I am thrilled to learn about the four composers selected for this years’ Johnny Dennis Music Awards. I wish the winners every success for their projects and look forward to hear the final results and how their work is shared with the wider community.
Kate Lucas, a Victorian-based composer and songwriter, plans to use her award prize money to promote a new album of music she is releasing and pitching to publishers and record labels, under the name Coda Chrome. Speaking of the award, she noted: “Receiving this award in recognition of my songwriting means so much to me! I feel so encouraged, and excited about being able to share my music more broadly thanks to the funding support this award provides.”
Composer and performer David Megarrity from Queensland will also put his prize money towards recording and releasing a new album of ukulele and double bass music, String, with his performance duo Tyrone and Lesley. He noted the award “recognises the kind of music and songs that don’t sit neatly in drop-down lists of genre and style. Light music for dark times. That’s the kind of music we need”.
Guitarist Robbie Melville from Victoria plans to use the funds to record, release, promote and tour a new album of jazz-inspired music, written for solo guitar, the result of composing at home during the many lockdowns of 2020-2021. He said “As a musician, I am constantly striving to create music that is meaningful to me in the hope that listeners may share a similar aesthetic or experience. Being chosen as one of the recipients of the Johnny Dennis Music Awards creates an opportunity to continue to compose, record and perform music to the best of my ability.”
While emerging composer, songwriter and musician Chiara Cimilio from Sydney, will also use her award prize for the promotion and release of new work under her alter ego Mami Baby. When told of the win, she said: “...this award has allowed me such greater means to continue crafting my art to the best of my ability. I’m honoured to be given this opportunity and I’m so excited to share what’s to come.”
The four join a long list of past winners including award-winning screen composers Allyson Newman, Brett Aplin, Pru Montin, recent ARIA nominee Nat Bartsch and noted jazz artist Phillip Johnston.