APRA has announced the recipients of its 2015 Professional Development Awards with Tim Carroll of Holy Holy, Ngaire and Briggs just some of the artists benefiting from the APRA initiative.
Each artist will receive $15,000 cash from APRA plus other tools for their career such as equipment.
The APRA Profession Development Awards recognize more than just the Pop genre favoured by ARIA. Artists specializing in Classical, Jazz and Film & Television are treated equally with the APRTA environment.
POPULAR CONTEMPORARY
Jack Carty, Ngaiire Joseph and Timothy Carroll (Holy Holy)
Few people in Australia tour like Jack Carty. Following the release of his third studio album ‘Esk’ (#7 on the Australian Independent Record Labels Association’s Album Chart and #17 on The Au Review’s list of the Best Australian Albums of 2014), he embarked on a 37-date tour of Australia and New Zealand. He spent the first eight months of 2015 touring with Ingrid Michaelson and Darren Hanlon, playing sold out shows of his own across six states and embarking on his first European tour. Jack has released three albums, two E.P’s, had songs on soundtracks, written with Josh Pyke and Katie Noonan and picked up the critical acclaim that only honesty in art affords. ‘Esk’ is no exception. It’s an album of imagery and groove that’s won Jack a dedicated and vocal fan base across the world. This is an album as reflective and as playful as it is poetic.
Growing up in New Zealand listening to reggae and her Mum’s Mariah Carey and Cliff Richard albums, it wasn’t till Ngaiire’s family moved to Australia that she first heard Ani DiFranco, Jeff Buckley, Tool, Sarah Vaughan, Debussy and Gershwin. Her first ever gig – Machine Gun Fellatio, officially blew her mind, inspiring a major Arts work for high school that filled her mother’s lounge room with gigantic phalluses. Releasing her future-soul debut ‘Lamentations’ in 2013 lead to her first ever slot at Glastonbury and shows with Alicia Keys and John Legend. Since then she’s been writing music for dance companies, creating crazy sound installations for David Walsh’s MONA – and creating her new record, Blastoma. Ngaiire released Blastoma’s first single, ‘Once’ in July 2015. Co-written with mega-babes Megan Washington and Paul Mac, and produced by Paul Mac and Jack Grace, ‘Once’ is about taking risks that turn into revelations: story of her life.
Timothy Carroll is lead singer and lyricist of Holy Holy, a musical project conceived with guitarist/composer Oscar Dawson from Melbourne. The Australian duo has experienced sold-out headline tours, international showcases, raves from radio programmers, journalists and bloggers from all over the world even before launching an album. But now their debut, ‘When the Storms Would Come’, is finally here – and it’s vaster, and wilder, than anything they’ve aired to date. Their stunning 2013 debut ‘Impossible Like You’ earned a five star review from triple j’s Music Director, Richard Kingsmill. Following singles received high rotation on triple j and glowing reviews. After a successful tour to the UK and airplay on 6Radio, XFM and Radio 1, they were lauded by the NME. Prior to Holy Holy, Timothy released two solo albums, winning ‘Song of the Year’ at the QMA Awards. He is Artist Director of A Festival Called Panama in Launceston, Tasmania.
ABORIGINAL TORRES STRAIT ISLANDER (ATSI)
Adam Briggs (Briggs)
An Indigenous kid from regional Victoria, in 2013 Briggs was named the National Indigenous Music Awards (NIMAs) New Talent of the Year. Briggs has three major musical works; ‘Homemade Bombs’ (2009), ‘The Blacklist’ (2010) and ‘Shepplife’ (2014). ‘Shepplife’ won the 2015 NIMA’s Album of the Year while the ‘Bad Apples’ video took the gong for Film Clip of the Year. Briggs has toured with Hilltop Hoods and supporting international tours with Ice Cube, Yelawolf, DOOM, Ghostface Killah and Pharoahe Monch. He has founded Bad Apples Music, Australia’s first all Indigenous national record label, to create sustainable and meaningful pathways for emerging Indigenous artists. In 2015 BRIGGS took a turn onto the big screen. He has generated a regular seat at the writer’s table of hit ABC show’s ‘Black Comedy’ and been in front of the camera as a major supporting role in upcoming series ‘Cleverman’, due to screen in 2016.
CLASSICAL
Peter McNamara
Peter McNamara is gaining a reputation as one of Australia’s most talented emerging composers. His works have been performed by a variety of major orchestras and ensembles in Australia and overseas including Ensemble Modern, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Ensemble Insomnio, Orchestra Victoria, Orkest de Ereprijs, Ensemble Offspring, the Tokyo Sinfonietta, Ensemble Phace, Ensemble Nomad and the Stroma Ensemble. McNamara has a growing number of commissions from artistic bodies including ‘Perpetual Inertia’ for the Dutch Orchestra and Ensemble Academy, ‘Der Ost-Westspiegel’ for international accordion virtuoso James Crabb, and ‘The German Hills’ for Ensemble Offspring. In 2006 and 2012, he was the composer-in-residence at the Campbelltown Arts Centre. His works have been commercially recorded and broadcast on radio by ABC Classic FM, 2MBS FM and 3MBS FM. Several of these broadcasts were live, including ‘Duo-Charged’ in 2010 and ‘Die Nacht fällt’ in 2003 from the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra’s 21st Century Australian Composers Program concert.
COUNTRY
Rebecca Chilcott (aka Ruby Boots)
As the vehicle of singer songwriter Rebecca Chilcott, Ruby Boots is the go-to talent for like-minded country artists touring Australia. Show after show, she’s received accolades for her up front sass and talent whilst nabbing coveted support spots with the likes of Shakey Graves/Shovels & Rope, Kris Kristofferson, Tony Joe White and Nikki Lane. In October 2015 she co-headlined at the Dashville Skyline Americana festival in NSW. Her debut album ‘Solitude’ was featured on radio around the country, RRR, PBS and RTR FM rating it as Album Of The Week and handing out impassioned rave reviews. Lead single ‘Wrap Me In A Fever’ recently took out the WAM Country Song of the Year Award while second ‘Middle of Nowhere’ was co-written with Vikki Thorn (The Waifs).
FILM & TELEVISION
Aaron Kenny
Aaron Kenny is a film, television and musical theatre composer. His accolades include the Australian Young Composer of the Year and a nomination for the Zurich Film Music Competition’s Award for Best Score. He is currently Music Assistant to Oscar winning composer Alan Menken (‘The Little Mermaid’, ‘Beauty And The Beast’, ‘Aladdin’). His most recent work can be found in the Australian feature film ‘Crushed’, which premiered at the 2015 Montreal International Film Festival. He also scored the Australian Academy Award nominated short film ‘Welcome to Iron Knob’, was Best Original Score Nominee (for the Kilda Film Festival 2012) short film ‘Moth’, as well ‘A Mighty Nice Man’ (Recipient of the HBO Development Award, premiered at the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival, and nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Short). He has won Best Original Soundtrack Awards for short film ‘Hand Model: The Musical’ and the animation ‘Run Crabs Run’.
JAZZ
Jeremy Rose
Saxophonist and composer Jeremy Rose works across jazz, classical, world and contemporary music. Composing and performing with The Vampires, the Jeremy Rose Quartet and reggae-dancehall act, The Strides, he also works with Ensemble Offspring, the Acacia String Quartet and Compass Quartet. In July 2015 Jeremy toured Europe with The Vampires, performing at the Love Supreme Jazz Festival, Edinburgh and Glasgow Jazz Festivals. His most recent project is “Iron in the Blood: a Musical Adaptation of Robert Hughes’ The Fatal Shore”. His accolades include the 2009 Bell Award for Young Australian Jazz Artist, finalist in both the Freedman Jazz Fellowship in 2012 and 2013 and the Art Music Awards in 2012 and 2013. Jeremy is currently completing a PhD at the Sydney Conservatorium. He’s studied non-western and improvised music traditions in Greece, Cuba, Bali, Banff, Berlin and the Dominican Republic, and with numerous mentors in New York and London.
SMUGGLERS OF LIGHT
Marcus Corowa
Growing up in far north Queensland, Marcus Corowa draws on his Aboriginal and South Sea Islander heritage to create captivating music with elements of blues, jazz and funk. Marcus’s accolades include winning the ‘Most Promising New Talent in Music’ award at the 2012 Deadly Awards (on the back of his debut EP, ‘The Greater You’), being a finalist in the 2011 APRA Professional Development Awards, and the 2010 Q Song Awards. He is a regular face at national music events and has played with some of the best in the industry including Mark Seymour, Toni Childs, Marcia Hines, Christine Anu, Archie Roach, Jessica Mauboy, Casey Donovan, Linda and Vicka, James Reyne and Frank Yamma. Marcus has been busy in 2015, songwriting for the soundtrack of the documentary about Indigenous basketball player Patty Mills, ‘For My People’. As Ambassador for the National Centre of Indigenous Excellence he is working on a documentary about smoking awareness.
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