The IVORS Classical Awards celebrate creative excellence over the past year in British and Irish composing with their prestigious annual awards. This year, 34 composers and librettists have been nominated for an Ivor Novello Award, representing an inspiring range of voices and styles that reflect the richness of contemporary classical music. Wise Music Group are proud to share the news that four associated composers have been nominated for the 2025 awards.
Jonathan Dove and librettist April de Angelis' community opera Uprising has been shortlisted for the Best Community and Participation Composition award. The opera was commissioned by Glyndebourne, where it received its premiere in February, and the Saffron Hall Trust. The project looks at the climate emergency through the eyes of the young, whom it will affect the most, and was initiated by Jim Potter and generously supported by Jim and Hilary Potter.
Judith Weir is nominated in the category for Best Large Ensemble Composition for her work Planet, a Britten Pears Arts commission which was premiered in June by the Knussen Chamber Orchestra led by Ryan Wigglesworth. Weir was last honoured by the Ivors in 2022 when she received the Academy Fellowship.
The Best Orchestral Composition nominations feature Sally Beamish for her work DISTANS written in 2020 for the Concertgebouworkest, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra and Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra. The work received its UK premiere in June 2024 at the Barbican, featuring soloists Janine Jansen and Martin Fröst alongside the London Symphony Orchestra.
Nominated for the same award is Chester composer Helen Grime for her song cycle for Soprano and Orchestra Folk, with text by Zoe Gilbert based on her novel of the same name. Written alongside and for Claire Booth, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra accompanied her in the world premiere in Glasgow in September 2024 conducted by Ryan Wigglesworth.
Find out more and discover the other fantastic nominees at the Ivors website here
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