The 11th Opus Prizes winners were announced yesterday, January 27, 2008, in Montréal. Amongst the 26 Opus Prizes… the “Disc of the Year — Musique actuelle, Electroacoustics” is petits Big Bangs by Marcelle Deschênes; the “Composer of the Year” was given to Serge Arcuri; the “Tribute Award” was given to Otto Joachim.

Fresh news on Paul Dolden’s activities. He just completed the piece Who Can Play the Fastest?, commissioned by the Stockholms Saxofonkvartett. He is also working on two other works: Who Has the Biggest Noise? — a commission by Swedish guitarist Stefan Östersjö —, and Who Has the Biggest Sound? (for “tape”). We’ll let you know about the respective places and dates of the premieres.

The V Electroacoustic Miniatures International Contest presented by the Ministry of Culture of the Junta de Andalucía (Spain) has rewarded Dominic Thibault for his piece Nuit noire, nuit grise. Of the 13 finalists, 4 other are Québécois or Canadians: David Berezan, James Duhamel, Thierry Gauthier, and Gilles Gobeil.

Irish composer Roger Doyle has just finished a 6-part series for RTÉ Lyric FM — Ireland’s National Radio Broadcaster — called “Electrolight,” on his personal journey through 60 years of electroacoustic music. (In RealPlayer format.)

1. The 1950s
2. The 1960s
3. The 1970s
4. The 1980s
5. The 1990s
6. 2000 onwards

Our online store remains open but we won’t be around much during this holiday season to process your orders… We will be back at our normal speed on January 3, 2008. Happy holidays!

The 4 recent releases that are finalists for Opus Prize (Disc of the Year — Musique actuelle, Electroacoustics) are:

• Alter ego by Pierre Alexandre Tremblay
• … et autres utopies by Francis Dhomont
• Geisteswissenschaften by A_dontigny
• petits Big Bangs by Marcelle Deschênes

The gala will take place on January 27, 2008 at Salle Claude-Champagne of the Université de Montréal.