Resonate Magazine | Australian Music Centre

Image: Liza Lim  
© Sydney Conservatorium of Music, University of Sydney

Sydney Conservatorium of Music has announced Professor Liza Lim as the inaugural Sculthorpe Chair of Australian Music. The position was made possible by composer Peter Sculthorpe's (1929-2014) generous bequest to the University of Sydney to promote and advance music in Australia.

Liza Lim is one of Australia's most internationally renowned composers who has worked with the world's most eminent festivals, orchestras and ensembles, as well as having an outstanding track record of research leadership. In 2018 she was awarded the Australia Council for the Arts' Don Banks Music Award in recognition of her 'unique output as a composer, work as an influential academic and teacher, and leadership particularly in the areas of gender and music, and in mentoring new generations of composers'.

In response to her appointment Professor Lim said: 'I'm incredibly honoured to be appointed to the Sculthorpe Chair at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. I'm inspired by Peter Sculthorpe's generosity and vision and of course, his iconic legacy as an Australian composer who looked to Asia and Indigenous Australia for new points of orientation. The position brings wonderful opportunities to advance and champion Australian music, linking our composers and performers at the Conservatorium to the wider community though projects that are collaborative, interdisciplinary and speak to our times.'

Head of School and Dean of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Professor Anna Reid, praised Liza Lim's work with the Conservatorium's Composing Women Program, as well as her output as a composer.

'Professor Lim's compositional focus is on music and ecological thinking. Her compositional practice is deeply imbued with a sense of the socio-cultural lineages of people, objects and performance practices, hence her interest in musical form as an emergent expression of group processes.'

Liza Lim will begin the five-year position in mid-November undertaking academic teaching, research and advocacy roles. She will work with a new cohort of composers in the 2020-21 Composing Women Program in a partnership with the Sydney Dance Company, Sydney Philharmonia Choirs and the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra. The four program participants, also announced earlier this week, are Brenda Gifford, Jane Sheldon, May Lyon and Fiona Hill.

As part of her new appointment, Professor Lim has curated a series of videos (vodcasts) called 'The Sculthorpe Sessions' in collaboration with ABC Classic, for release as part of ABC's Australian Music Month in November. Other public events planned include a new festival at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music in 2021.

> Liza Lim - AMC profile

> 'Inaugural Sculthorpe Chair of Australian Music announced' - news article on the Sydney Conservatorium website