The Canada-based Azrieli Foundation presents the London debut of the Azrieli Music Prizes at Cadogan Hall

The Azrieli Music Prizes (AMP) were created by the Azrieli Foundation in 2014 to 'offer opportunities for the discovery, creation, performance and celebration of excellence in music composition'. 

The foundation is a Canadian non-profit organisation whose mission is to improve lives through Education, Research, Healthcare and the Arts mainly in Canada and Israel. There are three main prizes:

• The Azrieli Prize for Jewish Music - awarded to a composer who has written the best new undiscovered work of Jewish music
• The Azrieli Commission for Jewish Music - awarded to encourage composers to creatively and critically engage with the question "What is Jewish music?"
• The Azrieli Commission for Canadian Music - offered to a Canadian composer to create a new musical work that creatively and critically engages with the complexities of composing concert music in Canada today

On 15 October 2023, the foundation is presenting the London debut concert of the Azrieli Music Prizes. At Cadogan Hall, the Philharmonia Orchestra, conductor Stephen Mercurio, with soprano, Sharon Azrieli, vocalist and sitar player, Sepideh Raissadat, shō player Naomi Sato and suona/sheng player Zhongxi Wu will perform the European premieres of three prize-winning works:

• Shāhīn-nāmeh by Iman Habibi (Laureate, 2022 Azrieli Commission for Jewish Music), a song cycle for voice and orchestra based on 14th-century Judeo Persian poetry of Shahin Shirazi, featuring vocalist and sitar player Sepideh Raissadat
• Birds Calling… from the Canada in You by Rita Ueda (Laureate – 2022 Azrieli Commission for Canadian Music), a work for shō, suona/sheng and orchestra which takes the audience on a journey incorporating Japanese, Chinese and Western musical traditions within a uniquely Canadian bird song soundscape
• Out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, O Lord by Aharon Harlap (Laureate, 2022 Azrieli Prize for Jewish Music), a work for soprano and orchestra with Sharon Azrieli as soloist. Deeply inspired by the Psalms, each of the five movements corresponds to a Psalm of a different mood and character.     

Full details from the Cadogan Hall website.