Antigone Quartet Prize

The Antigone Music Collective is committed to promote the voices of living composers. The Antigone Quartet Prize is a yearly award given to a composer who aligns with our vision for new music, and who we feel has a unique voice. This is prize awarded at the discretion of the board. The inaugural composer for our 2024 commission is Cincinnati-based composer Nicolas Bizub. Both of these works will be performed in the summer of 2024.

In early 2024 the AMC was delighted to announce that we have gone ahead with the commission, although not as originally planned. For a variety of reasons, we decided to go ahead with the commissioning of a duo for violin and cello that will be performed by AMC founders Amelia Korbitz and Liam Battle.

The duo will be 15-20 minutes long and will use Bizub’s poem “Lavender Among Thorns” as its inspiration.

“Lavender Among Thorns” by Nicolas Bizub

  • those Thorns are now dull

    I’ve allowed Them to dim

    to remain not Blades;

    wrought, twisted layers;

    but ash

    ash decaying

    ash, feeding Fauna lush

    those Thorns, they aren’t thick

    I’ve pruned them back, now thin

    to remain but threads;

    tattered, frayed, and spent;

    wilting

    wilting, dull barbs

    barbs, buried beneath blooms

    those thorns, they are dead

    a resplendent rot in ruin

    waving softly,

    winds gently blow over

    Lavender

    growing among thorns

    color cascades glow

    soft splendor flowing

    from thorns,

    Lavender thrives

  • https://drive.google.com/file/d/1feGymEBEFeWqO8jWq6sI2no8VGmQih_6/view?usp=sharing