The Philip Neill Memorial Prize is an annual prize administered by the University of Otago for excellence in original composition.[1] The award is open to all past and present students of a university in New Zealand, except previous winners who are excluded for a period of five years.
It was established in 1943 in memory of Philip Foster Neill, a medical student at the University of Otago who died during the polio outbreak of 1943. In the first year of the prize, 1944, the topic was for a prelude (or fantasia) and fugue for either piano or organ. Douglas Lilburn was publicly awarded the first prize of £25 on 25 June 1944, with Harry Luscombe of Auckland the runner-up.[2] It is the longest continuously running award of its kind in New Zealand.
The prize is determined each year with a set task with different parameters each year, usually relating to duration and instrumentation, which are announced early in the year, with a deadline for submission at the beginning of July. The prize is not always awarded.
1945 Harry Luscombe for Sonata in G major for violin and piano[4]
1946 Frank Callaway for Theme and Variations for String Orchestra[5]
1947 tied between Dorothy Scott for In a younger Land, a song cycle for mezzo-soprano and violin, cello and piano[6] and Dorothea Anne Franchi for The Desolate Star a song cycle for baritone and piano setting text by Robin Hyde [7]
1948 John Ritchie for Passacaglia and fugue on an original theme for two pianos[8]
1949 Charles Martin for Sonata for pianoforte and violin[9]
1950 Claire Neale for Variations on an original theme in the phyrgian mode, with a ground bass finale[10]
1951 Georgina Smith for Theme and Variations [for two pianos][11]
1952 Leslie Pearce Williamson Jordan for Fantasy-sonata for cello and piano
1953 No award
1954 Nigel Eastgate
1955, 1956, 1957 No award
1958 Barry Vercoe for A Program Suite for Oboe, Clarinet and Bassoon[12]
1962 shared between Robin Maconie for Basia Memoranda for lyric tenor and string quartet and Graham Hollobon for Elegy, a song cycle setting text by Alastair Campbell
2020 David Hamilton for Canticle 6: Fragments from Lorca for Mezzo, Violin and Piano,[37] highly commended Chris Adams for Dowland Fragments for Mezzo, Violin and Piano
2021 Ben Hoadley for Four Preludes for cello and piano [38]
^Freed, Dorothy Whitson (1 January 1959). "Variations for woodwind quintet". Variations for woodwind quintet | Items | National Library of New Zealand | National Library of New Zealand. Archived from the original on 5 June 2020. Retrieved 4 June 2020.
^specified, Not (1 January 1965). "Inward correspondence regarding competition prizes". Inward correspondence regarding compe... | Items | National Library of New Zealand | National Library of New Zealand. Archived from the original on 4 June 2020. Retrieved 4 June 2020.
^Norman, Philip T. (1983). "Appendix A11". The beginnings and development of a New Zealand music: The life, and work (1940-1965), of Douglas Lilburn (Ph.D). University of Canterbury.Music. Retrieved 15 September 2021.
^Norman, Philip T. (1983). "Appendix A11". The beginnings and development of a New Zealand music: The life, and work (1940-1965), of Douglas Lilburn (Ph.D). University of Canterbury.Music. Retrieved 15 September 2021.
^Caskie, Helen (1 January 1982). "Rhapsody for violin and piano". Rhapsody for violin and piano | Items | National Library of New Zealand | National Library of New Zealand. Archived from the original on 6 June 2020. Retrieved 4 June 2020.
