The winners of the 2026 Art Music Awards have been announced at a ceremony (19 August) hosted at Melbourne’s Timber Yard.

Hosted by Namila Benson with guest presenters Connor D’Netto and Aura Go, the awards celebrate the outstanding achievements of Australian composers, performers, improvisers and organisations across classical music, jazz, sound art and experimental music.

This year’s Awards marks the 100th anniversary of APRA AMCOS, who co-presents the ceremony alongside the Australian Music Centre.

Work of the Year

For the Work of the Year: Choral award, Paul Stanhope take home his fifth gong for Mahāsāgar. Composed for the West Australian Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, the work explores the the ocean and its capacity for “danger, sorrow, wonder and healing” and sets poetry from Australian writers.

Alex Turley and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. Photo © Craig Abercrombie

Alex Turley has earned his first Art Music Award, taking home Work of the Year: Large Ensemble for the ocean’s dream of itself, for mezzo-soprano and orchestra. Setting poems from West Australian writers to music, the work premiered Wyoming’s Grand Teton Music Festival in 2025 (Turley talks about it here), and will have its Aussie premiere with the SSO in 2027.

Collaborators Louise Devenish, Kate Milligan Aaron Wyatt and Navid Constantinou have taken home Work of the Year: Electroacoustic/Sound Art with Dark Oceanography. 

Written for three percussionists and multi-channel, spatialised electronic sound, the work draws on scientific data to sonify the future impact of global warming. This is the second consecutive win in this category for Milligan, who took home the 2025 award with Tactus.

Mindy Meng Wang and Monica Lim: Opera for the Dead. Photo supplied

Opera for the Dead, Mindy Meng Wang and Monica Lim’s the immersive cyber-opera, has earned Work of the Year: Dramatic. Melding together Western, Chinese, traditional and experimental practices, the work explores Chinese funeral culture through a variety of different musical forms – including an “underworld disco” – and lets its audience wander freely through a moveable performance space.

Composer-pianist Nat Bartsch has won Work of the Year: Jazz & Improvised Music with When All Is Still and Quiet. Inspired by principles of mindfulness and radical acceptance, Bartsch wrote the work as a way to “encourage [students] to… stay centred, cope with the world’s complexities”.

Anne Cawrse. Photo © Emma Luker

Adelaide composer Anne Cawrse is the inaugural winner for Work of the Year: Solo and Small Enseble category for Killing the Angel in the House,  a solo flute work written for Eliza Shephard that borrows its title from an essay written by Virginia Woolf.

Noemi Libra Friedman is the inaugural winner for the Work of the Year: Medium Ensemble Award with BloodRiverRootTree. A site-specific work composed for Melbourne’s Norla Dome, the work is a meditation on “biological unity, fractal theory, and organic time”, paired with animation and an immersive perofrmance setup.

Performance of the Year

nyilamum song cycles at the 2025 Adelaide Festival. Photo by Tony Lewis

The Performance of the Year: Classical & Experimental Award has been given to the Australian String Quartet and vocalist, composer and academic Lou Bennett for their performance of Bennett and Paul Stanhope’s nyilamum song cycles. Awarded the 2025 Paul Lowin Song Cycle Prize, the composition tells the story of the return of a body of a baby girl from museum storage to her home in Jaara Jharr, where she was laid to rest.

Collective project The Cloud Maker has been awarded Performance of the Year: Jazz and Improvised Music. Performers Te Kahureremoa Taumata, Aviva Endean, Sunny Kim, Freya Schack-Arnott and Maria Moles draw upon goddess folklore stories from their respective heriiages and weave them together into a live performance.

Nick Russoniello performing Air Mass. Photo © Jacquie Manning

Performance of the Year: Soloist was awarded to Air Mass, a solo program from Nick Russoniello that spans from Telemann and Debussy to original compositions and Daft Punk, performed with a variety of different saxophones and a loop pedal.

“Air Mass is inspired by a desire to have a rich and colourful show, but with just solo saxophones as the source,” Russoniello told Limelight in 2025. “For me, part of the joy of live performance is to see how far I can take an idea.”

Luminary & Excellence Awards

Musica Viva Australia has been awarded the National Luminary Award (Organisation). The organisation presents chamber music concerts from leading international and Australian musicians around the nation and celebrated its 80th anniversary in 2025. It has commissioned more than 160 new works across its history and offers a variety of education and professional development programs for Australian artists.

Daryl Buckley. Photo © Nico Keenan.

The National Luminary Award (Individual) has been presented to Daryl Buckley, the Artistic Director of ELISION Ensemble – a position he has held since 1986. This year, the ensemble celebrated its 40th anniversary; across its history, it has conducted over 50 tours to 22 countries, commissioned around 800 new works and put out 22 discs.

Wollongong Conservatorium has earned the Award for Excellence in Music Education for its Music in Schools program, bringing specialist band and classroom music lessons to over 15 schools in the Illawarra and South Coast region.

Chamber Music Adelaide and Port Augusta Performing Arts has earned the Award for Excellence in a Regional Area for its Where We Meet: Chamber Music series.

Victoria’s Chamber Made took home the Award for Excellence in Experimental Practice for its 2025 presentations and artist development activities, including its Listening Acts live performance and installation program at Melbourne Recital Centre.

Liza Lim. Photo © Astrid Ackermann

Announced as the winner of the Richard Gill Award for Distinguished Services to Australian Music earlier this month, Liza Lim recieved her honour at the ceremony for her “visionary contribution to Australian art music”.

Also announced previously, the State Luminary winners were presented with their awards on the night. The late Michael Sollis (ACT) was awarded for his work as an artistic leader, community facilitator, composer and educator; pianist Alex Raineri (QLD) for his musicianship and work as director of the Brisbane Music Festival; flautist Melanie Walters (SA) for her work with the Adeleaie Wind ORchestra an Coruscalia Collective and championing new music;  and soprano Hannah Lee Tungate (WA) for her work with Tenth Muse Initiative and Women Composers Project.

Organisations honoured were People’s Republic (NSW) for its contribution to experimental musica as a venue, promotor and studio;  Van Diemen’s Band (TAS) for its work with regional communities, audiences and new Australian work, and Chamber Made (VIC), taking home its second award for its ambitious programming and work with composers and performers.

More about the Art Music Awards can be found here.