The University of Sydney is in the process of recruiting someone for the role of the Sculthorpe Chair of Australian Music, a new position at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music made possible by a generous bequest from iconic Australian composer Peter Sculthorpe, who died in 2014.

Peter Sculthorpe. Photo © Sam Grimmer/Limelight

“My association with The Con goes way back,” Sculthorpe said in 2009 when plans for the chair was first announced, ahead of the composer’s 80th birthday. “In fact, I have been associated with every director since Eugene Goossens in the 1950s. Little did I know back then that the conservatorium would reach the heights it has today where it is regarded as one of the top ten music institutions in the world.”

“Given that we have Chairs of Australian Literature, the question I asked myself was ‘why not a Chair of Australian Music’,” he said. “It is a logical, timely and obvious move. And it was imperative that it be at Sydney’s Conservatorium.”

“It was Peter Sculthorpe’s intention that the Chair may ‘grow to become a greater support for the cause of Australian music’,” the University says in its job listing, “as ‘that cause has been...