Grants

 

2022 Grant Timeline

September 12: Applications open

November 15: Final applications due

January 2023: Decisions announced via email

The 2022 grants for will encompass the performance years: 2023-2024, 2024-2025, and 2025-2026.  The first installment of grant funding will be released in the spring of 2023 to support programming for the 2023-2024 season.

Revised Grant Program

Women’s Philharmonic Advocacy has been proud to provide Performance Grants in the U.S. since 2012, helping hundreds of community, professional, and youth orchestras across the country perform works by historic and contemporary women composers.  The impact of these grants has been heard from coast to coast, by small and large ensembles, in rural and urban communities, in live, broadcast and streamed performances.  

Our original intention with this grant program has always been to encourage more performances of works by women composers by large ensembles, and as such this program was originally designed to provide funding to assist with the costs associated with learning new music, including renting or purchasing scores and parts, hiring extra musicians to meet the requirements that are outside an ensemble’s typical roster, bringing in guest speakers, or allowing for additional educational programming to enhance the concert experience for the wider community.

In re-examining the reach and effectiveness of this grant program, we have decided to bring significant changes to the program which will make the impact of the Performance Grants Program directly in line with the current need for long term, systemic changes within the larger classical music community.  Instead of impacting single concerts, the updated program will allow us to build relationships with ensembles to help identify and facilitate opportunities for broader representation and inclusion throughout multiple concert seasons.  

 

The WPA Performance Grants as of September 2022 are now focused on impacting the long-term programming decisions in American orchestral concert programming to more accurately resemble the actual diversity found within the historical and contemporary makeup of western art music.  

The newly-revised WPA Grants will be awarded annually to a maximum of five ensembles, each of whom must commit to a three-year partnership with WPA to develop an inclusive programming model that will carry throughout the commitment of the grant period and beyond.  

Each U.S. applicant ensemble for the program must meet the following criteria: 

  • Community, Professional, or Youth orchestras in the United States who seek to expand their repertoire, attract wider audiences, include engaging educational programming, and be a positive model of change in the classical music world.
  • Ensembles who have demonstrated an established commitment toward diversity, inclusion, and representation of women’s voices and are looking to expand their impact are especially encouraged to apply.  
  • Each ensemble must demonstrate artistic excellence in performance.  Note: A (relatively) recent audio sample is required for the grant application.  
  • The organization’s artistic and administrative staff must be able to commit to a three year partnership to work directly with Women’s Philharmonic Advocacy Grant Administrator and representatives to develop short and long term goals for long term and systemic changes within their individual organizations to address the inequities that have historically been synonymous with classical music programming.  
  • In addition, we will work together to develop additional educational opportunities for audiences and the larger community to learn about the often ignored composers and their music you will be featuring in your programming. 
  • Organizations must be eager to be on the leading edge of change as the classical music community begins to reckon with the systemic inequity and racism that sits at the core of traditional programming.  

The total award of the grant for each winning ensemble will be $5,000, distributed as follows:

First Year:      $1,000

Second Year: $1,500

Third Year:     $2,500

Failure to meet outlined and agreed upon objectives at any point will mean the forfeiture of future payments.  

In addition, members of the WPA Board of Directors as well as the Grants Administrator will be available to apply their wide-ranging professional expertise to guide ensembles as they work to expand their concert repertoire, build educational programming opportunities, develop their digital impact, and strive to be on the leading edge of change in the classical music world.  

 

Good luck and thank you for your interest in our mission to more fully represent and perform the entire roster of exciting classical repertoire composed by women.