Landscapes - Soundscapes - Spring 2026 Composition Competition

The members have voted in this poll; Spring 2026 Competition Poll and have decided about the form and details of the next Young Composer's Composition Competition! As per the previous trend, this competition has no monetary rewards - only kudos and badges. Also in accordance with the results of the 2025 Halloween Satisfaction Survey, we are inviting the members/competitors to participate in the creation of the badge awards that will be dispersed at the end of the competition! So if you have any ideas for particular badges that would accord with the kind of music that will be submitted for this competition and the theme of this competition, let us know in the List of Manually-Awardable Badges thread and we will take your ideas into consideration! Please reply to this topic to declare your intent to participate in this competition!

The winners will be determined by popular voting polls!

Reviewing and Judging: The reviewing of the competition submissions will once again be spearheaded by our volunteer staff and those who wish to contribute their time and effort to reviewing the entries out of the goodness of their own hearts (and/or sense of fun!). You may use the Official Competition Reviewing Template, or jettison the template and review the submissions just like you would any other piece of music on the website! You could even make your own template! You will be rewarded for your efforts with "Ardent Reviewer" badges in three tiers:

1. Featherweight Reviewer - for reviewing 33% of the entries

2. Welterweight Reviewer - for reviewing 66% of the entries

3. Heavyweight Reviewer - for reviewing 100% of the entries

Thank you for whatever time and effort you're willing to give!

Instrumentation: as per the poll, the members are free to compose for any kind of trio/quartet/quintet from a Pierrot ensemble to a kazoo trio to a quartet of Tibetan throat singers! Write for the serpent! You may use any combination of 3 - 5 monophonic or polyphonic instruments/voices.

Pictures, Photos, Paintings: You are encouraged to submit a picture, photo or a painting of the landscape you based your composition on. This is totally optional, but if you submit one, please do not use AI to generate your image. However, you may use a screenshot from a game. Or you can use a completely imaginary landscape.

Duration: 3 - 7 minutes with a sweet spot of 5 minutes.

Deadline: Tuesday, June 2nd, 2026

Entrants thus far:

@Fruit hunter

Here is the submissions thread for the competition where participants are encouraged to post links to their composition (rather than posting their piece directly into the pre-existing topic - make your own dedicated topic so the members at large can review your music there):

We are instituting a policy of not allowing any AI generated works in the competition. Because of this you will be required to detail how you created your piece and submit a PDF score or midi file for the perusal of the staff and members at large.

I declare my intent to join into this competition