Banbury’s Young Musician of the Year competition returns after two-year break

Organised by the Rotary Club of Banbury, the contest has been held for 30 years, giving many young people valuable performance experience and, for some, it has been a launch pad towards a career in music.

Over the many years of the competition, eight winners have gone on to become professional musicians.

This year’s preliminary rounds will be held at Tudor Hall School on January 20 and 21, 2023, with the finals being held on Saturday February 4.

Apart from competing for one of the many trophies, this year a prize of £100 will be awarded to the Young Musician of the Year and £25 to the Junior Young Musician of the Year.

There will be trophies awarded to all the winners in each class throughout the competition.

There are solo, duet and ensemble categories and the solo section has classes including piano, singing, guitar, woodwind, strings and brass.

The competition covers musicians aged 8 to 19 with three age groups for the soloists, and rules about ages for the duets and ensembles.

Entrants will have a maximum time limit of either four, six or eight minutes to impress the judges and will need to pay a entry fee of five pounds for a solo performance or eight for a duet and £10 for a ensemble performance.

Entry forms can also be downloaded from the Banbury Rotary Club website and the deadline for entering is Saturday December 3, 2023.

More information can be found at banburyrotaryclub.org.uk/about-us/committees/youth-services/young-musician-competition/.