GEORGINA PALMER

Georgina Palmer (b. 2002) is an emerging composer and arts practitioner from Aotearoa New Zealand, and is now based in Melbourne, Australia. Her notable composition highlights to date include winning the 2020 NZCF/SOUNZ Big Sing Choral Composition Competition, winning the 2022 Audrey Reid Orchestra Composition Prize, having a work performed by the 2022 National Youth Brass Band of NZ, having a work performed in the 2022 Celebrating Global Harmony Through Music concert at Carnegie Hall (NYC), winning the 2024 RSCM Harold Smart Composition Prize, and being selected as a finalist for both the Todd Young Composer Awards (NZ) and the prestigious County Hall Arts Peace Symphony Concours (UK) in 2025. She was the Emerging Composer for the 2023 At The World's Edge Classical Music Festival in Queenstown, NZ, and participated in the 2025 Vienna Contemporary Composers' Festival, and continues to intertwine her composition practice with her passion for dance, film, and other creative mediums. Scroll down to read her full biography.

Georgina Palmer (b. 2002) is an emerging composer and arts practitioner from Aotearoa New Zealand, who completed her tertiary composition studies with First Class Honours via the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music (MCM) in 2025.

Shortly after commencing piano lessons in 2008, Georgina began composing small piano works, several of which she then performed in her annual local Performing Arts Competitions (from the age of seven). She commenced violin and percussion studies in 2016 to learn about composing idiomatically for a wider range of orchestral instruments; this led to her being involved in a variety of ensembles at secondary school, including choirs, jazz bands, rock bands and multiple award-winning chamber music groups. Georgina credits her final two years of schooling – at Nelson College for Girls – as the most significant to her childhood musical development; whilst there, she won the 2020 NZCF/SOUNZ Big Sing Choral Composition Competition with her work A Music Everywhere, which has since been frequently performed/broadcast across Aotearoa and beyond. A Music Everywhere was part of a portfolio of three works that Georgina submitted for the NZQA Scholarship Music awards in late 2020 (the other two being A Grand Adventure and Briony); she received an Outstanding result for her portfolio – the highest possible mark nationwide. She also attained Distinction in her ATCL Performance Diploma on Piano the following year.

Image by Jesse Fletcher, March 2025.

Georgina began her composition (and piano) studies at The University of Otago in 2022, where she became close with fellow emerging New Zealand composer and pianist Cameron Monteath. She then transferred to the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music (within The University of Melbourne) in 2023, studying composition and film to further broaden her artistic horizons; she then graduated in December 2025 with First Class Honours. In her second year in Melbourne, she became close with emerging filmmaker Talia Frank (USCB Class of 2025), and Georgina has since scored two short environmental documentaries under Talia’s film-direction (Crossing the Divide and Hydra on the Horizon); Crossing the Divide has since gone on to feature highly in the Oceanside International Film Festival, the USC Eco Media Festival, and the San Francisco Frozen Film Festival.

Outside of her formal music studies, Georgina has received a number of commissions from individual performers and arts organisations, both locally and internationally. These commissioners include acclaimed New Zealand-Japanese violinist Rakuto Kurano (for whom she wrote A Day In The Village); the 2022 National Youth Brass Band of New Zealand (for whom she rearranged A Music Everywhere into brass-band form; Georgina also played percussion with the Band in 2021); the well-regarded Trinity College Choir at The University of Melbourne (for whom she set the Latin scared text Te Lucis Ante Terminum); and Victoria’s premier competitive brass band, Darebin City Brass Preston Band (for whom she wrote Spiritus Aeris in honour of the band’s 90th anniversary in 2024). Georgina also composed her first symphony, Whakamahara (Moments), in early 2025, as part of the County Hall Arts Peace Symphony Concours (London, UK).

Additionally, since her initial success with A Music Everywhere as a teenager, Georgina has also been the recipient of a number of local and international composition awards, including winning the 2022 Audrey Reid Composition Prize for the second revision of A Grand Adventure (and she performed percussion in the work’s premiere at the Dunedin Town Hall); being selected as the Oceania-based composer representative for the 2022 Celebrating Global Harmony Through Music concert at Carnegie Hall, NYC (for which Upon Clee Hill was performed); joint-winning the 2023 Sutherland Trio Composition Prize with MCM classmate Bryn Renard (for which Emerge was performed); winning the 2024 RSCM Harold Smart Memorial Composition Prize (for her sacred choral work With Faith and Hope Eternal); and being selected as a national finalist for 2025 in the prestigious Todd Young Composer Awards (for which Flourish was performed by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra).

Georgina has undertaken two composition residencies to date; the Emerging Composer residency at the 2023 At the World’s Edge (AWE) Festival (Queenstown, New Zealand), and was part of a small group of emerging composers selected for the 2025 Vienna Contemporary Composers’ Festival (VCCF) (Vienna, Austria). For AWE, she composed a new work – Maramataka – for French Horn, violin and cello under the mentorship of prominent New Zealand composer Salina Fisher (via Zoom). The work was debuted at the festival by acclaimed London-based French Horn player Ben Goldscheider, along with two of the festival’s Emerging Artists: Lorna Zhang (violin) and Damon Herlihy-O’Brien (cello). She regards her time at AWE as one of the most important experiences of her creative practice to date. For VCCF, she composed a new work – Coming of Age, her first-ever string quartet – which was debuted by the Mivos Quartet at the Mozarthaus recital hall during the two-week residency programme. She thoroughly enjoyed connecting with other young composers from across the world through the VCCF experience.

Outside of composition, Georgina is incredibly passionate about dance teaching and choreography (and has begun to intertwine her dance and compositional practices together) as well as arts education in general; she now works as a school Music Administrator in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs, alongside continuing to undertake composition commissions when the opportunity arises. She wishes to thank her family, friends, partner and colleagues in their incredible support of her rich creative journey so far, and looks forward to what’s to come next in her practice.