Awards aplenty for Griffith’s creative campus

Elly Hoyt, Queensland Conservatorium jazz vocal graduate, has won a Bell Award for Best Australian Jazz Vocal 2011 for her first self titled CD.

Elly joins a growing list of recent national award winners, and nominees from the South Bank campus.

Jazz is a highly complex and specialised music form and Elly’s natural affinity for it came to light by winning a James Morrison jazz vocal award while completing her degree at QCGU.

Since then she has steadily carved out a place for herself as a vocalist and as a unique and subtle interpreter of lyrics.

Elly is now living and working in Melbourne before “heading to New York for a couple of months to take a look at the scene there, and work with some of my heroes” she says.

Also nominated for a Bell Award was Misinterprotato, an exciting contemporary jazz trio, who met while completing their degrees at QCGU, and are making their mark on the Australian jazz scene.

In Sydney earlier this week Dr Vanessa Tomlinson, Head of Percussion at QCGU and driving force of the unique musical fraternity Clocked Out, won the 2011 State and National inaugural Award for Excellence by an Organisation at the APRA Art Music Awards.

Clocked Out explores all facets of contemporary music, from environmental explorations to intercultural collaborations to the new ‘standard’ repertoire of the past 50 years.

Clocked Out has significantly reshaped the parameters of music-making in Australia.

Also nominated at the awards in the Excellence in Music Education category for their Young Composers program, was QCGU’s artists-in-residence vocal ensemble, The Australian Voices.

The Art Music Awards cover composition, performance, and outstanding contributions by individuals and organisations in Australian music, music education and regional music.

Meanwhile at the Queensland College of Art, six students from Griffith Film School are packing their bags and their three short films to attend the Cannes Short Film Corner at Cannes International Film Festival.

In Melbourne, QCA graduate and award winning photographer Renata Buziak has opened her solo exhibition in association with the publication of her book, Afterimage.