Who We Are

       John Ness Beck established the John Ness Beck Foundation in 1987, only a few months before he passed away from cancer. The Foundation was established in memory of Randall Thompson and Joseph Clokey and is tax exempt. It recognizes outstanding achievement in choral composition and arrangement of traditional church music, enhances and furthers the careers, study, education and experience of promising composers and arrangers, and promotes and stimulates the learning of choral composition and traditional church music.

      John Beck's desire was simple: to encourage and promote the writing of traditional sacred music. The Foundation has sought to honor this goal in several ways. For several years, scholarships were awarded to students from the Westminster Choir College and the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary who exhibited promise in the writing of sacred choral music. At present, the Foundation has embarked on a program which recognizes current composers of traditional sacred choral music by selecting two compositions yearly which best exemplify the type of writing that fit the criteria set forth by John Beck. Prior to 2009 compositions were nominated by a panel of seven judges comprised of composers, music store retailers and university music instructors, each panelist suggesting one to five compositions for consideration. (No composer could nominate or vote on their own composition.)

For the 2009 award year, a change is being made on how published traditional sacred choral pieces are selected for the competition.  We are contacting publishers and asking them to submit two of their best pieces in terms of quality of writing and artistic merit for judging.  Unpublished composers are still able to submit their work to the Executive Director as described on the Contact Us page of this website.

The first place  award is $5,000.00 and the second place recipient receives $3,000.00.

The members of the Board of Directors are:

Craig R. Courtney
Jeffrey D. Hamm
David L. Thomas