About Us
ABOUT THE GROUP
The International Film Music Critics Association (IFMCA) is an association of online, print and radio journalists who specialize in writing about original film and television music.
The IFMCA was originally formed in the late 1990s as the now-defunct “Film Music Critics Jury” by editor and journalist Mikael Carlsson, a member of the editorial staff at Music from the Movies for over ten years and a regular contributor to filmmusicradio.com and filmmusicmag.com. He is also the owner of the Swedish independent film music label MovieScore Media.
Since its inception, the IFMCA has grown to comprise over 50 members from countries as diverse as Australia, Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.
IFMCA AWARDS
The annual IFMCA Awards, which were first presented in 2004, are the only awards given to composers by film music journalists.
The IFMCA strongly feels that a film score’s strength lies in the combined impact of two important elements: the effectiveness, appropriateness and emotional impact of the score in the context of the film for which it was written; and the technical and intellectual merit of the composition when heard as a standalone listening experience. As such, the membership votes for the best scores of each year with these two criteria in mind, and strives to recognize scores which excel in both these areas. As an international organization, the IFMCA also makes conscious efforts to celebrate the best film music, not just from mainstream Hollywood productions, but world-wide, wherever it may originate.
BECOME A MEMBER
The IFMCA welcomes experienced film music journalists who are willing to take an active part in our organization. If you have expertise and knowledge in the field, as demonstrable via publicly accessible media, and would like to join the IFMCA as a new member, you may request the entry forms for the admission procedure. Please send us an email at subscribe@filmmusiccritics.org before July the 31st each year, in order to be considered for membership in that same year. Your submitted material must be in English and will be reviewed by the Admittance Committee during the following fall.
PROCESS FOR SUBMITTING A SCORE FOR AWARD CONSIDERATION
Any composer and/or formal representative (PR agency, etc) holding a valid license to promotionally handle the composer’s material, can submit a score for consideration for the IFMCA awards each year.
The following rules apply:
1. To be eligible for judgment in the yearly awards procedure, you/your client’s work must be for a feature film, television show or video game, belonging to one of our corresponding awards’ categories. For more info, please follow the guide as listed in the most recent awards’ archive entry at http://filmmusiccritics.org/awards-archive/
2. We will consider only original film/television/game scores written for films or productions of major worldwide distribution. These features must have either played in cinemas, been released on DVD, aired on television or, in the case of video games, been released in the year of the game’s production. All of the above must have occurred during in the corresponding year of each awards season, running January 1-31 December. Films which have only been shown at film festivals, and have not yet recieved wider distribution, are not eligible until they play a commercial run.
3. The music can be submitted, with the relevant PR material, only via press@filmmusiccritics.org.
4. The music must be in a widely used digital audio format, such as a good quality (256+kbps) mp3, and the promo material in either jpeg, text, doc, docx, pdf.
5. The promos will be made accessible to IFMCA members exclusively, for internal use and consideration only.
Please make sure you have permission to promotionally distribute any release you wish to submitting to us. For any info please contact us at press@filmmusiccritics.org.
