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After immigrating to Australia in 1939, Czechoslovakian Paul Lowin worked as a wholesale dealer of cloth and dry goods, establishing the Swedish Handweaving Co. on George Street. Although a successful businessman, his work was never his main preoccupation. Mrs L Krips, a neighbour often visited by Lowin, wrote, "We never found out what he was doing for a living, as nothing seemed to him important enough to talk about if he could talk about music".

Lowin’s passion for music was manifest in the hand-written will found when, shortly after returning to Vienna in 1959, he died of a heart attack. The will outlined his dream of encouraging excellence in music composition and his wish to establish a competition for works by living Australian composers.

It took thirty years for an appropriate scheme to be approved by the Chief Justice of NSW but eventually, in 1990, Australia’s richest prize for music composition was established. The competition was initially held every three years, but in 1995 further changes by the court enabled the competition to be held every two or three years. Since 1999 the prizes have been presented in collaboration with the Australian Music Centre, and the next prizes will be held this year.

The Orchestral Prize ($25,000) is for a work for modern chamber or symphony orchestra of at least 30 players and 15 independent lines. The work may include instrumental or vocal soloists and/or choral, electronically produced or pre-recorded elements.

The Song Cycle Prize ($15,000) will be awarded to a work suitable for chamber performance, using no more than 1-8 independent vocal lines, accompanied by up to 10 instrumental players.

The Paul Lowin trust is a charitable foundation managed by Perpetual, established to encourage excellence in musical composition. The 2009 Prizes will be judged by a panel of leading Australian composers and music practicians. Previous recipients of the Paul Lowin Prizes include Brett Dean, Rosalind Page, Nigel Butterley, Brett Dean, Julian Yu, Georges Lentz, Brenton Broadstock, Martin Wesley-Smith, Raffæle Marcellino, Liza Lim and Andrew Ford.

Anyone can nominate a work for the award including publishers, composers and the general public. Entries should be sent to the Trustee of the Paul Lowin Prizes: c/- Australian Music Centre, Level 4, The Arts Exchange, 10 Hickson Road, The Rocks, Sydney NSW 2000 by 30 June 2009. The application form, guidelines and further information, can be downloaded from the website www.amcoz.com.au .