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Last call for registrations and submissions for the 19th edition of the World Soundtrack Awards Film Music Composition Contest! The deadline for application is 31 May 2020. This is your chance to win the Sabam Award for the Best Original Composition by a Young Composer. This year participants are invited to write an original composition for a selected excerpt from J'ai perdu mon corps (I Lost My Body), Jérémy Clapin's 2019 film (which was part of the Official Competition at Film Fest Ghent 2019). The winner will receive the Sabam Award for the Best Original Composition by a Young Composer.

Film has made avant-garde composer Krzysztof Penderecki world famous. Starting as two separate sources of inspiration, film and music became one and enriched each other. Precisely for this reason, Penderecki received a Lifetime Achievement Award of the World Soundtrack Academy, last year at Film Fest Ghent 2019.

For several weeks now, we have all been living a different reality: we face an unprecedented health crisis, and we see the enormous damage it is causing worldwide. Film Fest Ghent empathizes with all those affected and hopes that the solidarity with those who are struggling and with those who are committed to the public interest will survive in post-corona times.

The 20th anniversary edition of the World Soundtrack Awards will be celebrated in a special way. Adapted to current circumstances, this year's WSA will be an online edition, livestreamed from Kinepolis Ghent, where the ceremony itself will take place. This will give the festival's international audience the chance to enjoy the award ceremony and concert from everywhere around the world in a safe and corona-proof manner. The World Soundtrack Awards will be the closing event of Film Fest Ghent.

On Monday (6 July 2020), the World Soundtrack Academy and Film Fest Ghent were saddened by the news that Ennio Morricone had deceased at the age of 91 in his hometown of Rome. We would like to express our condolences and deepest sympathy to his family members. As a festival that focuses on film music, we feel highly privileged to have welcomed the world-renowned Italian composer as a guest of honour twice (in 1987 at the festival and in 2000 at a concert organized by Film Fest Ghent), where he performed his music live with the Belgian National Orchestra.

To celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the World Soundtrack Awards, Film Fest Ghent devotes its annual album to all thirteen winners of the coveted World Soundtrack Film Composer of the Year Award over the past two decades. The album will be released on 23 October 2020 and is called World Soundtrack Awards: Tribute to the Film Composer. Just as WSA’s previous albums, the music is performed by Brussels Philharmonic and conducted by maestro Dirk Brossé.

Each year, Film Fest Ghent is devoutly committed to the art of film music by hosting the World Soundtrack Awards as well as coordinating the WSA Industry Days. A manifold of events introduces the film music industry and young aspiring film composers to the modi operandi of renowned film music talent. Guest speakers and attendants of this year's Industry Days include 2020 WSA Lifetime Achievement Award Winner Gabriel Yared, Alexandre Desplat and Nainita Desai.

The World Soundtrack Academy proudly presents this year's nominees for the renowned WSAwards. The wide range of selected composers includes our guest of honour Alexandre Desplat, Thomas Newman, Benjamin Wallfisch and John Williams. Moreover, last year's Television Composer of the Year, Hildur Guðnadóttir, is now nominated for the Film Composer of the Year Award whereas last year's Film Composer of the Year, Nicholas Britell is now nominated for the WSAward for TV Composer of the Year. As this demonstrates the blurring boundaries between film, television and other audiovisual media, the World Soundtrack Awards will more than ever celebrate the art of composition for screen.

In collaboration with Film Fest Gent Screen International devoted a special supplement on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the World Soundtrack Awards, launched by the World Soundtrack Academy and instigated by Film Fest Gent in 2001.

Film Fest Ghent will explore the cross-pollination between film and music at its 47th edition with VIDEODROOM 2020. In collaboration with Kunstencentrum Vooruit, the festival will present film classics such as Solaris, Koyaanisqatsi and The Shining while giving them a VIDEODROOM make-over. Live music concerts and performances will propose experimental perspectives on the film canon while offering unforgetable experiences.