bravo!

Houston artists, groups, and festivals land $13.3M grant from Mayor's office

Local artists will receive $13 million next year from the city.

Photo via Garden Theater

As Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner winds down his final term, one of his lasting legacy has just announced a major gift to local arts.

The City of Houston Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs (MOCA) will award more than $13 million in grants to some 72 individuals and 156 arts and culture nonprofit organizations, the agency announced. Specifically, $13,323,343 will go to individuals, organizations, and fiscally sponsored projects offering public exhibitions, presentations and performances in 2024, per press materials.

These awarded funds come from the Support for Organizations, Festival and Support for Artists and Creative Individuals grant programs, which support local arts and arts groups. Funds are raised by a portion of city’s Hotel Occupancy Tax and managed and administered each year by the Houston Arts Alliance (HAA).

Qualifying for these grants is a lengthy process. Applications go through a two-step process are reviewed by HAA staff for objective eligibility. Then, eligible applications are scored by some 130 panelists, who are experts in the arts and vetted through the HAA Grants Committee of the Board of Directors. After scoring, the competition process is reviewed in full, voted on, then advanced to the Board of HAA for review and vote.

dance troupe The grants will aid local dance, arts, theater, music groups, and more.Photo courtesy of Theresa Chapman

Once Board review is complete, the results are sent to MOCA for the City’s and mayor’s approval. This year, Turner has approved a new BIPOC boost formula as part of the larger grants competitions’ formulas for funding artists, groups, and festivals. Turner has allocated an additional $800,000 to the grants programs to support the new formulas, according to press materials.

“We began implementing the City’s Arts & Cultural Plan at the beginning of my tenure and MOCA has dedicated itself to increasing access, transparency and equity to the City’s grants system over the last eight years,” Mayor Sylvester Turner noted in a statement. “That hard work was evident in the first equity indicators report where arts grants received a 96-equity score highlighting more opportunity across the city. As we continue to ensure that Houston’s diversity remains its strength, we must continue building an inclusive creative ecosystem where creatives and entities thrive. I am proud to have this as part of my legacy in serving Houston and its people.”

An artistic way to draw an end to his tenure, indeed.

raise the baton

Prestigious international conductor competition will debut in Houston

Photo by Clayton Stephenson

Conductor Marin Alsop will lead the judging panel.

Houston is about to get a new baton in town, and this one comes with international ambitions.

The Cliburn has announced the launch of the Cliburn International Competition for Conductors.

Classical music cognoscenti might be asking what this has to do with Houston. After all, the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition has long been synonymous with Fort Worth. The answer lies in legacy, logistics, and a bit of full-circle musical fate: Houston is home to a world-class orchestra, a premier music school, and a deep-rooted connection to Van Cliburn himself, who made his orchestral debut here at age 12.

The new program is set to debut in June 2028 in Houston. So there it is.

Open to conductors ages 21 to 35, the competition marks the first major international conducting competition in North America, placing the city on the global podium for emerging musical leadership.

The new initiative is a collaboration between The Cliburn, the Houston Symphony, and the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University. The Houston Symphony will perform with all competitors.

“The event will bring people to Houston from around the world, enhancing our reputation as an international city with a thriving arts and cultural sector,” Gary Ginstling, executive director and CEO of the Houston Symphony, tells CultureMap.

Competition rounds will take place at both the Shepherd School and Jesse H. Jones Hall for the Performing Arts.

“Collaborations like this are central to who we are as a university,” Matthew Loden, dean of the Shepherd School of Music, says. “They build on a deep network of relationships we’ve established with renowned arts organizations in Texas and around the world, and they strengthen the multifaceted programs already in place at Shepherd.

Loden frames Houston — and Texas more broadly — as uniquely positioned to lead in the arts. Often dubbed the Third Coast, he sees the region as more than a participant in the global cultural conversation. Instead, he views Texas as actively shaping a growing center for artistic innovation, making Houston a fitting home for the first major international conducting competition in North America. It’s a point of pride, he notes, but hardly a surprise.

At the helm of the jury will be Marin Alsop, who also conducted the 2022 and 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competitions. An artistic advisory committee stacked with conducting prowess will help shape the competition’s structure and repertoire, including former Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra music director Miguel Harth-Bedoya (Shepherd’s resident director of orchestras), current Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra music director Robert Spano, Kent Nagano, Juraj Valčuha (Houston Symphony music director), and Xian Zhang.

Applications will open in October 2026, with submissions due in November 2027. A screening jury will narrow the pool to as many as 25 applicants for live auditions in early 2028, ultimately selecting 12 competitors. All rounds will be open to the public, with tickets going on sale in early 2028, and performances livestreamed to a global audience.

One grand prize winner will receive $50,000, concert engagements, and enhanced career support, while finalists will each earn $20,000.

Building on the Cliburn’s digital reach, more than 100 million video views across 180 countries in recent years, the new competition aims to be a launchpad for the next generation of maestros, with Houston as the overture.

performing-arts houston symphony rice university