Leo Lehtinen (Composition department) won the TROMP composition competition. TROMP is an international percussion competition and festival in Eindhoven. In addition to this competition and festival, TROMP organizes a composition competition for young composers who study at Dutch conservatories. The compositions were performed by fellow students for an online audience and a jury.

Leo Lehtinen was chosen as the winner of the prize for his composition How Sauce Sounds. His composition was performed by Christian Smith, who also is responsible for the sound selection and video production. ‘Organic flow. Great visuals. Modern technique. One whole production,’ according to the jury that consisted of Marijn ten Harmsen van der Beek (chairman), Bert Palinckx (director November Music), Davo van Peursen (director Donemus Publishing) and Janco Verduin (composer).

Leo tells about his experience:
‘I'm a composer and a pianist on my final year of studies at the Royal Conservatoire. I do my best work collaborating with instrumentalists and creative musicians and I'm exploring this subject also in my research. The piece for TROMP competition started as a school project with Christian Smith from the Oerknal Ensemble, and we enjoyed the project so much that we wanted to keep on developing it. The second version of the piece was performed at DAM festival in Kosovo, and for the TROMP competition I wrote a more virtuosic solo part to go with the video. Christian did the video production and was creatively involved also in the sound selection and performance, so we decided to split the € 1500 prize between us. Let's see what we come up with next - maybe there's another household percussion wonderland waiting to be realised.’