Kris Olsen, a UK-based Norwegian who graduates this year from the Guildford School of Acting, on Sunday won the Stephen Sondheim Society's performer of the year competition 2012, which carries with it a prize of £1,000. Emma Salvo, a musical theatre student at the Royal Academy of Music, came second and gets £500.

Olsen and Salvo (the latter pictured right mid-performance: photo courtesy David Ovenden) were among a group of 12 students from various drama academies across the country who came together Sunday afternoon at the Queen's Theatre in the West End in a competition that required the entrants first to sing a Sondheim song of their choice and then to sing a new song from a musical or project as-yet-unperformed.  

Olsen's Sondheim selection was "Buddy's Blues" from Follies, a number that one of the judges, Julia McKenzie, will know especially well since she starred in the 1987 West End premiere of that show. Salvo plumped for the title song from Sunday in the Park with George, which she delivered with precision, wit, and an impish appeal. 

The new material, in turn, was judged separately in the category of Best New Song and came with its own £1,000 prize. The Betty Blue Eyes team of George Stiles (music) and Anthony Drewe (lyrics), underwriters of the prize (alongside britishtheatre.com) as well as its judges, split the award between two people: the actor/director Douglas Hodge for "Powercut" from the new musical he has been workshopping called Meantime, and Dougal Irvine for "Do You Want a Baby, Baby?" from a show called The Busker's Opera.