The Sun Aria singing contest began in 1924 as a new segment of the annual contests conducted since 1891 by the South Street Society of Ballarat, Victoria.
The prize, initially of 23 guineas, was for "an aria from Grand Opera, to be sung in English"[1] presented by The Sun News-Pictorial, a Melbourne newspaper.
perhaps to differentiate it from the Geelong, Bendigo, and Sydney Sun Arias, listed below.
'Comunn-na-Feinne is a Scots Gaelic association, founded in Geelong in 1856[3] The Sun-Pictorial sponsored an Aria Prize in conjunction with Geelong's festival in 1925[4] and subsequently.
The newspaper offered similar prizes for the Bendigo musical, literary, and elocutionary competitions held in May 1925 and every year thereafter to 1936.