PROGRAM

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937): Pavane pour une infante défunte

Nicolai Medtner (1880-1951): 6 Skazki, Op. 51

Intermission

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1878-1943): Variations on a Theme of Corelli, Op. 42

George Gershwin (1898-1937)/Earl Wild (1915-2010): “Somebody Loves Me”, “The Man I Love”, “Embraceable You”, “I Got Rhythm”  

Nicolai Medtner was a younger contemporary of Rachmaninoff and Scriabin, and it is only in the last several decades that his music has emerged from their shadow. His compositions include 14 piano sonatas, 3 piano concertos, 3 violin-piano sonatas, a piano quintet, and more than 100 songs. Some of his most appealing compositions are the dozens of piano pieces called Forgotten Melodies (1919-22) and Skazki (literally tales or legends, but usually called Fairy Tales in English, apparently at the suggestion of Medtner's wife, Anna.) The Six Skazki on this program are representative.

A charming biography of Nikolai Medtner appears in a website with the irresistible name  Dr. Estrella’s Incredibly Abridged Dictionary of Composers 

https://stevenestrella.com/composers/composerfiles/medtner1951.html

Rachmaninoff: the theme is La Folia, not by Corelli although he is one of the more than 150 composers who have made use of it over the years. The first publication of La Folia dates from the mid-1500s, but it is likely much older. Rachmaninoff dashed off these variations at his holiday home in Switzerland in 1931. He tells a hilarious story about his own performances of the work in the Wikipedia article Rachmaninoff.

In 1931 President Herbert Hoover invited the 16-year-old pianist Earl Wild to play at the White House, and the next five presidents (FDR, HST, DDE, JFK, and LBJ) all renewed the invitation. He created numerous virtuoso piano transcriptions, including 14 songs by Rachmaninoff (1981). His best-known works are the Gershwin transcriptions, culminating in two sets of Virtuoso Etudes after Gershwin (1954, 1973) and a set of variations on Someone to Watch Over Me (1989). YouTube has some videos with Earl Wild playing Gershwin/Wild.

ARTIST

Jui-Sheng has completed his Doctorate at McGill (but his home country is Taiwan) and his career has already begun. 

“The young pianist Jui-Sheng Li is a mature, thoughtful,and intelligent musician, with a powerful technique, and amazing skill at learning scores very quickly! He is more than ready to perform solo or chamber repertoire on any professional concert series.” Jane Coop, C.M., O.B.C.

“Jui-Sheng plays with a sincerity and thoughtfulness that leads to an uncomplicated but passionate performance.”Burt Wathen, Artistic Director of the Lunenburg Academy of Music Performance

“[A] musician of integrity and depth...One looks forward to hearing more from this young artist.” Rorianne Schrade, The New York Concert Review

PROGRAM

A Mystical Evening: Music for violin and harp

Saint Saens' Fantaisie for violin and harp

Canadian composer Caroline Lizotte: New Piece: Partita, Opus 52

Arvo Pärt -Spiegel im Spiegel

Astor Piazzola:  Café 1930 

R. Murray Schafer: Wild Bird

ARTISTS

Lori Gemmell, Harp

Lori Gemmell was the principalharpist with the former Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony from 1999-2020.Before joining the KWS she played with Orchestra London and with the Calgary Phillharmonic Orchestra. She received her Masters degree from the University of Toronto where she studied with eminent harpist, Judy Loman. Lori also studied with Catherine Michel in Paris, France and Alice Chalifoux in Camden, Maine.Lori has been a regular at the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival. She has also been featured at Les Concerts aux Iles du Bic near Rimouski, The Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival in Detroit, The Festival of the Sound in Parry Sound, Ontario, The Indian River Festival in P.E.I and the Festival International du Domaine Forget. Lori performed with LeNEM, a contemporary chamber group in Montreal with whom she toured through Europe and Japan. She has given solo concerto performances with the National Arts Centre Orchestra, the Edmonton Symphony, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony and Orchestra London, among others.Canadian Composers have long valued her passion and dedication to their music. Over the years she has worked closely with Srul Irving Glick, John Weinzweig, Alexina Louie, Glenn Buhr, Marjan Mozetich, Jeff Ryan, Andy Creeggan,Kevin Foxand now Caroline Lizotte. Her long association with R. Murray Schafer resulted in her recording of The Crown of Ariadnein 2010, after which Schafer wrote Four Songs for Harp and Mezzo-Sopranofor Lori and his wife, Eleanor James. In April2023, Lori premiereda new work by RihoMaimets, Ecdysis, for harp, piccolo and orchestra with Kaili Maimets and the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony.With her husband, Tom Allen, Lori enjoys creating musicand storytelling shows. They have co-produced programs based on music by R. Murray Schafer, Marjan Mozetich, Alexina Louie, as well asBohemians in Brooklyn, The Judgment of Paris, andFrom Weimar to Vaudevilleall surprise hits at the Global Cabaret Festival at the Young Centre in Toronto. Their have toured all over Canada with theirshowcalled The Missing Pages-The Canadian Who Met Beethoven.Their latest show, J.S. Bach’sLong Walk in the Snow, is touring through Canada this year.Their Covid project was a feature film called The Last Curlew, which is showing in theatres in Ontario and Quebec as well as online on Vimeo.Lori teaches harp and chamber music at Wilfred Laurier University,where she enjoysexploring improvisationwith her harp class, and in the summers at the National Youth Orchestra of Canada.In 2002, Lori released her first solo recording, Prelude,in 2009, a harp duo recording with Jennifer Swartz, The Garden of Peacocks,on the Atma label, in 2010, Divertissement, with trumpeter Larry Larson, and in 2011 a solo recording, Canadian Music for Harp. Shealso played on the Grammy-nominated recording The Reminderby Feist and in 2013 on Bohemiansin Brooklynwith Patricia O'Callaghan and Bryce Kulak.

Sheila Jaffé was born into a family of musicians and was fascinated by classical music from a young age. Born in Montreal and raised in South Florida, she returned to her native Quebec at the age of thirteen to live and study with her second cousin Catherine Dallaire, concertmaster of the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec and professor of violin at the Conservatoire de Musique de Québec. After completing high school as part of the arts intensive program at l'École Secondaire Pierre-Laporte in Montreal, Sheila completed her Bachelor's degree in violin performance at the Université de Montréal. Over the course of her years in Montreal, it became clear that chamber music and orchestral playing were at the core of her musical passions. She co-founded the Alaya String Quartet, performed in numerous chamber music concerts in the city, and kept herself impossibly busy with every kind of ensemble she could put together. In the summers, she participated in orchestral, chamber music and masterclass festivals such as Schleswig-Holstein Orchester, Domaine Forget, International Musicians Seminar and Open Chamber Music at Prussia Cove, Orford Arts Centre, Aurora Music in Sweden, and several others. Sheila continued her studies in Berlin, Germany with a Master's program at the Hanns Eisler Hochschüle für Musik, during which she also was accepted into the Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester Akademie for a one-year position. During this time she also co-founded the Alondra String Quartet, who were invited to the International Musicians Seminar Prussia Cove as well as the Toronto Summer Music festival. The members of this quartet are now in leading orchestras around the world. In 2013, at the Rosebud Chamber Music Festival in Alberta, Canada, she co-founded the Rosebud String Quartet (RSQ), with whom she currently performs regularly. In 2015, Sheila joined the Canadian Opera Company as a violist while continuing to nurture her love of chamber music on the violin by performing with various ensembles in Toronto, as well as her quartet and the occasional recital with her husband, pianist Peter Longworth. She has also recently been appointed as principal viola of the National Ballet of Canada Orchestra. Sheila Jaffé plays on a Francesco Gobetti (1710-15) violin and Raymond Schryer (2001) viola on generous loan from Canimex.

PROGRAM

Brahms: Symphony No. 3 

(Four-hands version. All of Brahms’ symphonies were composed originally for four-hands piano, then orchestrated. They make a fascinating comparison!)

Note: The duo presents the final symphony, Symphony No. 4, on May 15

ARTISTS

KWCMS regulars know ( and love!) pianist Angela Park, who is our “workhorse”, playing usually several times a year in various of our concerts. But you may not know her partner Stephane Sylvestre, who is “One of Canada's most praised and sought-after chamber musician, Mr. Sylvestre has collaborated with world renowned musicians and ensembles such as James Campbell, James Sommerville, Ransom Wilson, Martin Beaver, Rivka Golani, Alain Trudel, Andrew Dawes, Corey Cerovsek, Susan Hoeppner, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the Penderecki String Quartet, the New Zealand Quartet, the Alcan Quartet, Quatuor Arthur-Leblanc, the New Orford String Quartet and first chairs of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra and Montreal Symphony Orchestra....” You get the idea! He has been Associate Professor of Music at Western University since 2005.

More about Brahms' Symphony No. 3 As befits a composer of Brahms’ stature, he wrote just one in each of four distinct styles and subject matters. We might loosely identify each with a season: No. 1 for perhaps winter; no. 2 with spring; no. 3 with (late) summer or early autumn; and no. 4 with late autumn, which in this part of Canada means drear and cold with perhaps a bit of snow. But no. 3? Ah, surely those late-summer days with a suggestion of autumn, or early autumn days with their strong tincture of a disappearing summer!

No. 3’s famous opening movement is introduced with a powerful theme, suggestive of a strong autumn wind. The development and commentary on this theme makes for wonderful music! “In addition to the passionate turbulence so common in Brahms’ works, there is a gentle intimacy to this symphony, whose four movements all end softly. The most striking unifying aspect is the three note “motto” F, A-flat, F, which opens the work and reappears throughout. This motive was something of an inside joke for Brahms, a response to his friend violinist Joseph Joachim’s musical motto FAE standing for “Frei aber einsam.”

The tension between the major and minor modes is one of the primary drivers of the symphony, with A natural and A-flat juxtaposed constantly, as they are in the first three chords.

The second movement has the character of a wind serenade with an austere second theme that returns again in the last movement. Clara Schumann described the delicately melancholy third movement as “a pearl, but it is a grey one dipped in a tear of woe.”

The unsettled turbulence of the last movement is resolved in the coda, with the return to F major and the gentle echo of the end of the first movement.(free but lonely)” [from a Princeton Symphony note, author Nell Flanders, assistant conductor.]

PROGRAM

Loeffler’s Two Rhapsodies, and Klughardt’s Schifflieder. There is also an arrangement of Beethoven op.11 for English horn, viola and piano.

These works are pretty much the entirety of literature for this group!

ARTISTS

David Vanbiesbrouck  David is a Graduate of Laurier where he studied with Dick Dorsey and Graham MacKenzie. Subbed frequently in KWS, is principal oboe in Guelph SO, and has a thriving reed business. 

Beth Ann de Sousa  Academically, I hold an AMus from Western Ontario Conservatory, BMus from Wilfrid Laurier University and a MMUS from Western University with all degrees in Piano Performance.

I am a founding member of the New Art Quartet and have performed frequently with the K-W Symphony Orchestra and the Canadian Chamber Ensemble. An experienced choral accompanist, I have worked with numerous conductors including Mario Bernardi, Bernard Labadie, Robert Shaw and Noel Edison.

As accompanist in residence at Laurier, I teach collaborative piano courses as well as co-ordinate the chamber music program. I maintain a busy performance schedule as an accompanist and chamber musician.

Judith Souman is a violist currently based in Waterloo, Ontario. She began violin lessons at the age of twelve, learning with the Suzuki method first with Terence McClean, and later under the tutelage of Lucia Schipperus and mentorship of Ian Hampton and Joel Stobbe at the Langley Community Music School. There she also began to explore her love of chamber music, improvisation, and music history. She holds a bachelor’s degree with a double major in viola performance and music history from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, where she studied with Christine Vlajk and the Penderecki String Quartet, and a master’s degree in classical viola from Codarts University of the Arts in Rotterdam, where she studied with Karin Dolman.

Judith has also taken lessons and played in masterclasses with people such as Nobuko Imai, Garth Knox, Asdis Valdimarsdottir, Gerald Stanick, Marc Sabbah, Brenda Brenner, Nikita Pogrebnoy, and the St. Lawrence, Lafayette, and Dali String Quartets. She has a keen interest in early music and historical performance practice and participated in a mentorship program with the Nota Bene ensemble, as well as learning from Jean Lamon and Patrick Jordan at the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute. She frequently performs contemporary music and has worked with established and emerging composers to perform their works in concert. Additionally, she has explored non-classical traditions through fiddling lessons with Shane Guse, and Hindustani music lessons with Lenneke van Staalen.

Judith has performed in concerts across Canada and the Netherlands, regularly playing solo and chamber music in the Spirit of the North Classical Music Festival in Smithers, and in the Zomerconcerten Dordrecht concert series, among others. She has performed as principal violist with the Prince George Symphony Orchestra, the Wilfrid Laurier University Orchestra, and the Codarts Student Orchestra.

In addition to her career as a performer, Judith is passionate about teaching, having taught private violin and viola lessons for over ten years, in addition to conducting orchestras, leading sectionals, and coaching chamber groups at various summer camps and youth orchestra programs in Canada and the Netherlands. She has followed string pedagogy courses and continues to seek out ways to improve her teaching and continue to learn.

PROGRAM

Brahms: Symphony No. 4 

(Four-hands version. All of Brahms’ symphonies were composed originally for four-hands piano, then orchestrated. They make a fascinating comparison!)

ARTISTS

KWCMS regulars know ( and love!) pianist Angela Park, who is our “workhorse”, playing usually several times a year in various of our concerts. But you may not know her partner Stephane Sylvestre, who is “One of Canada's most praised and sought-after chamber musician, Mr. Sylvestre has collaborated with world renowned musicians and ensembles such as James Campbell, James Sommerville, Ransom Wilson, Martin Beaver, Rivka Golani, Alain Trudel, Andrew Dawes, Corey Cerovsek, Susan Hoeppner, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the Penderecki String Quartet, the New Zealand Quartet, the Alcan Quartet, Quatuor Arthur-Leblanc, the New Orford String Quartet and first chairs of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra and Montreal Symphony Orchestra....” You get the idea! He has been Associate Professor of Music at Western University since 2005.

Notes: Eduard Hanslick, acting as one of the page-turners, exclaimed on hearing the first movement at this performance: "For this whole movement I had the feeling that I was being given a beating by two incredibly intelligent people.” I’m sure that many in this audience will sympathize with Hanslick’s reaction! It’s a powerhouse structure, requiring (and rewarding) the most careful listening. Its first movement is famous for its structure of falling thirds and ascending fourths - and then vice versa! You will surely be as fascinated by this structure was was the first audience.

Next comes its not-very-slow slow movement. Its slow movement, Andante Moderato - which I can’t help comparing to the slow movement of Beethoven’s Seventh - is written in the Phrygian mode in E Major [think E-F-G-A-B-C-D] - all that counts here for those who don’t know is that this is the darkest of the seven “modes” - like the whole of this very dark symphony.

We then have the only true scherzo in all of Brahms’ symphonies. It is a positively riveting movement. The movement is in 2/4 instead of 3/4 and has no Trio section in the middle, and yet it is for sure a Scherzo! The orchestral version, of coourse, has the advantage of contrasting instrumental forces, and it will be interesting to see whether the piano version predicts those....!

Finally the colossal finale of this amazing work, a  passacaglia. based on a theme of Bach (from the closing movement of Cantata no. 150) - thirty variations (like the Goldberg Variations or the Chaconne of Bach) but followed by a huge coda,  in which we have “material from the variations with intermittent quasi-variations.” This rather trechnical description gives little idea of the power of this movement.

Interestingly, some authorities [sorry, I forget just who] have suggested that Brahms’ Fourth was written as a sort of epitaph to The Symphony, which he thought a doomed species. In that, fortunately, he was wrong as the form has continued to flourish. But - what a statement if that was the idea!

PROGRAM

Beethoven, Piano Trio No. 1 in E-Flat major, Op. 1 No. 1

Charlotte Bray, That Crazed Smile (for piano trio, 2014)

Schubert, Trio no. 1 in B flat major, op. 99

ARTISTS

Ken Gee is a Classical pianist born in Hamilton but now a longtime resident of Guelph. He studied music at McMaster University, where he was awarded the McMaster Medal for the Creative and Performing Arts, and piano in Toronto with Boris Berlin. Ken was a music critic for the Hamilton Spectator, manager for chamber music series and Ensemble Sir Ernest MacMillan, co-director of the Hamilton Kiwanis Music Festival, and a teacher at McMaster University, Sheridan College and Mohawk College. He developed classical piano music software for PG Music Inc., Victoria, and engraves music for the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto.

Ken has performed an impressive amount of string and piano chamber music, especially repertoire for violin & piano, cello & piano, and piano trio, quartet and quintet. He has also given many concerto performances with various orchestras (including Bach, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Bloch, and the Canadian premiere of the Yellow River Concerto), as well as solo piano recitals.

He is the pianist for Suzuki String School of Guelph, and Suzuki summer Institutes in Waterloo and Montreal. Ken has also been a piano adjudicator, private teacher and chamber music coach. He is on the board of the Guelph Youth Music Centre (former chair) and the Kiwanis Music Festival of Guelph. In 2008, he was the recipient of a City of Guelph Mayor’s Award. Ken is married to violinist wife, Paule Barsalou (teacher and teacher trainer at the Suzuki String School of Guelph and Laurier).

Ken created and continues to be the sole organizer of Guelph Musicfest, a chamber music festival at the GYMC, celebrating its 18th season in 2024. Select Guelph Musicfest concerts are now repeated in Waterloo, Hamilton, Owen Sound and Blue Mountain. 

Sadie Fields This Canadian/British (and Brussels-based) violinist enjoys a diverse career as soloist, chamber musician, collaborator, and researcher. Sadie discovered the violin at the age of seven when her primary school went to see the famous Axelrod collection of Stradivarius violins. After she heard these Strads being played, she was hooked, and persuaded her mother to let her start lessons. She started performing at a young age. Sadie performs regularly throughout Europe and North America, and her concerts also bring her further afield, including to the Middle East, Asia, and New Zealand. Sadie has long been passionate about chamber music, and was the founding leader of the Castalian Quartet and violinist of Trio Khnopff. She is also the founding violinist of the Festival Trio (Canada) and the Belgium-based Flash Ensemble, a flexible chamber ensemble with a string trio as its core. Sadie plays in recital with a number of fine pianists, and has recently formed a duo with Italian accordionist Luca Piovesan. Sadie was a member of the Swedish ensemble Camerata Nordica for ten years, and she currently performs regularly with the New European Ensemble (Netherlands) and many other ensembles in Europe.

As a recording artist, Sadie’s most recent disc was released in June 2023—Flash Ensemble’s pioneering recording of the complete string trios by Hungarian composer Laszlo Lajtha (Pavane Records). Her recording, Weinberg – 1945, by Trio Khnopff (Pavane Records), has met with great critical acclaim in Europe and North America, and was chosen as BBC Music Magazine’s ‘Chamber Disc of the Month’ for January 2020. Sadie has recorded extensively for BIS Records with Camerata Nordica, and has released two discs with Champs Hill Records. The first, a disc of Mendelssohn chamber music, was chosen as BBC Music Magazine’s Editor’s Choice and Chamber Disc of the Month, and was also Chamber Music Disc of the Quarter by the German Record Critics’ Award Association. Sadie’s second disc for Champs Hill is the complete Brahms Sonatas with pianist Jeremy Young, released to widespread critical acclaim. Sadie also broadcasts regularly on BBC Radio 3, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Radio New Zealand, NDR (Germany), Swedish radio, Klara (Belgium), Musiq’3 (Belgium), and NPO Radio 4 (Netherlands), and many others.

Sadie holds a PhD from the Royal Academy of Music, London. Her practice-led doctoral research addresses practical and philosophical ideas associated with the concepts of learning and ‘tradition’, focusing on her own engagement with Bartók’s violin works. Sadie has won awards from over twenty UK and international associations and competitions, and was a Leverhulme Fellow at the Royal Academy of Music and the Edison Visiting Fellow at the British Library.

Principal teachers include György Pauk, Yair Kless, and Atis Bankas, and Sadie has also been guided and mentored by Ivry Gitlis, Ida Haendel, and Ferenc Rados. As a teacher herself, Sadie teaches violin and chamber music, she taught at King's College London, and she gives masterclasses at conservatoires and universities in China, Canada, and the UK.  Sadie plays on a very fine violin by Gioffredo Cappa, made in Italy in 1687.

Paul Pulford studied with American cellist George Neikrug and with Scottish cellists Peggie Sampson and Joan Dickson. He has played in the BBC Scottish Symphony, Toronto Symphony, Austin (Texas) Symphony, and was principal cellist of the Toronto Chamber Players and Irish Pro Musica Ensemble. As a soloist he has performed with the National Arts Centre Orchestra, the Banff Festival Orchestra, Symphony Nova Scotia, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, RTE (Ireland) Symphony, and the Irish Pro Musica Ensemble. He has performed extensively as a recitalist and has recorded the complete Beethoven and Brahms sonatas with fortepianist Boyd McDonald.

Paul Pulford has spent the majority of his years as a cellist in chamber ensembles that include: Penderecki, Orford, Brunswick and University of Alberta String Quartets; the Galliard Ensemble; new music groups Blue Rider Ensemble, ARRAY New Music and NUMUS Ensemble.

As a conductor Paul Pulford co-ordinates the orchestral program at Wilfrid Laurier and has appeared as a guest conductor with Symphony New Brunswick, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, Mississauga and Georgian Symphonies and is Resident Conductor of the NUMUS Ensemble. He has also been conductor of the New Brunswick and KW Symphony Youth Orchestras and conducted the premiere of Tim Brady's opera, The Salome Dancer.

Paul retired from the music faculty of Wilfrid Laurier University, moving from Waterloo to his former "summer home" in Long Reach, NB. Sadie & Ken are thrilled that he is able to return for our Festival Trio.

NOTES

The program pairs two of the greatest trios every written—the invigorating Beethoven Trio no. 1 in E-flat and the sublime Schubert Trio no. 1 in B flat, paired with mesmerizing and magical trios by British composer Charlotte Bray.

Charlotte Bray is one of the most esteemed and in-demand composers of her generation. Exhibiting uninhibited ambition and desire to communicate, her music is exhilarating, inherently vivid, and richly expressive with lyrical intensity. Championed by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Aurora Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, and Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, her music has been performed at festivals in Aldeburgh, Cheltenham, Tanglewood, Aix-en-Provence and Verbier and with renowned conductors including Marin Alsop, Sir Mark Elder, Sakari Oramo, Oliver Knussen, Jessica Cottis, Daniel Harding, Duncan Ward, and Karina Canellakis.

PROGRAM

Franz Schubert: Sonata in A Major, op. 120  (1825)                 

I.  Allegro Moderato          

        II.  Andante

        III.  Allegro

Bela Bartok: Out of Doors  (1926)                     

With Drums and Pipes. Pesante 

        Barcarolla. Andante

Musettes. Moderato

The night's music. Lento

The chase. Presto

intermission

 Sergei Rachmaninoff: Four Preludes  (1903-10)               

Andante, op. 23 #6 in E flat major

Allegretto, op. 32 #2 in B flat minor 

Allegro Vivace, op. 23 #8 in A flat major     

Allegro Vivace, op. 23 #7 in C minor

Claude Debussy: Images, Book II  (1907)              

        Cloches à travers les feuilles (Bells heard through the leaves)

Et la lune descend sur le temple qui fut (And the moon descends on the temple that once was)

Poissons d'or (Goldfish)

ARTIST

Pianist Mark Valenti received his Master of Music from Northwestern University and a Bachelor of Music from the Philadelphia Musical Academy. He has studied with such notable teachers as Benjamin Whitten, Zoltan Kocsis, and Mary Sauer. In addition to giving solo recitals in cities throughout the U.S., Mr. Valenti has performed in France, Belgium, Hungary, and Luxembourg as well as for former First Lady Barbara Bush in Washington, D.C.

Mark Valenti has performed in recital live on WFMT classical radio. He has also done extensive work in the Jazz field including performances with Gregory Hines, Frank Foster, and Al Grey and has appeared on television with Joe Sudler’s Swing Machine and singer/actor Christopher Durham.

Formerly a Professor of Music at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Xavier University in Chicago, and the Loire Valley Music Institute in France, Mr. Valenti currently teaches at his studio in the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago and is available for lessons for all levels and all styles.

Here are two appreciations of Mark’s playing:

Shabnam Azimi
“The first thing I realized about Mark is his true passion for piano. He is a kind of artist who lives piano and exposes his students to the dynamics of his colorful world. This is a rare quality! Mark uses music theory and philosophy in his teaching which takes the learning experience to a totally different level. He is flexible and customizes his teaching style based on different types of students - from slow learner to fast learner, busy professional to the one with more relaxed schedule, math-lover to math-hater, etc. I found Mark a great teacher and recommend him to anyone who likes to enjoy playing piano!”

David Sayen
“Mark is probably the most dedicated artist I know. We have worked together since 1982 when he was in Philadelphia. In the recital or performance setting he curates his chosen pieces so exquisitely that the program is more of an experience than just a concert. As an educator he makes a deep connection with his students and invests his personal time to create a learning and supportive community among his students. As an instrumentalist, he can play any style and really bring forth the meaning in the music whether it is a jazz piece, a romantic piece or whatever."

PROGRAM

Bach: Goldberg Variations

intermission

Michael Matthews: Image Fragments (2024)

Brahms:  Piano Sonata #2

ARTIST An outstanding interpreter of J.S. Bach and contemporary composers, pianist Peter Vinograde regularly tours the U.S., Canada, and Asia. Recent seasons featured performances in Nanjing, Rome, Santa Fe, San Francisco, Singapore, Taipei, and Xiamen. More recently, he recorded Arnold Rosner’s Piano Concerto #2 with the London Philharmonic, and gave two recitals at the new Usina Art Center in Buenos Aires. A recent National Gallery recital featured all seven Bach Toccatas.

 As a chamber musician, Peter Vinograde has appeared at the Bard, Bargemusic, Caramoor, and Wolftrap Festivals.  As a collaborative artist, he toured throughout Asia with violinist Midori, including her Singapore debut, also performing with her at the Cape Cod and Mostly Mozart Festivals. 

His numerous distinctions began with first prize in the 1971 J.S. Bach International Competition, followed by a New York debut at Carnegie Recital Hall and an N.E.A.-sponsored Lincoln Center recital at Alice Tully Hall. He has been featured on NPR's Performance Today and CBC-TV's the Journal. CDs include releases on the Albany, CBC, Decca and Phoenix labels. His primary teacher was Zenon Fishbein.

 In conjunction with his Bach for Pianists class at the Manhattan School of Music, Dr. Vinograde annually presents Bach recital/lectures at conservatories and universities, most recently at C.S.U. Northridge, Juilliard, Oberlin, and Northwestern. 

Peter has been a member of the Manhattan School of Music Precollege faculty since 1982.

"Instantly impressed as a pianist with a big technique, a lively mind, and a passionate commitment to the music." The New York Times (N.Y. Debut) peter vinograde from www.msmnyc.edu

PROGRAM

Mendelssohn: Octet

Schoenberg: Transfigured Night Sextet

Debussy:  Danses Sacrée et Profane 

Mendelssohn's String Octet in E-flat major, Op. 20, MWV R 20, was written by the 16-year-old Felix Mendelssohn during the fall of 1825 and completed on October 15. Written for four violins, two violas, and two cellos, this work created a new chamber music genre. Conrad Wilson summarizes much of its reception ever since: "Its youthful verve, brilliance and perfection make it one of the miracles of nineteenth-century music." This was one of the first works of Mendelssohn to be very well received.

Verklärte Nacht (Transfigured Night), Op. 4, is a string sextet in one movement composed by Arnold Schoenberg in 1899. Composed in just three weeks, it is considered his earliest important work. It was inspired by Richard Dehmel's poem of the same name, combined with the influence of Schoenberg's strong feelings upon meeting the sister of his teacher, Alexander von Zemlinsky (1877–1942), whom he married in 1901.

Danses Sacrée et Profane, for harp and strings The first dance of this lovely work, which Debussy composed in 1904, “sacred,” begins in a slow and stately mood set by unison strings, joined by the harp in an uplifting reverie, with numerous ascending and descending chromatic passages. The “secular” dance, which follows without a break, is in the form of a lilting waltz, with various statements of the main theme traded back and forth between the harp and strings. Towards the end of the piece, a short introspective reverie makes its appearance. The waltz then resumes at a joyous pace, followed by a majestic and sonorous ending.  

Source: https://www.broadwaybach.org/musical_work/danses-sacree-et-profane/

ARTISTS

Rebecca Diderrich, viola Born in London ON, Rebecca holds a Bachelor of Music Performance degree from the University of Toronto where she studied with Lorand Fenyves, and a Professional Performance Certificate from Lynn University in Boca Raton Florida where she studied with Ralph Fielding. While living in Florida, Rebecca was the principal violist of the Southwest Florida Symphony Orchestra where she also appeared as a soloist. She was a violist with both the Palm Beach Opera and Florida Grand Opera orchestras for many years, and played frequently with the Naples Philharmonic and the Palm Beach Chamber Music Festival. Rebecca also worked as a studio musician in Miami, recording on albums produced for many artists including Gloria Estefan, Christian Castro and Natalie Cole. After returning to Canada to raise her children closer to home, Rebecca became a member of the (now former) Kitchener Waterloo Symphony. John Helmers, cello A graduate of Queens University and Indiana University, where he studied with Janos Starker. John has served as principal cellist of the Calgary Philharmonic, the National Ballet of Canada and, since 1986, the Kitchener Waterloo Symphony where he appeared often as soloist. During the Summer months he was a regular guest artist and mentor for the National Academy Orchestra in Hamilton. 

Vicky Dvorak, violin Vicky Dvorak is a violinist in the Kitchener Waterloo Symphony, and has been teaching and playing chamber music in this community since 1992. 

Lori Gemmell, harp Lori Gemmell was the Principal Harpist with the former Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony since 2000. She teaches at Wilfrid Laurier University and for the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. Lori enjoys being involved in many solo and chamber music projects: with the Four Seasons Harp Quartet, with trumpeter, Larry Larson, harp duo with, Jennifer Swartz, harp and storytelling with her husband Tom Allen, and playing with pop artists Kevin Fox and Feist. Lori has two solo recordings, Prelude and Canadian Music for Harp, a harp duo recording with Jennifer Swartz, The Garden of Peacocks, and Divertissement with trumpeter Larry Larson. On April 12 she premiered “Partita” for violin and harp, with violinist Sheila Jaffe. This piece was written by internationally acclaimed Canadian composer Caroline Lizotte, commissioned by the Canada Council for the Arts. 

John Helmers, cello John Helmers holds a MMus degree in Performance from Indiana University where he studied with Janos Starker. Since 1986, John has been the principal cellist of the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestra and a member of the Canadian Chamber Ensemble. He has previously served as the principal cellist of both the National Ballet of Canada (1982-86) and the Calgary Philharmonic.

Mr. Helmers has appeared as soloist with the Calgary, Hamilton and Kitchener Symphonies and has toured internationally as cellist of the CCE. John is currently a member of the teaching staff at Conrad Grebel College, University of Waterloo. 

Bénédicte Lauzière, violin Described as “beautiful to watch and breathtaking to hear” by the Guelph Mercury, violinist Bénédicte Lauzière enjoys a prolific career on the Canadian stage. She was concertmaster of the former Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, with which she was featured as a soloist. She is an avid chamber musician, her recent collaborations including Emanuel Ax and members of the Penderecki String Quartet. As a recitalist, she enjoys her partnership with pianist Angela Park. She won numerous prizes and awards including the Prix d’Europe 2014, the Michael-Measures Award 2011, the Peter Mendell Prize 2010 as well as a grant for professional musicians from the Canada Council for the Arts. Ms Lauzière was a laureate of the Stulberg International String Competition in 2010 and won numerous first prizes at the Canadian Music Competition. As a soloist, her recent performances include Chausson’s Poème op. 25 (2023), Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto op. 35 in d major (2023), Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending (2021), Barber’s Violin Concerto op.14 (2018), Beethoven’s Triple Concerto (2018) with pianist Stewart Goodyear and cellist John Helmers, Korngold’s Concerto op.35 in d major (2016) and Ravel’s Tzigane (2016). She has been featured as guest soloist with the Kingston Symphony Orchestra, the Elora Festival, the National Academy Orchestra of Canada and the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec. Bénédicte obtained her Master of Music degree from the Juilliard School in New York City in May 2014, where she studied with Masao Kawasaki with the support of the Karl H. Kraeuter, H. & E. Kivekas and Starr scholarships. She has performed both at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. She holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the Schulich School of Music at McGill University, studying with Jonathan Crow as recipient of the Lloyd Carr-Harris scholarship. In her younger formative years, she studied at Conservatoire de Musique de Montréal with Helmut Lipsky. 

Natasha Sharko, viola Natasha hails from Sudbury Ontario, where she happily spent her childhood developing preliminary violin skills; private instruction with the pre-eminent Kozak family, leadership in the Sudbury Youth Orchestra, and Symphony responsibilities formed the backbone of her love for performance. She also played Lead Alto Saxaphone in her high school Jazz and Concert Bands, broadening her range, and amplifying the rhythmic and perpetual inevitability of being onstage. University brought her into big city life— Montreal and Toronto, where she completed both Bachelors and Masters Degrees, and added Viola to her studies. Natasha thereafter freelanced for many years in Toronto, honing her craft, until the opportunity to lead the Viola Section in the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony arose. She humble served in that orchestra for 12 years, developing an unparalleled fellowship of Violists, and her heart grew three sizes that decade. Currently Natasha embraces a vibrant freelance lifestyle, renewing long-lost collegial partnerships and searching for a new Orchestral home. 

Miriam Stewart-Kroeker, cello Miriam Stewart-Kroeker was a tenured member of the (now former) Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony and is a founding member of the Andromeda Piano Trio. She studied with Paul Pulford and the Penderecki String Quartet at Wilfrid Laurier University, where she received an Honours Bachelor of Music in Cello Performance as well as a Diploma in Chamber Music Performance. She went on to complete a Master’s degree in Cello Performance at McGill University under the direction of Matt Haimovitz. On top of performing with various orchestras throughout Ontario, Miriam is an active chamber musician and soloist. The Andromeda Trio recently received two grants from Canada Council for the Arts and the Region of Waterloo Arts Fund to commission and record a piece by local composer, Karen Sunabacka, which explores Métis-Mennonite relations in Canada, inspired by Karen and Miriam’s ancestries on Treaty 1 territory. 

Jung Tsai, violin Based in Ontario, Canada, violinist Jung Tsai has performed extensively in the region where she has served as 2nd Associate Concertmaster in Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestra and Concertmaster of Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Orchestra in Waterloo region in the past. Her other main appearances include performing as guest concertmaster and guest soloist with several local symphony orchestras in Ontario. Ms. Tsai is also a committed chamber musician in addition to her solo and orchestral performances. She has participated in the ensembles of string quartet and piano trio in the past which brought her to performances in North America. Recently she has been part of Coriolis chamber ensemble that has been annually presented in chamber series concert in Quebec and Ontario provinces. Jung received her Bachelor degree in Mannes The New School for Music (New York), Master Degree in DePaul School of Music (Chicago) and Artist Diploma in McGill School of Music (Montreal). During her stay in the United States she has won several prizes including winner of Mannes Community Concerto Competition, finalists of Plowman Chamber Music Competition, and Luminaries Fellowship winner of string category. Her past teachers include Nina Beilina, Ilya Kaler, Axel Strauss, Jonathan Crow and Denise Lupien. Based in Ontario, Canada, violinist Jung Tsai has performed extensively in the region where she has served as 2nd Associate Concertmaster in Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestra and Concertmaster of Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Orchestra in Waterloo region in the past. Her other main appearances include performing as guest concertmaster and guest soloist with several local symphony orchestras in Ontario. Ms. Tsai is also a committed chamber musician in addition to her solo and orchestral performances. She has participated in the ensembles of string quartet and piano trio in the past which brought her to performances in North America. Recently she has been part of Coriolis chamber ensemble that has been annually presented in chamber series concert in Quebec and Ontario provinces. Jung received her Bachelor degree in Mannes The New School for Music (New York), Master Degree in DePaul School of Music (Chicago) and Artist Diploma in McGill School of Music (Montreal). During her stay in United States she has won several prizes including winner of Mannes Community Concerto Competition, finalists of Plowman Chamber Music Competition, and Luminaries Fellowship winner of string category. Her past teachers include Nina Beilina, Ilya Kaler, Axel Strauss, Jonathan Crow and Denise Lupien. 

Xueao Yang, violin A native of China, Xueao began studying the violin at the age of four. At the age of twelve, she was accepted into the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing. She obtained her Bachelor of music with outstanding achievement and Master’s degree From McGill University. She also received her Performance Certificate in violin at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. She has also been the recipient of many scholarships due to her incredible musicianship, including but not limited to: the Lloyd Carr-Harris String Scholarship, the HP Robert Fung Scholarship, the Bill&Judy Watson Scholarship, and the Williamson Music Foundation Scholarship. Her teachers include Kevin Lawrence, Violaine Melançon, Denise Lupien and Felica Moye. Xueao was a member of Les Jeunes Virtuoses de Montréal at the Montréal Chamber Music Festival in 2021 and a participant of the National arts Centre Orchestra Mentorship Program in 2022. Xueao has performed in music festivals such as Madeline Island Chamber Music Festival, (USA), Zodiac Music Festival( France), Green Mountain Chamber Music Festival(USA), Pacific Music Festival (Japan) and the Brott Music Festival. She has been featured in solo masterclasses for James Ehnes, Daniel Philips and Donald Weilerstein. Xueao has frequently played with major orchestras in Canada, including Toronto Symphony, Montreal Symphony, Thunder Bay Symphony, guest principal second violin with the Regina Symphony and the National Ballet of Canada. She served as associate principal second violin of the former Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony for the 2022-2023 season. 

PROGRAM

Resphigi: Violin Sonata, b minor

+ TBA

ARTISTS

Adam Didderich, violin, is a native of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He began playing violin at age five. His advanced studies brought him to the University of Toronto and later to Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida for studies with Elmar Oliveira and Stephen Majeske. Most recently, he studied at the University of Miami with Glenn Basham and Felicia Moye. In addition to his violin studies, he had the opportunity to study jazz improvisation with Mark O'Connor, Vince Maggio and Whit Sidener . He has played with orchestras such as the New World Symphony, the Naples Philharmonic, Florida Grand Opera, Palm Beach Opera, and the Palm Beach Symphony. He also played many commercial recordings produced in Miami, including for Gloria Estefan, Natalie Cole, Christian Castro, and many others. Since moving back to Canada in 2014 he has continued to record commercially, and has been playing with Sinfonia Toronto, Toronto Concert Orchestra, London Sinfonia, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, and for Mirvish Productions.

Born in Japan and raised in Canada, pianist Dr. Lisa Tahara first came to public attention with her concerto debut aged 15. Critically acclaimed performances followed in venues across Europe, Mexico, Canada and the United States. A prizewinner at both the Canadian Music Competition and Canadian Concerto Competition in addition to numerous other awards and scholarships internationally – Lisa has given concerts extensively both as a chamber musician and soloist.

Following a successful European debut performing with the Danube Symphony Orchestra (in Budapest, Hungary) as a first-prize winner of the 2019 Piano Concerto Festival, the same orchestra called her a few months later to replace a suddenly injured colleague. This saw Lisa fly on only a few days notice to Europe and give a performance of Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto which was tremendously well received by the local press and colleagues alike.

A sought-after chamber musician and collaborative pianist, Lisa Tahara has over twenty years of experience working with instrumentalists and vocalists in addition to choral and instrumental ensembles. She is a founding member of the Integral Ensemble (formerly the Amarok Ensemble) and twice became one of only eight pianists chosen for the internationally renowned collaborative piano internship at the Banff Centre. Lisa has been invited to many chamber music festivals including the Toronto Summer Music Festival, St. Lawrence String Quartet Chamber Music Seminar, Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival and Festival Del Lago.

Her vast repertoire has seen concerto performances with orchestras across Canada including the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, Burnaby Symphony Orchestra, Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra, University of Victoria Orchestra, Sooke Philharmonic Orchestra and the Georgian Bay Symphony Orchestra.

A devoted and passionate music educator, Dr. Lisa Tahara recently joined the faculty at the University of Toronto. She also maintains an active teaching studio and her students have been awarded many top prizes in local music festivals. Dr. Tahara’s interests in music and how it affects the quality of life for older adults inspired her to conduct keyboard classes involving improvisation at the Dunfield Retirement Residency in Toronto, Ontario as part of her doctoral dissertation in 2013, and has given lectures and workshops on this subject across the country.

Lisa Tahara studied at the University of Victoria and University of Toronto, in addition to programs in Europe at the Mozarteum in Salzburg and the Wiener Musikseminar in Vienna. She has participated in masterclasses with artists such as Emanuel Ax, Menahem Pressler, and Andras Schiff.

Making her home in Toronto, Canada, she is a member of the College of Examiners for The Royal Conservatory of Music whilst additionally Lisa Tahara has adjudicated for numerous exams and festivals in Canada. She loves to travel and experience different cultures, and has a keen interest in reading and photography!

PROGRAM

Maddalena Lombardini - String Quartet No. 2

Maddalena Lombardini - String Quartet No. 5

Elfrida Andrée String - Quartet in d minor 

Imogen Holst - Phantasy Quartet 

Pēteris Vasks - Fruit of Silence 

ARTISTS

Justin Kuryes (cello),  Sarah Pizzichemi (viola),  Willie Braun (violin),  Brandon Vance (violin)

Skyros Quartet brings a bright and inventive style to the performance stage, having concertized extensively on multiple continents. Skyros Quartet takes its name from the Greek isle of Skyros, one of a quartet of islands in the Aegean Sea. The members of Skyros Quartet are Sarah Pizzichemi, Brandon Vance, Justin Kurys, and Willie Braun. Established in 2010, they have been heard at some of the most prestigious venues and music festivals including the Aspen Music Festival and School (Aspen, Colorado), Seattle Chamber Music Society (Seattle), Deer Valley Music Festival (Park City, Utah), Sunflower Music Festival (Topeka, Kansas), QuartetFest at Sir Wilfrid Laurier University and Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Music Society (Ontario, Canada), the CommonTone Arts Music Festival (Moscow, Idaho), and at the University of British Columbia concert series (Vancouver, Canada). Skyros has also performed on tour in Xi’an and Hangzhou, China. In 2019, Skyros had the honor of giving the West Coast premiere of the newly composed Piano Quintet by Philip Glass with concert pianist Paul Barnes who commissioned the piece. During the 2017 season, Skyros Quartet, along with cellist Eric Wilson (Emerson String Quartet emeritus), gave the Canadian premiere of Mikołaj Górecki Elegy for Cello and String Quartet at the University of British Columbia.

Skyros released their debut album, INTROSPECTIVE ODYSSEY, to great international acclaim in August 2015. It can be heard on the Navona label of Parma Recordings, and includes works by Sibelius, Turina and Britten. As a quartet, Skyros has collaborated with many living composers in the performance of new music. Most recently performing with acclaimed percussion group arxduo, they gave the west coast premier of works for percussion duo and string quartet by Michael Laurello and Christopher Dietz. In 2019 Skyros worked with internationally renowned Latvian composer Pet̄eris Vasks presenting many of his works for string quartet. Skyros performed in the critically-acclaimed ballet Approaching Ecstasy with contemporary dance company Whim W’him, vocal ensemble The Esoterics, and composer Eric Banks. They have commissioned and premiered string quartets by Kate Skinner (Wounded Bird, She Dances, 2021), Sabrina Clarke (On Whale Beach, 2021), Liza Sobel (Prayer, 2011), and Devin Maxwell (Bouquet Canyon, CA, 2013). They have also worked with Tonia Ko (Aspen Music Festival and School), Charlie Leftridge (in collaboration with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Chamber Singers and again with the Esoterics), and Stephanie Martin (Sound in the Land conference at the University of Waterloo). In 2014, Skyros was featured at Fast Forward Austin, a new music festival in Austin, Texas. Skyros performed string trios and quartets by the four composers of the W4 New Music Collective: Ruben Naeff, Molly Herron, Matt Frey, and Tim Hansen. Skyros made up the core string section of the UT New Music Ensemble for its 2011- 2012 season.

Skyros earned Masters in Chamber Music Performance from the University of Texas at Austin Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music, mentored by the Miró Quartet and Sandy Yamamoto. From 2012-2015, they served as the first Graduate Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Glenn Korff School of Music, where they completed Doctorates in Chamber Music Performance under the guidance of the Chiara String Quartet. Skyros was also mentored by Earl Carlyss (Juilliard Quartet), James Dunham (Cleveland Quartet), Sylvia Rosenberg, and members of the Takacs, American, Jupiter, and Pacifica String Quartets at the Aspen Music Festival and School Center for Advanced Quartet Studies. Skyros has also been coached extensively by the Muir and Penderecki String Quartets and composer Joan Tower.

Skyros is passionate about educating audiences to the wonders of the string quartet. They regularly visit schools, lead community engagement programs and interactive family concerts, enabling them to inspire audiences of all ages and musical backgrounds. In 2015, the members of Skyros developed an in-school chamber music coaching program from the educational non-profit organization Chamber Music Guild. This in-school program provides weekly coachings to young string quartets using a curriculum designed by Skyros. The members of Skyros Quartet became artistic directors of CMG in 2016. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Skyros Quartet and CMG developed a chamber music podcast to stay connected to the larger music community called The Counterpoint Club. Members of Skyros have also served as faculty at Seattle University, Edmonds Community College, Union College (Lincoln, Nebraska), and the University of Texas at Austin String Project. At UNL, they were Graduate Teaching Assistants for chamber music outreach and a teaching-artist class that works with students to develop interactive presentations for children.

In February 2020, Skyros Quartet formed Constellation Creatives, their own non-profit 501(c)3 organization. Constellation Creatives champions innovative experiences of storytelling through the lens of music with a vision to forge an interactive cultural institution embedded in the Puget Sound community.

PROGRAM

Franz Joseph Haydn, String Quartet in C Major, Op.20, No.2

Sergei Prokofiev, String Quartet No.2 in F Major, Op. 92, “Kabardinian”

Edward Elgar, Piano Quintet in A minor, Op.84

ARTISTS

Anya Alexeyev, piano   Born in Moscow into a family of musicians, Anya Alexeyev started studying at the Gnessin Music School at the age of five, and in 1989 entered Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory to become a student of the renowned professor Dmitri Bashkirov. The following year she was awarded a scholarship to the Royal College of Music in London, where she studied with Irina Zaritskaya. During her student years, Anya Alexeyev won numerous prizes including the John Hopkinson Gold Medal (Royal College of Music), Elizabeth, The Queen Mother’s Award for ” the most outstanding contribution to the Royal College of Music”, the First prize at the Newport International Piano Competition, Young Concert Artists Trust, and The Capital Radio/Anna Instone Memorial Prize.

Alexeyev has performed extensively in many countries across Europe (Britain, France, Austria, Belgium, Spain, Switzerland, Sweden, Russia, Finland, Ireland, Greece, Germany, and Macedonia), as well as in the USA, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Malaysia, and South Africa.

She has performed as a soloist on numerous occasions in all of London’s major concert halls – Wigmore Hall, Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elisabeth Hall, and Barbican Hall. Throughout her career, she has also appeared in such venues as Berlin Philharmonie, Vienna Konzerthaus, Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, Herodes Atticus Theatre at the Acropolis in Athens, Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, Great Hall in Moscow Conservatory, Philharmonia Hall in St. Petersburg, Birmingham Symphony Hall, Usher Hall in Edinburgh, Johannesburg Symphony Hall, Dewan Filarmonik in Kuala Lumpur, Palais Montcalm in Quebec City, Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto, and Bargemusic in New York.

She has performed concertos with many distinguished orchestras, including the Royal Philharmonic, BBC Philharmonic, Moscow State Symphony, Vienna Chamber, The Philharmonia, Royal Scottish National, Deutschland Radio, City of Birmingham Symphony, Bournemouth Symphony and Sinfonietta, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, London Mozart Players, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, English Chamber, Belgian National Symphony, and Quebec Symphony, collaborating with such conductors as Temirkanov, Simonov, Oramo, Bakels, Judd.

Alexeyev has an extensive solo repertoire, ranging from baroque to cutting-edge contemporary music. In addition to enjoying playing standard concert repertoire,she has been following her passion for discovering lesser-known music, which resulted in performances and recordings of rarely played works and premieres. 

As a collaborative musician, she has participated in many chamber music festivals in Europe and North America.

Alexeyev has recorded for EMI, Dutton Epoch, Toccata Classics, and Marquis Classics labels. Her performances have been broadcast by BBC Radio 3 (UK), GMTV (UK), CBC (Canada), Deutschland Radio, and numerous other radio stations around the world. In 1995, she premiered Paul McCartney’s first solo piano piece, A Leaf, which was later released on CD for EMI Classics.

She is a faculty member at Wilfrid Laurier University, the Glenn Gould School, and the Phil and Eli Taylor Performance Academy for Young Artists.

Penderecki String Quartet Celebrating their 36th  anniversary, the Penderecki String Quartet began their career as winners of the Penderecki Prize at the National Chamber Music Competition in Łódz, Poland in 1986.   Now based in Waterloo, Ontario where they have been Quartet-in-Residence at Wilfrid Laurier University since 1991, The Penderecki String Quartet has become one of the most celebrated chamber ensembles of their generation.  The four Penderecki musicians (now originating from Poland, Canada, and USA) bring their varied yet collective experience to create performances that demonstrate their “remarkable range of technical excellence and emotional sweep” (Toronto, Globe and Mail).

The PSQ's international performing schedule has included appearances in New York (Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall), Amsterdam (Concertgebouw), Hong Kong (Academy for the Arts), Los Angeles (REDCAT Hall at Disney Center), St. Petersburg (Sheremetev Palace), the Adam Festival in New Zealand, and throughout Europe in Rome, Madrid, Paris, Belgrade, Prague, Krakow, Vilnius, and Zagreb.  The PSQ has also toured extensively in Mexico, Australia, Venezuela, Brazil, Colombia, and from coast to coast in Canada.

Dedicated educators, the PSQ have been recent guests at Bloomington Indiana University’s String Academy, the Beijing Conservatory, University of Southern California (Los Angeles), University of British Columbia in Vancouver, and with their partner universities in Osnabrück, Germany and Lyon, France.

To this day the PSQ is a devoted champion of the music of our time, having premiered over 100 new works from composers in Canada and abroad.   Penderecki Quartet's large discography includes over three dozen recordings including the chamber music repertoire of Beethoven and Brahms on both the Marquis and Eclectra labels, as well as the first Canadian release of the six Béla Bartók quartets.  Their disc of Marjan Mozetich’s “Lament in the Trampled Garden” won the 2010 JUNO Award for Best Composition.   In October 2013, the PSQ worked with Maestro Krzysztof Penderecki on his Third Quartet (2008) and performed it at Symphony Space in New York City on the occasion of his 80th birthday.  This followed with the recording of Penderecki’s Third Quartet along with quartets of Norbert Palej on the Marquis label.  In 2022, the PSQ was featured in Howard Shore’s soundtrack to David Cronenberg’s film Crimes of the Future.

The Penderecki Quartet has performed with diverse artists such as Atar Arad, Jeremy Menuhin, Stewart Goodyear, James Campbell and have recently appeared with jazz saxophonist Jane Bunnett, jazz pianists Egberto Gismonti, Don Thomson and David Braid, pipa virtuoso Ching Wong, Dancetheatre David Earle, Pentaedre Wind Quintet, actor Colin Fox, and New York turntable artist DJ Spooky.

The Penderecki Quartet continue to be active members of the Faculty of Music at Laurier University where they have built the string program to be one of the top programs in Canada, attracting an international body of students. Their annual Quartetfest at Laurier is an intensive study seminar and concert series that has featured such ensembles as the Tokyo, Fine Arts, Lafayette, Miro, Ying, and Ariana String Quartets.

INFO COMING SOON!

INFO COMING SOON!

PROGRAM

Tabea Squire - “I danced, unseen“ for string quartet (2020)

Dmitri Shostakovich - String Quartet No.2 

Claude Debussy - String Quartet in G minor 

ARTISTS

Helene Pohl (violin I), Monique Lapins (violin II), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello)

Founded in 1987, the New Zealand String Quartet – Te Rōpu Tūrū O Aotearoa - exists to provide transformational chamber music experiences for all New Zealanders. Over the past 36 years the Quartet has established an international reputation for its insightful interpretations, compelling communication, and dynamic performing style. 

 The NZSQ provides dynamic and high-quality musical experiences for all New Zealanders embracing the fresh and familiar. The Quartet’s rich repertoire includes a wide variety of New Zealand music, composers’ cycles from Beethoven to Bartok, Mozart to Berg, and theatrical presentations encompassing spoken word and dance, from Haydn’s Seven Last Words to Schoenberg’s Transfigured Night. The NZSQ proudly champions New Zealand and Māori music and artists as cultural ambassadors at home and abroad. Since its inception, the Quartet has premiered over 150 New Zealand works, and now works closely with its Mātanga Ngā Toi Māori, taonga pūoro player Horomona Horo. 

The NZSQ takes a leadership and advocacy role in advancing music education. Devoted teachers and mentors, all members of the Quartet teach at the New Zealand School of Music – Te Kōkī where the NZSQ has been Quartet-in-Residence since 1991, as well as running the Adam Chamber Music School in Nelson.  The NZSQ runs the NZSM Chamber Music Intensive Weekend in Wellington for up-and-coming chamber musicians, and regularly mentors students from Sistema programmes across the country. 

In 2023, Helene, Monique, Gillian, and Rolf surpassed 100 years of collective service to music in New Zealand. The three longest serving members of the Quartet have each been awarded the MNZM honour for services to music in New Zealand.

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTISTS

Celebrating their 36th  anniversary, the Penderecki String Quartet began their career as winners of the Penderecki Prize at the National Chamber Music Competition in Łódz, Poland in 1986.   Now based in Waterloo, Ontario where they have been Quartet-in-Residence at Wilfrid Laurier University since 1991, The Penderecki String Quartet has become one of the most celebrated chamber ensembles of their generation.  The four Penderecki musicians (now originating from Poland, Canada, and USA) bring their varied yet collective experience to create performances that demonstrate their “remarkable range of technical excellence and emotional sweep” (Toronto, Globe and Mail).

The PSQ's international performing schedule has included appearances in New York (Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall), Amsterdam (Concertgebouw), Hong Kong (Academy for the Arts), Los Angeles (REDCAT Hall at Disney Center), St. Petersburg (Sheremetev Palace), the Adam Festival in New Zealand, and throughout Europe in Rome, Madrid, Paris, Belgrade, Prague, Krakow, Vilnius, and Zagreb.  The PSQ has also toured extensively in Mexico, Australia, Venezuela, Brazil, Colombia, and from coast to coast in Canada.

Dedicated educators, the PSQ have been recent guests at Bloomington Indiana University’s String Academy, the Beijing Conservatory, University of Southern California (Los Angeles), University of British Columbia in Vancouver, and with their partner universities in Osnabrück, Germany and Lyon, France.

To this day the PSQ is a devoted champion of the music of our time, having premiered over 100 new works from composers in Canada and abroad.   Penderecki Quartet's large discography includes over three dozen recordings including the chamber music repertoire of Beethoven and Brahms on both the Marquis and Eclectra labels, as well as the first Canadian release of the six Béla Bartók quartets.  Their disc of Marjan Mozetich’s “Lament in the Trampled Garden” won the 2010 JUNO Award for Best Composition.   In October 2013, the PSQ worked with Maestro Krzysztof Penderecki on his Third Quartet (2008) and performed it at Symphony Space in New York City on the occasion of his 80th birthday.  This followed with the recording of Penderecki’s Third Quartet along with quartets of Norbert Palej on the Marquis label.  In 2022, the PSQ was featured in Howard Shore’s soundtrack to David Cronenberg’s film Crimes of the Future.

The Penderecki Quartet has performed with diverse artists such as Atar Arad, Jeremy Menuhin, Stewart Goodyear, James Campbell and have recently appeared with jazz saxophonist Jane Bunnett, jazz pianists Egberto Gismonti, Don Thomson and David Braid, pipa virtuoso Ching Wong, Dancetheatre David Earle, Pentaedre Wind Quintet, actor Colin Fox, and New York turntable artist DJ Spooky.

The Penderecki Quartet continue to be active members of the Faculty of Music at Laurier University where they have built the string program to be one of the top programs in Canada, attracting an international body of students. Their annual Quartetfest at Laurier is an intensive study seminar and concert series that has featured such ensembles as the Tokyo, Fine Arts, Lafayette, Miro, Ying, and Ariana String Quartets.

PROGRAM

“Love, Diversity, and Madness”

Schubert's last piano trio, "E-flat piano trio" (one of the major classics of the trio literature)

Shostakovich Piano Trio No.1 “Poeme” [NOT his more famous Trio no. 2 - those who have heard no. 2 should really hear this one!) 

Paul Schoenfield "Cafe Music" (He is Professor of Composition at University of Michigan).

ARTISTS

Jung Tsai (violin), Rebecca Morton (cello) and Tomoko Inui (piano)

NOTES

Paul Schoenfield, also spelled Paul Schoenfeld or Pinchas Schoenfeld,[1] (born 1947, Detroit, Michigan) is a classical composer. He is known for combining popular, folk, and classical music forms.

He began to take piano lessons at the age of six, and wrote his first composition a year later. Among his teachers were Julius Chajes, Ozan Marsh and Rudolf Serkin. He holds a B.A. degree from Carnegie-Mellon University and a Doctor of Music Arts degree from the University of Arizona.

Schoenfield was formerly an active concert pianist, as a soloist and with groups including Music from Marlboro. With violinist Sergiu Luca he recorded the complete violin and piano works of Béla Bartók. He gave the premiere of his piano concerto Four Parables with the Toledo Symphony in 1983. Jeffrey Kahane recorded the work in 1994 with John Nelson and the New World Symphony. Also on the Argo CD are Vaudeville, Schoenfeld's concerto for piccolo trumpet, played by Wolfgang Basch, and Klezmer Rondos, concerto for flute, baritone and orchestra, performed by flutist Carol Wincenc. Critic Raymond Tuttle called the CD: "Some of the most life-affirming new music I've heard in a long time", while he characterized Four Parables as "wild silliness in the face of existential dread."

Andreas Boyde gave the European premiere of Four Parables in 1998 with the Dresdner Sinfoniker and Jonathan Nott, a live performance which was issued on the Athene Records label in 1999. In 2008 the work was released on Black Box Classics with Andrew Russo and the Prague Philharmonia led by JoAnn Falletta. Also on the CD Russo plays Four Souvenirs with violinist James Ehnes and the piano trio Café Music with Ehnes and cellist Edward Arron. Café Music was commissioned by the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra (SPCO) and inspired by Schoenfeld's turn as house pianist at Murray's steakhouse in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It premiered at an SPCO chamber concert in January 1987 with Schoenfeld at the piano.

In 1994, the same year he was awarded the Cleveland Arts Prize, an evening of Schoenfield's pieces was presented at Reinberger Hall by violinist Lev Polyakin and other members of the Cleveland Orchestra with the composer at the piano. Cleveland Orchestra principal violist Robert Vernon gave the world premiere of Schoenfield's viola concerto in 1998, and made the premiere recording, released on Naxos Records in the same year.

Schoenfield's two-act opera, The Merchant and the Pauper, was commissioned by the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis and given its premiere there in 1999. Its libretto is adapted from a tale fashioned and first told in 1809 by one of the most significant personalities in Hassidic history, philosophy, and lore- Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav (1772-1811), the founder of the Bratslaver Hassidic sect.

Schoenfield's song cycle Camp Songs was commissioned by Seattle's Music of Remembrance (MOR). It was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2003.[3][4] The song cycle Ghetto Songs, commissioned by MOR, was recorded in 2009 by Naxos.

In 2010 Schoenfield's Sonata for Violin and Piano was premiered at Lincoln Center with Cho-Liang Lin, violin, and Jon Kimura Parker, piano.

Schoenfield was a Professor of Composition at the University of Michigan until retiring in 2021.[5]. He is also a dedicated scholar of the Talmud and of mathematics.

PROGRAM

David Sinclair's own compositions from his last two recordings, including: Bulerías, Tangos, Alegrías, Colombianas, Guajiras, Taranta, Granaína, Soléa, Rumba, Rondeña and Farruca

ARTIST

David Sinclair, flamenco guitar

¨David Sinclair is a WLU graduate with an honour´s degree in classical guitar performance, studying with Lynne Gangbar. Over the past 25 years, he has performed many concerts at the KWCMS.  He has lived in Granada, Spain since 2005 and he will be performing his own flamenco compositions from his last 2 recordings, ¨Paseo de Las Palmas¨ (2014) and ¨A Mi Padre¨(2023). 

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTIST Flavius Wagner was born in Germany (Baden-Baden) and started to play guitar at the age of 4 years. He was educated in the music school in Baden Baden for ten years. As he was 14 he changed to university of music to Stuttgart to get a pre college student. After his pre college he is now studying his bachelor also in stuttgart with Prof. Johannes Monno. In his lifetime, Flavius did a lot of national and international competitions. He won three times a first prize at „Jugend Musiziert“ this is a national german competiton. He gets a first prize by a competiton named „Gitarrophilia“ and a fourth prize in the Andres Segovia competition in germany. Also Flavius was awarded with the third prize at the „Visegrad Guitar Competition“ in Bratislava 2021. 2022 he was a finalist by the „international Hannabach prize“ in Augsburg also he was finalist by the great „Anna Amalia competition“ 2023 in Weimar (Germany). Flavius received a first prize in the competition at the International guitar Festival Sarajevo 2023, and in June 2023 he was awarded with the fourth prize by the IYC senior devision at the GFA convention in New York. Wagner is playing solo recitals and concerts, also with other instruments together as duo with violin or clarinet. He is also a part of a guitar quartet, where he is playing chamber music. Since 2022 he is lecturer for a national youth guitar and mandolin orchestra to lead the guitars in rehearsals. Many Masterclasses with world renowned teachers and guitarist like Prof. Reichenbach, Prof. Krivokapic, Prof. Andrea de Vitis and Prof, Judicaël Perroy gave him great influence and new musically and technically impulses.

PROGRAM

TBA 

ARTISTS

Adam Didderich, violin, is a native of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He began playing violin at age five. His advanced studies brought him to the University of Toronto and later to Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida for studies with Elmar Oliveira and Stephen Majeske. Most recently, he studied at the University of Miami with Glenn Basham and Felicia Moye. In addition to his violin studies, he had the opportunity to study jazz improvisation with Mark O'Connor, Vince Maggio and Whit Sidener . He has played with orchestras such as the New World Symphony, the Naples Philharmonic, Florida Grand Opera, Palm Beach Opera, and the Palm Beach Symphony. He also played many commercial recordings produced in Miami, including for Gloria Estefan, Natalie Cole, Christian Castro, and many others. Since moving back to Canada in 2014 he has continued to record commercially, and has been playing with Sinfonia Toronto, Toronto Concert Orchestra, London Sinfonia, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, and for Mirvish Productions.

Born in Japan and raised in Canada, pianist Dr. Lisa Tahara first came to public attention with her concerto debut aged 15. Critically acclaimed performances followed in venues across Europe, Mexico, Canada and the United States. A prizewinner at both the Canadian Music Competition and Canadian Concerto Competition in addition to numerous other awards and scholarships internationally – Lisa has given concerts extensively both as a chamber musician and soloist.

Following a successful European debut performing with the Danube Symphony Orchestra (in Budapest, Hungary) as a first-prize winner of the 2019 Piano Concerto Festival, the same orchestra called her a few months later to replace a suddenly injured colleague. This saw Lisa fly on only a few days notice to Europe and give a performance of Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto which was tremendously well received by the local press and colleagues alike.

A sought-after chamber musician and collaborative pianist, Lisa Tahara has over twenty years of experience working with instrumentalists and vocalists in addition to choral and instrumental ensembles. She is a founding member of the Integral Ensemble (formerly the Amarok Ensemble) and twice became one of only eight pianists chosen for the internationally renowned collaborative piano internship at the Banff Centre. Lisa has been invited to many chamber music festivals including the Toronto Summer Music Festival, St. Lawrence String Quartet Chamber Music Seminar, Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival and Festival Del Lago.

Her vast repertoire has seen concerto performances with orchestras across Canada including the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, Burnaby Symphony Orchestra, Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra, University of Victoria Orchestra, Sooke Philharmonic Orchestra and the Georgian Bay Symphony Orchestra.

Polish born cellist Dr. Dobrochna Zubek has established herself as a versatile artist dedicated to a wide-ranging musical repertoire and committed to exploring boundaries between artistic disciplines in her own words: “The bridge between the arts found in interdisciplinary performances fascinates me.  Through improvisation, I find that I can make a strong connection and create a dynamic and integrative performance.”  A soloist, chamber musician, orchestral cellist, and educator whose evolving and multi-faceted career has taken her to a number of cities in Europe, Asia, and North America. Over the years she has collaborated with a variety of artists such as Peter Gabriel, José Carreras, Shauna Rolston, and Gioconda Barbuto.

Zubek has held an orchestra position with the Orquesta Sinfonica del Estado de Mexico (2009-2012) and on festival stages, she has participated as a soloist at Geneé International Ballet Competition, (2019) Banff Center for Arts and Creativity (2019) and Ottawa Chamberfest (2016) to mention the most recent. She has given a series of masterclasses in Poland, Canada, the USA, and China. Some of them as a part of the University of Toronto’s Faculty of New Music Festival held in Chinese Universities in Guiyang, Chengdu, and Hong Kong.

Zubek made her New York debut at La MAMA experimental theatre, an off-Broadway, with an all-female production of This is Why We Live for cello and two actors where she was described as a virtuoso cellist and her playing as soulful and wonderful.  As a member of Thin Edge New Music Collective, she has made a mark as a vibrant artist premiering new works in the Canadian new music scene. In a recent performance of the premier of The Pomegranate, a chamber opera written by cellist Kye Marshall, where Zubek was featured as a solo cellist.

As a recording artist, Zubek’s repertoire includes Mexico-Voyage followed by the Juno-nominated CD recording of Hymns of Heavens and Earth composed by Peter-Anthony Togni. Recent commissions and dedications include works by Lucia Álvarez, Norbert Palej, Andrzej Zubek, Parisa Sabet, and Gregory Newsome.

Zubek’s awards include, among others, first place in the Peggy Friedman Gordon Music Competition, (2002), the Sidney Liebermann Competition, (2004), and the 2007 Alexandria Symphony Orchestra Competition in the United States.

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTIST

Pianist, composer, and event organizer Michael Arnowitt is one of the most creative musicians of today. His imaginative musical landscapes, extraordinary sense of touch at the piano, and warm onstage personality have delighted audiences in concert halls around the world. He lives in the USA and Canada and has given piano performances in France, Belgium, Germany, Holland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Russia, and Korea. His life and music is the subject of a documentary film, “Beyond 88 Keys” (2004). The documentary, filmed in both the USA and Europe, contains footage of concert performances, educational talks, and interviews. The film has been broadcast on public television and shown at a variety of film festivals and venues including the Rode Pomp, an arts center in Gent, Belgium and the Anthology, a theater in New York City’s East Village. Once international touring resumes, he will be performing an 8 concert tour of China with the guitarist Steve Blair where the duo will perform in Beijing and other Chinese cities.

His past creative projects have included “If Music Be the Food of Love,” a performance of classical and jazz music about food with the simultaneous serving to the audience of the food tastes that inspired the composers, and a collaboration combining his piano improvisations with the live creation of paintings on stage by visual artists. In 2013, his composition “Haiku Textures” for three cello soloists and orchestra was premiered, the three cellos symbolizing the three lines of a Japanese haiku poem. He has also performed with the photographer Marjorie Ryerson a special multi-media program “Water Music” where piano music about water is combined with the projection of water photographs and readings on the subject of water written by leading musicians of today.

In 1989 Michael Arnowitt began his novel, 26-year long presentation of the complete 32 Beethoven piano sonatas, matching up his age as he performed the various sonatas with Beethoven’s age as Beethoven composed them. The eight concerts in the project, spaced out over 26 years, thereby became a study in the psychology of aging and development. Audiences have seen how Beethoven developed as a composer, how Arnowitt developed as a pianist, and the intersection of the two processes. He has performed these “Beethoven & Arnowitt” concerts throughout the United States and in Canada, Korea, and Germany.

Michael Arnowitt has appeared as piano concerto soloist with many orchestras, including the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Kiev Chamber Orchestra under Roman Kofman. He has performed in concert with the Ying Quartet, and has toured Canada and the United States giving duo performances with Beverley Johnston of Toronto, one of the world’s leading classical percussionists. The Washington Post said of a concert Michael Arnowitt performed at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., “he played with an exquisite sense of touch, color and musical imagination.” The Rheinische Post said of a Michael Arnowitt performance in Düsseldorf, Germany, “he played with a striking virtuosity and deeply felt passion.”

Michael Arnowitt has also been the principal organizer of a number of large-scale fundraisers for humanitarian aid, among them an April 1999 benefit concert for Balkan war refugees that raised over US $10,000 and collected clothing and 300 emergency first aid kits for the refugee camps. In 2016 he organized a benefit concert for Syrian refugees, creating a special program surveying Syria’s diverse cultures, with thirty performers presenting Syrian secular and sacred music, poetry, short stories, and drama.

His current projects include working on a new composition, Sound Essence, for jazz quartet and Indonesian gamelan orchestra. He is also developing a new concept of a multi-sensory performance event where he will be collaborating with a fabric artist, chef, botanist, and technologists to create a novel concert where the audience will be presented music paired with related simultaneous experiences in all the senses – touch, smell, sight, and taste.

In 2021 he began working on writing a book of essays about music which will be published later this year by Fomite Press. These essays offer Michael Arnowitt’s insights about moments in his favorite pieces of piano and orchestral music along with anecdotes from his life as a touring concert pianist.

The internationally-known flutist and composer Louis Moyse said while in his 90’s:

“During my long musical career, I have met few really great artists in the various disciplines of the field and I am very pleased to name Michael Arnowitt, pianist and musician as one of them. He expresses his art on the highest level. I have great respect for his interpretations and his way to communicate to any audience his feelings through his love for music.”

PROGRAM

BEAUTY AND FEAR

Lera Auerbach:  Postlude

Sergei Prokofiev: Violin Sonata no. 1

Cécile Chaminade: Trois Morceaux, op. 31

Camille Saint-Saëns: Violin Sonata no. 1 in D Minor

ARTISTS

Michael Sheppard, piano  Known as “a virtuosic soloist possessed of power, sensitivity, earthiness, and humor” (Whitney Smith, Indianapolis Star) with the “power to make an audience sit up and pay attention...thought- provoking for performers and listeners alike” (James Manheim, All Music Guide ), Michael Sheppard was a winner of the prestigious American Pianists Association Classical Fellow Award, a designation that led to the release of a critically acclaimed solo recording by Harmonia Mundi in 2007.

As a pianist, conductor and composer, Michael gives masterclasses, teaches and plays with some of the top singers and instrumentalists around the US; he also coaches singers, instrumentalists, and conductors, working at both the Peabody Conservatory and the Baltimore School for the Arts, sharing his love and understanding of music and the artistic process with future generations.

Jessica Tong, violin  Canadian violinist Jessica Tong has garnered international acclaim as a soloist, recitalist and chamber musician, having been described as an "outstanding talent" (Performing Arts in Canada) with "keen sensitivity and receptivity" (Bloomington Herald Times), who "allow[s] us to savour her sense of ardour and intensity, but never at the detriment of her tonal beauty." (ClassiqueInfo France). She has been a top prizewinner at the Eckhardt-Gramatté Competition, the Toronto Symphony, Canadian Music and Yellow Springs International Chamber Music Competitions and has served as first violinist of both the Vinca and Larchmere String Quartets, during which time she was Artist-in-Residence for the Perlman Music Program in Florida, the ProQuartet Odyssée Program in France and at the University of Evansville in Indiana.

She is currently the Violin Professor at the State University of New York at Fredonia, Chamber Music Director of the Composers Conference, and the newly appointed Artistic Advisor at Avaloch Farm Music Institute.

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTISTS

Marcus Scholtes, violin 

Marcus Willem Scholtes is currently the Associate Concertmaster of Sinfonia Toronto, a Juno-award-winning ensemble. He is an alumnus of the prestigious Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, where he graduated with a Doctor of Music degree in Violin Performance in the studio of renowned pedagogue Mimi Zweig.

A multi-talented artist, Marcus is an active soloist on both the violin and piano, at times even performing as a soloist on both instruments on the same concert program. As pianist, he has most recently performed Beethoven's 3rd Piano Concerto, and has performed solo piano programs in South Korea.

As Concertmaster, Marcus has led the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival orchestra in Germany, and has performed and toured much of Europe with this ensemble, including concerts in Spain, Turkey, Poland, Budapest, the Czech Republic, and Denmark. Marcus is also an original member of Aldeburgh Strings based in the UK, which has recently recorded two CDs, both released to critical acclaim in the UK and Germany. Outside of his musical interests, he is a driving and automotive enthusiast.

Miriam Stewart-Kroeker, cello 

Miriam Stewart-Kroeker is a native of Hamilton, Ontario, where she began her studies at the age of 5.  She studied with Paul Pulford and the Penderecki String Quartet at Wilfrid Laurier University, where she received an Honours Bachelor of Music in Cello Performance as well as a Diploma in Chamber Music Performance.  She went on to complete a Master’s degree in Cello Performance at McGill University under the direction of Matt Haimovitz. She recently joined the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony cello section in January 2020.

​On top of performing with various orchestras throughout Ontario, Miriam is an active chamber musician.  She is a founding member of the Andromeda Piano Trio, who perform frequently for a number of chamber music series in the region, including the Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Music Society, Guelph Connections Chamber Music Series, Conrad Grebel Noon Hour series, Toronto Chamber Players series and more.  In 2013 Miriam completed a winter residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts in solo and chamber music, and her chamber ensembles have been the recipients of a number of awards. She has performed as a soloist with numerous orchestras and ensembles, including the Cambridge Symphony Orchestra, Da Capo Chamber Choir and the Georgian Bay Symphony

Heidi Wall, piano

Heidi Wall performs piano solo repertoire, chamber music, and concertos both locally and abroad. While studying with Anya Alexeyev at Wilfrid Laurier University for her Bachelor of Music in piano performance, Heidi placed first in the concerto competition, was awarded the gold medal for music and won two gold medals in the Canadian Music Competition. She then completed three residencies at the Banff Centre, one of which resulted in a recording of Schöenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire with the Gruppo Montebello which was released on the Etcetera label in Europe. Wall completed a Masters in Music in Performance and Literature at Western University with Stéphan Sylvestre in 2017. During that time, she placed first in the Maritsa Brookes Concerto Competition and was honoured with the prestigious Artistic Performance OGS Award.

Heidi is currently a DMA student at Western University. She coordinates the Kitchener-Waterloo Kiwanis Music Festival, is the music director at the Church of the Good Shepherd, is faculty pianist at National Music Camp of Canada, and teaches piano. Heidi Wall lives in Kitchener-Waterloo. 

PROGRAM

Schubert, Shepherd on the Rock 

+ TBA

ARTISTS

James Kenneth Campbell (b. Leduc, Alberta, near Edmonton, 10 August 1949) is a Canadian/American clarinetist. He has more than 40 recordings, a Juno Award, a Roy Thomson Hall Award, Canada's Artist of the Year, the Order of Canada, and The Queen's Golden Jubilee.

Since 1988, Campbell has been teaching clarinet at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. He has been the Artistic Director of the Festival of the Sound in Parry Sound, Ontario since 1985.

He won the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) Talent Festival and the JM International Clarinet Competition in Belgrade, Yugoslavia in 1971. In 1972 he represented Canada at the 26th Congress of the International Federation of JM at Augsburg. Additionally, he was a semi-finalist in the Budapest International Clarinet Competition in 1970.

He was a jury member on various competitions, including the 1987 Jeunesses Musicales International Competition in Belgrade, along with Walter Boeykens (Belgium), Thea King (UK), Ludwig Kurkiewicz (Poland), Milenko Stefanovic (Yugoslavia), Ernest Ackun (Yugoslavia), Marko Rudzak (Yugoslavia) and Stjepan Rabuzin (Yugoslavia)

The Canadian Music Council named him artist of the year in 1989, and he was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 1997.

Leslie Fagan, Soprano

I have performed under the batons of such noted conductors as Hans Graf, Sir David Willcocks, Jukke Pekke Saraste, Kent Tritle, Heinz Ferlisch, Victor Borge and Elmer Isler and have delighted audiences and critics alike at Royal Albert Hall, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Bordeaux Opera House, Roy Thomson Hall and Massey Hall.

Highlights of my past engagements include: a solo concert of music of Stravinsky and Debussy with the Bordeaux Aquitaine Symphonie Nationale, France; Bach's Weinachts Oratorium in Stuttgart, Germany; Handel's Messiah at the Royal Albert Hall in London, England; Tafelmusik Orchestra and Choir in Toronto, Ontario; and an engagement as guest soloist at the International Choral Festival in Gouda, Netherlands.

In the spring of 2009, I premiered 5 Mendelssohn Lieder at Steinway Hall in New York with the Clarion Music Society. The previous season marked my official Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center debut. I have been invited by both the Oratorio Society of New York under the direction of Kent Tritle and Music Sacra under the baton of Richard Westenburg to sing their performances of Handel’s Messiah at Carnegie Hall. My Lincoln Center Debut was singing Carmina Burana with Musica Sacra and the world premier of Alessandro Cadario’s Cantata for Revival.

I have been fortunate enough to share the stage with many great artists including Victor Borge, Lois Marshall and Maureen Forrester.

On the opera stage, I have sung the title role in Donizetti's Linda di Chamounix; Pamina in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte; Sophie in Massenet's Werther; and Musetta in Verdi's La Boheme and Nanetta in Verdi's Falstaff. At the Aldeburgh Festival in England, I performed the roles of Tytania in Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream and Zerlina in Mozart's Don Giovanni.

I can be heard frequently on CBC radio and have appeared on CBC television, BBC radio, BBC television and NPR.

Personal website: www.lesliefagan.com

Angela Park, piano

Angela Park has established herself as one of Canada’s most sought-after pianists. Praised for her “stunningly beautiful pianism” (Grace Welsh Prize, Chicago), “beautiful tone and sensitivity” (American Record Guide), and for performing “with such brilliant clarity it took your breath away” (Chapala, Mexico). Angela’s versatility as both soloist and chamber musician has led to performances across Canada, as well as in the United States, Europe, Japan and Mexico. She has performed for such notable series as Montreal’s Pro Musica, Ottawa Chamberfest, Toronto Summer Music Festival, Parry Sound’s Festival of the Sound, Winnipeg Virtuosi, Debut Atlantic and Prairie Debut Tours, Orchestra London Canada, Sinfonia Toronto, Stratford Symphony, and the Northern Lights Music Festival in Mexico.

Angela developed a passion for chamber music early on in her music studies, and this has led to a varied career as a chamber musician. She has developed a longstanding collaborative partnership with violist Sharon Wei, both as a duo, and as former founding members (2006-2022) of the renowned Ensemble Made In Canada. Their work together reached across every province and territory across Canada, culminating in a JUNO Award for their Mosaïque Album in 2021. They have also toured as a duo for Debut Atlantic and Prairie Debut, and continue to collaborate regularly with other musicians across the country.

Cellist Rachel Mercer and Angela have also forged an important duo partnership since their first performance in 2006. As the Mercer-Park Duo, they have performed and recorded a vast range of repertoire for cello and piano with a focus on Canadian contemporary composers. Rachel and Angela have been privileged to work with violinist Yehonatan Berick as the AYR Trio (2010-2020), with Mayumi Seiler as the Seiler Trio, and with Scott St. John as the St. John-Mercer-Park Trio.

Angela was previously a pianist for Piano Six – New Generation, an organization that toured remote communities across Canada. In 2019 she joined pianist Stéphan Sylvestre to form a piano duo, focusing on the complete Brahms Symphonies in their four-hand versions. Among other collaborations, Angela has performed with such international artists as violist Rivka Golani, violinist Martin Beaver, clarinetist James Campbell, soprano Leslie Fagan, and leading members of the Montreal and Toronto Symphonies.

Past and future highlights include a world premiere of John Burge’s Second Piano Concerto with Sinfonia Toronto, solo recitals for Confluence Concerts in Toronto and Consortium Aurora Borealis in Thunder Bay, tours with Prairie Debut and Debut Atlantic, performances with Lyrica Baroque in New Orleans, Louisiana, collaborative recitals at the Interlochen Center for the Arts, and Ensemble Made In Canada tours of Canada and the United States. Angela has recorded independent solo albums, and collaborative discs with cellist Rachel Mercer and Ensemble Made In Canada for labels including NAXOS Canadian Classics, Centrediscs, and Enharmonic Records. She is also featured on a recording of Srul Irving Glick’s Suites Hébraïques with clarinetist James Campbell, saxophonist Wallace Halladay, and violinist Barry Shiffman.

In 2010 Angela earned her DMA in Performance from the Université de Montréal, and previously received her MMus and BMus degrees from the University of Toronto. From 2011-2014, Angela was Visiting Assistant Professor of Collaborative Piano-Woodwinds at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music. She has given masterclasses and educational outreach workshops for universities and communities across Canada, as well as at SUNY New Paltz, Stanford, and Indiana University in the United States. Angela has been Assistant Professor of Piano and Collaborative Piano at Western University since 2019. She is a regular guest teacher at Music at Port Milford, a summer chamber music academy for high school students. Angela is currently co-Artistic Director of 5 at the First Chamber Music Series in Hamilton, and sits on the board of the Stratford Summer Music Festival. 

PROGRAM

Arvo Pärt (b.1935): Für Alina (1976) 

Charles T. Griffes (1884-1920): Pleasure Dome of Kubla Khan (1915) 

Franz Liszt (1811-1886): Sonata in B minor 

Intermission

Gian-Carlo Menotti (1911-2007): Ricercare and Toccata (1953) 

(on a theme from “The Old Maid and the Thief”) 

Claude Debussy (1862-1918): Three Préludes, Book Two (1913) 

Géneral Lavine-eccentric

Bruyères

Feux d’artifice

Moritz Moszkowski (1854-1925): Caprice Espagnol, Op. 37 

ARTIST

Michael Lewin is one of America’s foremost concert pianists, winning over audiences in 30 countries with playing of “majestic power and searing emotion.” (The London Times). His career was launched with top prizes in the Franz Liszt International Competition, the American Pianists Association Award and the William Kapell (University of Maryland) International Piano Competition. His recordings have won a Grammy Award and a Roundglass Music Award.

He has appeared as orchestral soloist with the Netherlands Philharmonic, Cairo Symphony, China National Radio Orchestra, Bucharest Philharmonic, Youth Orchestra of the Americas, State Symphony of Greece, Moscow Chamber Orchestra, the Boston Pops, and the Phoenix, Indianapolis, Miami, North Carolina, West Virginia, Nevada, New Orleans, Colorado, Guadalajara, and Puerto Rico Symphonies. Solo appearances include New York’s Lincoln Center, London’s Wigmore Hall, Boston’s Symphony Hall, Taiwan’s National Concert Hall, Hong Kong’s City Hall Theatre, Holland’s Muziekcentrum, Moscow’s Great Hall, the Athens Megaron, the National Gallery of Art, the Newport, Ravinia and Spoleto Festivals and PBS Television. His extensive repertoire includes over 40 piano concertos, with particular interest in the music of Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Liszt, Debussy and a host of American and Latin American composers.

Mr. Lewin’s award-winning discography on Sono Luminus, Naxos and Centaur includes a pair of acclaimed Debussy recordings entitled “Beau Soir” and “Starry Night”, the complete piano music of Charles T. Griffes and Scarlatti Sonatas for Naxos, “Michael Lewin plays Liszt,” “A Russian Piano Recital”, “Bamboula!” piano music of Louis Moreau Gottschalk, “Piano Phantoms,” “If I Were a Bird” and the 4 Violin Sonatas by William Bolcom with Irina Muresanu.

Michael Lewin is Professor and Head of Piano at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee and Classical Music Director for Ethos Music in China. He gives master classes worldwide, directs the Boston Conservatory Piano Masters Series and has taught many prize-winning and successful pianists. He is a Juilliard School graduate and a Steinway Artist. His teachers included Leon Fleisher, Yvonne Lefebure, Adele Marcus and Irwin Freundlich. Please visit www.michaellewin.com for more information.

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTISTS

For twenty-four years through live performances and acclaimed recordings, violinist Nancy Dahn and pianist Timothy Steeves have built an international career in the Canadian chamber ensemble Duo Concertante. Their name comes from the inscription over Beethoven’s “Kreutzer” sonata, “in stilo molto concertante,” which implies the two performers are equal, dynamic voices. This defines their unique artistic relationship and the “deeply integrated performances that flow naturally as if the music were being created on the spot” (Gramophone). Outstanding musicians, champions of new Canadian music, visionary artistic directors, and inspiring mentors, Duo Concertante have forged a musical legacy and strive to provoke thought and engagement through music in innovative ways.

After their first concert in 1997, the Halifax Chronicle-Herald called Duo Concertante “two packages of musical dynamite that would credit any stage on the planet.” Since then, they have performed in more than 700 concerts across North America, Europe, Central America and China. Their recitals have received numerous accolades including the following critical quotes from national and international press:

• Grace and fire… fury and repose…a triumphant mass of non-stop energy – Wholenote

• Majesty, passion and excitement. Inspiring! – Wiener Zeitung (Vienna)

• Artistry, poetry and impeccable technique – La scena musicale

Duo Concertante’s recordings have set the benchmarks for musicians around the world. Of their epic recording Beethoven: Complete Sonatas for Violin and Piano (a 3 CD album), preeminent critic John Terauds stated “…these beautiful interpretations are so good right down to the tiniest of details that they deserve to be called a reference in… contemporary performance”. Gramophone writes that Dahn and Steeves “do Atlantic Canada proud in this splendid new set” and describes their interpretation as a “miracle of… knowledge and poetry”. The album received critical praise in German, Austrian, British and Canadian media; it was featured for months on Air Canada’s entertainment system and is heard on CBC radio almost weekly.

Duo Concertante have twelve other acclaimed recordings on top Canadian labels ATMA, Centrediscs, and Marquis, many of which have won awards and special recognitions. The all-Canadian works CD Wild Bird includes Murray Schafer’s Duo for Violin and Piano which won a 2011 Juno Award (Classical Composition of the Year). A two-disc set of J.S. Bach’s Sonatas for Violin and Keyboard, received the first of three consecutive ECMAs for Classical Recording of the Year, followed by Incarnation in 2018 and Perfect Light in 2019. Their Franz Schubert: Music for Violin and Piano was selected by CBC Music as one of “Canada’s Top 20 Classical Albums of 2020.” Ecology of Being, released in 2022, features music written especially for Duo Concertante and inspired by the climate emergency. It has been praised as “a powerful and deeply moving album performed with world-class expressiveness and musicality …. This release is a stunning collection of highly personal works wonderfully performed by the duo.” (The Wholenote)

Duo Concertante are the founders and artistic directors of the Tuckamore Festival – an internationally acclaimed chamber musical festival held for two weeks each August. For 22 years, Tuckamore – a major contributor to the cultural life of Newfoundland and Labrador – has put the province on the map by welcoming leading artists and emerging musicians worldwide to St. John’s. The Tuckamore Festival has presented more than 140 outstanding guest artists; mentored more than 400 young musicians and composers representing 10 countries around the globe; travelled to more than two dozen communities for school tours and performances; and produced more than 500 performances and events. In addition to Tuckamore, Duo Concertante regularly perform and collaborate with other artists of international stature at summer music festivals throughout North America, including the Ottawa International Chamberfest, Cactus Pear Music Festival, Toronto Summer Music, Festival of the Sound, Indian River Festival, Domaine Forget and Music Niagara.

As champions of Canadian music, Duo Concertante have few equals, and their lasting impact will be a legacy of new works created through their unprecedented commitment to commissioning new works. To date the duo has been responsible for sixty-nine new works and original arrangements for violin and piano by leading composers. This includes works by Andrew P. MacDonald (Double Concerto for violin and piano, Op. 51), Alice Ho (Capriccio Ballo, Cœur à cœur), Chan Ka Nin (Cool Mountain Water, Late in a Slow Time, Incarnation), Denis Gougeon (Chants du cœur), Omar Daniel (Wild Honey), Jean Lesage (Portrait of a Sentimental Musician in a Distorting Mirror), Kelly-Marie Murphy (Dance Me to Your Beauty with a Burning Violin), Brian Current (Faster Still with string quartet), Linda Bouchard (Spill Out), Kati Agócs (Supernatural Love), Andrew Staniland (The River within Us…, The Ocean is Full of its Own Collapse) and Jocelyn Morlock (Petrichor, Asylum). The Duo regularly includes new Canadian pieces alongside standard repertoire in such prestigious venues as Wigmore Hall (London), Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall (New York City), Shanghai City Theatre, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Roy Thomson Hall and the Four Seasons Performing Arts Centre (Toronto), the National Arts Centre (Ottawa), and the Forbidden City Concert Hall (Beijing), among others.

Duo Concertante uses music as a means of drawing attention to issues of historical and social importance, often in collaboration with composers, writers, dancers, and actors. They also enjoy performing for children; their Ecology of Being and What life Throws at You programs have been shared with over 1500 students across Newfoundland and Labrador. Since 2020, Duo Concertante has been active creating unique music videos. Melissa Hui’s piece from the Ecology of Being project was made into a 21-minute film and won Best Experimental Film and Best Original Score at the 2020 IndieX Filmfest (Los Angeles). In 2022, the Duo created SOLACE – four films with music by Dawn Avery, Alice Ho, Jessie Montgomery and Cesar Franck. The Jessie Montgomery film, End of the Line, was an award winner at the Los Angeles Women’s Independent Film Festival.

Upcoming projects and commissions for 2023-2024 include a 60-minute dramatic/musical piece by playwright Robert Chafe and composer Randolph Peters which addresses issues relating to ocean change and sustainability, a new sonata written for the Duo by German composer Stefan Heucke, and a 40-minute multimedia piece by composer Alice Ho and animator Duncan Major inspired by Tom Dawe’s Newfoundland ghost stories.

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTISTS

This excellent ensemble is the Quartet in Residence at the Mannes School of Music in Manhattan. They all attended Rochester School of Music in the state of New York, and selected their name from the formerly huge Kodak company situated in Rochester.

Kodak Quartet is violinist Edgar Donati, violinist Martin Noh, violist Daniel Spink and cellist Blake Kitayama. They have performed with Grammy winning artists Time for Three, Kronos Quartet, and Jack Quartet and worked with members of the American, Beethoven, Juilliard, Pacifica, Verona, Jupiter, Arianna, JACK, and Ying Quartets.

“The dynamic, award-winning string quartet, Kodak Quartet, is setting the world on fire with their passionate and energetic playing". They are highly regarded for their work with contemporary composers on new compositions and for presenting traditional works with a contemporary flavor. Kodak's members hail from the US, Canada and France. Their international performance career brings concerts to a great diversity of people, season highlights include concerts at Carnegie Hall, Merkin Hall and the Lunenburg Academy of Music Performance. They have also performed for thousands of children at non-traditional performance venues including school concerts, movie theaters, and working alongside Rob Kapilow in his program “What Makes it Great?”. Kodak Quartet formed in Rochester, New York while attending the Eastman School of Music and are currently based in New York, NY.

Kodak Quartet has performed with Grammy winning artists Time for Three, Kronos Quartet, and Jack Quartet. They have worked with members of the American, Beethoven, Juilliard, Pacifica, Verona, Jupiter, Arianna, JACK, and Ying Quartets. The Kodak Quartet is currently the Cuker and Stern Resident String Quartet at the Mannes School of Music. “ [from their web pages on google)

Born in South Africa to French and Spanish parents, Edgar Donati is a true citizen of the world. He is fluent in three languages and has lived in many different countries, forging his own eclectic style. He began his studies at the age of 5 with Tedi Papavrami and Viollça Agolli, immediately winning first prize in Paris’ Flame Competition and the Vatelot Violin Competition. After moving to Serbia and winning first prize in the International Petar Konjovic Competition and the Young Artists Podium, Edgar made his solo debut with the Serbian Vojvodina Symphony Orchestra. He maintains an active performing career, and has given several solo recitals in Belgrade’s Kolarac Concert Hall and at the Serbian Academy of Fine Arts (SANU). He is also regularly invited to perform in Montreal, France, and Guadeloupe.

Edgar spent time at the Conservatoire National Régional de Paris before moving to North America where he received his Bachelor of Music and Masters of Music from McGill University’s Schulich School, studying with Marcelle Mallette and Axel Strauss. He also holds a Performer Diploma from the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University under the tutelage of Mauricio Fuks. He has worked with Salley Koo and currently studies with Lucie Robert at the Mannes School of Music, as part of the graduate string quartet. He has also worked with several famous masters such as Alexandre Brussilovski, Vladimir Landsman, Dejan Bogdanovic, Yuri Volguine, Boris Kuschnir and Zakhar Bron

The Korean-Canadian violinist, Martin Noh, was born in South Korea and raised in Canada. He is an active performer, playing solo, chamber, and improvised works both nationally and internationally. In 2015, Martin made his debut with the Kitchener Waterloo Symphony Orchestra, and since then, has performed as a soloist with various symphony and chamber orchestras throughout Ontario. In 2017, he was selected as a national finalist at the Canadian Music Competition.

Martin has traveled the world as an orchestral musician, performing in world-renowned venues across North America, Europe, and abroad. A scholarship recipient at the Eastman School Of Music, Martin studied under the tutelage of Professor Oleh Krysa and has worked closely with members of the Ying Quartet as part of the Intensive Chamber music seminar. He has also worked with Salley Koo at Montclair State University. Martin is currently studying with Lucie Robert as part of the Cuker and Stern Graduate String Quartet residency.

In addition to his active performing career, Martin is also a dedicated teacher. He has maintained his international studio for over 5 years, sharing his knowledge and passion for music with students around the world.

Outside of violin, Martin enjoys playing various sports such as table tennis, basketball, badminton, and tennis. He currently plays on a violin made by Andranik Gaybaryan in 2018.

Blake Kitayama is a chamber musician, orchestral cellist, and music educator who strives to foster an accessible musical dialogue. Blake made his solo debut with the Colorado Music Festival Orchestra in 2003. Alongside positions with the Jackson Symphony and Huntsville Symphony, he most recently held a position with the Winston Salem Symphony and has recorded for Navano Records. In addition to performing recitals across the United States, Blake has appeared on national broadcasts APM’s Performance Today and WDAV. He currently enjoys performing concerts and outreach nationally and internationally with the Kodak Quartet.

An advocate for collaboration and new music, Blake has continuously worked across genres. He has provided cello and vocal harmonies for songwriters such as Sofie Zamchick, Anna Schofield, Fermata Caesura, and Fox Apt . In the classical world, he has also debuted dozens of new classical works for mixed ensembles written by his contemporaries.

As an educator, Blake has extensive experience working with all ages and backgrounds. He has maintained a private studio for over 8 years, and has taught at summer festivals alongside the Phoenix Quartet. He seeks to build curiosity and engage his students in the awareness and process that is cello playing.

He earned a Bachelor of Music from Vanderbilt University under the instruction of Felix Wang and his Master of Music at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts with Brooks Whitehouse. He most recently studied with Christine Lamprea at Montclair State University and Jay Campbell at the Mannes School of Music, as a member of the Cuker and Stern Graduate String Quartet.

Daniel Spink, violist, is an active performer, and collaborator with living composers. He has premiered and recorded new works for both solo viola and string quartet. He 

performs nationally and internationally as a solo, chamber, orchestral musician, and teacher with both violin and viola and with the string quartet, Kodak Quartet. Daniel regularly performs in outreach settings including past solo appearances with Central City Opera’s Inside the Orchestra chamber music performances for Merkin Hall’s “Bridges” series, the Eastman School’s Music for All series, and the Rochester Early Music Festival for Coffee Connection. Daniel has been a member of CityMusic Cleveland Chamber Orchestra since 2019. Daniel made his solo debut with orchestra at age 10 on violin. In 2016, Daniel was a finalist in the American Viola Society Festival’s National Solo Competition.  A lover of cross genre improvisation, he teaches and regularly performs in improvised concerts. In 2016, Daniel was a finalist in the American Viola Society Festival’s National Solo Competition. As a teacher, Daniel maintains a selective international studio of students across the US and overseas, including students In Europe, the UK, Japan, and Singapore. Daniel teaches violin, viola, and improvisation. Mr. Spink received his Bachelor of Music and Masters of Music at the Eastman School of Music where he studied with Carol Rodland and Masumi Per Rostad and was professor Rostad’s teaching assistant.   Growing up in Colorado gave Daniel a lifelong love of sunshine and the outdoors.  Away from the viola, he enjoys practicing mixed martial arts, swimming, cycling, and hiking and has performed as a jazz saxophonist at jazz clubs and venues in Denver.   Daniel plays an unnamed Italian violin from the 1860’s on generous loan from the Eastman School of music, and viola made by Nicolas Augustin Chappuy in 1768.

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTISTS

James Kenneth Campbell (b. Leduc, Alberta, near Edmonton, 10 August 1949) is a Canadian/American clarinetist. He has more than 40 recordings, a Juno Award, a Roy Thomson Hall Award, Canada's Artist of the Year, the Order of Canada, and The Queen's Golden Jubilee.

Since 1988, Campbell has been teaching clarinet at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. He has been the Artistic Director of the Festival of the Sound in Parry Sound, Ontario since 1985.

He won the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) Talent Festival and the JM International Clarinet Competition in Belgrade, Yugoslavia in 1971. In 1972 he represented Canada at the 26th Congress of the International Federation of JM at Augsburg. Additionally, he was a semi-finalist in the Budapest International Clarinet Competition in 1970.

He was a jury member on various competitions, including the 1987 Jeunesses Musicales International Competition in Belgrade, along with Walter Boeykens (Belgium), Thea King (UK), Ludwig Kurkiewicz (Poland), Milenko Stefanovic (Yugoslavia), Ernest Ackun (Yugoslavia), Marko Rudzak (Yugoslavia) and Stjepan Rabuzin (Yugoslavia)

The Canadian Music Council named him artist of the year in 1989, and he was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 1997.

Penderecki String Quartet 

Jeremy Bell, violin

Jerzy Kapłanek, violin

Christine Vlajk, viola

Katie Schlaikjer, cello

The PSQ have been Quartet-in-Residence at Canada's Wilfrid Laurier University since 1991. Current members are from Poland, Canada, and the USA. Previously they were affiliated with the University of Wisconsin (1988–91). The quartet's annual Quartetfest at Laurier is an intensive study seminar and concert series.

The quartet's recording of Marjan Mozetich's Lament in the Trampled Garden won the Juno Award for Classical Composition of the Year in 2010.

The Penderecki String Quartet is a champion of contemporary music and has premiered or commissioned over 100 new works from composers in Canada and abroad. Selected composers include Andrew Ager; Carmen Braden;[2] Glenn Buhr; Ka Nin Chan; Brian Cherney; Omar Daniel; Srđan Dedić; John Estacio; Anthony Genge; Jarosław Gołembiowski; Peter Hatch;[3] Christos Hatzis; Daniel Janke; Veronika Krausas;[4] Alice Ho; Matthew Malsky; David L. McIntyre;[5] Piotr Grella-Możejko; Kelly-Marie Murphy; Norbert Palej; Laurie Radford; Jeffrey Ryan; J. Mark Scearce; David Scott; Linda Catlin Smith; Jesse Stewart; Kotoka Suzuki; and Marek Żebrowski.

In October 2013, the PSQ worked with Maestro Krzysztof Penderecki on his Third Quartet (2008) and performed it at Symphony Space in New York City on the occasion of his 80th birthday.[6]

The Penderecki String Quartet was the first Canadian quartet to have recorded the complete Béla Bartók string quartet cycle.

In 2015 Polish composer Marek Żebrowski wrote "Fire" ("Pożar") for the quartet, which David Lynch used for his animated short of the same name.[7][8]

The Penderecki String Quartet has performed world-wide, including appearances in New York (Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall), Amsterdam (Concertgebouw), Hong Kong (Academy for the Arts), Los Angeles (REDCAT Hall at Disney Center), St. Petersburg (Sheremetev Palace), the Adam Festival in New Zealand, and throughout Europe in Rome, Madrid, Paris, Belgrade, Prague, Kraków, Vilnius, and Zagreb. The PSQ has also toured extensively in Mexico, Venezuela and Brazil and from coast to coast in Canada.

PROGRAM

Rebecca Clarke (1886-1979) Trio

Darren Sigesmund New work

Robert Schumann Trio No. 1 in d minor Op 63

ARTISTS

Violinist Scott St. John, from London Ontario, is known for his joyful style of music-making and inspiring chamber music coaching. Scott is Concertmaster and Artistic Partner of the innovative ROCO Chamber Orchestra in Houston, Texas, and teaches Chamber Music at University of Toronto. He performs frequently with the St. John – Mercer – Park Piano Trio, and returns often to the summertime Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont. Recently Scott was appointed as “Chamber Music Artist-in-Residence” at Western University in London Ontario.

Rachel Mercer Described as a “pure chamber musician” (The Globe and Mail) creating “moments of pure magic” (Toronto Star), Canadian cellist Rachel Mercer has appeared as a soloist and chamber musician across five continents.

Grand prize winner of the 2001 Vriendenkrans Competition in Amsterdam, Rachel is Principal Cello of the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa and Artistic Director of the “5 at the First” Chamber Music Series in Hamilton. Rachel regularly collaborates with her longtime duo partner, pianist Angela Park, and was cellist of JUNO Award-winning piano quartet Ensemble Made In Canada (2008–2020), AYR Trio (2010–2020), and the Aviv Quartet (2002–2010). Rachel has given masterclasses across North America, South Africa, and in Israel and has given talks on performance, careers, and the music business. An advocate for new Canadian music, Rachel has commissioned and premiered over 25 solo and chamber works, including cello concertos by Stewart Goodyear and Kevin Lau.

Rachel is now the Principal Cellis, NYCO.

Angela Park has established herself as one of Canada’s most sought-after pianists. Praised for her “stunningly beautiful pianism” (Grace Welsh Prize, Chicago), “beautiful tone and sensitivity” (American Record Guide), and for performing “with such brilliant clarity it took your breath away” (Chapala, Mexico). Angela’s versatility as both soloist and chamber musician has led to performances across Canada, as well as in the United States, Europe, Japan and Mexico. She has performed for such notable series as Montreal’s Pro Musica, Ottawa Chamberfest, Toronto Summer Music Festival, Parry Sound’s Festival of the Sound, Winnipeg Virtuosi, Debut Atlantic and Prairie Debut Tours, Orchestra London Canada, Sinfonia Toronto, Stratford Symphony, and the Northern Lights Music Festival in Mexico.

 Angela developed a passion for chamber music early on in her music studies, and this has led to a varied career as a chamber musician. She has developed a longstanding collaborative partnership with violist Sharon Wei, both as a duo, and as former founding members (2006-2022) of the renowned Ensemble Made In Canada. Their work together reached across every province and territory across Canada, culminating in a JUNO Award for their Mosaïque Album in 2021. They have also toured as a duo for Debut Atlantic and Prairie Debut, and continue to collaborate regularly with other musicians across the country.

Cellist Rachel Mercer and Angela have also forged an important duo partnership since their first performance in 2006. As the Mercer-Park Duo, they have performed and recorded a vast range of repertoire for cello and piano with a focus on Canadian contemporary composers. Rachel and Angela have been privileged to work with violinist Yehonatan Berick as the AYR Trio (2010-2020), with Mayumi Seiler as the Seiler Trio, and with Scott St. John as the St. John-Mercer-Park Trio.

Angela was previously a pianist for Piano Six – New Generation, an organization that toured remote communities across Canada. In 2019 she joined pianist Stéphan Sylvestre to form a piano duo, focusing on the complete Brahms Symphonies in their four-hand versions. Among other collaborations, Angela has performed with such international artists as violist Rivka Golani, violinist Martin Beaver, clarinetist James Campbell, soprano Leslie Fagan, and leading members of the Montreal and Toronto Symphonies.

NOTES

Rebecca Helferich Clarke (27 August 1886 – 13 October 1979) was a British classical composer and violist. Internationally renowned as a viola virtuoso, she also became one of the first female professional orchestral players in London.[1]

Rebecca Clarke had German and American parents, and spent substantial periods of her life in the United States, where she permanently settled after World War II. She was born in Harrow and studied at the Royal Academy of Music and Royal College of Music in London. Stranded in the United States at the outbreak of World War II, she married composer and pianist James Friskin in 1944. Clarke died at her home in New York at the age of 93.

Darren Sigismund 2010 JUNO nominee and Galaxie Rising Star winner Canadian trombonist Darren Sigesmund has firmly established his Strands project as one of Canada's leading national and international touring ensembles [for much more, just google Sigismunc]

Here is a veritable Trio to End All Trios! Friends and incredible musicians all (Scott and Angela are  husband/wife), they make for a rare combination! (Literally rare, since they all have day jobs in different places - Scott at U of T; Rachel wtih National Arts Center Orchestra, and Rachel at Western.) So we’re very happy that they could manage a date for us!

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTIST

Ms. Graef performed a wonderful concert for us a couple of years back. Here is her return engagement.

American cellist Anita Graef has garnered praise as a musician of “superb artistry” (Pasadena Now) who plays with “high energy and polish” (WQXR). She has appeared both nationally and internationally in concerto, recital and chamber music engagements, while establishing a reputation as an artist who is equally at home exploring traditional as well as contemporary works, along with a deep commitment to service, outreach and education. Notable appearances include features in Strings Magazine, as well as Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert series, and “Concerts from the Library of Congress.” She has also performed as a guest of various radio programs, including WQXR, WFMT and NPR, among others.

As the winner of the 2022 Gheens Young Artist Award and the 2021 American Prize, recent seasons have seen concerto debuts from Ms. Graef with the Louisville Orchestra, the Arkansas Philharmonic, the Riverside Symphony, the Miami Valley Symphony and many others. She recently concluded an appointment as the 2023 Duncanson Artist-in-Residence for the Taft Museum of Art. Upcoming recital and chamber music appearances include engagements with the Norton Museum of Art (West Palm Beach, FL), Saugerties Pro Musica, the Turner Center for the Arts (Valdosta, GA), Musica Sierra (Lake Tahoe/Reno, NV), the Adirondack Lakes Center for the Arts, and the Partnership for the Performing Arts (Brookings, OR), with return appearances to “Live from WFMT” and others. Ms. Graef has appeared at numerous festivals, most recently including the Victoria Bach Festival, Green Lake Festival of Music, along with Artist-in-Residence positions at pianoSonoma and Lake George Music Festival. In 2023, Anita assumed the role of Artistic Director for Tallgrass Chamber Music Festival.

Ms. Graef also serves as the Artistic Director of the Juliani Ensemble, an inventive, multi-faceted chamber ensemble, with whom she performs extensively both on tour and in residence in Chicago, directing their Saturday Salons series. In 2023, along with the other core members of the Juliani Ensemble, she helped to launch an outreach program in collaboration with the Mayfair Arts Center providing free music instruction, lessons and resources to students of all ages and backgrounds in Chicago’s South Side neighborhoods.

Born into a family of professional musicians, Anita grew up surrounded by music. Her introduction started with piano studies, while beginning to study cello at age four, later making her concerto debut at the age of twelve. She went on to obtain a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Michigan’s School of Music, Theatre, and Dance, where she studied with professor Anthony Elliott. Following this, she received her Master’s Degree from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music as a CSO/CCM Fellow, under the tutelage of Ilya Finkelshteyn.

When not making music, Anita enjoys reading, cooking, crocheting, weight lifting, hiking, horseback riding, any kind of dance training, spending time with friends and family, volunteer work and exploring new cities.

Ms. Graef performs on a modern Italian cello by Ferdinando Garimberti, dated 1923.

PROGRAM

Exploring the historical ties between France and North America through music, and the mutual influence between 20th century French and North American composers.

Debussy: La cathédral engloutie (The Sunken Cathedral)

Poulenc :Improvisation No.11

Tailleferre: Impromptu

Poulenc: Improvisation No.15

Tailleferre: Valse Lente

Debussy:Lescollinesd’Anacapri(The Hills of Anacapri)

Tristan Savella plays  Frederic Rzewski: IV.“WinnsboroCottonMillBlues”

Samuel Barber - selections from Souvenirs, 4-hands

Waltz - Pas de deux - Two-Step -- Galop

Alexina Louie:  Fastforward (Therrien)

Debussy (played by Savella):

II.La puerta del vino (WineGate): Mouvement de Habanera

VI.Général Lavine-eccentric: Dans le style et le mouvement d’unCakewalk

X.Canope (CanopicJar)

XII.Feuxd’artifice(Firework

Ravel: Rapsodie Espagnole (4-hands version)

Jean-Luc Therrien

’For the early birds, there was a half hour chamber music performance by students of the Glenn Gould School. Jean-Luc Therrien, in his final year of the Artist Diploma program, performed seven of the nine movements from Robert Schumann’s Waldszenen (Forest Scenes) Op. 82. It was easy to find oneself in the haunted forest of Schumann’s imagination. His playing was absolutely exquisite.’’

Tristan Savella

Based in Toronto, Filipino-American pianist Tristan Savella has been an active soloist and chamber musician in the United States, Canada, and Europe. His career has taken him to performances at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall in New York City, the Schloss Mirabell in Salzburg, Austria, and the Canadian Opera Company’s Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre in Toronto. In 2019, he performed Saint Saens’ Carnival of the Animals with the Toronto Concert Orchestra, under Vincent Cheng, at Flato Markham Theater in Markham, Ontario and in 2013, his Piano Trio was chosen to represent the Eastman School of Music as part of “The Conservatory Project”, sponsored by the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. 

Tristan holds a Bachelor of Music in Applied Music from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, a Master of Arts (Klavier Solistenausbildung) with highest distinction from the Universität Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, an Artist Diploma from The Glenn Gould School in Toronto, and a Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Toronto. He is also an alumnus of the Interlochen Arts Academy in Interlochen, Michigan. His principal teachers have included T.J. Lymenstull, George Kern, John O’Conor, Lydia Wong, Jamie Parker, and the late Marietta Orlov and Nelita True.

Furthermore, Tristan is the recipient of multiple prizes at various national and international competitions, including third place at the Concours Flame in Paris, first place at the Bradshaw and Buono International Piano Competition in New York City, and a finalist prize at YoungArts Week – sponsored by the National YoungArts Foundation – in Miami. Additionally, Tristan was awarded third prize at the 2018 Glenn Gould School Chamber Music Competition, alongside cellist, Kimberly Jeong. Apart from performing, Tristan works as a private piano and music theory teacher in Toronto, as well as an accompanist at The Royal Conservatory of Music and the Canadian Children’s Opera Company. Aside from music, Tristan enjoys traveling and is an avid tennis and ping pong fan.

PROGRAM 

TBA

ARTISTS

The QUATUOR MAGENTA (Ida Derbesse, 1st violin; Elena Watson, 2nd violin; Claire Pass-Lanneau, viola; Fiona Robson, cello) is a string quartet founded in 2021 and based in Paris. For the upcoming seasons, the quartet is in residence at Proquartet - Centre Européen de Musique de Chambre and junior artist in residence at the Singer-Polignac Foundation. 

Finalist at the 8th Joseph Haydn Chamber Music Competition in Vienna, the quartet also won prizes at the 2023 FNAPEC competition (Académie des Beaux-Arts scholarship) and the Zukunftsklang Competition Stuttgart 2022 (3rd prize). 

The Quatuor Magenta has been invited to perform at numerous festivals in France, including the Festival de Radio France Montpellier, the Musikfest Parisienne, the Festival de la Chaise-Dieu, Un Été en France with Gautier Capuçon, the Modigliani Quartet’s Festival Vibre !, and the International Piano Festival in la Roque d’Anthéron, as well as in Switzerland (Festival de la Collégiale in Neuchâtel) and in Germany (Klangraum Konzerte in Cologne). They are featured on flutist Julien Beaudiment’s album California Dreamin’ which was released in 2023 on Klarthe. 

This season, contemporary music has pride of place with Quatuor Magenta’s participation in the Kronos Quartet’s “50 for the Future” Marathon at the Philharmonie de Paris’s String Quartet Biennial, as well as a recording project of Olivier Korber’s string quartet and performances of Yves Balmer’s string quartet in spring 2024. 

The Quatuor Magenta studies with the Quatuor Ébène at their quartet academy at the University of Music and Performing Arts Munich, with the Quatuor Modigliani in the new Élite program at the École Normale de Musique de Paris, and with Rainer Schmidt of the Hagen Quartett at the Basel University of Music. They are grateful for the support of the Culture and Musique Foundation (Fondation de France) and that of ADAMI, and they work with Chapeau l’Artiste Production. 

PROGRAM

Brahms Piano Quintet

Haydn String Quartet TBA 

+ piano solo TBA

ARTISTS

Noted for “an extraordinary range of colour” (Montreal Gazette), and “poetic brilliance” (Toronto Star), Canadian pianist Francine Kay has performed extensively in Europe, North America, and Asia, at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Weill Recital Hall, Lincoln Center, Salle Gaveau, The National Gallery, Roy Thomson Hall, The Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts, and Bargemusic. Francine Kay made her New York debut at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall as the winner and Recitalist of the Year of the New York Pro Piano Competition.

She has been soloist with orchestras such as the Toronto Symphony, the Princeton Symphony, New York’s West Side Chamber Orchestra, the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra London, the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, Symphony Nova Scotia, the Victoria Symphony and Sinfonia Toronto among others, under conductors such as Georg Tintner, Mark Laycock, Nurhan Arman, Agnes Grossman, Kevin Mallon, Jonathan Yates, and Simon Streatfeild. 

Francine Kay’s recordings on the Analekta and Audio Ideas labels have received international acclaim. Her recording of the Debussy Preludes was nominated for a JUNO Award and selected by Germany’s Fono Forum as as Disc of the Month, citing its “astonishing grace and floating sonorities”. Francine Kay gave the premiere of Canadian composer Oskar Morawetz’s Four Contrasting Moods which became a live recording for CBC records.  Ms. Kay’s performances have been broadcast on NPR, the BBC, WFMT, WCNY, Radio France, and the CBC, among others.

Ms. Kay’s collaborations include groups such as the Penderecki, Avalon, Wister, Harlem, Arianna String Quartets, Cantata Profana and Trio Arkel. She has performed at festivals such as the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, the Icicle Creek International Chamber Music Festival, Music Mountain, the Banff Summer Festival, the Orford Arts Centre, the International Course of Interpretation, Nowy Sacz, Poland and the 60th Chopin Festival, Marienbad, Czech Republic. 

Francine Kay was the recipient of the Women’s Musical Club of Toronto Career Development Award, the Chalmers Award, and grants from the Canada Council.

Ms. Kay received her Bachelors and Masters degrees at the Juilliard School studying with Adele Marcus, the Artist Diploma from the Glenn Gould School in the master classes of Leon Fleisher, and the Doctor of Musical Arts from SUNY Stony Brook studying with Gilbert Kalish. Ms. Kay was a chamber music fellow at Tanglewood, and a participant at the Banff Centre where she participated in the classes of George Sebok and Marek Jablonski. 

Francine Kay is currently on the faculty of Princeton University and is a regular faculty artist at the Zodiac Academy and Festival in the south of France. 

Celebrating their 36th  anniversary, the Penderecki String Quartet began their career as winners of the Penderecki Prize at the National Chamber Music Competition in Łódz, Poland in 1986.   Now based in Waterloo, Ontario where they have been Quartet-in-Residence at Wilfrid Laurier University since 1991, The Penderecki String Quartet has become one of the most celebrated chamber ensembles of their generation.  The four Penderecki musicians (now originating from Poland, Canada, and USA) bring their varied yet collective experience to create performances that demonstrate their “remarkable range of technical excellence and emotional sweep” (Toronto, Globe and Mail).

The PSQ's international performing schedule has included appearances in New York (Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall), Amsterdam (Concertgebouw), Hong Kong (Academy for the Arts), Los Angeles (REDCAT Hall at Disney Center), St. Petersburg (Sheremetev Palace), the Adam Festival in New Zealand, and throughout Europe in Rome, Madrid, Paris, Belgrade, Prague, Krakow, Vilnius, and Zagreb.  The PSQ has also toured extensively in Mexico, Australia, Venezuela, Brazil, Colombia, and from coast to coast in Canada.

Dedicated educators, the PSQ have been recent guests at Bloomington Indiana University’s String Academy, the Beijing Conservatory, University of Southern California (Los Angeles), University of British Columbia in Vancouver, and with their partner universities in Osnabrück, Germany and Lyon, France.

To this day the PSQ is a devoted champion of the music of our time, having premiered over 100 new works from composers in Canada and abroad.   Penderecki Quartet's large discography includes over three dozen recordings including the chamber music repertoire of Beethoven and Brahms on both the Marquis and Eclectra labels, as well as the first Canadian release of the six Béla Bartók quartets.  Their disc of Marjan Mozetich’s “Lament in the Trampled Garden” won the 2010 JUNO Award for Best Composition.   In October 2013, the PSQ worked with Maestro Krzysztof Penderecki on his Third Quartet (2008) and performed it at Symphony Space in New York City on the occasion of his 80th birthday.  This followed with the recording of Penderecki’s Third Quartet along with quartets of Norbert Palej on the Marquis label.  In 2022, the PSQ was featured in Howard Shore’s soundtrack to David Cronenberg’s film Crimes of the Future.

The Penderecki Quartet has performed with diverse artists such as Atar Arad, Jeremy Menuhin, Stewart Goodyear, James Campbell and have recently appeared with jazz saxophonist Jane Bunnett, jazz pianists Egberto Gismonti, Don Thomson and David Braid, pipa virtuoso Ching Wong, Dancetheatre David Earle, Pentaedre Wind Quintet, actor Colin Fox, and New York turntable artist DJ Spooky.

The Penderecki Quartet continue to be active members of the Faculty of Music at Laurier University where they have built the string program to be one of the top programs in Canada, attracting an international body of students. Their annual Quartetfest at Laurier is an intensive study seminar and concert series that has featured such ensembles as the Tokyo, Fine Arts, Lafayette, Miro, Ying, and Ariana String Quartets.

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ARTISTS

Alexander Tselyakov, piano

Daniel Tselyakov, piano

Alexander Tselyakov Pianist and educator, Professor Alexander Tselyakov has been described as a "phenomenal pianist", having "an intoxicating sound", and "a perfect artistic individuality", and "...representing the best aspect of Russian pianism and all its attributes... effectively synthesized the emotional balance of Arthur Rubinstein and the more highly-strung febrile quality of Horowitz." Harris Goldsmith, New York Concert Review.

He began his concert career with the State Philharmonic Orchestra in his native Soviet Union at the age of nine. Alexander Tselyakov went on to win one of the leading prizes at the prestigious VIIIth International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, the Second International Music Competition of Japan, the Ibla Grand Prize International Piano Competition and the Mazara del Vallo International Piano and Orchestra Competition in Italy, the Israel Competition and the New Orleans International Piano Competition. His playing has inspired standing ovations in Japan, Germany, Italy, Israel, Spain, Portugal, France, England, Sweden, Austria, Poland, Finland, the United States, Denmark, the Netherlands, Turkey and Canada where he now makes his home. Tselyakov combines virtuosity with breath-taking musicality in the Russian tradition of great pianists. He studied with Lev Naumov (custodian of the Heinrich Neuhaus methods that are credited with producing many extraordinary twentieth-century Russian keyboard masters such as Gilels and Richter) at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow. Tselyakov has performed frequently with leading orchestras including the Leningrad Philharmonic, the Moscow Philharmonic, the Moscow Radio Symphony and the State Byelorussian Philharmonic. He has appeared with the Tokyo Philharmonic, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestra Symphonique de Québec, the Buffalo Philharmonic, the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, the Virginia Symphony, the Istanbul State Symphony Orchestra and Symphony Nova Scotia, to name a few.

Tselyakov has appeared as a recitalist at major festivals and concert halls around the world. He has performed at the Shostakovich Philharmonic Hall in St. Petersburg, the Great Hall of the Moscow State Conservatory, the Tel-Aviv Museum, the Toronto Art Centre (the Ford Centre), the Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto, the Palais Montcalm in Québec, the Kleinhans Music Hall in Buffalo, the Temppeliakin Kirkko Hall in Helsinki, the University of Fine Arts and Music in Tokyo, the Conservatorio Publico Professional in Granada (Spain), and at the Regentenbau Hall in Bad Kissingen (Germany). While still in Russia Tselyakov was appointed concert solo pianist with the Byelorussian State Philharmonic and Assistant Professor of Music at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow.

Tselyakov continued to impress audiences and critics alike. Several more important prizes followed along with recitals for such dignitaries as Michael Gorbachev and the late Yitzhak Rabin. In 1994, Tselyakov immigrated to Canada and made his debut to great acclaim that December at the Ford Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto. Recitals across the country soon started to materialize.

Tselyakov is now counted in the ranks of Canada’s leading concert pianists. That indescribable “something extra” which is so evident in his concerts made an immediate impact on Canadian audiences and continues to do so. Recent concerts have included a highly successful performance at Carnegie Recital Hall in New York, critically acclaimed concerts at Wigmore Hall in London, performances at The Centre Cultural (Paris, France), the University of Chicago, the International Piano Festival in Istanbul, at Merkin Hall (New York), at the International Piano Festival (San Jose, CA), the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival, the Phillips Collection (Washington), the Embassy Series (Washington), at Blackheath Hall (London), the Vendsyssel Festival (Denmark), the Stockholm-Royal Palace Music Festival (Sweden), at Bösendorfer Saal (Vienna, Austria), at Cristofori Concerten Hall (Amsterdam), and at the Concert & Congress Centre de Doelen, Rotterdam (Netherlands). Tselyakov has also been heard recently on WQXR New York’s “Reflections on the Keyboard”, on the Danish Radio, on the BBC Radio (London, UK), ON Erstsendung, DeutschlandRadio Berlin (Germany) and on CBC Radio (Canada).

Active as a chamber musician, Tselyakov collaborates with many leading Canadian musicians and is Artistic Director of the Pender Harbour Chamber Music Festival, BC and of the Clear Lake Chamber Music Festival, MB, Canada.

Alexander Tselyakov lives in Brandon, Manitoba where he has held a full-time position as Professor of Piano at Brandon University since 2003.

Daniel Tselyakov  Daniel Tselyakov has garnered acclaim for the sensitivity and depth of his interpretations, as well as the rare emotional intensity, bold energy, and virtuosity that he brings to his performances. His musical journey began within a family deeply rooted in music, as he started his piano studies at the age of five under the guidance of his father, the renowned Canadian pianist Alexander Tselyakov. Additionally, he received instruction from Aster Lai and his mother, Alla Turbanova.

His prodigious talent became evident when he completed his Royal Conservatory of Music First Exam for Grade 8 with exceptional results at the tender age of eight.

Continuing his musical journey at Brandon University’s School of Music, Daniel’s dedication and talent flourished under the guidance of Dr. Michael Kim. His pursuit of musical excellence led him to complete a Bachelor of Music degree at the prestigious Oberlin Conservatory, where he studied with Angela Cheng. Subsequently, he achieved a Master of Music degree at the Université de Montréal under the tutelage of Jimmy Brière. Daniel’s unwavering commitment to music and his exceptional talent propelled him to earn a Doctoral degree in Piano and Musicology under the mentorship of Dr. Ning Lu at the University of Utah, USA, where he also imparted his expertise by teaching piano keyboard courses.

Daniel’s journey has been adorned with numerous high-profile scholarships, trophies, awards, and competition wins. Noteworthy among these are the MRMTA National Competition, Winnipeg Chamber Orchestra Young Artist Award, McLellan Orchestra Competition with Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra Award, Women’s Musical Club of Winnipeg Best Performance Competition, National Canadian Music Competition, Livorno International Piano Competition (Italy), MTNA National (USA) Piano Competition, Utah Music Teachers Association Piano Concerto/Orchestra Competition, Utah MTNA Competition Artist Performance, and the San Jose International Piano Competition (USA), among others. His exceptional talent earned him full scholarships to esteemed music academies, including Pinchas Zukerman’s Young Artist Program, Art of the Piano Festival, Toronto Summer Music, and PianoTexas International Academy & Festival.

Throughout his musical education, Daniel studied under legendary mentors such as Sergei Babayan, Yoheved Kaplinsky, Olga Kern, Marc-André Hamelin, André Laplante, Marc Durand, and John Perry. His remarkable accomplishments include being the youngest musician ever invited as a guest artist with the prestigious Virtuosi Concert Series. He has also performed as a soloist with renowned orchestras, including the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the Canadian Sinfonietta, the Winnipeg Symphony Chamber Orchestra, and the San Luis Potosi Symphony Orchestra in Mexico. Notably, at the age of 12, he performed Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2 as a soloist with the Penderecki String Quartet. His performances have graced prominent festivals worldwide, such as Music and Beyond, Ottawa ChamberFest, Perry Sound Festival (where he was twice honored as Young Artist of the Year at the Charles W. Stockey Centre for the Performing Arts), Clear Lake Chamber Music Festival (where he also serves as artistic director), Agassiz Chamber Music Festival, Texas International Festival, and the Gijon International Piano Festival in Spain. Daniel’s acclaimed performances have adorned prestigious music stages including Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto, Markham Performing Arts Centre, Gallivan Performing Arts Center, and many more. He has also presented captivating solo recitals across Canada, the USA, and Europe in countries like Italy, France, and Spain.

Presently, Daniel proudly serves as the co-Artistic Director of the Clear Lake Chamber Music Festival in Canada. Through his dedication, he aims to nurture a rich musical experience and share his immense talent with audiences around the world.

PROGRAM

Part 1 of Ms. Taves' complete cycle of Beethoven Piano Sonatas: 17 "Tempest", 15 "Pastorale", 23 "Appassionata"

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

PROGRAM

Part 2 of Ms. Taves' Complete Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle: 5, 9, 27 and 32 (the final sonata)

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

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ARTIST

David Gillham, violin, has an extensive solo and chamber music career, having performed throughout Asia, Europe, the Americas and South Africa. He has performed in major venues such as Tokyo’s Opera City and Bunka Kaiken Recital Halls, Baxter Concert Hall in Cape Town SA and the Chicago Cultural Centre, as part of the prestigious Dame Myra Hess memorial concerts.

An internationally respected pedagogue, David is regularly invited to teach, give masterclasses and serve on competition juries in North America, Europe and Asia.

In 2011, he joined the Faculty at the University of British Columbia, in Vancouver Canada.

As an enthusiastic interpreter of chamber music, Mr. Gillham is currently a member of the Vetta chamber players, the Archytas Ensemble and the Ridge Piano Trio. He enjoyed extensive concertizing with the Arianna String Quartet as its second violinist from 2005-2012. In addition, he enjoys collaborating with musical personalities such as Regis Pasquier, Violaine Melançon, Johannes Moser, Noah Bendix-Balgley, James Dunham, Atar Arad, Anton Nel, Jose Franch Ballester, Jane Coop and Robert Silverman to name just a few. He is regularly invited to festivals such as the Hammelburg, (Germany), Zodiac ( France ), FEMUSC (Brazil), Kuandu (Taiwan), Sonoran (USA), Pender Harbour and the Domaine Forget International Music Festival in Charlevoix, Quebec.

Inspired by Franco Gulli and Enrico Cavallo to continue performing the standard violin and piano duo repertoire with the same stylistic precision and unity as a string quartet, Mr. Gillham has performed the violin and piano duo repertoire with pianist Chiharu Iinuma for 20 years. Concerts have taken the duo to China, Taiwan, Japan, and across both the United States and Canada.

For Centaur Records, the duo has recorded sonatas by Grieg, Mendelssohn, Respighi and Beethoven.

As a soloist with orchestra, David has given performances with the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, the Gateway Festival Orchestra of St. Louis, the Korea Jade Philharmonic, the West Coast Symphony , the Grand Forks Symphony and the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra. With the UBC symphony Orchestra, Mr. Gillham has toured Western Canada, performing the Tchaikovsky violin concerto and performed John Corigliano’s Chaconne from the Red Violin, with the composer in attendance as part of UBC’s Corigliano Festival.

Beyond the standard repertoire of solo and chamber music, Mr. Gillham has dedicated himself to the performance and recording of todays composers. His recording of Marcus Goddard’s two string quartets and string trio with the Archytas ensemble on the Palladino label, was released in 2020. He has also recently recorded Stephen Chatman’s Pender Harbour Suite for piano trio with pianist Corey Hamm and cellist Eric Wilson.

In 2018, Mr. Gillham had the honour of performing Juno nominated composer Alice Ping Yee Ho’s, Coeur а Coeur for violin and piano with Corey Hamm, live on CBC at the Juno Awards Classical Showcase Concert.

Mr. Gillham’s students have appeared as soloist with the Vancouver Symphony orchestra, The Vancouver Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vancouver Metropolitan Orchestra and the Philharmonia Northwest of Seattle. Many of his former students hold positions in major symphony orchestras, and have continued their studies at institutions such as the Colburn Conservatory in Los Angeles and the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. Mr. Gillham is regularly invited to teach at universities such as Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music, the Wuhan Conservatory, the Kaohsiung Normal University, the University of Music and Theatre in Hamburg, McGill University and the University of Toronto.

Mr. Gillham is co-ordinator of the violin-sessions at the Domaine Forget International Music Festival and Academy in Charlevoix, Quebec. The intensive four week program for gifted and advanced students from around the world, regularly features masterclasses by renowned violinists such as Vadim Gluzman, Rachel Barton Pine, Vadim Repin, Christian Tetzlaff and Midori.

A graduate of Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, the Peabody Conservatory and the University of Manitoba, in 2002, David was awarded the Queen Elizabeth Golden Jubilee Medal for his contribution to the arts in Canada.

He plays on a violin made by Carlo Tononi, Venice Italy, 1725.

Japanese pianist Chiharu Iinuma has been increasingly in high demand as a teacher, coach and ensemble pianist.  A founding member of the Ridge Trio, the Chamber Ensemble Bloomington and the Duo Gillham-Iinuma, for many years she was the studio pianist for Joseph Gingold, Janos Starker, Franco Gulli, Neli Shkolnikova, Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, Miriam Fried, Yuval Yaron, Taras Gabora, James Campbell and IU String Academy at Indiana University's Jacobs School.  In 1993, she was invited to participate in the inaugural Isaac Stern Chamber Music Workshop at Carnegie Hall in New York.  She has been heard on NHK and CBC radios over the years.  In recent years, she has played in concerts and festivals in Germany, Sweden, Scotland, China, Taiwan, Japan, as well as across U.S. and Canada collaborating with Arianna String Quartet, Pendereki String Quartet, Adrian Anantawan, Dale Barltrop, Ariel Barnes,  Rachel Barton-Pine, Martin Beaver, James Campbell, Timothy Chooi, Marc Coppey, Mark Fewer, David Gillham, Tom Landschoot, Blair Lofgren, Antonio Lysy, Johannes Moser, Philippe Muller, Christoph Schickedanz, Alan Stepansky, Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, Rafael Wallfisch, Rob Weir, Thomas Wiebe, Eric Wilson, Min-Ho Yeh, among others. 

From 2001 to 2004, she was the Director of Accompanying at the University of Central Arkansas where the Duo Gillham-Iinuma was "Duo in Residence".  Chiharu has served as a staff pianist and coach at institutes such as the Meadowmount School of Music, Indiana University Summer String Academy and currently at the Domaine Forget International Music and Dance Academy in Quebec, Canada, where she is also on a faculty for the Collaborative Piano Program. 

She has recorded "Edvard Grieg: The Three Sonatas for Violin and Piano" with David Gillham for Centaur Records (CRC2873), and "Johannes Brahms: The Complete works for Violin and Piano" with Christoph Schickedanz also for Centaur Records (CRC3498).   

Chiharu was born in Nagano and raised in Tokyo, Japan.  Following her graduation from the Toho Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo, she was awarded the Asahi Beer Arts Foundation Scholarship, which enabled her to study at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music where she received her Performer Diploma, Artist Diploma and Master’s degree.  Her teachers include Yoshimi Tamaki, Shuku Iwasaki, Shigeo Neriki and Leonard Hokanson.  

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Guy Few is a virtuoso. As a powerful pianist and astonishing trumpeter, he delights his audiences with his intensity and charm. Montreal's Le Devoir calls him "outrageously gifted" and "quite simply phenomenal". It is no wonder that he is in demand as a soloist and has played with many orchestras in Canada and the USA.

Guy, often with Stephanie, has been a frequent performer on KWCMS concerts.

Stephanie Mara received an Associate Diploma in Piano Performance from the Royal Conservatory of Music and a Bachelor Degree in Piano Performance from Wilfrid Laurier University, where she studied with Garth Beckett. As a collaborative pianist and coach for Wilfrid Laurier University, she works with students majoring in brass, bassoon, clarinet and cello and have assisted in masterclasses with Alain Trudel, Dennis Najoom and James Campbell. Her festival and series appearances include the Elora Festival, the Festival of the Sound, the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival, Barrie Colours of Music and Quad City Arts (U.S.A.).

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ARTISTS

Four musicians with equally stellar pedigrees formed the New Orford String Quartet with the goal of developing a new model for a touring string quartet.  Their concept – to bring four elite orchestral leaders and soloists together on a regular basis over many years to perform chamber music at the highest level – has resulted in a quartet that maintains a remarkably fresh perspective while bringing a palpable sense of joy to each performance. The Toronto Star has described this outcome as “nothing short of electrifying. 

The New Orford String Quartet has seen astonishing success, giving annual concerts for national CBC broadcast and receiving unanimous critical acclaim, including two Opus Awards for Concert of the Year, and a 2017 JUNO Award for Best Classical Album. Recent seasons have featured return engagements in Chicago, Montreal and Toronto, as well as their New York City debut on Lincoln Center’s Great Performers series.

The original Orford String Quartet gave its first public concert in 1965, and became one of the best-known and most illustrious chamber music ensembles. After more than 2,000 concerts on six continents, the Orford String Quartet gave its last concert in 1991. Two decades later, in July 2009, the New Orford String Quartet took up this mantle, giving its first concert for a sold-out audience at the Orford Arts Centre. The New Orford has since gone on to perform concerts throughout North America and lead residencies at the University of Toronto, Schulich School of Music, Mount Royal University, and Syracuse University. In September 2017 the Quartet became Ensemble in Residence at the University of Toronto, and was recently named Artistic Directors of the Prince Edward County Music Festival, where they made their curatorial debut in September 2018.

In 2011, the Quartet recorded its debut album of the final quartets of Schubert and Beethoven, released by Bridge Records to international acclaim. The recording was hailed as one of the top CDs of 2011 by La Presse and CBC In Concert and nominated for a JUNO Award in 2012. Critics have described the recording as “…flawless… a match made in heaven!” (Classical Music Sentinel); “a performance of rare intensity” (Audiophile Audition); and “nothing short of electrifying… listen and weep.” (The Toronto Star). Their follow-up album of the Brahms Op.51 Quartets was equally well-received, and received the 2017 JUNO for best chamber music album.

The New Orford is dedicated to promoting Canadian works, both new commissions and neglected repertoire from the previous century. New Orford String Quartet projects have included performances of major Canadian string quartets from the 20th century including works by Glenn Gould, Sir Ernest MacMillan, Jacques Hétu, R. Murray Schafer, and Claude Vivier, as well as commissions of new works from composers such as Francois Dompierre, Gary Kulesha, Airat Ichmouratov and Tim Brady. The Quartet thrives on exploring the rich chamber music repertoire; recent collaborations include those with pianists Marc-André Hamelin and Menahem Pressler.

The Quartet regularly tours in the major cities of North America, including Washington, D.C., Toronto, and Los Angeles; at the same time, the members feel strongly about bringing this music to areas that don’t often hear it, and as a result perform frequently in remote rural locations and smaller Canadian communities. The New Orford String Quartet are Artists-in-Residence at Western University in London, ON.  

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ARTISTS

For 50 years, concert pianist Janina Fialkowska has enchanted audiences and critics around the world. She has been praised for her musical integrity, her refreshing natural approach and her unique piano sound thus becoming “one of the Grandes Dames of piano playing” (Frankfurter Allgemeine).

Born in Canada, she began her piano studies with her mother at age 4 continuing on in her native Montreal with Yvonne Hubert. In Paris she studied with Yvonne Lefébure and in New York at the Juilliard School with Sascha Gorodnitzki, experiencing the best of both French and Russian piano traditions. Her career was launched in 1974, when the legendary Arthur Rubinstein became her mentor after her prize-winning performance at his inaugural Master Piano Competition, calling her a “born Chopin interpreter” laying the foundation for her lifelong identification with this composer.

Since then she has performed with the foremost orchestras worldwide under the baton of such conductors as Zubin Mehta, Bernard Haitink, Lorin Maazel, Sir Georg Solti, Sir Roger Norrington and Yannick Nézet-Séguin, to name one of the younger generation. She has won special recognition for a series of important premieres, notably Liszt’s newly discovered Third Piano Concerto with the Chicago Symphony and several contemporary piano concertos. Ms Fialkowska's discography includes many award-winning discs, e.g. the BBC Music Magazine’s 2013 “Instrumental CD of the Year" award as well as the Canadian "Juno Award" in 2018.

Her native Canada has bestowed upon her their highest honors: “Officer of the Order of Canada”, the “Governor General’s 2012 Lifetime Achievement Award in Classical Music” (Canada's equivalent to the US Kennedy Centre Awards), as well as three honorary doctorates. She passes on her wide musical experience in master classes and at her annual “International Piano Academy” in Bavaria, where she now resides and makes frequent appearances as a juror of the world's most prestigious piano competitions.

2020 began promising with another tour in North America featuring concerts in five Canadian provinces including a highly acclaimed recital at Salle Bourgie in Montreal as well as a recital at Willamette University in Oregon’s capital Salem, before the consequences of the corona epidemic stopped her tour cancelling her last two concerts. The subsequent lockdowns prevented numerous further engagements, although a brief loosening of the restrictions allowed her to return to the prestigious Klavier Festival Ruhr for an enthusiastically acclaimed recital in Dortumund (" ... a real pianistic moment of glory ..." Westallgemeine Zeitung) as well as to the Belfast International Arts Festival where she performed Beethoven’s piano concertos Nos. 3 and 4 in October of 2020

On May 7, 2021 Ms Fialkowska celebrated her 70th birthday.. Most of the concerts of her “Birthday Celebration Tour” were cancelled as well as the production of a new CD. Nevertheless her birthday was heartily celebrated in the media worldwide. In November her autobiography “A Note in Time” (Novum Publishing, London UK) was released.

She was looking forward to a tour of a seven weeks in Canada and the US starting in late January of 2022. But yet again, Covid restrictions and logistics put a spanner in the works. What remained of this tour was a short one-week trip across the Atlantic in early March with two concerts for Portland Piano International in the US and a triumphant comeback recital for the Ottawa Chamber Festival.

At the end of April 2022 Janina Fialkowska went on a tour of four Canadian provinces starting in Halifax with Symphony Nova Scotia, followed by a recital in Quebec City for the Club Musical. After concerts with the Calgary Philharmonic she performed in Ontario at the Guelph Festival as well as for the in Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Music Society and at the Hamilton Conservatory for the Arts and at Montreal’s Salle Bourgie ending in Saskatchewan with the Regina Symphony and a recital in Saskatoon for Gustin House. After that she returned to Europe to perform at the Berlin Piano Festival in Germany’s Capital as well as the prestigious Klavierfruehling Deutschlandsberg in Austria followed by several recitals in Germany and a concert with the Rijeka Symphony (Croatia). Highlights in 2023: Rerturning to the Klavierfestival Ruhr (Düsseldorf), a concert with the Cologne Chamber Orchestra, recitals in the UK as well as a tour of summer festivals and a winter tour in Ontario, Canada.

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After winning her first  competition at age 5, guitarist Cinzia Milani proceeded through more until, at age 12, she began tour performing and has since been just about everywhere  (including Canada - where she included master classes at the Royal Conservatory in Toronto.)

Here are a few more small excerpts: 

In the latest years she performed in Mexico and she was a part of jury at “Concurso Internacional de Guitarra de Sinaloa”.

She created the show "Venere" of music composed and performed live by her, in collaboration with the dance company "Performing Dance": the feminine universe told through music and dance.

Further to her work as a guitarist, are her activities as a violinist; graduate in violin, she plays in various orchestras and, with them, performs both in Italy, Spain and France.

One of the few “repeats” we do from our overseas musicians, Cinzia is invited back because of the impression she made last  year!

PROGRAM

Saturday, March 29, 2025

Emilie Mayer: String Quartet TBA + more TBA

Monday, March 31, 2025

Emilie Mayer: String Quartet TBA + more TBA

ARTIST

“…Until Saturday evening, I had never heard a performance by one of these multilingual quartets where the classical repertoire was delivered at a level that was competitive with the finest traditional groups. But the Carpe Diem Quartet, appearing at the Dumbarton Church, was extraordinary. Among these contemporary quartets who speak in different tongues, the Carpe Diem is the best one out there." (The Washington Post, Washington, DC)

One of the most unique and sought-after chamber ensembles on the concert stage today, the Carpe Diem String Quartet is a boundary-breaking ensemble that has earned widespread critical acclaim. Carpe Diem defies easy classification with programming that includes classical, Romani, tango, folk, pop, rock, and jazz-inspired music. The Quartet appears regularly on traditional concert series stages like Carnegie Hall in New York City, Jordan Hall in Boston, The National Gallery of Art in Washington DC, The Accademia Chigiana in Siena, Suntory Hall in Tokyo, National Library Concert Hall in Beijing, and The BinHai Performing Arts Center in Tianjin, as well as in unconventional venues like Poisson Rouge in NYC, the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society of Half-Moon Bay, CA, and the Mug & Brush in Columbus, OH. 

“The Carpe Diem players turned in a fiery and flexible performance that was astonishingly free…” (The New York Times)

“With enthrallingly flawless execution and miraculous synchronicity, the Carpe Diem String Quartet wowed their New York audience on Saturday night at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall… With a flair for the romantic and technical expertise to spare, the ensemble is a perfectly structured, dexterously concentrated success...This ensemble must be held in only the highest and most reverent esteem…” (New York Theatre Guide)

“One would have to search long and hard to find a more charming and enjoyable chamber music concert . . . A number of elements contributed to this end result, not the least of which the superb musicianship of the four musicians - Carpe Diem is a seriously talented quartet in the most traditional definition.” (Herald-Tribune, Sarasota, FL)

Carpe Diem’s CD “Montana,” by composer (and quartet member) Korine Fujiwara, received this rave review in Strings Magazine: Carpe Diem “must be one of the most adventurous groups of its kind.”  Carpe Diem has recorded the complete cycle of the nine string quartets of Sergei Taneyev for Naxos, as well as the complete string quartets of Jonathan Leshnoff, Reza Vali’s The Book of Calligraphy and Longing, two CDs with singer/guitarist Willy Porter, Anansi and the Sky God with John Gunther, saxophone, the complete string quartets of Richard Jordan Smoot, Bruce Wolosoff’s Songs without Words, Quintets No. 1 and 2 for Mandolin and String Quartet by mandolinist Jeff Midkiff, and Dances of the Yogurt Maker - Music for String Quartet and Turkish Folk Percussion by Erberk Eryilmaz. Recently the CDs of Jeff Midkiff’s and Erberk Eryilmaz’s music were awarded Gold Prizes at the Global Music Awards.

Carpe Diem seeks out, and is sought after by, artists from many different genres for collaborations, including : American singer/songwriter/ guitarist Willy Porter, Latin Grammy winner/bandoneón player Raul Juarena, klezmer clarinetist David Krakauer, cellist Yo Yo Ma, banjo virtuoso Jayme Stone, Shannon Heaton, Celtic flautist, mandolinist Jeff Midkiff, trumpeter Tom Battenberg, classical guitarist Nicolo Spera, Chinese pipa player Yihan Chen, Jazz Quartet the Whirly Birds, and world master of the Persian santoor Dariush Saghafi.

Devoted to expanding the reach and impact of community engagement, Carpe Diem has been awarded six transformative outreach grants from the PNC Foundation ArtsAlive Awards. The Quartet’s outreach performances incorporate diverse and eclectic repertoire tailored to specific audience demographics; use cameras, video, and artistic contributions to enrich presentations visually; rely on communication from the stage to introduce music and engage the audience; and explore fun, imaginative, and thought provoking themes to connect audiences to chamber music. These carefully crafted performances have allowed the Quartet to reach underserved audiences including The Apache Nation, Ohio Women’s Reformatory residents, and families at the Columbus Museum of Art.

Sam Weiser, violin, formerly a member of the award-winning Del Sol Quartet, is a lifelong chamber musician and advocate of contemporary music. 

Sam has performed all over the country, from the Herbst Theater and the Kennedy Center to a raft floating along the Yampa River. He has premiered over 150 new works by composers such as Vijay Iyer, Huang Ruo, and Chen Yi. Sam is the violinist in sfSound, a member of One Found Sound, and the Assistant Concertmaster of the California Symphony. He studied with Ian Swensen, Lucy Chapman, James Buswell, and Patinka Kopec. He holds bachelors’ degrees from Tufts University (computer science) and the New England Conservatory (violin), as well as a master’s degree from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (chamber music).

Marisa Ishikawa is an avid performer, educator, and entrepreneur based in Houston, TX. As a violin teacher and a founder and faculty member of Opus 1 Chamber Music School, she is passionate about cultivating a love for music in her students. As a performer in the internationally renowned Carpe Diem String Quartet and co-founder of the arts non-profit Austin Camerata, she is devoted to curating and presenting inclusive and engaging performances that showcase diverse composers and styles of music. In her free time, Marisa enjoys cooking and practicing yoga.

As a performer, Marisa has performed in Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, and Jordan Hall, as well as throughout Europe and China. She serves as the second violinist of the internationally recognized Carpe Diem String Quartet, a boundary-breaking ensemble that has earned widespread critical and audience acclaim for its innovative programming and electrifying performances. With the Quartet, she appears on the quartet’s recording, Dances of the Yogurt Maker, which features the string chamber works of Turkish composer Erberk Eryilmaz. This album was released in May 2021 on the MSR label, was produced by Grammy Award winner Judith Sherman, and received Gold Prize in the Global Music Awards. Marisa also composed her first work for string quartet as part of the quartet’s interactive virtual performance An American Story. This performance was sponsored by the PNC Arts Alive Grant and was released in May 2021.  

As an entrepreneur, Marisa co-founded the nonprofit chamber music organization Austin Camerata. Its mission is to enrich the city of Austin, TX by introducing new audiences to the world of chamber music through creative concerts, artistic collaborations, and community outreach. Dedicated to broadening the audience for chamber music, Austin Camerata performs an array of repertoire, from the most revered classical masterpieces to newly written, genre-defying works. The ensemble is known for creative artistic collaborations that augment the music’s emotional power, and performances frequently feature collaborations with visual art, creative writing, and dance ranging in style from flamenco, to hip-hop, to ballet.

In 2021, Marisa co-founded Opus 1 Chamber Music School, Houston chamber music program. Opus 1’s goal is to create experiences and ensembles – tailored to the unique personality and playing of every student – that foster a sense of community, high standards, and enthusiasm for each other and chamber music. Whether a student intends to pursue music as a career or as a lifelong hobby, Opus 1 equips them with the interpersonal and musical skills and passions that chamber music uniquely provides.

Marisa was born in Boulder, Colorado and began playing the violin at the age of three. Between 2011 and 2015, she earned a Bachelor of Music with Highest Honors from the University of Colorado Boulder. Additionally, she received a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with High Distinction from CU Leeds School of Business. From 2015 to 2017, Marisa studied with Brian Lewis at the University of Texas Austin, where she received the Starling Distinguished Violinist Scholarship and earned a Master of Music degree. In 2020, she earned her Doctor of Musical Arts degree from CU Boulder under Charles Wetherbee. During this time, she worked as a Teaching Assistant giving individual lessons to undergraduate BM and BA violin students and assisting in major Music History courses and non-major Music Appreciation classes. Her final thesis, Keeping and Retaining Audiences in Today’s Classical World, explored reasons for and solutions to classical music’s declining audience population. Solutions include forming relationships with audience members, programming underrepresented musical voices, and presenting artistically collaborative performances.

Marisa has worked with numerous artists, such as Glenn Dicterow, Naoko Tanaka, Alexander Kerr, Rachel Barton Pine, Ani Kavafian, Peter Otto, and Stephen Rose, the Takács String Quartet, and the Miró String Quartet. As a soloist, Marisa has performed with the National Repertory Orchestra, the Austin Civic Orchestra, and the Greater Boulder Youth Orchestra. Additionally, she has participated in the National Repertory Orchestra and the Aspen Music Festival.

Montana native Korine Fujiwara is a founding member of the Carpe Diem String Quartet, a devoted and sought-after chamber musician and teacher, and a gifted composer and arranger.

Ms. Fujiwara is Professor of violin and viola at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Washington. She served for many years on the music faculty of Ohio Wesleyan University and is in great demand for master classes and clinics throughout the United States. Korine’s students have been accepted into the performance programs of such institutions as Indiana University, Cincinnati College Conservatory, and Northwestern University to continue their musical studies.

Named as one of Strings Magazine’s “25 Contemporary Composers to Watch,” Korine has received multiple commissions including works for opera, chamber ensembles, chorus, concerti, and music for modern dance. Her works have been performed throughout the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Italy, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Australia, China, and Japan. Her musical language encompasses a wide range of influences, including classical, folk, jazz, and rock and roll. Her diverse artistic collaborations have helped to infuse her work with a rhythmic power and intensity. 

Critics have remarked of Ms. Fujiwara's music, “The ear is forever tickled by beautifully judged music that manages to be sophisticated and accessible at the same time,” “Contains a very rare attribute in contemporary classical music: happiness.” (Fanfare Magazine); “She knows how to exploit all the resources of string instruments alone and together; her quartet writing is very democratic, with solos for everyone; her solo violin writing is fiendishly difficult.” (Strings Magazine). “Fujiwara beautifully meets the challenge of weaving together different emotions across generations that make sense musically while delighting the ear.” (WOSU Classical 101 by Request) “Fujiwara’s music is rich and beguiling throughout.” (The Columbus Dispatch)  “Artfully layered and knitted together…While each “room” has its own musical personality, the poignant sections in which characters in different periods actually sing together—a trio, a sextet, and even an octet—dovetail perfectly. The dramatic arc builds persuasively to the climactic moments, shifting with increasing speed between scenes to the culminating revelation.” (The Wall Street Journal)

Korine is a recipient of an Opera America Commissioning Grant from the Opera Grants for Female Composers program, made possible through the generosity of The Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation, for the composition of “The Flood,” an award-winning opera with Stephen Wadsworth, librettist, premiered by Opera Columbus and ProMusica Chamber Orchestra in February 2019.

Ms. Fujiwara is a gifted performer on both the violin and viola, and holds degrees from The Juilliard School and Northwestern University, where she studied with Joseph Fuchs and Myron Kartman, respectively. Her other mentors include Harvey Shapiro, Robert Mann, and Joel Krosnik. Ms. Fujiwara is a member of the music honorary society Pi Kappa Lambda.

Korine began her orchestral career with the Brooklyn Philharmonic and served as a principal player and soloist with the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra of Columbus. She is also a former member of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, where she held the position of Acting Assistant Principal Second Violin.

Korine performs on a 1790 Contreras violin, 2004 Kurt Widenhouse viola, and bows by three of today’s finest makers, Paul Martin Siefried, Ole Kanestrom and Charles Espey, all of Port Townsend, WA, USA.

Cellist Ariana Nelson is based in Houston where she is a member of the Houston Grand Opera Orchestra. She frequently performs with other ensembles in the Houston area, including the Houston Symphony, Houston Ballet, and Texas New Music Ensemble. Ariana has taught and coached as an adjunct faculty member at Texas Southern University, and at AFA’s Chamber Music Academy. She is an avid proponent of new music and loves experimenting with different styles, including improvisation and folk music. This passion led her to co-found the Pacific Crest Trio in 2020, a group that dives into multiple genres and prioritizes engaging more audiences and community outreach. Her eclectic tastes have also led her to appearances at Jazz at Lincoln Center, performances for patients recovering in Mount Sinai Hospital’s transplant ward, and a performance with the Silk Road Ensemble at Tanglewood. In 2015 Ariana was invited to perform in a small chamber orchestra to accompany Yo-Yo Ma at the Kennedy Center as part of the Kennedy Center Honors event. Ariana has received many honors as a soloist, most recently winning third prize at the 2016 Eisemann Young Artists Competition in Dallas, Texas.

A native of Seattle, Washington, Ariana was steeped in chamber music as a child. Family influences in music extend three generations back to her grandfather, Alan Iglitzin, who was the founding violist of the Philadelphia String Quartet. Her mother Karen was the first violinist of the quartet before she started her own chamber music organization in Seattle, called Chamber Music Madness. Since age eight, Ariana has been playing string quartets. Her extensive chamber music experience has included coaching with renowned musicians such as Emanuel Ax, James Dunham, David Finckel, John Harbison, Desmond Hoebig, Jon Kimura-Parker, and Roger Tapping.

Ariana is passionate about bringing the joy of music to others in her community. In recent summers, Ariana has been an artist faculty member at the the Charles Ives Music Festival, a week long program for young students. There she teaches private lessons, coaches chamber music, and performs several concerts featuring new and contemporary music in Danbury, Connecticut. Additional summer appearances include the Grand Teton Music Festival, Strings Music Festival, Fontainebleau Conservatoire Américain, Spoleto Festival USA, Tanglewood Music Center, Aspen Music Festival and School, Le Domaine Forget Chamber Music Festival, the Olympic Music Festival and the Zephyr International Chamber Music Festival in Italy.

Ariana received her Master of Music degree at the Juilliard School in May of 2017 where she studied with Darrett Adkins. She completed her Bachelor of Music degree at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, where she graduated cum laude in May of 2015. There she had the privilege of studying cello with Norman Fischer of the Concord Quartet.

PROGRAM

Part 3 of Ms. Taves' Complete Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle: 12, 16, 25, 18

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

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Part 4 of Ms. Taves' Complete Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle: 11, 22, 29 "Hammerklavier"

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

PROGRAM

Part 5 of Ms. Taves' Complete Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle: 10, 14 "Moonlight", 24 "à Thérèse", 28, 30 (op 109, first of the great three final sonatas)

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

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TBA

ARTISTS

Pioneering piano chamber music sensation ENSEMBLE VIVANT, “Canada’s Chamber Music Treasure” (John Terauds, Toronto Star), burst onto the international concert and recording scene over 30 years ago with exciting, innovative genre-diverse programming including Classical, the syncopated rhythms of Ragtime, The Great American Songbook, Latin and other Jazz-related styles. Veteran Jazz Icon, musician, composer, arranger Rick Wilkins, C.M. commented: “This is the highest-level chamber music-making. No matter the genre, there is magic in Ensemble Vivant’s music-making.” A favourite among audiences, Ensemble Vivant is also known for its warm and engaging rapport and its passionate, deeply communicative playing that touches the hearts and souls of listeners of all ages, bringing them lasting joy. As Opening Day Entertainment Group (ODEG) recording artists, Ensemble Vivant has 15 internationally acclaimed CDs that are heard regularly on radio and digital platforms around the world.

The core quintet is Catherine Wilson, piano/artistic director; Corey Gemmell, violin; Norman Hathaway, viola; Tom Mueller, cello; George Koller, bass. Regular collaborators include Aysel Taghi-Zada, violin; Liza McLellan, cello; Kevin Turcotte & Alex Brown, trumpet; Mike Murley, Allison Au and Tara Davidson, sax; Virginia MacDonald, clarinet; Juan Carlos Medrano, Latin percussion; Adrian Bent (drummer from Drake’s band) and many others.

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TBA

ARTISTS

TBA

PROGRAM

TBA

ARTISTS

The Chicago Brass Quintet has been pushing the bounds of chamber orchestration for more than four decades. Originally founded in a Northwestern dorm room, the Quintet rose to national prominence with the release of their first recording for Crystal Records and through a notable appearance at the International Trumpet Guild’s Conference in Ithaca, New York.

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Over the course of their history, the Quintet has made numerous contributions to the contemporary arts community, and has played to acclaim before audiences around the world. Today, the ensemble remains as vibrant as ever, and continues to engage with music lovers through an enriching calendar of concerts, workshops, and educational events.

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TBA

ARTIST

Madeline was a student of Wilma Berkel’s at Western, and Wilma said we’ve just got to have this musician, she’s going to be one of the finest Canadian guitarists! 

CBC Music’s ‘hot 30 under 30’

Hall’s trajectory continued this past summer, when she was named to CBC Music’s 2023 30 hot Canadian classical musicians under 30 list, reserved for those who are “highly skilled, creative, disciplined and determined to make their mark in the world of classical music.”

The honour included an invitation for Hall to play at the Enoch Turner Schoolhouse historic site and museum in Toronto, where she performed Joaquin Turina’s Sonata, Op.61.

PROGRAM

Part 6 of Ms. Taves' Complete Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle: 19, 20, 6, 21 "Waldstein"

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

PROGRAM

Part 7 of Ms. Taves' Complete Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle: 1, 8 "Pathétique"

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

PROGRAM

Part 8 of Ms. Taves' Complete Beethoven Piano Sonata Cycle: 3, 7, 13, 26 "Les Adieux"

ARTIST

Heather Taves Concert pianist Heather Taves brings her “radiantly beautiful, commanding and authoritative” artistry to audiences everywhere, as she connects with openness and humour to share musical worlds. An internationally respected classical artist, she is preparing the complete cycle of 32 Sonatas by Beethoven for completion in 2024. Heather shares this process in her entertaining blog “Beethoven Journey” at https://heathertaves.substack.com/

Gifted in multiple genres, Heather showcases her gifts as improvisor, composer, and writer. She is composing music for an event titled Painted Dances, joining forces with the popular Propeller Dance Company which includes wheelchair dancers, artist Julea Boswell, and emerging filmmaker Aaron Daniels Casey. As an improvisor, she plays keyboard in the Scott Parsons Band which presents stories of Black history to communities large and small. She has performed music by diverse living composers such as Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, Palestinian-Canadian composer John Kameel Farah, Turkish composer Can Kazaz, and British jazz pianist Julian Joseph.  Her vision is to share music in all its diverse facets as a powerful force to bring people together.

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TBA

ARTIST

Yamaha Artist Jarred Dunn has been described by critics as “a piano sound-colour magician” (Muzikos Barai, Vilnius), “evocative and mystical” (New York Classical Music), "technically perfect" (Belarusian First Radio), and “a virtuoso with the most exquisite touch” (Freethought Today, Madison). Mr. Dunn is featured on the 2018 CBC Top 30 Under 30: Hot Canadian Classical Musicians (CBC) and has hosted CBC’s This is My Music. He is currently on the Faculty of McGill University Schulich School of Music and Alumni Committee of the Aspen Music Festival and School.

His playing has been heard on CBC/Radio-Canada, 98.7 WVMO, New Classical 96.3FM, WWFM, WQXR, Belarusian First Radio, and Madison Freethought Radio/Television. His recordings include Chopin and Debussy (AFA, 2018), Brahms in Solitude (2022); Chopin's Diary: The Mazurkas (Lexicon Classics, 2023), and a fourth album of the complete works of Henryk Mikołaj Górecki (2024). Brahms in Solitude received attention in LaScena Musicale and Piano Professional (EPTA) as a five-star album, “His deft voicing and clarity speak to his understanding of the works of Brahms’s idol, J.S. Bach. His soft sound is at once full-bodied and resonant, and unthinkably quiet. Dunn’s precision, sense of musical direction, and knowledge of the piano’s every colour are on display here.”

Mr. Dunn won First Prize and Concerto Award at the 7th International Chopin Competition of Lithuania (Vilnius 2018), leading to concerts in Europe and abroad, and was a finalist/prizewinner in the 1st Jan Hofmann International Competition (Kraków 2019). He won prizes in Piano and Chamber Music at the Rome, Verona Zinetti, and Vitti International Competitions, and First Prize in McGill Piano Concerto Competition. He has performed worldwide as a recitalist, chamber musician, and soloist with orchestras, and his career has included invitations to perform in Poland, Hungary, Belarus, Slovakia, Germany, Spain, Portugal, France, Malta,The Czech Republic, England, United States, Canada, China, and Australia. He enjoys playing solo recitals, a capacity in which he performs regularly. Following Mr. Dunn's all-Chopin recital in Warsaw, one critic wrote,

The playing of the brilliant Canadian performer did not lack the “Polishness” that he had a chance to learn thoroughly from the best Polish teachers during his Master’s Studies in Katowice or later in Bydgoszcz. The “Polishness” was audible in every piece: from Nocturne in C minor op. 48 with its drama that was built by the pianist from the very first chords and the tragic ending, through Scherzo in E major op. 54, played with a great sensitivity, brilliant sound and technical mastery, to the brilliant Polonaise Fantaisie op. 61, a piece that is very complex harmonically and difficult in many aspects. Jarred Dunn showed his virtuosity, amazing sense of style, elegance and noble - but not excessive - sensitivity, passion - without being pathetic, beautiful piano and powerful forte, melodious - but not sugary - cantilena, broad phrasing and very rich, nuanced range of sounds.  -- Nina Sankari, K. Łyzczyński Foundation, Warsaw

In his repertoire are over forty concertos, representing his interest in this genre of performing. He has appeared as a concerto soloist with the Niagara Symphony, Sinfonia Toronto, York Symphony, McGill Symphony, Toruń Symphony, NOSPR Katowice (National Radio Symphony of the Republic of Poland), Vilnius Chamber, Cantus Symphony (Vilnius), Eurasian Chamber (Berlin), Budapest Chamber, and Belarusian State Radio-Television Orchestras, among others. He has collaborated with conductors Bradley Thachuk, Denis Mastromonaco, Anna Duczmal-Mroz, Przemysław Fiugajski, Jean-Marie Zeitouni, Jakub Chrenowicz, Erki Pehk, Sabatino Vacca, Alexander Liebreich, and Nurhan Arman.

As a chamber musician, he has collaborated with the Johannes Brahms International Master Classes (Poertscach, Austria), the Ãtma Quartet (Poland), Baroque cellist Jessica Korotkin, pianists Dominic Gál and Urszula Stańczyk, and violinist Anna Kuk (Reverb Ensemble), including performances of major works by Franck, Mozart, Brahms, Beethoven, etc. in New York, Toronto, Czech Republic, Italy, Slovakia, and Poland. He is on the artist-faculty of Semaine Internationale Piano at Musique de Chambre (Switzerland) working with such distinguished artists as Edith Fischer, Jorge Pepi-Alos, and Marc Jaermann.

Noted by Tonebase Piano as “a revered pedagogue,” Mr. Dunn has given lectures, workshops and master classes at The Juilliard School, Royal College of Music (London) Southern Methodist University Meadows School of the Arts (Dallas), Bydgoszcz Academy of Music, Katowice Academy of Music, F. Chopin University of Music, Chetham's School of Music, McGill University, University of Puget Sound (Seattle), Laurier University, Canadian Music Centre (CMC), Vilnius New School of Music (Lithuania), Queen's University, and many others. His articles have been published in Canadian Music Educators’ Journal, Piano Magazine (formerly Clavier Companion), and Canadian Music Teacher. Of special importance to him was research at the former site of Auschwitz-Birkenau on music during the Holocaust, culminating in an article about Anita Lasker-Wallfisch (former cellist of the Auschwitz Women's Orchestra). He is featured in the Frances Clark Center From the Artist Bench series (2022). He has received awards and distinctions for his scholastic, musical, and pedagogical achievements including the Teacher Recognition Award (RTO), Graduate Prize of CFMTA National Essay Competition, and research-creation funding from the FRQSC and Canada Council for the Arts. 

His interest in a multitude of approaches to piano playing and musical personalities has taken him around the world. He participated in master classes with many renowned pianists, including Dmitry Alexeev, Dmitri Bashkirov, Seymour Bernstein, Rafał Blechacz, Andrea Bonatta, Janina Fialkowska, Leon Fleisher, Peter Frankl, Leslie Howard, Jenö Jandó, Robert Levin, Robert McDonald, John O’Conor, Choong-mo Kang, Tobias Koch, Julian Martin, Andrzej Jasiński, Seymour Lipkin, Matti Raekallio, Zbigniew Raubo, Hartmut Sauer, Ilja Scheps, Wojciech Świtała, Balasz Szokolay, and Nelita True. Currently based in Montreal, Dr. Dunn teaches at McGill University Schulich School of Music.

A double-graduate of the University of Toronto (MusBacPerf; B.Ed.), he also studied at Aspen Music Festival and School and The Juilliard School with Jacob Lateiner and Yoheved Kaplinsky. While in New York, he became one of the only members of his generation to study with Dorothy Taubman. Mr. Dunn graduated with Distinction from the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music in Katowice (MM, Diploma), where he was a student of Prof. Anna Górecka (daughter of composer H. M. Górecki). He completed his piano training in the class of Prof. Katarzyna Popowa-Zydroń at the Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz. He holds a Doctor of Music (Performance) from McGill University Schulich School of Music, where he was invited to teach while still completing his studies. He worked extensively with Maria João-Pires in Portugal, about which the CBC published Five Things I Learned from Maria João-Pires. He also received important teaching from Andrei Gavrilov, Andrzej Jasiński, and Robert Levin.