Evolution: Classical 2022 Participant and Faculty Program (Jul 5)

Celebrating its 30th season, the Gryphon Trio is one of the world’s preeminent piano trios, garnering acclaim and impressing international audiences with its highly refined, dynamic and memorable performances.

With a repertoire that ranges from traditional to contemporary and from European classicism to modern-day multimedia, the Gryphons are committed to redefining chamber music for the 21st century.

Creative innovators with an appetite for discovery and new directions, the Gryphon Trio has commissioned over 100 new works, and frequently collaborates on projects that push the boundaries of chamber music. The trio tours regularly throughout North America and Europe, and their 22 recordings are an encyclopedia of works for the genre. Honours include three Juno Awards for Classical Album of the Year – most recently, that of 2019 – and the prestigious 2013 Walter Carsen Prize for Excellence in the Performing Arts from the Canada Council.

Deeply committed to music education and audience development, the Gryphons conduct master classes and workshops at universities and conservatories, and are artists-in-residence at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Music and Trinity College. Dr. Jamie Parker is the Rupert E. Edwards Chair in Piano Performance and Annalee Patipatanakoon is Associate Professor of Violin and Head of Strings at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Music.

Since 2010, the trio’s multi-faceted arts creation program Listen Up! has engaged elementary school students, teachers and parents in 16 Canadian communities and provided them with the experience and knowledge required to participate actively in the arts.

The Gryphon Trio has had a long association with the Ottawa Chamberfest – Roman Borys served as Artistic Director between 2007-2015, as Artistic and Executive Director between 2015-2021 and Patipatanakoon and Parker served as Artistic Advisors between 2008-2021. The Trio are currently Directors of Classical Music Summer programs at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.

Megumi Masaki is a pianist, multimedia performing artist, educator and curator. She is recognized as an innovator that reimagines the piano, pianist and performance space. Her work pushes boundaries of interactivity between sound, image, text and movement in multimedia works through new technologies, including hand-gesture-motion tracking to generate and control live-electronics and live-video, AI, 3D visuals, keyboard-controlled computer game, e-textile sensors and active infra-red tracking. As a Japanese-Canadian artist, her work also explores how human rights and environmental issues can intersect and be communicated through music. Over 70 compositions have been created with/for Megumi and she has premiered 150 works worldwide. Megumi was appointed to the Order of Manitoba and Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.
www.megumimasaki.com

Åstrand is a renowned Swedish mallet specialist, a unique voice of both the marimba and the vibraphone. He is a sought after soloist, regularly performing and giving master classes internationally. Since 2017, Åstrand heads the contemporary music and improvisation class at Orford Music Summer Academy. Also commissioned as a composer, compositions include works for percussion and chamber ensembles, brass quintets, saxophone quartet, choirs, and big band. A more spectacular side features compositions for ice instruments for percussion ensemble, as well as using fighter aircrafts, snow trucks, and buildings as instruments to be played on. Åstrand’s music can also be found in multimedia performances including dance, video projections, ice instruments, and fire sculptures. Anders Åstrand regularly collaborates with various ensembles and groups. He plays vibraphone in both Soundscape Orchestra and Firm roots. Åstrand also plays the vibes in the big band Ann-Sofie Söderqvist Jazz Orchestra, and can be heard on the albums Move. The duo Vibes and Bass (Mikael Berglund, bass and Anders Åstrand, mallets) has released two albums with original music, Seven Thoughts and Frantelunia. His own groups include WÅG (Mattias Wager, church organ; Anders Åstrand, mallets and percussion, and Gary Graden, vocals), Åstrand-Erlandsson Duo (Robert Erlandsson, double bass and Anders Åstrand mallets), and his percussion ensemble, Global Percussion Network, with which he has toured extensively in Sweden, Europe, the United States, and South Korea. Anders Åstrand regularly performs at Percussive Arts Society International Convention (PASIC). He functions as International Education Orchestral Consultant for Zildjian since 2008. Anders Åstrand plays Yamaha instruments, Zildjian cymbals, Vic Firth mallets, and Evans drumheads.

Image by Anders Astrand

Aiyun Huang enjoys a musical life as soloist, chamber musician, researcher, teacher and producer. Globally recognized since winning the 2002 First Prize and Audience Prize of the Geneva International Music Competition. She is a champion of existing repertoire and a prominent voice in the collaborative creation of new works. Huang has commissioned and premiered over two hundred works in her two decades as a soloist and chamber musician. The Globe and Mail critic Robert Everett-Green describes Huang’s playing as “engrossing to hear and to watch” and her choice of repertoire as capable of “renovating our habits of listening.” Her past highlights include performances at the Victoria Hall in Geneva, Weill Recital Hall in New York, Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra’s Green Umbrella Series, LACMA Concert Series, Holland Festival, Agora Festival in Paris, Banff Arts Festival, 7éme Biennale d’Art Contemporaine de Lyon, Vancouver New Music Festival, CBC Radio, La Jolla Summerfest, Scotia Festival, Cool Drummings, Montreal New Music Festival, Centro Nacional Di Las Artes in Mexico City, Cervantino Festival, and National Concert Hall and Theater in Taipei. Her recent highlights include performances with St. Lawrence String Quartet, L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Taipei Symphony Orchestra and San Diego Symphony Orchestra. Her recent premieres include works by Philippe Leroux, David Bithell, Nicole Lizée, George Lewis, and Eliot Britton.

Paul Wiancko has led an exceptionally multifaceted musical life as a composer and cellist. An avid chamber musician, Paul has performed alongside Midori, Yo-Yo Ma, Richard Goode, Chick Corea, Mitsuko Uchida, Nico Muhly, Max Richter, and members of the Guarneri, Takács, JACK, Parker, Kronos, Orion, and Juilliard quartets. His performances with Musicians From Marlboro have been described as "utterly transparent" and "so full of earthy vitality and sheer sensual pleasure that it made you happy to be alive" (Washington Post).

Chosen as one of Kronos Quartet's "50 for the Future," Paul's own music has been described as "dazzling", "compelling" (Star Tribune) and "vital pieces that avoid the predictable" (Allan Kozinn, journalist). National Public Radio recently wrote, "If Haydn were alive to write a string quartet today, it may sound something like Paul Wiancko's LIFT​," a 26-minute work featured on the Aizuri Quartet's Grammy-nominated album Blueprinting, one of National Public Radio's top 10 classical albums of 2018. Paul is a recipient of the S&R Foundation's Washington Award for Composition and has been invited to be composer-in-residence at the Caramoor, Twickenham, Newburyport, Portland, and Methow Valley Festivals. This year, Paul's music will be premiered by Alexi Kenney at Wigmore Hall, the Eybler Quartet at Banff Centre, Tessa Lark, Marina Piccinnini, and Michael Thurber at the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, and the St. Lawrence String Quartet and James Austin Smith at Spoleto Festival USA, where he is the 2019 Bank of America Composer-in-Residence.

Violinist and violist Matt Albert is the Chair of Chamber Music at the School of Music, Theatre & Dance at the University of Michigan. He previously served as the Director of Chamber Music and SYZYGY at the Meadows School of the Arts, Southern Methodist University. He was a founding member of Eighth Blackbird, with whom he received numerous awards, including first prizes at the Naumburg, Concert Artists Guild, Coleman, and Fischoff Competitions, and three Grammy awards for their recordings on Cedille Records. He serves as one of the concertmasters for Nu Deco Ensemble and regularly plays as the violist with Alarm Will Sound. Previous collaborations include work with Seraphic Fire, the International Contemporary Ensemble, Wilco, the Shreveport Symphony (as Concertmaster), the Baltimore Symphony, and the Sarasota Orchestra (as Associate Concertmaster). In the summers he mentors for Evolution: Classical at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, and he plays principal second violin for the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music.

Image by RR Jones.

Patricia O’Callaghan’s recording career spans six solo CDs and many interesting guest collaborations.  Her early recordings focused on European cabaret and she is considered a specialist in the music of Kurt Weill performing his Threepenny Opera, Seven Deadly Sins, and Kleine Mahagonny with Soulpepper Theatre Company, Edmonton Opera, and Vancouver Opera and others.

She has sung with some of the world's great ensembles and artists (Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Don Byron Quartet, Bryn Terfel), and has performed in venues that range from London's Royal Opera House to New York's Noho cabaret Le Poisson Rouge.

Patricia also writes and co-writes songs and has had the honor of premiering many new compositions, from both the classical and pop worlds working with many creators including R. Murray Schafer, Dennis Lee, Christos Hatzis, George Aperghis, Steve Reich, and Steven Page.

Patricia's film, theatre and television credits include her own Bravo! special, CBC produced Ken Finkleman series Foolish Heart, and the semi-autobiographical Rhombus / Westwind film Youkali Hotel, which has won several prizes, including a Golden Sheaf Award to Patricia for best female performance. 

Recent projects include a collaboration with The Gryphon Trio called Broken Hearts and Madmen and a new project Deepest December which will be her first Christmas CD featuring beautiful carols, haunting arrangements and unusual juxtapositions not found on typical recordings.

Allen is a passionate music lover, storyteller, accomplished trombonist, writer, and broadcaster. He brings a wealth of knowledge to CBC Music. Tom hosted Music and Company on CBC Music for ten years and then went on to host CBC Music Mornings. Prior to this, his weekly stories aired to a keen Ontario audience on CBC Radio One's Fresh Air and nationally on This Morning. He is the creator, along with the harpist Lori Gemmell, of a series of stage shows mixing storytelling, history, classical music, and original popular song. These shows include Bohemians in Brooklyn ("slickly written" and "beautifully punctuated," Now Magazine), The Judgment of Paris, From Weimar to Vaudeville, and The Missing Pages, all of which have received dozens of performances and tour the country on an ongoing basis. Tom has also authored three books, most recently The Gift of the Game, a reflection on hockey and the role the game plays in the life of a divorced parent. Allen studied at McGill University, graduated from Boston University and received his M.A. at Yale University. While looking for full-time work as a trombonist, he temped on Wall Street and cooked in a Mexican restaurant. In 1987, he began touring with the Great Lakes Brass until he joined CBC Radio in Halifax. Tom lives with his wife in Toronto with their son, hoping for visits from the other kids who aren't kids anymore. He is an avid cyclist and plays recreational hockey and basketball.

Sri Lankan-born Canadian Dinuk Wijeratne is a JUNO and multi-award-winning composer, conductor, and pianist who has been described by the New York Times as ‘exuberantly creative’, by the Toronto Star as ‘an artist who reflects a positive vision of our cultural future’, and by the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra as ‘a modern polymath’. His boundary-crossing work sees him equally at home in collaborations with symphony orchestras and string quartets, tabla players and DJs, and takes him to international venues as poles apart as the Berlin Philharmonie and the North Sea Jazz Festival.

Dinuk was featured as a main character in ‘What would Beethoven do?’ – the 2016 documentary about innovation in classical music featuring Eric Whitacre, Bobby McFerrin and Ben Zander. Forthcoming projects include new works for Grammy-winning baritone Elliot Madore (featuring Dinuk as pianist) and Grammy-nominated mandolinist Avi Avital, the test piece for the Banff International String Quartet Competition 2022, and conducting debuts with the Calgary Philharmonic and Qatar Philharmonic, Doha.

Dinuk made his Carnegie Hall debut while still a student in 2004 as a composer, conductor, and pianist performing with Yo Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble. A second Carnegie appearance followed in 2009, alongside tabla legend Zakir Hussain. Dinuk has also appeared at the BoulezSaal (Berlin), Kennedy Center (Washington DC), Opéra Bastille (Paris), Lincoln Center (New York), Teatro Colón (Buenos Aires), Sri Lanka, Japan, and across the Middle East. Dinuk grew up in Dubai before taking up composition studies at the Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM), Manchester, UK. In 2001, he was invited by Oscar-winning composer John Corigliano to join his studio at New York’s Juilliard School. Conducting studies followed at New York’s Mannes College of Music, and doctoral studies under Christos Hatzis at the University of Toronto.

Dinuk has composed specially for almost all of the artists and ensembles with whom he has performed; to name a few: Suzie LeBlanc, David Jalbert, James Ehnes, Kinan Azmeh, Bev Johnston, Joseph Petric, Sandeep Das, Tim Garland, Ed Thigpen, Ramesh Misra, Barry Guy, Eric Vloeimans, Buck 65, DJ Skratch Bastid, the Gryphon Trio, the Afiara, Danel & Cecilia String Quartets, the Apollo Saxophone Quartet, TorQ Percussion, and the Symphony orchestras of Toronto, Vancouver, the National Arts Centre, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Buffalo, Illinois, Fresno, Asheville, Saskatoon, Windsor, Victoria, PEI, and Thunder Bay. Dinuk is the only artist to have served both as Conductor-in-Residence and Composer-in-Residence of a Canadian orchestra (Symphony Nova Scotia).

A passionate educator, Dinuk is committed to helping emerging and mid-career classical artists navigate the classical music industry in today’s increasingly complex, diverse, and globalized world. As a Creativity Consultant he serves private clients as well as students of the Banff Centre (Evolution Classical) and Toronto’s Glenn Gould School. His educational guide ‘Define Your Artistic Voice’ was downloaded 150 times from his blog within the first two days of its release. Dinuk also served as Music Director of the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra for thirteen seasons. He is also the recipient of the Canada Council Jean-Marie Beaudet award for orchestral conducting; the NS Established Artist Award; NS Masterworks nominations for his Tabla Concerto and piano trio Love Triangle; double Merritt Award nominations; Juilliard, Mannes, & Countess of Munster scholarships; the Sema Jazz Improvisation Prize; the Soroptimist International Award for Composer-Conductors; and the Sir John Manduell Prize – the RNCM’s highest student honour. His music and collaborative work embrace the great diversity of his international background and influences.

www.dinukwijeratne.com

Composer in Residence Program during BISQC 2022 made possible with support by Dr. Gail Andrew.

The lecture series is generously supported by Ernie and Sandra Green.

A versatile artist, whose talents transcend the boundaries of dance, music, opera and multi-media, Marie-Josée Chartier moves easily between her many roles as choreographer, performer, director, vocalist and teacher. Her dynamic choreography is influenced by contemporary music, literature and the visual arts as she explores and deconstructs the vulnerabilities of human beings.

Her acclaimed pieces have been presented at major festivals and by dance companies across Canada, Europe and Latin America. Her work was the subject of several documentary films. Since 2003, in addition to her activities as a performer and choreographer, Marie-Josée directs/stages contemporary opera and multi-media productions for: Gryphon Trio, Toca Loca, Queen of Puddings Music Theatre, Tapestry Opera, Theaturtle and l’Ensemble Contemporain de Montréal (ECM+).

Chartier receives the following awards: Jacqueline Lemieux Prize (2015); K.M. Hunter Artist Award (2001), 9 Dora Mavor Moore Award nominations; recipient of a Dora for fifty- one pieces of silver (2002) and shared two Doras with the collective URGE for And by the way Miss (2005).  Marie-Josée formed Chartier Danse in 2003 to support her projects and create a cornerstone for large scale productions and partnerships in Canada and abroad.

Brandon Patrick George is a leading soloist and Grammy-nominated chamber musician whose repertoire extends from the Baroque era to today. He is the flutist of Imani Winds and has appeared as a soloist with the Atlanta, Baltimore, and Albany symphonies; the American Composers Orchestra; and Orchestra of St. Luke’s Chamber Ensemble, among others. He has been praised as “elegant” by The New York Times, as a “virtuoso” by The Washington Post, and as a “knockout musician with a gorgeous sound” by The Philadelphia Inquirer. His debut album was released by Haenssler Classics in September 2020. George has performed at Alice Tully Hall, Carnegie Hall, the Elbphilharmonie, the Kennedy Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Dresden Music Festival, and the Prague Spring Festival, among other venues. Before his solo career, George performed with many of the world’s leading ensembles, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and the International Contemporary Ensemble. George trained at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the Conservatoire de Paris, and the Manhattan School of Music. He joined the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music in 2021.

One of the world’s most versatile pianists, Bosnian-born Pedja Muzijevic has been widely praised for his interpretations of the standard literature and for his imaginative programming. He has toured extensively as soloist with orchestras and as a recitalist throughout eastern and western Europe, Great Britain, Canada, the United States, South America, and Asia.  He is the director of music programming at the Baryshnikov Arts Center in New York City.

Violinist Parmela Attariwala interweaves life as a performer-creator, researcher, equity advocate and educator. Parmela pursued her fascination with sound and unworded music through studies in performance (Indiana University and Bern Conservatory), electroacoustic and jazz composition, and ethnomusicology (School of Oriental and African Studies, and the University of Toronto). Her creative work explores the liminal space between musical genres, artistic disciplines, and identities, often using improvisation as a point of departure. Parmela has recorded three critically acclaimed Attar Project albums featuring works for violin and tabla. She has also collaborated extensively with choreographers (bharata-natyam, butoh and contact) as composer and movement artist.

More recently, Parmela has been working with visual artists, creating musical responses to installations by Jeffrey Gibson, Nep Sidhu, Luciana Santos, Peter Morin and Ayumi Goto. She is currently developing a series of soundscores for bharata-natyam dancer Sujit Vaidya; and is co-creating music for the Indigenous-led opera Namwayut (Calgary Opera) as well as for Re:Naissance Opera’s virtual opera, Live from the Underworld.

Parmela uses her academic chops to advocate for a radical reimagining of the Canadian musical ecosystem centred around equity, access, decolonization and ethical practice. She recently developed an anti-racist, anti-oppressive music curriculum for a Toronto community music school; and in 2021, she co-founded Understory an online multi-disciplinary creation platform for Canadian improvising artists.

Hugh Conacher is a lighting and multi-media designer, and a photographer, whose practice is based in live performance. He has collaborated with musicians, choreographers, directors, visual artists, and dance and theatre companies throughout Canada and around the world, in venues large and small. He approaches each project as an individual work of art. 
Hugh’s multi-disciplinary process straddles the worlds of lighting design, new media technologies, projection and photography, blurring the lines between disciplines, using whichever media form best serves the vision of his current project. 

Hugh serves on the boards of several arts organizations and has been the curator for the High Octane Gallery at the Gas Station Arts Centre in Winnipeg since 2002. His photographic work resides in private collections and has been published worldwide.

Hugh has been a member of the Associated Designers of Canada since 1982 and is a member of l’Association des professionnels des arts de la scène du Québec.

Sigi Torinus creates new media works that include site-specific installation and improvisatory interactive live-video performance. Her work explores our perceptions of the migratory journey, through time and space, in physical, ephemeral and digital worlds. She holds an MFA from the Braunschweig Art Institute, Germany, and San Francisco State University in California. As a professor of Integrated Media at the University of Windsor in Ontario, she co-directs the Noiseborder Multimedia Performance Laboratory with composer and multimedia artist Brent Lee.
As a co-founder of the Noiseborder Ensemble, she has been exploring artistic and technical complexities in multimedia performance, including the integration of acoustic instruments and emerging sound processing technologies, the development of performance practice in real-time audio and video creation, and the potential for new relationships between sound and moving images. The ensemble includes Brent Lee (composer, sound designer, saxophonist, keyboardist, guitarist), Sigi Torinus (video artist, installation artist), Nicholas Papador (percussionist, composer, keyboardist), Chris McNamara (media artist, sound designer, visual artist), Trevor Pittman (clarinetist, composer), and Megumi Masaki (pianist). The ensemble has performed at various festivals and venues, including ClarinetFest Oostende, Belgium (2018); the Festival des Musiques de Création in Jonquière, Quebec (2015); Beyond The Keys, Laban Theatre, London UK (2015); Bangor University, Wales (2015); the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival (2013); the Sonorities Festival in Belfast (2013).
 

Eliot Britton (b.1983) bridges sound worlds.  From the imperceptible rhythms of the natural environment to towering, digitally magnified timbres, his musical language uses the tools and techniques of the 21st century to build and share networks of music and meaning. Britton’s fiercely virtuosic and award-winning aesthetic brings together performers and technology, finding new modes of expression and collaboration. From soloists, drum machines and orchestras to augmented reality and machine learning, Britton seeks innovative ways of connecting and expressing Canada’s contemporary soundscape. As an Anglo-Metis from Manitoba, Britton is passionate about collaborating on narrative expanding indigenous projects. 

A graduate of the University of Manitoba (w. Michael Matthews) and McGill University (w. Sean Ferguson), Britton is now a teacher, researcher, and composer at the University of Toronto. There he is the Director of the newly rebuilt Electronic Music Studios (UTEMS) and splits his time between the Composition and Music Technology areas. Britton is currently the composer in residence at Red Sky Performance, as well as co-director of Cluster New Music + Integrated Arts Festival. His work at UofT seeks to expand the framework for research creation, opening new spaces for diversity in the creative applications of music technology.  

Born in Toronto, Bassist Roberto Occhipinti is a well established presence in the Canadian and International Jazz scene. A 5 time Juno award musician, he is equally at home playing classical music as well as jazz and world music. 

In addition to leading his own groups with 6 recordings under his name, he has performed ,toured and recorded with Jane Bunnett, Hilario Duran, Jamey Haddad, Jovino Santos Neto, Don Byron, Jeff Coffin, Uri Caine ,Bob Mintzer,  Enrico Rava, Stefano Bollani, Benny Golson and Dafnis Prieto.

Susan Sinclair teaches the Alexander Technique and the Pilates Method in her Toronto studio,  directs the Sinclair Studio Alexander Technique Teacher Training program, and trains Pilates teachers.

Susan is on faculty at the Tokyo School for the Alexander Technique, the Houston School for the Alexander Technique and has taught for the Alexander Alliance Training in   the USA, Germany and Japan.

Sinclair teaches at Toronto Dance Theater, is guest faculty at The Gestalt Institute of Toronto, and has taught courses at Humber College, Center for Indigenous Theater, Equity Showcase Theater, and in workshops to University of Toronto, Western University, and Temple University.

Sinclair presented her work at the Eighth and Ninth International Congresses of the Alexander Technique in Lugano Switzerland, and regularly teaches at Alexander Technique International conferences in Europe, USA, Canada and Japan.

Susan graduated from the Alexander Foundation, Philadelphia, School of the Toronto Dance Theater, and Ryerson Polytechnical Institute.

Since 1990, Susan has developed a  unique combination of  the Alexander Technique and her own Pilates-evolved method,   and worked with many musicians, dancers and actors for voice production, performance enhancement, injury prevention and recovery, and physical conditioning.

Playwright Janet Munsil is grateful to live and work on the land of the Lekwungen people. Her plays are inspired by historical subjects and have been seen internationally, in productions by Alberta Theatre Projects (Emphysema: A Love Story, That Elusive Spark), Theatre Calgary (Pride and Prejudice), and Northern Light Theatre in Edmonton (The Ugly Duchess), the National Arts Centre, Tarragon, Touchstone, Persephone, Arts Club Stanley Theatre, West Yorkshire Playhouse (Leeds), and the Soho Theatre in London’s West End.  She was a finalist for the Governor General’s Award for drama in 2014. Her play Be Still was adapted as an award-winning feature film (dir. Elizabeth Lazebnik, 2021) and her new play, Attaboy! is being developed as a screenplay. From 1992-2016, she was the AD/Producer of Intrepid Theatre, Victoria Fringe Festival and Uno Fest. Munsil has a BFA in Theatre and an MFA in Writing from the University of Victoria, where she teaches playwriting and dialogue. She was Artist-in-Residence at UVIC’s Centre for Studies in Religion and Society while writing two commissioned plays, Act of Faith (Realwheels) and Sveva (Powerhouse, Vernon). She’s been a regular guest of Banff writing programs, most recently in 2015 at the Playwrights Lab and Leighton Residencies, where she wrote in the boat. She is deeply grateful for this opportunity to return to blend her work as faculty with the Evolution Classical program while she works on her new play, Beyond Repair:  a tragicomedy for piano trio set in pre-WW2 Berlin, about the fates of siblings Eleonora and Francesco von Mendelssohn, and the Stradivari cello known as “The Piatti.” 

The 2022 winner of Music NB's "Innovator of the Year" award, Martin Daigle is an interdisciplinary performer, composer, researcher, and producer from New, Brunswick, Canada. Flourishing from creative foundations as a drummer and percussionist, his diverse work as a performer, composer, and researcher pushes the boundaries between audio-visual and elctro-acoustic art. Martin's innovative approach to percussion music utilizes electronic devices; notably, ongoing research in the development of an "augmented drum kit," which combines acoustic drum sounds, digital samples and visual manipulations for a truly unique result. 

Well versed as a performer and studio artist, Martin's artistry spans many genres including rock, jazz, and classical percussion and has appeared in festivals including Open Ears, Halifax Jazz Festival, Acadie Rock, and many more. 

Martin's research is currently focused on drumming balance, drum kit timbre, and orchestration, and the development of haptic-enhanced drum educational tools. These projects seek to increase educational accessibility and reduce drum-related injuries. This work has been published in HAID20 and presented at the CIRMMT-OICRM-BRAMS Student Symposium, ACTOR project's yearly conference, and various universities in North America and in Europe. Martin has pursued artistic research at the Banff Centre, CIRMMT, and McGill University. In 2021, he released a debut solo album entitled "Mossy Cobblestone." "Drum Machines," a much-anticipated new album further innovating technological applications is set for release in 2023.

Marie Lévêque’s passion for artistic expression through movement inspired her to invest in a career in contemporary dance performance. This journey constantly allows her to let her creativity speak with space, imagery, and vulnerability.

After receiving her diploma in dance choreography from Nantes Conservatory (France), Marie moved to Montreal to study at École de danse contemporaine de Montréal where she worked with Linda Rabin, Sophie Corriveau, Andrew Harwood, Jamie Wright and Clara Furey. Since her graduation in 2020, Marie works with the interdisciplinary company called We all fall down and Danse Carpe Diem-Emmanuel Jouthe.

Her love for creation includes the distortion and deconstruction of strong imagery and symbolism anchored in the historical heritage of humankind. She is interested in the delocalization of art by sharing movement in public spaces, one by one performance, retirement homes, in order to create closer ties with various individuals from different generations. She is starting a program for adapted and inclusive dancing in order to offer the stage experience to all. This spirit of inclusion is fundamental to Marie's approach to art. Her ongoing journey and artistic creations are inspired by teamwork and the french expression [le] “vivre ensemble”.

is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund. 

Ollie Hawker is a Glasgow-based composer and improviser interested in ideas of digital nostalgia and the internet as folk culture. He primarily writes for solo instruments/small ensembles and electronics, using the combination of acoustic forces and digital manipulation to delve into the strange mixture of romantic melancholy and dark seductiveness he finds within parts of the internet and digital culture. In the attempt to explore this dichotomy, his work often blurs the lines between sincerity and irony, tragedy and comedy, banality and profundity.

Ollie holds a Masters degree in composition at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where he was also awarded the 2020 Kimie Composition Prize. He has recently worked with Sound Festival, Cryptic, and Live Music Now Scotland, and has performed his live electronic pieces at Sound Thought Festival, Radiophrenia and the Scottish Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh. He plays in the bands Neuro Trash and Instruction Manual, and works as a music practitioner for the charities Paragon, Hear My Music and Drake Music Scotland.

Ollie Hawker is generously supported by the Sir Mark Turner Memorial Scholarships Endowment. 

Claire Latosinsky is a soprano who strives to combine research and performance to tell stories that matter. A 2022 graduate of the Bachelor of Music in Voice Performance from the University of Toronto, where she studied with Wendy Nielsen, Claire also holds an English Major from U of T. Claire has studied and performed music internationally, as a Schubert Fellow at Songfest in Los Angeles in 2019, and at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Finland during the Winter of 2020. She was a 2020-2021 Undergraduate Fellow at the Jackman Humanities Institute, researching the intersection of nationalism and gender in the works of Jean Sibelius. After co-founding the Faculty of Music Anti-Racism Alliance, Claire has been involved in projects to promote equity, diversity, inclusion and accessibility within the academy and the classical music community, including the digital exhibit “Polyphony: Diversity in Music.” This Fall, Claire will return to U of T to pursue a Master of Musicology, where she will continue to research nationalism in Finnish music. In her spare time, Claire likes to read, play piano, and walk her dog, Buster.

Claire Latosinsky is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund. 

A four-time national winner of the Canadian Music Competition and a recent graduate of the University of Toronto’s Bachelor of Music program, Futian completed her undergraduate studies in both Piano Performance and Psychology on a full tuition scholarship. She also served as the Performance Director for the Faculty of Music Undergraduate Association and President of the Community Outreach Initiative. Upon graduation, she received the Gabriella Dory Prize in Music which is awarded to a graduating student in Piano, Violin, Cello, Clarinet, or French Horn who has attained the highest marks in Performance. Outside of music, Futian is an avid lover of biking and photography. She is also a long-time volunteer in the music therapy program at the Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital and is extremely passionate about using music as a way to improve the mental and physical health of children! She is currently pursuing a Master of Music in Piano Pedagogy as an Ontario Graduate Scholar, which recognizes some of Ontario’s best graduate students in all disciplines of academic study.

Futian Yao is generously supported by the Boris Roubakine Memorial Endowment.

Alex Ellsworth is a cellist, composer, theater performer and educator. After completing degrees in cello performance at University of Maryland and DePaul University, Alex invested his creative energy into the contemporary classical, songwriter and experimental theater communities in Chicago. He has performed for nearly two hundred audiences as a touring cast member of the cinematic shadow puppetry company Manual Cinema, was a member of Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and is Co-Artistic Director of the artist collective Mocrep. Alex released a four track EP of original music called The Silver Hour and participated in the Chicago premiere of Ghost Quartet by Broadway composer Dave Malloy. For the past two years he has been the Music Director at Holderness School, a boarding school in the White Mountains of central New Hampshire. He is thrilled to be at Banff this summer and plans to spend this coming fall in New York and New Orleans, connecting with the larger creative community.

Alex Ellsworth is generously supported by the Marek Jablonski Piano Endowment.

Violinist, Michael Siess is an active performer in the Los Angeles area, regularly joining ensembles such as Delirium Musicum, LA Chamber Orchestra, and the Pacific Symphony. He has contributed to numerous recordings including Delirium Musicium’s upcoming debut album, The String Theory’s “Origin”, as well as numerous Hollywood studio sessions. Beginning his musical studies in Portland, OR, Michael holds degrees from the Cleveland Institute of Music and USC Thornton School of Music, studying with Margaret Batjer, William Preucil, and Itzhak Perlman.

Over the summers he has enjoyed playing at a variety of festivals including the Perlman Music Program, Aspen Music Festival, the Pacific Music Festival and the Banff Centre’s Evolution: Classical. As a soloist he has made recent appearances with the Portland Chamber Orchestra, Portland Youth Philharmonic, and CIM Orchestra. Michael is a founding member of the classically trained, genre-bending band, Mixtape. Their original music and arrangements can be heard in numerous film soundtracks, animated shorts, music videos, electronic productions, as well as live in clubs around LA. In 2021, they were among the first class of participants at Honeywell Arts Academy’s Resonance Institute in Indiana, receiving mentorship from the band, Time for Three. Mixtape’s debut visual album, “Astral Planes” is now available online.

Michael Siess is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund.

Nathan Ben-Yehuda has been recognized as an emerging musician of impassioned energy and integrity. Born in Los Angeles, he most recently was a winner of the 2017 Yamaha Young Performing Artist award, and has also received 3rd prize in the Seattle International Piano Competition. He has worked closely with such composers as George Lewis, Kaija Saariaho, Oliver Knussen and Thomas Ades. Nathan has held a fellowship at the Tanglewood Music Center, where he performed in a variety of new music and chamber music groups, and took part in a complete performance of Olivier Messiaen’s Catalogue d’Oiseaux alongside pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and performed Nancarrow Studies on two pianos with composer/pianist Thomas Adès. He has been featured in live broadcasts on BBC Radio 3 “In Tune” as well as on WMHT Radio. He has appeared on Musiqu3 TV in Beligium as a competitor in the 2021 Queen Elisabeth competition. He recently was one of two pianists invited to the Taos School of Music, directed by Robert McDonald, and perform as part of their young artist chamber music series. He is also the pianist for the Victory Players, a recently formed new music ensemble based in Holyoke, MA. In 2020, Nathan became a permanent member of Mixtape, a four-piece band blending traditions across genres into seamless programs. Having earned degrees from Juilliard and Royal Academy of Music in London, he is now faculty at Cal Lutheran University.

Nathan Ben-Yehuda is generously supported by the Marek Jablonski Piano Endowment.

Juan-Salvador Carrasco’s diverse interests are coalescing into a multi-faceted musical career.

He is the cellist and co-founder of Mixtape, a groundbreaking classical instrumental band that performs original arrangements and original music. In the summer of 2021, Mixtape attended and performed in Time For Three’s ‘Honeywell Resonance’ residency, as well as The Banff Centre’s ‘Evolution Classical’ program. On August 25th, 2021, Mixtape released its visual album debut: ’Astral Plains’ on YouTube.

In 2018-2020, Juan-Salvador was named an LA Orchestra Fellow. Through the fellowship, Juan-Salvador performed in the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, mentored the young talents at ICYOLA (Inner City Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles), and studied with Ralph Kirshbaum at the University of Southern California. In July 2019, the four LA Orchestra Fellows performed Michael Abels’s Urban Legends, a concerto for string quartet and orchestra, in Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Juan-Salvador has performed chamber music with Anthony McGill, Philip Setzer (Emerson Quartet violinist), and Robert Chen (Chicago Symphony Concertmaster). As a soloist, Juan-Salvador has performed the Schumann, Dvorak, Elgar, Haydn C Major, Saint-Saëns, and Vivaldi Double Cello Concertos with orchestras in both the U.S. and Mexico. He has also performed with Delirium Musicum and Kaleidoscope chamber orchestras.

Juan-Salvador was awarded First Prize at USC Thornton’s 2019 Solo Bach Competition and has competed as a semi-finalist in the Nationwide Sphinx Competition.

As a solo cellist, Juan-Salvador has attended summer festivals such as the Heifetz International Music Institute Chamber Seminar, Bowdoin Music Festival, London Master Classes (England), PyeongChang Music Festival (Korea), and the Perlman Music Program.

Juan-Salvador has a Master of Music and Graduate Certificate from USC’s Thornton School of Music and a Bachelor’s of Music from Northwestern’s Bienen School of Music. His previous cello teachers include Ralph Kirshbaum, Hans Jorgen Jensen, Ron Leonard, and Eleonore Schoenfeld.

Juan-Salvador Carrasco is generously supported by the Jenny Belzberg Endowment. 

Misha Vayman is a professional violinist, educator, and dog lover. He has performed in a wide variety of contexts, from opening for Dorian Electra to soloing with various orchestras in the United States, Mexico, Russia, and China. Animals have been known to enjoy his playing, as do some people. In fact, he has twice won the Grand Prize in the international ENKOR Competition, once in the Solo division, and once in the Chamber Music division. The latter he accomplished as part of the greatest piano trio in the world, the Benefic Piano Trio.

With his genre hopping band Astral Mixtape, Misha has been featured at a variety of venues across Los Angeles and at multiple international music festivals. Mixtape’s most recent release is an hour long music video titled “Astral Plains”, where there are lots of fancy lights, and everyone looks really good and plays really well.

Misha is part of Delirium Musicum, a chamber orchestra known to bend time and space to their will with no regard for anyone's safety. He is prominently featured in many rehearsal outtakes, completely goofing off, or as he likes to put it, “keeping it light”.

Misha is a recent graduate of the USC Thornton School of Music. Before that, he attended the Colburn Conservatory, and the Cleveland Institute of Music. A lot of practice was done at all three, and now he’s good, and doesn’t need to practice at all.

Misha Vayman is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund.

As a musician with an exploratory approach to playing her bass, Zoe Markle has performed  improvisational music with Mark Dresser, been a member of two DownBeat winning ensembles, and has commissioned music from a number of successful young composers. Her excitement for contemporary classical music has taken her to Boston as a performance fellow for the Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice (SICPP) at New England Conservatory, where she had the opportunity perform the music of Michael Finnissy and Beat Furrer. Most recently, Zoe performed on a premier of a piece by Joseph Schwantner. Zoe has commissioned and/or premiered pieces by Nomi Epstein, Molly Joyce, John Supko and others.

Passionate about teaching, she maintains a studio teaching double bass, bass guitar, and ukulele since 2015, and loves to share her knowledge and love of music through teaching. Zoe is pursuing her Master’s degree at the Eastman School of Music, having earned a Bachelor of Music from Lawrence University, where she graduated Magna Cum Laude. Her teachers include James VanDemark, Mark Urness, Matt Turner, and Jose Encarnacion.

Zoe Markle is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund.

Nolan Ehlers is an award-winning percussionist versed in a variety of styles. Active as a performer of contemporary works, Nolan has commissioned and/or premiered pieces by Carlos Simon, Nomi Epstein, Molly Joyce, John Supko, Aleksandra Vrebalov, and others. Currently, Nolan is part of an upcoming premiere for a work by Michael Gordon. Nolan is the co-founder of Else, if Else, a trio of piano, percussion, and double bass.

A student of Batá drums, Nolan has traveled to Cuba to learn from Los Muñequitos de Matanzas and other local musicians. As co-director of the Lawrence University Jazz Band, Nolan received a Downbeat Student Music Award for a performance of latin jazz and folkloric Afro Cuban music.

Other performances include the water opera Breathe, soloing with the Lawrence University Percussion Ensemble, and substituting for the Green Bay Symphony Orchestra and Fox Valley Symphony Orchestra. Nolan is currently in his Master’s degree at University of Michigan, having earned a Bachelor of Music from Lawrence University, where he graduated Summa Cum Laude. His teachers include Doug Perkins, Ian Antonio, Jeremy Epp, Nancy Zeltsman, and Dane Richeson. Nolan is a member of Phi Kappa Lambda.

Nolan Ehlers is generously supported by the Frederick Louis Crosby Memorial Endowment.

Benjamin Portzen [he / him] is a composer, improviser, and movement artist who strives to make space for connection, healing, presence, and absence through immersive sound and movement works. By commingling practices of premeditation and spontaneity, Ben offers the opportunity for performers and witnesses to create and interrogate relationships between bodies, ideas, sounds, and objects in real-time. At present, Ben’s research interests include designing intelligent computer collaborators for composition and improvisation, illuminating the body as the locus of creative potential in the creation of sound works, the facilitation of “real” experiences for performers and audiences, and the ways in which artistic practice offers the opportunity for radical self-transformation and -dissolution.

Ben holds a Bachelor’s of Music from Lawrence University (‘21) where he studied composition with Asha Srinivasan and Joanne Metcalf, piano with Anthony Padilla, improvisation with Matt Turner, and dance with Margaret Paek. As a 2021 Thomas J. Watson Fellow, Ben will spend one year across Japan, Nepal, Belgium, Germany, and Iceland exploring the role art can play in imagining and building a more equitable, sustainable, and compassionate future by embracing our unknowns with more fascination than fear.

Madeline Hildebrand is currently pursuing her Doctorate degree at Stony Brook University studying under Gilbert Kalish and Christina Dahl. Her playing has taken her coast to coast in Canada and America, Italy, and Romania.  Her recent engagements have included a performance of Philip Glass’ etudes alongside Glass himself, a concerto performance with the Thunder Bay Orchestra, appearances with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, and a house concert tour across southern British Columbia through Living Room Live. Madeline recently held the position of interim artistic director for Canada’s Virtuosi Concerts, where she developed their Young Artist Program.

An advocate for performing music “in the margins”, Madeline’s recent concert programs have featured current composers who employ the use of digital technologies. Madeline’s unique programming will be featured in her performances this summer at Banff’s Classical: Evolution program.

Madeline Hildebrand is generously supported by the Marek Jablonski Piano Endowment.

Hong Kong-raised percussionist Hoi Tong Keung believes in the power of music in connecting people from around the world. As a contemporary music advocate, she has collaborated with composers and premiered their works at soundSCAPE festival (online) and Sō Percussion Summer Institute (U.S.A.). Hoi Tong’s primary performance and research interests lie in works for speaking percussionist. Recently, she presented a lecture-recital on a text-music analysis of Rzewski’s The Fall of the Empire. She is also interested in electroacoustic works. In addition to performing pieces from the repertoire, she is researching methods for recreating Stockhausen’s Strahlen (2002). A student of Aiyun Huang and Beverley Johnston, Hoi Tong is a first-year DMA student at the University of Toronto. She holds a M.M. in Percussion Performance from Boston Conservatory at Berklee and a B.A. with first-class honors from the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Hoi Tong Keung is generously supported by the Frederick Louis Crosby Memorial Endowment. 

Bevis Ng is currently completing a Master’s degree in Percussion Performance at the University of Toronto. His teachers include Prof. Aiyun Huang, and Prof. Beverley Johnston. He is a teaching assistant for the university’s percussion ensemble and also a research assistant in the TaPIR lab. He graduated with first-class honors from The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts for his Bachelor's degree. He studied with Dr. Matthew Lau, Dr. Lung Heung Wing, and James Boznos. His degree is fully funded by the HKSAR Government Scholarship Fund.

Bevis is an active chamber and solo percussionist. He is a core member of The Up:Strike Project, a Hong Kong-based contemporary percussion group. The group has premiered works by Adams, Cuong, Honstein, Socolofsky, and Temple in Hong Kong. During the global pandemic, he organized a Livestream solo recital featuring works by Miyoshi, Lang, Volans, and Hatzis. In 2019, He was chosen as the final 16 candidates for RTHK4’s Young Music Maker, where he made his TV and radio debut. As one of the winners in the concerto trial at The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, he performed Concerto for Marimba and Strings by Emmanuel Séjourne with the Academy Symphony Orchestra in 2018.

Bevis Ng is generously supported by the Boris Roubakine Memorial Endowment.

She is a young violinist dedicated to teaching and chamber music. Graduated from the National Conservatory of Music and specialized in Xalapa,Veracruz. She has participated in Festivals in Canada, New York and Germany, where she has gained great experience to master the violin.

Alejandra was part of the UNAM (National Universiry of Mexico) youth scholarship programs, was a member of the Eduardo Mata Youth Orchestra and the Academy of Ancient Music.

She is a founding member of the oírTrìo Ensemble, she brought together 10 years of experience, with which she has recorded for UNAM and played in the main halls of the country. Her repertoire ranges from baroque to contemporary.

She participated in the work “Triple Concierto” by Claudio Valdés Kuri as an actress. Her interests are linked to multidisciplinary work and that is why she constantly trains herself to exercise it on stage. Recently she is taking singing lessons.

Alejandra Cortés Vargas is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund.

Born in Mexico City, Diego Cifuentes studied at the National Conservatory of Music in Mexico and at Codarts Hogeschool voor de Kunsten in Rotterdam, the Netherlands where he obtained a Master of Music degree.

With an eclectic style, Diego Cifuentes deals with repertoires that range from the music of the baroque period to the latest avant-garde. He has always been committed to the dissemination of Mexican and Latin American works, the interpretation of the great works of international masters of all time; and attracting new audiences while maintaining a fresh, dynamic, and historically informed touch.

Since 2011, he has been part of the oirTrio Ensamble, winners of the first place and the special prize for the best interpretation of a Mexican work at the 7th Ollin Yoliztli National Chamber Music Contest in May 2014.

Currently, Diego Cifuentes resides in Mexico City where he is cello principal at Red Orquesta México and organizes and is part of various chamber music projects. On top of that, he is also a professor of cello and chamber music at the Autonomous University of Morelos.

Diego Cifuentes is generously supported by the Frederick Louis Crosby Memorial Endowment.

Mexican pianist Sebastián Espinosa graduated from the National Conservatoire of Music Mexico, and holds a Master degree from Guildhall School of Music & Drama.

Sebastián is a passionate performer of new music, projects that combine music and scene, and chamber music.

He collaborates with new music ensembles and theatre companies in México, in which he acts, performs, and plays the piano. He performed the first “Candlelight Concerts” in Mexico City with music from Chopin, has premiered around 20 pieces (highlight: Armando Luna’s Second Piano Concerto, with Mexico City Philharmonic.), and performed in Shanghai Expo 2010; the University of British Columbia in Vancouver; New York University, the Barbican Centre, and major festivals and halls in Mexico.

With his ensemble: oirTrio Ensemble, he won first prize in the Seventh National Chamber Music Competition Ollin Yolliztli 2014 (México). With this group he tries to present classical music in new ways, using theatre resources and other music genres.

Sebastián Espinosa Carrasco is generously supported by the Benediktson Fellowship Fund for Mexican Artists.

Persephone and the Phoenix is a wildfire of creative plenty. The NYC-based duo taps into the lush synergy between composition, curation, and playful curiosity by expanding the boundaries of genre, stage, and storytelling.

Nicole Brancato, keys, and Teagan Faran, strings, invite the world to join in on their collaborative energy exchanges. Formed on the tropical island of Manhattan, P&tP create to connect our larger social consciousness with the realities of our modern human experience. Together, Nicole and Teagan's extensive credits include the Guggenheim, Lincoln Center, the Fulbright Program, and the Kennedy Center. The duo is dedicated to cross-disciplinary conversation, and will be premiering a new work in collaboration with the NYC March for Science in Fall 2022.

Nicole Brancato is generously supported by the Boris Roubakine Memorial Endowment.

Persephone and the Phoenix is a wildfire of creative plenty. The NYC-based duo taps into the lush synergy between composition, curation, and playful curiosity by expanding the boundaries of genre, stage, and storytelling.

Nicole Brancato, keys, and Teagan Faran, strings, invite the world to join in on their collaborative energy exchanges. Formed on the tropical island of Manhattan, P&tP create to connect our larger social consciousness with the realities of our modern human experience. Together, Nicole and Teagan's extensive credits include the Guggenheim, Lincoln Center, the Fulbright Program, and the Kennedy Center. The duo is dedicated to cross-disciplinary conversation, and will be premiering a new work in collaboration with the NYC March for Science in Fall 2022.

Teagan Faran is generously supported by the Michael Davies Scholarship Endowment Fund.

Erin James is a multidisciplinary artist who seeks to dance the intersection between music, visual art and text through her work combining textiles and the violin. Erin holds a masters degree from the Royal College of Music in London, has performed on CBC Radio, at the Music By the Sea festival, with the Vancouver and Edmonton Symphonies and with the Vancouver Opera and Allegra Chamber Orchestras. She is pursuing her doctorate in violin performance as well as a degree in fashion design and her thesis work combining textiles and music has been fully funded by a Bombardier SSHRC grant. Erin is as passionate about transforming garbage into art as she is about transfiguring works from the classical music repertoire so that they are more vibrant and accessible. Based in Toronto, Erin is the recipient of numerous scholarships and grants including most recently a Johann Strauss Foundation scholarship to pursue studies in Austria.

Erin James is generously supported by the Frederick Louis Crosby Memorial Endowment.

Kathleen was born in Halifax and grew up in Edmonton. She started playing cello at age five with her primary teachers being Grazyna Sobieraj and Julie Amundsen. Kathleen completed her bachelor ’s of music degree at the University of Alberta with Tanya Prochazka. She then completed a master’s degree in cello performance with Matt Haimovitz at McGill University.

Kathleen has performed as a chamber musician with Matt Haimovitz cello ensemble -Uccello - at Carnegie Hall in 2013 and in San Francisco and Nappa Valley. She co-founded Trio De Mood (an Alberta based string trio) which has performed across Alberta and the Maritime Provinces. She continues a variety of chamber music collaborations around Alberta and most recently has delved into the possibilities of cello and bassoon duos.

Following an exciting season acting principal cello of Symphony Nova Scotia in Halifax during 2017/2018, Kathleen was very delighted to return to her Alberta roots and join the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra as a section cellist. Kathleen loves teaching. She was a cello and bass teacher for the YONA Sistema program in Edmonton from 2015-2017 and she continues to teach privately and to give master classes.

In her free time, Kathleen enjoys frolicking in the outdoors and spending quality time with friends and family. Some of her favorite activities include anything on skis, anything on two wheels and taking long walks with her partner Antoine and their dog Couinette. Kathleen is also a self proclaimed donut connoisseur, and is always on the hunt for the next best pastry.

Kathleen de Caen is generously supported by the Susan and Graeme McDonald Music Endowment.

Hailed by critics as "charismatic, crisp, precise, and elegant”, Janna Sailor has firmly established herself as a conductor, violinist, and groundbreaking visionary on the Canadian music scene. In addition to guest conducting the major orchestras in Canada, Janna pursues a diverse career as a violinist, delving into contemporary, world and early music, jazz and improvisation, chamber music, and interdisciplinary projects with dancers, visual artists, and electronics.

Combining diverse experiences on the international stage with a deep sense of community, equality, and social justice, Janna’s creative output is firmly rooted in the conviction that classical music should be inclusive and accessible to all. This conviction has led Janna to work on a number of arts based social initiatives, including instructing disadvantaged youth on Vancouver’s downtown Eastside, fundraising and outreach activities for immigrants, establishing music therapy programs, and the founding of the Allegra Chamber Orchestra, an all female professional ensemble with a social action mandate to champion the works of female minority artists and to enact change through music. The orchestra and its unique output and mandate has been featured on CBC Radio, Radio ICI, The Walrus, The Strad magazine, The Violin Channel, The Hub, public radio stations across Germany and France, amongst other international media. The orchestra regularly commissions and premiers works by Canadian, female and minority composers, and has co-founded and continues to support a music therapy program for women living on the street on Vancouver's downtown Eastside.

Janna is a passionate educator and holds a conducting and sessional lecturer position at Mount Royal University in Calgary, Alberta, where she currently resides with her partner and two Cornish Rex kittens, Jerry the Adventure Cat and I Love Lucy.

Janna Sailor is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund.

Alicia Venables was born in Victoria and grew up in Armstrong, B.C. She regularly plays with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra having held a one-year contract from 2019-2020. Previously, she was a member of the first violin section in the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra.

She was a participant at Music Academy of the West, the New York String Orchestra Seminar, the National Arts Centre Program in Ottawa, the Banff Masterclass Program and Morningside Music Bridge. She also had the opportunity to participate in Masterclass Al-Andalus in Spain and the Fjord Cadenza

Festival in Norway. While at Music Academy of the West, she was accepted into the String Quartet Seminar and was mentored by the members of the Takács Quartet. She also performed under the baton of renowned conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel and Stéphane Denève.

She received her Master of Music Degree from Carnegie Mellon University where she studied with Andrés Cárdenes. During her studies there, she was a member of the CMU Honors String Quartet where they travelled to Doha, Qatar as cultural ambassadors. She received her Bachelor of Music Degree from San Francisco Conservatory of Music with Ian Swensen and a Diploma in Music Performance from Mount Royal University where she studied with William Van der Sloot. She is currently on faculty at the Vancouver Academy of Music.

Alicia Venables is generously supported by the N. Murray Edwards Family Fund.

Improviser, pianist/keyboardist, and interdisciplinary collaborator Joey Chang creates work that is a result of experimenting and collaborating with improvisational processes in other mediums, technology, or formats. He has performed improvisatory works in solo and collaborative settings including at The Stone at the New School, Roulette, Millennium Stage at Kennedy Center, and the Cary Arts Center in North Carolina. Joey’s work with dancers, actors, visual artists, and animators has led to extensive investigation in musical experimentation with spontaneous visual forms, from presentations with improvised dance to improvised 3D modeling and graphic design. His work has been commissioned and presented by prominent organizations such as the Clayton Piano Festival, Metropolis Ensemble, The Dream Unfinished, Metlive Arts, District of Raga, Marymount Manhattan College, and the Sparkhill Concert Series.

As an organizer and producer, Joey is co-founder of the interdisciplinary experimental performance collective, "The Moving Orchestra", performing original works and interactive Conduction in spaces across New York City. Joey also currently performs with Katherine Kyu Hyeon Lim in their improvisation-based duo, “Impromptuo”.

Joey obtained his B.M. and M.M. from the Juilliard School and was a recipient of the school’s 2018 Career Advancement Fellowship for professional artists.

Joey Chang is generously supported by the Jenny Belzberg Endowment.

Based in New York City, South Korean violinist Katherine Kyu Hyeon Lim has been presented by acclaimed organizations such as Chamber Music America, House of Yes, International Contemporary Ensemble, (Le) Poisson Rouge, Metropolis Ensemble, The Juilliard School, Prague Conservatory, and Music Technology at Mason Gross. Lim’s early performing career, starting at the age of 10, mainly took place in South Korea, Czech Republic, Germany, and the UK. She is co-founder of Impromptuo and The Moving Orchestra, both of which focus on performing free-form improvisation. She was also founding member of the Unison Quartet, finalists and received honorary mention at the Bartók World Competition. Lim is currently loving teacher of 20 young violinists as faculty member at Opus 118 Harlem School of Music and New Amsterdam School. She holds degrees from The Juilliard School and is currently a Doctor of Musical Arts candidate at Rutgers University Mason Gross School of the Arts.

Katherine Kyu Hyeon Lim is generously supported by the Michael Davies Scholarship Endowment Fund.