Conducting and harpsichord lecturer Alexander Weimann and the Pacific Baroque Orchestra (PBO) received a JUNO nomination in the category of Classical Album of the Year for their album Nuits Blanches: Opera Arias at the Russian Court of the 18th Century with soprano Karin Gauvin.
Prof. Weimann and the PBO also received high praise for their concert New Music for Old Instruments as part of Vancouver Pro Musica’s Sonic Boom Festival.
This year, sessional lecturer of jazz trumpet and jazz piano Alan Matheson presented some excellent courses and lectures, including a six-part online course called “Women of Jazz: Composers, Arrangers and Instrumentalists” with UBC Extended Learning, a lecture on Finnish Jazz with the Canadian Friends of Finland, and “What Makes It Jazz?” with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.
Assistant Professor of Voice and Opera Krisztina Szabó was busy with online performances and broadcasts this term, including the John Beckwith Songbook with Confluence Concerts, Behind the Keys with the Vancouver Chamber Choir, This Is My Music with Tom Allen on CBC, An Italian Baroque Festive Celebration with Alexender Weimann and the Pacific Baroque Orchestra, and Wagner for Valentine’s Digital Concert with the Vancouver Opera.
Pianist and Professor Emeritus Robert Silverman was featured in the article “Noteworthy: Canadian Pianist, Pedagogue Robert Silverman” in theJ.ca, which details his magnificent career journey and praises him as a “powerful, highly skilled orator of the keyboard.”
Director of Bands Dr. Robert Taylor conducted the Interscholastic Association of Southeast Asia Schools (IASAS) Honour Band, an ambitious online project that included music students and teachers from Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Jakarta, Manila, Bangkok and Taipei. The students composed and performed works with the guidance of composer Jodie Blackshaw.
In January, the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra performed Zart, a new orchestral work by composer and sessional lecturer Dr. Jocelyn Morlock, alongside Mozart’s “Gran Partita” K. 361, to rave reviews. David Gordon Duke of the Vancouver Sun described the concert as “superlative music rarely heard as part of the programming of a major Canadian orchestra.” Read more about Dr. Morlock’s approach to composition in the fall 2020 issue of High Notes.
Faculty members Beth Orson, oboe, and Jeremy Berkman, trombone, performed at Vancouver Pro Musica’s Sonic Boom Festival as featured artists.
Professor of Musicology Dr. David Metzer talked about power ballads on the popular podcast Switched on Pop, and the history of sea shanties and how they are enjoying a vogue today on CBC Radio.
Associate Professor of Teaching Dr. Brandon Konoval delivered the 2021 MacLennan Lecture in the History and Philosophy of Science for the University of King’s College (Halifax, NS) on March 24. His talk, “Rameau’s Nemesis: Music, Nature, and Society in the Writings of Rousseau,” addressed Rousseau’s critique of Rameau’s music theory, in relation to Rousseau’s natural philosophy and his account of the relationship between science and music.
In February, conductor Miriam Burns and the Ohio State University Symphony Orchestra performed Prairie Dawn, Professor of Composition Dr. Stephen Chatman’s concerto for clarinet and string orchestra with harp. Read more about Prof. Chatman’s work and career in this issue of High Notes.
Assistant Professor of Viola Marina Thibeault has performed a number of exciting concerts over the past few months, including Telemann’s Concerto for viola in G major with L’Orchestre de L’Agora at the 2020 Bach Festival; and Latvian composer Peteris Vasks’s Concerto for Viola with the Kamloops Symphony Orchestra, which will be available to stream from April 23–May 22, 2021.
Prof. Thibeault has received two grants from the Canada Council. The first grant will fund the recording of her third album, Viola Borealis, with friends and colleagues from Orchestre de l’Agora and conductor Nicolas Ellis. The second grant will fund special collaboration between Prof. Thibeault, composer Taylor Brooks, Turning Point Ensemble, and conductor Owen Underhill that will premiere at the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts in 2022-23. Comprised of a solo viola piece and a concerto, the performance will focus on, in Prof. Thibeault’s words, “[my and Taylor’s] shared experiences as recent parents who had traumatic experiences around the birth of our children, fuelling the desire to create music that would both express these experiences and provide respite for other parents and children with similar experiences.”
This term, Prof. Thibeault also taught online masterclasses for Potsdam University, Amici Program, Domaine Forget, the Morning Side Music Bridge and the Canadian Viola Society.
