NATIONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Canadian pianist Janelle Fung has performed in concert from coast to coast in Canada, including tours with Prairie Debut and Jeunesses Musicales du Canada. Winner of the “Artist of the Year” award from the BC Touring Council in 2014, her international concerts have taken her to over twenty countries on five continents. An avid chamber musician, Ms. Fung has appeared in concert with the Ying Quartet, New York Woodwind Quintet, Mark Fewer and Matt Haimovitz.
Ms. Fung has been a prize winner in numerous national and international competitions, including the Joanna Hodges International Piano Competition, the Concours OSM-Standard Life, and the Canadian Music Competition. She has been featured on radio stations nationally and internationally including CBC, Radio-Canada, Classical 96.3 FM, NPR, and Radio France.
Ms. Fung’s interest in opera have led to collaborations with Nicole Cabell, Teresa Stratas, and William Warfield. She has toured twice as Touring Artistic Director for opera productions presented by Jeunesses Musicales du Canada and is currently on faculty at Highlands Opera Studio.
Born in Vancouver, Canada, Janelle Fung began her piano studies at the age of four. Her principal teachers have included Nelita True, Julian Martin and Marc Durand. Ms. Fung received her Bachelor of Music degree from the Eastman School of Music, her Master of Music degree from the Juilliard School and her doctorate from l’Université de Montréal. She is grateful to the Canada Council for the Arts and Yamaha Artists for their continued support.
Biography is not available at this time
Frazer is a corporate and securities lawyer, with an emphasis on M&A and corporate finance. He has extensive experience in a wide variety of Canadian and cross-border mergers and acquisitions, strategic investments, and securities offerings (including initial public offerings). Frazer advises clients at every stage of growth, and also advises Canadian and international investment dealers on equity and debt financings and securities regulation. Frazer is also an amateur trumpet player with wide-ranging musical interests.
Directors
Maureen’s solo career has focused on promoting Canadian classical contemporary repertoire by collaborating with established and emerging composers to commission, première, and re-perform their works. Her debut album, Lady of the Lake (Leaf Music/Naxos, June 2017) includes song cycles by Schubert and Halifax-based composer Fiona Ryan and was nominated for Classical Recording of the Year (2018) by ECMA and Music Nova Scotia. In 2015, Maureen founded Crossing Borders, a contemporary classical recital series which has toured programs of art song, opera arias, musical theatre, and electronics to the United States and Canada. This past fall, she toured Colombia with a program featuring Canadian and Colombian composers.
In 2014, Essential Opera presented a triple bill of Canadian premières where Maureen created the roles of Dorothy Parker (Etiquette, Pearce), Anna (Regina, Denburg), and Cindy (Heather: Cindy + Mindy =BFFS 4EVER, Thornborrow). Maureen has also created the roles of Helen (Aunt Helen, Pearce), Keri Ferrell (Hipster Grifter, Denburg), Lorelie Henderson (Stockholm Syndrome, Ryan), Bride (Cake, Pearce), Hannah (Hannah & Paige and the Zombie Pirates, Thornborrow), and Sister Mary Francis/Mother Francis (Time of Trouble, Raum).
Her formal training includes a Master of Music from the University of Toronto, a Bachelor of Music from Dalhousie University, and a Bachelor of Arts from St. Thomas University (French and Spanish). Maureen has been on faculty at the Halifax Summer Opera Festival for Massenet’s Cendrillon, Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea, Händel’s Alcina, and returns this year for Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas and John Blow’s Venus and Adonis. She is a frequent festival adjudicator and offers masterclasses and workshops in the Maritimes and Toronto.
After belatedly starting music in his last years of high school, Simon Bertrand started a multi-instrumental training at the Conservatory of Montreal on both the clarinet and saxophone, which led him over the years into Jazz and several chamber music ensembles. However, composition gradually became his main point of interest, in which he received a basic training from André Prévost at the University of Montréal, where he was also introduced to the treasures of traditional ethnical music by Jose Evangelista. From 1990 to 1998 he settled in Paris, where he completed several degrees in saxophone and chamber music, and studied writing a theorical manners with Prix de Rome Marcel Bitsch and musical Analysis and composition with Claude Ballif, under the aegis of whom he received in 1994 a unanimous 1st prize of composition, first nominee.
Since then, he has been very active as a composer, teacher and lecturer and his music has been performed in several countries such has France, Denmark, Holland, Japan, USA and Canada by several soloists and chamber music ensembles such as the Trio Maurice Duruflé, The New Danish Saxophone Quartet, the Trio Contrastes, The NEM, Pro Musica Nipponia among others. His music has been broadcasted by the Radio-France, Radio-Canada and NHK (Japan). He has received numerous grants from the Quebec Arts and letters Counsel and was in 2000, grantee of the Japanese government’s Cultural Affair Invitation program for artists from abroad. He was then invited for lectures in the Toho Gakuen University of Music of Tokyo and the Hiroshima Elizabeth University.
Since September 2001, he has been composer in residency at la Chapelle historique du Bon-Pasteur in Montréal and has been since his return to Canada from Japan in January 2001 at the origin of many events and initiatives in the contemporary music area.
Jennifer Butler’s music has been described as intimate, resonant, and sonorous. Silence, holding and releasing tension, and layered colours and textures are important qualities in many of her compositions.
Her music has been performed across Canada and in the USA by outstanding ensembles and producers such as the Vertical Orchestra, the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, Vancouver New Music, the Western Front (Vancouver), l’Ensemble Lunatik (Quebec City), Arraymusic (Toronto), the Microscore Project (Los Angeles), Continuum Contemporary Music (Toronto), Nu:BC (Vancouver), and Tiresias (Vancouver).
Recent projects include: Stolen Materials Stolen Time, commissioned by Vancouver’s Standing Wave Ensemble; The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls, commissioned by Vancouver New Music; Under Bleak Skies, commissioned by Redshift for the Aventa Ensemble, and performed again at the VSO’s inaugural new music festival; Unvanishing, a collaboration with video artist Terry Billings and the Saskatoon Symphony Players; and Confluence, a choral piece written with poet Rae Crossman especially for R. Murray Schafer on his 80th birthday. Upcoming projects include new works for the Vancouver Inter-cultural Orchestra and the Onyx Trio.
In 2009, Jennifer completed Doctoral studies at UBC. Her thesis composition explored the concept of a feminine aesthetic in music and examined the role gender plays in creating and understanding art. She was the President of the Canadian League of Composers from 2011-14, has been an active member of R. Murray Schafer’s Wolf Project since 2000, and is an associate composer with the Canadian Music Centre.
For more information visit: www.jenniferbutler.ca
Gavin Fraser is a Nova Scotia-born composer and bass-baritone known for his music inspired by dreams, nature, and storytelling. His work spans chamber music, opera, and film scores. Recent accolades include the Karen Kieser Prize and a SOCAN Foundation award. Fraser previously was a Composer Fellow with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra and now performs with the Christ Church Cathedral Choir in Montreal.
One of Canada’s busiest composers, Allan Gilliland, was born in Darvel, Scotland in 1965 and immigrated to Canada in 1972. Based in Edmonton (Alberta), he has written music for solo instruments, orchestras, choirs, brass quintets, wind ensembles, big bands, film, television, and theatre. His music has been performed and broadcast by ensembles around the world, including the Edmonton Symphony, Boston Pops, Vancouver Symphony, Detroit Symphony, St. Lawrence String Quartet, Canadian Brass, Alberta Baroque Ensemble, Camerata Romeau (Cuba), National Youth Choir, National Wind Band, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Zapp String Quartet (Holland), St. Petersburg State Capella Symphony Orchestra (Russia), Edinburgh String Quartet and the brass section of the New York Philharmonic. Many of these performances have been in the world’s major concert halls, including; Symphony Hall in Boston and Detroit, Tchaikovsky Hall in Russia, the Royal Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, and twice at Carnegie Hall in 2012. Allan has written for soloists such as James Campbell, Jens Lindemann, John Patitucci, Jim Walker, Dean McNeill, William Eddins, PJ Perry, Ronda Metzies, Wycliffe Gordon, Dave Young, Nora Bumanis and Julia Shaw, Mark Gould, Ingrid Jensen, and Martin Riseley. His music has been recorded on over 30 CDs, including three, Collaborations, O Music, and Dreaming: The Prague Sessions, dedicated entirely to his music.
For five years (1999 ‐ 2004), Allan was Composer-in-Residence with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. He has written concerti for violin, trumpet, harp, cello, flute, oboe, accordion, and clarinet. He has also been Composer-in-Residence at the Festival of the Sound in Parry Sound, the Colours of Music Festival in Barrie, Ontario, and the Strata New Music Festival in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Other highlights include The Winspear Fanfare, composed for the opening of the Francis Winspear Centre for Music, Dreaming of the Masters given its American premiere by the Boston Pops, and Dreaming of the Masters III, given its American premiere at Carnegie Hall in 2012. In 2002 his orchestral work On the Shoulders of Giants took First Prize at the prestigious Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s Centara New Music Festival Composers Competition. In 2012 his CD O Music was nominated for two Western Canadian Music Awards and won Best Classical Composition. Allan has also won composition contests sponsored by Pro Coro Canada and the Alberta Band Association, as well as First Place in the Jean Coulthard Competition for Composers and the Lydia Pals Composers Competition. In 2017 he was named Canadian Composer of the year by the Canadian Band Association.
Allan holds a diploma in Jazz Studies (trumpet) from Humber College, a Bachelor of Music degree in performance and a Master of Music degree in composition from the University of Alberta, and a Ph.D. in Composition from the University of Edinburgh. His teachers include Violet Archer, Howard Bashaw, Malcolm Forsyth, Nigel Osborne, and Peter Nelson. Allan has taught at the University of Alberta, the University of Edinburgh, Red Deer College, and MacEwan University in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, where he was head of composition from 2004-2016, Chair of Music from 2012-2016, and since 2017 has been the Dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts and Communications.
Jason Grossi is a composer, performer, architect, and professor. A native of Windsor, Ontario, his composition work is wide ranging from small ensemble to large orchestra, performed in Canada and the US. His architectural works cover almost every building type and are located in North America and Europe. In addition to a designer, Jason is often engaged as a conservation architect and has been responsible for restoring many prominent historic places in Ontario and in Europe. He is a professor and coordinator of the interdisciplinary Visual Arts and the Built Environment [VABE] program at the University of Windsor’s School of Creative Arts, teaching visual arts and architecture.
Biography is not available at this time
Toronto violinist and composer Clare Pellerin recently premiered her new Psyche String Quartet (28 min.) with the Grenadier Quartet. She performed the Canadian premiere of John Rutter’s Visions for solo violin and choir with Cantores Celestes in 2018 and opened Romeo Scaccia’s Canadian debut with Saint-Saëns’ Rondo Capriccioso in 2015. She has recorded with Protest the Hero, with the choir of St. James Cathedral, and for film composer James Mark Stewart.
Clare has played with ensembles across the GTA, upstate New York, California, and Singapore, including the Seiler Strings, Symphonia London, the Eramosa Ensemble, the Society for New Music, the Emperor Quartet, and Volker Hartung’s Swing Band. She is a founding member of the Grenadier String Quartet and also serves as concertmaster of Unitatis Strings and principal second violinist of the Kindred Spirits Orchestra. She is a regular recitalist at Belmont House and in the Guelph Connections concert series, in which her composition Windswept was also recently premiered.
The Métis daughter of an award-winning French-Canadian/Algonquin sound engineer and an Irish-Canadian violist, Clare began playing violin at age 5. She studied violin and composition at the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts in Singapore and at Colgate University in upstate New York and earned an MA in Composition and Violin Performance at York University in Toronto, where she was concertmaster of the York University Symphony. She is a current student of Mayumi Seiler (violin) and Chan Ka Nin (composition), and previously studied with Adele Armin, Laura Klugherz, Zechariah Goh Toh Chai, and Zhou Tian. Clare also holds an honours BA in political science from the University of Toronto and an MA in political studies from the University of Saskatchewan, and has training in ballet and flamenco.
As a young composer and performer living in Toronto, Adam Scime has been praised as “a fantastic success” (CBC) and “Astounding, the musical result was remarkable” (icareifyoulisten.com). Adam’s work is widely known for its coloristic exploration and innovative sonic experimentation. His work has received many awards including the 2015 CMC Toronto Emerging Composer Award, The Socan Young Composer Competition, The Karen Keiser Prize in Canadian Music, The Esprit Young Composer Competition, and first prize in the 2018 Land’s End Composer Competition.
Adam was recently selected for the Ensemble contemporain de Montréal (ECM+) 2016 Generations Project during which his piece Liminal Pathways was toured across nine Canadian cities. In 2019 Adam was selected by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra as one of the NextGen Composers where he has been commissioned to write a new work for the orchestra. Additionally, Adam’s music continues to be performed and commissioned by many renowned ensembles and soloists including The Penderecki String Quartet, Nouvelle Ensemble Moderne, The Esprit Orchestra, Array Music, The National Arts Centre Orchestra, The Thin Edge New Music Collective, The Hamilton Philharmonic, l’Orchestre de la Francophonie The Gryphon Trio, New Music Concerts, Soundstreams, The Bicycle Opera Project, Véronique Mathieu, Nadina Mackie Jackson, and Carla Huhtanen, among others.
Biography is not available at this time
Rosemary Thomson is a Canadian conductor and chorus master. As of 2018, she is the Music Director of the Okanagan Symphony Orchestra, chorus master of the Calgary Philharmonic, and Assistant Conductor for the Canadian Opera Company.
Po Yeh is Executive Director of Prairie Debut, a touring organization that links Canadian classical and world music artists to over 80 communities that are mostly rural and outside the main centres in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and the Yukon. Po also has a keen interest in supporting the performance and creation of contemporary new music, through working with Land’s End Ensemble, New Works Calgary, the Canadian New Music Network, Luminous Voices and the Canadian Federation of Music Teachers Associations.
Cuban-born Alondra Vega-Zaldivar is a composer, performer, and teacher residing in Barrie, Ontario. She holds degrees in Composition from the University of Western Ontario, and curates and organizes recitals. Her work has been performed in Canada, the US, and Croatia. She is the founder of the Art Song Collaborative Project which aims to bring Canadian and international composers together to create new opera through art songs.
Holly Nimmons is responsible for the overall management and leadership of the organization as the President and CEO. She works with the National Board and CMC Regional Directors to implement the strategic goals and objectives of the Centre. She has worked with the Canadian Music Centre since 2018 and started as the Director of Development and Communications.
Previously Executive Director of the Coalition for Music Education in Canada for seven years, she implemented innovative programs such as Youth4Music that empowered youth leadership to advocate for the value of music-learning in their lives. She managed an annual celebration of music education that involved music makers of diverse backgrounds and genres in schools and communities across Canada (Music Monday); most notably, a live earth-space singalong with Commander Chris Hadfield in the International Space Station.
Other past roles include Executive Director of the College of Midwives of Ontario for thirteen years, followed by senior management with YWCA Canada and transitional leadership for DAREArts. She led a successful business providing management services to not-for-profit organizations, including organizational transformation such as strategic planning and capacity building.
Nimmons’ father, Phil is a founding member of the Canadian Music Centre and the Canadian League of Composers. She has deep respect for and is inspired by the CMC’s mission, vision and music creation in Canada.
Regional Councils
Regional Councils are advisory bodies established to further the goals and objectives of the Canadian Music Centre in five regions across the country.
