Biographies
guest conductors | composer-in-residence | performers
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Guest Conductors
Geoffrey Butler | Howard Cable | Ronald Royer
Geoffrey Butler
Mr. Butler's affinity for vocal music has led him to a successful international career as a tenor ― and onto the podium to conduct some of the greatest works of the choral and opera repertoire. Artistic Director and Conductor of the Toronto Choral Society since 1994, Mr. Butler has created a friendly yet challenging choral environment where singers develop their musical abilities and make a positive contribution to the Toronto community. He is also Co-Artistic Director of Opera York where he directs some of Canada's finest young professionals in both modern works and the operatic classics. Recent conducting credits include La Traviata, La Bohème, Rigoletto, Die Fledermaus, Carmen, and Così fan tutte as well as the North American premiere of And the Rat Laughed. Mr. Butler's passion for the voice and rapport with young singers means he is also in great demand as a vocal instructor, clinician, and adjudicator.
Howard Cable
Principal Pops Conductor
Dr.
Howard Cable, a member of the Order of Canada, has been a leading figure in Canadian music for over 60 years and studied at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. His experience on both radio and television and his familiarity with a broad range of repertoire includes arranging/composing for entertainers such as the Toronto
Mendelssohn Choir, Sharon, Lois and Bram, and the Toronto Children's Chorus. On the world stage, he has conducted for Ella Fitzgerald, Tony Bennett, Peggy Lee, Bob Hope, Victor Borge, Danny Kaye and Jim Carrey!
During the past summer Dr. Cable was in Ottawa giving master classes and conducting the Band of the Ceremonial Guard. This elite band plays every summer morning on Parliament Hill for the ceremony Changing of the Guard. The band arrives at the Hill playing Cable's "Ten Provinces March". Also, Dr. Cable conducted the C. G. Band at Carleton University in the first performance of his latest suite "The Shining Mountains".
Composer-In-Residence
Alex Eddington
Composer, musician, playwright and actor Alex Eddington completed a Master's degree in composition at the University of Alberta; his undergraduate training was in his native Toronto. He has attended several workshops for emerging composers including the National Arts Centre Young Composers' Programme in 2006, and the 2008 Quatuor Bozzini "Composer's Kitchen" in Montréal. Mr. Eddington's musical works have been commissioned and performed in Canada and internationally by musicians and ensembles including the Mississauga Symphony, the Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra, the Talisker Players, the Toronto Chamber Choir and soprano Kristin Mueller-Heaslip. In 2008, his orchestral work Reiteration was the winner of the Orchestras Mississauga Emerging Composer Competition. He received a 2004 SOCAN award for his monodrama Death to the Butterfly Dictator!, and in the same year, Dance Attack! for orchestra was a finalist in the Toronto Symphony Orchestra's "New Creations" competition. Mr. Eddington is an Associate Composer of the Canadian Music Centre.
As a playwright and actor, Alex Eddington has created three original plays for himself to perform on the Canadian Fringe theatre festival circuit: two solo shows - an autobiographical monologue (WOOL) and a multi-character "musicological comedy-thriller" (The Fugue Code) - and a two-person play with live music (Old Growth). He was the recipient of the 2008/09 Urjo Kareda Residency Grant at Tarragon Theatre in Toronto, through which he created and workshopped a full-length play (Emily C.) and was an apprentice to three professional sound designers. In summer 2009, Mr. Eddington travelled to Calgary to participate in the renowned One Yellow Rabbit Summer Lab Intensive. He recently toured his unique new production of TJ Dawe's beloved one-man comic monologue, Tired Clichés, across Canada.
Alex Eddington is also a choral singer, musical improviser, conductor, a concert narrator who has appeared with members of the National Arts Centre Orchestra, and a freelance arts administrator who has worked with Tafelmusik, the Toronto Consort, soprano Mary Lou Fallis, and the Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra.
Alex Eddington is based in Toronto, Canada. Please visit him online at www.AlexEddington.com.
Performers
Red Brass Quintet | Toronto Choral Society | Julia Mirzoev | Anne-Marie Ramos | Dion Mazerolle
Red Brass Quintet
Andre Dublesten and Jonas Feldman, trumpets
Iris Krizmanic, French horn
Alon Soraya, trombone
Wilfrid Lee, bass trombone
The Red Brass is a dynamic group of professional musicians in the Greater Toronto Area. Founded in 2008, the Red Brass have performed in a variety of settings including the Toronto Fringe Festival and the Toronto Pride Parade. From classical to fusion, the repertoire that the group covers is endless. Members of the Red Brass have been featured soloists, and performed with orchestras including the Scarborough Philharmonic, Niagara Symphony, Ontario Philharmonic, and the Canadian Opera Company. and have toured with several high profile groups.
Toronto Choral Society
The Toronto Choral Society is a friendly, challenging amateur choir of over 140 voices under the leadership of Artistic Director Geoffrey Butler.
The Toronto Choral Society performs a challenging, eclectic repertoire including traditional choral classics and music of the many cultures of the City. It presents at least two major ticketed concerts every year, one in December and one in May or June. TCS often sings at special events in the community and participates in benefits for charitable organizations such as Out of the Cold and its own sister choir, the Street Haven Women's Choir.
Founded in 1845, the Toronto Choral Society is the oldest choir in the City. Recent concerts have featured works such as Brahms' Requiem, Haydn's Creation, Ramirez' Navidad Nuestra, and Bruckner's Te Deum. The choir has also presented music of many cultures of our city as, for example, in a recent three-concert series "Toronto: a Musical Mosaic" and has welcomed accomplished Toronto singers, instrumentalists, orchestras and storytellers as featured guest performers.
The TCS choir looks forward to its upcoming presentation of An Eastern European Christmas on December 14, 2011 and Brahms' Ein Deutsches Requiem in collaboration with SPO on February 25, 2011. For more information about the choir and upcoming concerts, please visit the TCS website at www.torontochoralsociety.org.
Julia Mirzoev
Julia Mirzoev was born in November 1996 in Toronto, Canada. From a very early age, she was attracted to the sound of the violin. She started playing violin at the age of two and a half years with her father. Julia's musical roots stemmed from a family of highly motivated professional musicians with strong social consciences. She is always surrounded by music at home. At age of three, Julia became a student of the prominent Canadian violin teacher Jacob Lakirovich, a distinguished musician and renowned pedagogue.
Julia's first stage performance was in the year 2000 and since then, she has frequently performed as a soloist in various recitals and concerts. In the same year, she made her debut with an orchestra with her teacher as a conductor. Every summer Julia takes part in the JVL Music Camp for the Performance Arts where she appears as a soloist, chamber player and concertmaster of the orchestra. In addition she took lessons and participated in master classes with Vadim Gluzman, David Zafer, Lee Joiner and Julian Fisher.
For her violin examinations of Royal Conservatory, she attained First Class Honors with Distinction in 2005 and received the Medals for highest mark in Ontario and Quebec in 2007 and 2010. Julia received numerous awards and scholarships from local, provincial and national competitions and festivals. In the years 2002, 2004 and 2006 she was awarded Richmond Hills Music Festival's scholarships for best violinist under the age of ten. In 2004 and 2009, Julia was 1st Prize Winner of CMC and Grand Prize Winner of 2008 CMC. The team of adjudicators of the 2007 Kiwanis Music Festival chose to award Julia with the Sid Oue Memorial Award for the Most Promising Student in Strings and she obtained the highest mark of the 2009 Kiwanis Festival - 99.
Julia has performed at the Mississauga Performing Arts Centre, the North York Performing Arts Centre and Richmond Hill Centre for the Performing Arts, CBC's Glenn Gould Studio and Koerner Hall of the Telus Centre of the Royal Conservatory.
In 2007 and 2011 Julia was the winner of the Provincial Finals of Ontario Music Festival Association. She was a participant of the Niagara International Chamber Music Festival. She also won the special "Most Promising Performer" prize in the Golden Menorah's 5th International Music Competition that took place in Berlin, Germany. In 2010 Julia was one of the semifinalist of prestigious Orchestre Symphonique De Montréal competition.
Julia is a student of Vaughan Secondary School (French Immersion Program). She is one of the academically strongest students in her class. Julia likes dancing and playing tennis. She enjoys listening to classical music, going to concerts and spends time playing chamber music with members of her family.
Anne-Marie Ramos
While studying voice at the University of Western Ontario, Anne-Marie performed such roles with UWOpera as Angelique in Ibert's Angelique, Suor Genovieffa in Puccini's Suor Angelica and Adele in Johann Stauss's Die Fledermaus. Upon graduating, she was awarded first place in the Canadian Opera Company Competition, London division. Anne-Marie was a recipient of the prestigious Board of Governor's Award for three consecutive years.
Also a graduate of the University of Toronto Vocal Music Performance Program, she participated in productions with the Opera School Division. She has gained notoriety in the musical theatre and operetta world with such roles as Mabel in Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance, Elsie in Yeomen of the Guard and Maria in West Side Story. During her graduating year Anne-Marie joined the Stratford Festival of Canada where she performed the role of Princess Tuptim in Rogers and Hammerstein's The King and I as well as Goddess Diana in Shakespeare's Pericles. Anne-Marie's most recent performance was as soprano soloist in Brahms' German Requiem with the Guelph Chamber Choir. Other recent roles are Esther in the Canadian debut of Wish Opera's Rosemarie, Julie Jordan in Edmonton's Mayfield Theatre and Cosette in Les Miserables with 1000 Islands Playhouse.
Dion Mazerolle
Originally from New Brunswick, baritone Dion Mazerolle is known for his versatility within the realms of opera and concert recitals. Having traveled extensively, he has performed in different companies around Canada, United States and Europe for companies such as Orlando Opera, Opera Ontario, Calgary Opera, Pacific Opera Victoria, Opera de Montreal, Opera York and Brasov State Opera in Romania. With the Brasov State Opera, Mazerolle toured 20 cities in Germany, France, Austria and Switzerland as the Villains in Offenbach's Les contes d'Hoffmann.
Past member of Atelier lyrique de l'Opera de Montreal, he is also the winner of numerous prizes including Grand Prize of the Young Artist Competition from Societe Radio-Canada, the Jacqueline Desmarais Foundation and Jeunes Ambassadeurs lyrique.
He has been recorded and heard on numerous occasions by CBC-Radio and SRC-Radio for Saturday Afternoon at the Opera/Opera du Samedi and different concert program series.