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Showing posts from April, 2012

Angela Hewitt Week, 14th-20th May 2012

I just received information from a friend about Angela Hewitt Week in Ottawa, 14th-20th May as declared by Mayor Jim Watson. Ms Hewitt is performing with Chamber Players of Canada on Friday 18th May; there will also be An Afternoon With Angela Hewitt on 20th May at the National Arts Centre hosted by the Canadian Friends of the Trasimeno Music Festival .

JUNO Pianos

In addition to all the fun of JUNOfest, those of us who like pianos were treated to the JUNO Pianos concept, inspired by Luke Jerram's Play Me, I'm Yours installations worldwide. Instead of having pianos on the street, JUNO Pianos featured 12 pianos in locations around Ottawa available for anyone to play. I found and played the Yamaha in University of Ottawa's Tabaret Hall and the Steinway grand piano (woop!) in Carleton University Art Gallery .  After playing in Tabaret on Wednesday 28th, I and the other people in Tabaret Hall were treated to a semi-impromptu concert (well, announced on Facebook) by some U of O music students for a few piano pieces, a flute sonata, violin solo and an opera song! The Steinway at Carleton University Art Gallery Saturday afternoon and a cycle ride to Carleton to meet some friends at the Art Gallery to play on another JUNO Piano, this time an antique Steinway grand. I'd not been to Carleton University Art Gallery bef

Sounds of JUNOfest

Classical JUNOs performers Something of a musical melange weekend but an excellent set of events! Eschewing some of the bands and artists we knew, we chose less familiar sounds for our JUNOfest experience. First up was the Classical JUNOs in Concert event at the National Arts Centre , featuring both nominated performers and composers. The mix of contemporary music was brilliantly played by Christina Petrowska Quilico , Susan Hoeppner , Heather Schmidt and the New Orford String Quartet . Quilico amazed the almost 100-strong audience with her performance of Derek Charke's Sepia Fragments   in a reduction for piano; I found this piece a really captivating mix of earthly and ethereal elements. Quilico's second performance was of Ann Southam's Glass Houses No. 5 , an hypnotic piece which sounded both fiendishly difficult to play but also very clean and unembellished. Susan Hoeppner's excellent performance of Eldin Burton's Sonatina for Flute and Piano got the po