Voice of the Lake

Last Sunday was the official end of the season for the Winnipeg Singers. We had our final concert at Westminster United Church with the help of Prairie Voices, a choir of young singers from here in Winnipeg. The concert went quite well, with the main focus being fundraising for the Singers. I haven't heard the numbers yet, but I think we did rather well. Prairie Voices was great, and it was especially fun to do a concert with Kristel Peters (of Apogee fame) directing one of the choirs. I think she'd be a great conductor to work with on a regular basis.

But that's over and done with, and the important things is the next gig, not the last one. Right now I'm working at St Margaret's Anglican Church at Westminster and Ethelbert, taking care of the Sunday morning choir, the men's choir and the Vespers choir.This Sunday I'll even be playing the organ for the service, so now's your chance to hear it if you're in the area. It will be interesting, if nothing else.

The next big gig on the horizon is still the Voice of the Lake which I'll be taking part in in June. It's a major piece that my friend Andrew Balfour is composing for the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra. He's the composer and conductor of Camerata Nova, a choir here in town I used to sing with, that has done very well for itself. He called back in December to see if I would be willing to sing a 'major' tenor aria in the piece. I said yes, and he's been composing it for me. Haven't seen the music yet, but I'm hoping it will come this week.

Camerata Nova concert - Mostly Monteverdi

I'm back singing with Camerata Nova again this May. The choir is performing a concert at St Margaret's church at the corner of Ethelbert and Westminster in Winnipeg's Wolseley neighbourhood. Full details are below and can also be found on the Camerata Nova webpage

Concert Dates:

• Wednesday, May 24th, 2006 at 7:30 pm
• Thursday, May 25th, 2006 at 7:30 pm

Ticket Price:

• Adults $18, Seniors $15, Students $8

Repertoire (links are to copies available on Choral Public Domain Library):

• 5 Excerpts from the Vespers by Monteverdi [Deus in adjutorium, Dixit dominus, Laudate pueri, Lauda Jerusalem, Ave Maris Stella]
• Vago augeletto che cantando vai - Monteverdi
• Domine ne in furore tuo - Monteverdi
• Pian piano - Mazzocchi
• Ardita zanzaretta - Gesualdo

St Margaret's Men's Choir

The St Margaret's Men's Choir is continuing it's series of evening services through April, May and June. The dates are as follows:

• April 16th - Easter Sunday - Service begins at 7 pm
• May 21st - Service begins at 7 pm
• June 18th - Service begins at 7 pm

Music has not been chosen yet, but I will try to publish the music for each service in advance.

Winnipeg Singers Concert May 15, 2005

The Winnipeg Singers are preparing to sing the last concert of the season in Winnipeg. This is a very exciting time for the choir, because we are in the process of finalizing our plans to travel to the International Federation for Choral Music's 7th Annual World Choral Symposium, held in Kyoto, Japan. Hence the name of the concert, On the Road to Kyoto.

It has been a difficult year, lots of work to be done, and at times it seemed the funding would not come through and we'd have to scrap the idea. But through the dedicated hard work of a few members of the Kyoto committee, the plans are becoming a reality.

The concert on May 15th, 2005 will feature the music that will be performed at the Symposium. In keeping with the requirements of the Symposium, we will be performing works from our home country, Canada, exclusively. The list of composers includes Sid Robinovitch, Leonard Enns, Imant Raminsch and Stephen Chatman, to name just a few.

The concert will be held at Bethel Mennonite Church on Stafford Avenue and starts at 7pm. Tickets can be purchased through me (those of you that may be interested know how to get in touch with me), at McNally Robinson Booksellers, or at the door. Hope to see as many of you there as possible.

The Classic Apogee Picture

A New Hope

Well, I've been thinking about putting together a website for a while now, but I never seem to have the time, due to my performance and rehearsal schedule. And a number of my friends complain to me about not updating my personal blog often enough, which is also due to my rehearsal schedule. And I often hear from my friends that they don't know about my performances until after they are done, which frustrates both the friend and me.

So it occurred to me the other day that I could fix a number of problems with one simple method... Keep a blog of my upcoming events, perhaps with a post-mortem or two on some of the concerts. That way, since I'm so busy, I'll always have something to write about (I hope!) and both the friends who want to hear news and the ones who want to know about my upcoming gigs will be satisfied.

Ironically enough, the first post that I'm going to put up is an ad for my LAST performance with Apogee Vocal Jazz. I've been singing with them for three years, and I've decided that I want to focus on my classical solo work. But we just cut a CD over Christmas, and we're going to have a CD release party... and now for the official stuff...

The Concert/CD Release will be held at the Martial-Caron Theatre in St Boniface College. Admission for the evening will be five dollars. CDs will be sold to concert-goers for $7. After that the price will be $10. Tickets can be purchased through me, or any other Apogee member (if you know any of the following... Simone Gendron, Kristel Peters, Liane Ouimet, Tina Klein, Jodie Borle or Paul Graham), or at the door. The show starts at 8 pm, and we will have our favourite combo with us, made up of Christien Lyons, Kelly Marques and Jonathan Alexiuk (if all goes according to plan).

I'll try to post the poster for the event. Hope to see as many people as possible out for this one.