Toronto’s The Noise Academy will current the North American premiere of Quid sit Musicus (What’s music?) by Philippe Leroux. The work for seven voices, cello, guitar and dwell interactive electronics shall be on stage on Could 10 and 11.
Quid sit Musicus is a piece that takes it inspiration from Early Music sources, including a recent sensibility and sonorities.
Quid sit Musicus
Xin Wang of The Noise Academy described discovering the work in a press release.
“It was December in 2023 once I first heard parts of Quid sit Musicus on YouTube whereas searching for modern rep for voice and guitar with Rob MacDonald. We each had been instantly drawn to its ever stunning sonic panorama. I educate a twenty first century modern vocal rep class in Glenn Gould College of Music.
“I try to make modern vocal music extra accessible for younger performers by introducing them to a large spectrum of notations, prolonged strategies, unconventional intervals and sophisticated rhythmic patterns. So my first thought was to have my class of ADP college students be taught and carry out the work. The GGS administration ultimately didn’t approve the mission however by then, the singers, the instrumentalists, the digital musicians and the composer had been gathered and able to go. It appeared a waste of this momentum to cancel the mission. A beneficiant nameless donation got here in proper earlier than I used to be to desert the entire manufacturing. And right here we’re, every week away from the primary day of every week lengthy rehearsal with Philippe Leroux being there every day! The singers and musicians have met quite a few occasions earlier than the primary official rehearsal and I’m so moved to see this unified dedication and dedication. Up to date music wants it. The time it takes for us to be taught a bit, no contract might ever pay sufficient. It has to return from the necessity of our personal curiosity.
“Quid sit Musicus is thru composed with operating size slightly below one hour. Philippe Leroux has at all times been one among my favorite composers. I really feel like a toddler stepping right into a world of surprise once I hear his music. It’s extremely demanding of all of the musicians individually and collaboratively. However once more, the possibilities of self discovery is simply that a lot larger when you’re confronted with a problem 🙂
“I believe listening to the music of Philippe is getting into an area that’s continually evolving, with such creativeness. I’m giddy with pleasure to share this with Toronto!”
Performers
There shall be seven singers for the efficiency.
Katelyn Chicken, 1st Soprano
Canadian soprano Katelyn Chicken is a graduate of the Glenn Gould College, and he or she was a 2025 Laffont Competitors Encouragement Award winner. Latest roles embrace Barbarina in Le Nozze di Figaro (Pacific Opera Victoria), Adele in Die Fledermaus (Toronto Metropolis Opera), Giannetta and Adele (cowl) in L’elisir d’amore, Madame Herz in Der Schauspieldirektor, and Donna Anna (cowl) in Don Giovanni. At present, along with her performing profession, Katelyn is the Creative Director and Co-Proprietor of Crashcat Studios.
Xin Wang, 2nd Soprano
Born in Yunnan in southwestern China, Xin got here to Canada on her personal on the age of 17 to finding out singing. Her research and profession have taken her from Winnipeg to Toronto, the place she is a trainer and mom in addition to a performer. Her curiosity in finding out the mechanisms of the singing physique, and sophisticated music, led her to exploration of up to date repertoire.
Charlotte Anderson, Alto
Vancouver native Charlotte Anderson earned a Bachelor of Music (Honours) from The Glenn Gould College, the place she is at the moment finishing her Artist Diploma. This season, Charlotte Anderson makes her debut as Zweite Dame in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte and as La Chauve-Souris in Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges. Along with her classical music research and performances, Charlotte can be a skilled jazz pianist, vocalist, and composer.
Chelsea Pringle-Duchemin, Counter Tenor
Mezzo-soprano Chelsea Pringle-Duchemin is an rising singer and composer from Montréal. In 2023, she obtained a Canada Council for the Arts grant for Unbound: Frauenliebe und -Leben, a recital mission which developed staging and authentic poetry for performances of Schumann’s tune cycle. The work targeted on themes of intimate accomplice violence and female liberation, a part of Chelsea’s curiosity in connection repertoire with feminism in each modern and conventional repertoire. This season’s highlights consists of performances with I Medici di McGill, and in Operatika: Arias of Seduction, a hybrid opera-pole dance recital mission, in addition to the opera pubs she curates at an area wine bar.
Nathan Gritter Tenor
Singer and conductor Nathan Gritter relies in Toronto, the place he’s a doctoral scholar in Historic Efficiency. He accomplished a Grasp of Music diploma, additionally on the College of Toronto. Nathan has labored with The Elora Singers, Toronto Mendelssohn Singers, Choir 21, Trinity Bach Challenge, and the Theatre of Early Music, and is the Director of Music at Kingsway-Lambton United Church.
Alan MacDonald, 1st Baritone
Alan is a graduate of Vancouver Opera’s Yulanda M Faris Younger Artist Program. He has additionally carried out with Refrain Niagara and Toronto’s Opera 5. Different latest roles consists of Prince Yamadori and the Imperial Commissioner in Madama Butterfly with Vancouver Opera, Vox Christus with the Vancouver Bach Choir in Bach’s Matthäus-Ardour, and Beethoven’s Symphony no 9 with the Vancouver Metropolitan Orchestra, amongst others.
Graham Robinson, 2nd Baritone
British Columbia born bass-baritone Graham Robinson earned a Bachelors of Music diploma in Voice from the College of Victoria, with additional research on the Toronto Metropolitan College. Now primarily based in Toronto, he has carried out with the Elmer Iseler Singers, Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra & Chamber Choir, La Chapelle de Québec, Elora Competition Singers, and Nathaniel Dett Chorale, amongst others.
Musical parts embrace strings and electronics.
David Hetherington, Cello/ Vielle
David Hetherington is the longstanding Assistant Principal Cellist on the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and a founding member of the Amici Chamber Ensemble. He’s a prolific recording artist, each on his personal and as a member of a number of ensembles, and a a number of JUNO Award winner. David’s live performance schedule consists of common performances of chamber music with New Music Live shows and Soundstreams Canada. He at the moment teaches cello on the Glenn Gould College and is the cello part coach of the Nationwide Youth Orchestra of Canada.
Rob MacDonald, Guitar / Lute
Rob MacDonald is on an incessant seek for lesser identified repertoire for what is unquestionably the world’s most ubiquitous instrument: the guitar. Rob earned an MMus from the Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins College, and immediately teaches guitar on the College of Toronto. He performs as half of the guitar ensemble ChromaDuo (with guitarist Tracy Anne Smith). The duo has launched a number of recordings on the Naxos label.
Justin Massey, digital
Canadian saxophonist, composer, and audio engineer Justin Massey relies in Toronto. He focuses his follow on modern music, and the seek for new sonorities and textures by way of the saxophone. Justin performs music of his technology, and commissions new repertoire whereas working with every composer to discover new sounds, together with by way of digital manipulation of the saxophone.
Fish Yu, digital
Tsz Lengthy (Fish) Yu started his music research at The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, the place he earned his Bachelor of Music in Composition & Digital Music. Since coming to Canada, he has earned a Grasp of Music diploma on the College of Toronto in Music Know-how & Digital Media, and is at the moment pursuing his Physician of Musical Arts. Fish is an lively composer and digital media artist in Toronto, and premieres a bit with New Music Live shows on Could 2, amongst different latest residencies and performances of his work.
Teri Dunn, conductor
Singer, conductor, and educator Teri Dunn has been the Music Director of the Canadian Kids’s Opera Firm since 2015. She has led a number of operas with the CCOC together with world premieres of Alice Ho’s The Monkiest King, and Serouj Kradjian’s The Nightingale of a Thousand Songs. Teri is the Dean of Choral Research on the St. Michael’s Choir College, the place she conducts three of their choirs.
Franco-Canadian Composer Philippe Leroux
French composer Philippe Leroux weaves collectively modern and Early Music in his work Quid sit Musicus. The work is made up of items primarily based on music and texts by French composer and poet Guillaume de Machaut (1300 to 1377) and his modern Jacob de Senlèches, the previous now seemed upon as a pacesetter of what we now name the French arts nova fashion of late medieval music. Simply as Quid sit Musicus is impressed by each new and outdated music, it blends acoustic and digital parts via its actions.
Leroux is a local of Boulogne Billancourt in France, and he studied on the Paris Conservatory (Conservatoire Nationwide Supérieur de Musique), after which he accepted an artist’s residency on the Villa Medici in Rome for a two-year interval.
His music is extensively carried out Europe, and has been acknowledged with quite a few prizes and sears, together with a Prix Hervé Dugardin for Greatest modern musical creation Award, André Caplet and Nadia and Lili Boulanger Prizes from the Academy of Superb Arts (Institut de France), and the Arthur Honegger Prize (Fondation de France) for his life’s work, which consists of greater than 90 items for orchestra and chamber ensembles, in addition to vocal works. He has taught and given lectures at Berkeley College within the US, Royal Conservatory of Copenhagen, and College of Toronto, amongst many different distinguished establishments internationally.
At present, he’s primarily based Montreal, the place he’s an Affiliate Professor in composition on the Schulich College of Music, McGill College.
His music is thought identified to incorporation seemingly disparate parts by way of a technique of synthesis. Actions and gestures are notated within the manuscript with a view to linking the sounds, story, and poetry of the work.
Performances
The live shows happen on the The Helen Gardiner Phelan Playhouse.
- Discover tickets and different particulars concerning the performances on Could 10 and 11 [HERE].
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Anya Wassenberg is a Toronto Metropolis Editor at Ludwig Van. She is an skilled freelance author, blogger and writing teacher.