The Canadian Music Centre BC (CMC BC) is pleased to announce Season 4, with six unforgettable concerts celebrating seven outstanding composers: Jacqueline Leggatt, Jocelyn Morlock, Jordan Nobles, Ernst Schneider, Ross Alden, Stephen Chatman, and Leila Lustig.
This 2019 – 2020 season is our most ambitious concert season ever, featuring exciting new collaborations with the Okanagan Symphony, Vancouver Chamber Choir, Victoria Composer’s Collective, Vetta Chamber Music Society, Oak Bay Music Society, Redshift Music Society, Of The Now Concert Series, UBC School of Music, and the Vancouver Academy of Music, including CMC BC’s first performances in Penticton and Victoria.
Celebration Series
Celebrating Canadian Composers
Launched in the fall of 2016, CMC BC’s unique Celebration Series offers six concerts every season, each performance offering a survey of the body of work of one iconic Canadian Composer from BC, with the series balanced equally between featuring women and men.
➥ Generous discounts available for purchases of tickets to more than one Celebration
Jacqueline Leggatt 60th Birthday Celebration
Our 2019-2020 Celebration Series opens with a special 60th Birthday Celebration of Canadian Composer Jacqueline Leggatt on Sunday, October 27, 2019, at 7:00 pm in the Vancouver Academy of Music’s recently refurbished Koerner Recital Hall.
This Celebration is a co-presentation with the Vancouver Academy of Music where Leggatt is Head of Theory. The concert features CMC BC’s new Ensemble-In-Residence Vetta Chamber Players, along with Vanier Park Strings and an installation for sixteen-channel speaker array.
➥ Tickets: $25 / $10 Students with ID
Jocelyn Morlock & Jordan Nobles Joint 50th Birthday Celebration
Collaborating with the Redshift Music Society, we’re pleased to present a unique joint 50th Birthday Celebration for award-winning Canadian composers Jocelyn Morlock and at the Annex on Monday, December 9, at 7:00 pm in a concert featuring Vetta Chamber Players, Redshift Music Society, and other invited guests.
➥ Tickets: $25 / $10 Students with ID
Ernst Schneider 80th Birthday Celebration
On Saturday, February 8 at 7:30 pm we co-present an 80th Birthday Celebration for Ernst Schneider in Penticton’s Cleland Community Theatre with the Okanagan Symphony, which will also be celebrating their 60th anniversary at that performance under the baton of Music Director Rosemary Thomson.
The concert features the World Premiere of Schneider’s Second Piano Concerto performed by Jana Luksts and will be preceded by a pre-concert performance of the composer’s chamber works performed by graduates of the Okanagan Symphony Youth Orchestra program.
Ross Alden 100th Birthday Celebration
Continuing a tradition to recognize the important work of neglected Canadian composers, CMC BC Concerts will present a posthumous 100th Birthday Celebration of Canadian composer Ross Alden with performances of his lush chamber music by Vetta Chamber Players in CMC BC’s uniquely intimate Murray Adaskin Salon on Monday, February 10, 2020 at 7:00 pm.
➥ Tickets: $39.95 / $10 Students with ID
Stephen Chatman 70th Birthday Celebration
Celebrating one of Canada’s most prolific and performed composers, CMC BC is joining together with the Vancouver Chamber Choir and the UBC School of Music, to co-present Stephen Chatman’s 70th Birthday Celebration featuring members of the Vancouver Chamber Choir and Vetta Chamber Players on Monday, March 30, 2020 at 7:30 pm in UBC’s Roy Barnett Recital Hall.
➥ Tickets: $25 / $10 Students with ID
Leila Lustig Celebration
Capping off our 2019-2020 Celebration Series is a Celebration of Canadian composer Leila Lustig featuring performances by Soprano Marnie Setka-Mooney, with Victoria musicians Kathryn LeGros, Diane Berry and friends on Monday, April 20, 2020 at 7pm in the uniquely intimate setting of the Murray Adaskin Salon.
➥ Tickets: $39.95 / $10 Students with ID
New Concerts in Victoria
In addition to our Celebration Series, this year CMC BC inaugurated a series of new collaborations with concert presenters in Victoria starting this past summer with a co-presentation of the Oak Bay New Music Festival in partnership with the Victoria Composers Collective and the Oak Bay Music Society. The coming season will also see two concerts co-presented with Of The Now Concert Series.
Celebration Series Background
The Celebration Concert Series began with a focus on the first generation of composers to do something revolutionary — write concert music on the West Coast of Canada. That original 2016-2017 season featured BC Legacy composers Jean Coulthard, Barbara Pentland, Murray Adaskin, Elliott Weisgarber, and Sylvia Rickard.
Subsequent seasons have surveyed succeeding generations of BC composers, offering a unique and broad survey of Canadian music as it has evolved in this province from approximately 1950 forward. From the beginning, the series has presented an equal number of women and men composers each season.
About CMC BC
In addition to CMC BC Concerts presented in Vancouver, Victoria, and Penticton, CMC BC offers:
- a free Barbara Pentland public-lending library of more than 24,000 original scores of Canadian music through our Vancouver Creative Hub;
- a range of composition education and appreciation programs including free annual Jean Coulthard String Quartet Readings for emerging composers and a signature Composer In The Classroom offered to schools around the province;
- Barbara Pentland Awards program recognizing extraordinary contributions to Canadian music;
- a highly specialized music print and bind service;
- the Murray Adaskin Salon, a uniquely intimate 45-seat black-box performance space equipped with 110″ high-definition screen A/V projection system, a full Video recording and Livestream broadcast studio with four Hi-Definition cameras, and stereo sound recording capability.
- CREATE Boardroom
About the Canadian Music Centre
The Canadian Music Centre has been supporting, preserving, and celebrating the works of Canadian composers since 1959. As proud and passionate advocates, we offer innovative resources for discovering, exploring, listening to and playing Canadian music online and in five creative hubs across the country.