Today I celebrate seven years leading the Canadian Music Centre in BC and I’m extremely proud of everything our team has accomplished in that time. Notably, creating the Murray Adaskin Salon, a small but beautiful performance space for new music that’s hosted more than 100 performances, workshops, screenings, book & CD launches since then.
In 2017 we launched the new CMC BC Presents concert series, producing more than 50 concerts in the years since despite the two-year pandemic hiatus, featuring a diverse group of composers and performers.
Through the pandemic, we produced more than 100 music videos, including 50 Unaccompanied Music Videos created in collaboration with Redshift Music Society, as well as dozens of videos of works created during our composition workshops. We have also produced more than 100 animated score videos in addition to composer documentaries, interviews and more. And sponsored a new CD of piano concertos by three BC composers, as well as Heather Pawsey’s landmark film of Barbara Pentland’s opera The Lake.
Through stewardship of the Hugh Davidson Fund, which is managed by the Victoria Foundation, the BC Director and Chair of the CMC BC Advisory Council have helped fund the commission of more than fourteen new orchestral works by Canadian composers.
We created the Barbara Pentland Awards program, honouring the memory of one of the greatest Canadian women composers and since then have presented approximately 100 awards since 2017, including Awards of Excellence for Outstanding Contribution to Canadian Music, as well as Awards of Excellence for Outstanding Composition and for Outstanding Performance in collaboration with music and composition competitions around the province. And we’ve awarded thousands of dollars in scholarships to composers at the undergraduate and graduate levels at UBC, UVic, and SFU.
We have also provided free composition workshops for emerging composers featuring celebrated composers including Jennifer Butler, Farshid Samandari, Jordan Nobles, Edward Top, and Rita Ueda. And offered a dozen Composer in the Classroom seminars to public school students across the province on Vancouver Island, the Gulf Islands, the Lower Mainland, Prince George, Smithers, and other centres led by brilliant educators including Elizabeth Knudson, Daniel Brandes, Rodney Sharman, and Thomas Beckman.
We have created innovative collaborations in partnership with leading arts organizations including Vancouver Art Gallery, Victoria Symphony, Chan Centre, Queer Arts Festival, Okanagan Symphony, Vancouver Maritime Museum, Art Song Lab, Langley Community Music School, Victoria Composers Collective, BC Registered Music Teachers Association, Vetta Chamber Music, Redshift Music Society, of the now concert series, James Bay Music Festival, Victoria Conservatory of Music, International Choral Kathaumixw, Kiwanis Music Festivals, Vancouver Chamber Choir, UBC School of Music, Burnaby Youth Detention Centre, the Rennie Collection, Vancouver Academy of Music and others.
And we have transformed our BC Advisory Council to one that is younger, comprised of a majority of women for the first time, and one that is more diverse and representative of our community, including Indigenous representation, people of colour, sexual minorities, and those with disabilities.
All of this work has been supported by the Province of BC and the BC Arts Council, the City of Vancouver, the Canada Council, Canadian Heritage, and the Government of Canada, as well as the Vancouver Foundation, the Victoria Foundation, the Deux Mille Foundation, the Azrieli Foundation, and donors like you, who have so generously supported our work over the past seven years.
Thank you to the volunteers who serve on our BC Advisory Council, to the various government bodies and Foundations that support us, and to the staff who are dedicated and have accomplished so much in such a short period of time!
Sincerely,
Sean Bickerton
BC Director