OUNDJIAN CONDUCTS VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872–1858)

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CONCERT PROGRAM

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Adapt. by Ralph GreavesFantasia on “Greensleeves”

Concerto in A Minor for Oboe and String OrchestraI. Rondo Pastorale: Allegro moderatoII. Minuet and Musette: Allegro moderatoIII. Finale (Scherzo): Presto

Serenade to Music

Intermission

Flos Campi (Flower of the Field) for Viola, Chamber Choir, and Chamber OrchestraI. Lento: As the lily among thorns... –II. Andante con moto: For lo, the winter is past –III. Lento: I sought him whom my soul loveth... –IV. Moderato alla marcia: Behold Solomon’s bed... –V. Andante quasi lento: Return, return O Shulamite! –VI. Moderato tranquillo: Set me as a seal upon thine heart

Piano Concerto in CI. Toccata: Allegro moderato –II. Romanza: Lento – III. Fuga chromatica con Finale alla Tedesca

Overture to The Wasps

These performances will be recorded live for Chandos Records.

Wednesday, November 15, 2017

8:00pm

Thursday, November 16, 2017

2:00pm

Peter Oundjianconductor

Louis Lortiepiano

Sarah Jeffreyoboe

Teng Liviola

Carla Huhtanensoprano

Emily D’Angelomezzo-soprano

Lawrence Wilifordtenor

Tyler Duncanbaritone

Elmer Iseler SingersLydia Adams Conductor & Artistic Director

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Peter OundjianMusic Director

Ralph Vaughan Williams was possibly England’s most significant composer, and he is a personal favourite of mine. This concert presents some of his finest works, featuring soloists from the Orchestra as well as some of Canada's most notable solo artists, and the Elmer Iseler Singers. The Fantasia on “Greensleeves” is so well known, it needs no introduction. The lyrical and engaging Oboe Concerto is rarely heard, but it is one of his most inspired works. Serenade to Music showcases his exquisite vocal writing, which also figures prominently in the ravishingly beautiful Flos Campi, so surprisingly scored for solo viola, choir, and chamber orchestra. The Piano Concerto is more dramatic, with a juggernaut opening and a brilliant fugal finale, while the Overture to The Wasps is scintillating and exciting.

NOV 15 PERFORMANCE SPONSOR

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THE DETAILS

Ralph Vaughan WilliamsBorn: Down Ampney, United Kingdom, Oct 12, 1872Died: London, United Kingdom, Aug 26, 1958

Ralph Vaughan Williams is best known

internationally for his compositions that

reflect the musical traditions of his native

country. Yet, there is far more to him than

that. “The extensive list of works (orchestral,

choral, ballet, opera, incidental music for

theatre and film) shows different levels of

composition, from the simplest occasional

pieces to the most visionary personal

expressions,” says the authoritative New

Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.

For every sweet, gentle piece such as

The Lark Ascending and the Fantasia on

“Greensleeves”, he created, with equal skill,

such rigorous, almost brutal works as the

fourth and sixth of his nine symphonies.

His finest creations are worthy to stand

alongside those of such contemporaries as

Sergei Prokofiev and Paul Hindemith.

Offspring of a wealthy family that included

the Darwins and the Wedgwoods, his

career path as a composer proved a bumpy

one until his discovery of England’s folk and

Tudor-era music ignited his creativity. For

all his fame, he kept both feet firmly on the

ground. “He never forgot that music was for

people; he was interested in every situation,

however humble, for which music was

needed,” says The New Grove. He engaged

in a wide variety of musical activities:

composing for school orchestras, collecting

and arranging folk songs, conducting,

editing, writing. By all accounts, he was a

kind, warm-hearted person—“Uncle Ralph”

to everyone who knew him.

In 1912, Vaughan Williams gained his first

theatrical experience through serving as

musical director for producer and actor Sir

Francis Benson’s season of Shakespeare plays

at Stratford-upon-Avon. The playbill included

The Merry Wives of Windsor. Shakespeare

twice mentions the haunting English folk-

tune “Greensleeves” in the text so taking these

references as his cue, Vaughan Williams used the

tune as the basis for an instrumental interlude in

his score for The Merry Wives.

The antics of Falstaff and the merry wives

captivated him, and more than a decade later,

he gave their story the full operatic treatment in

Sir John in Love (1928), with the text prepared

by himself and drawn almost entirely from The

Merry Wives. This time, Vaughan Williams chose

to have “Greensleeves” both sung and played

instrumentally. In the first scene of Act III, Mrs.

Ford lies on a couch, takes up her lute and sings

the song. The tune reappears as an instrumental

interlude between the scenes of Act IV. “Lovely

Joan”, another folk-tune that Vaughan Williams

had collected himself in Norfolk in 1908, appears

in Act II, sung by Mrs. Quickly as she enters from

offstage. Ralph Greaves used these instrumental

materials, placing “Lovely Joan” at the centre, as

the basis for the Fantasia you will hear at these

concerts.

Program note by Don Anderson

Fantasia on “Greensleeves”Composed: 1928; adapt. Ralph Greaves, 1934

4min

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This concerto was commissioned and premièred

by the internationally celebrated British oboist,

Léon Goossens (1897–1988). Several other

distinguished British composers wrote music

expressly for him, including Elgar, Bax, Howells,

Arnold, Bliss, and Britten.

Vaughan Williams composed the Oboe

Concerto directly after the Fifth Symphony.

The première was scheduled for a Henry

Wood Promenade Concert in London on July

5, 1944, but the continuing threat of missile

attacks, launched from Nazi Germany, resulted

in it being postponed and relocated. The

first performance took place in Liverpool on

September 30. Goossens was the soloist and Sir

Malcolm Sargent conducted the Royal Liverpool

Philharmonic Orchestra.

The gentleness that is the concerto’s most

prominent characteristic gives no hint of the

turbulent background to its creation. “There is

rarely any hint of forcefulness,” author James

Day has written, “for most of the work is a

kind of mezzo-voce murmur. The orchestra

is kept firmly on the leash; for the most part it

tends to nod sagely in agreement every time

the soloist says anything particularly wise. This

happy give-and-take sets the tone for a genial

little work, full of felicitous touches of scoring

and poetry.” It includes material for a scherzo

that the composer had discarded from the

Fifth Symphony. The soloist has only limited

“breathing room”, Vaughan Williams calling upon

her/him to play almost continually from first bar

to last.

The opening movement, “Rondo Pastorale”,

communicates equal parts warmth, whimsy, and

wistfulness, with the soloist floating and soaring

eloquently over a warm field of strings. The

movement ends in quiet satisfaction. Minuet and

Musette, the brief, sprightly second movement,

evokes the music of the 18th century, but its

personality lies closer to a rural landscape than

the ballroom.

The finale, the longest movement, demands

considerable virtuosity from the soloist for

the first time in the concerto. It is a scherzo

with two trios—the first waltz-like and the

second more reflective. “The two-part coda

is more impassioned,” author Malcolm Walker

has written, “and recalls themes from earlier

movements, before the oboe scampers away

with interjections from the strings, finally coming

to rest on a pianissimo high D.”

Program note by Don Anderson

Concerto in A Minor for Oboe and String OrchestraComposed: 1944

19min

MAKE THE PART “OBOISTIC”Vaughan Williams

dedicated his

concerto to Léon Goosens, who

was responsible

for some editorial

changes to the oboe

part. In a letter from

composer to oboist:

“I hear from the BBC

that they have asked you to play my new

concerto at the Proms. I need hardly say I

am pleased at the prospect, if you are also

pleased—but you had better see it before

you make up your mind! [...] I shall welcome

suggestions from you as to making the part

more “oboistic".

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THE DETAILS

Vaughan Williams composed this exquisite

work at the request of the esteemed British

conductor, Sir Henry Wood (1869–1944), to be

premièred at a concert marking Wood’s 50th

anniversary on the podium. He replied with

the Serenade to Music, and dedicated it to Sir

Henry, “in grateful recognition of his services

to music.” He tailored the serenade to specific

vocalists, all of whom had worked with Wood

and were delighted and honoured to salute

him. Wood conducted the première at the

Royal Albert Hall, London, on October 5, 1938.

The original text, which Vaughan Williams

adapted, comes from Act V, Scene 1, of

Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice.

The scene is a starlit garden, where the lovers

Jessica and Lorenzo discuss music’s power

to soothe the soul. During the scene, they

are themselves serenaded by musicians.

Musicologist Frank Howes has written of

this score, “When Shakespeare spoke of

music in this passage he did what is virtually

impossible—he fixed in words all the heart-

easing qualities of the most volatile of the

arts. Vaughan Williams has made a further

distillation and presents us with the essence of

music in music.”

Program note by Don Anderson

Serenade to MusicComposed: 1938

14min

Text

How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank!Here will we sit and let the sounds of musicCreep in our ears: soft stillness and the nightBecome the touches of sweet harmony.Look how the floor of heavenIs thick inlaid with patines of bright gold:There’s not the smallest orb that thou behold’stBut in his motion like an angel sings,Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins;Such harmony is in immortal souls;But whilst this muddy vesture of decayDoth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.Come, ho! and wake Diana with a hymn!With sweetest touches pierce your mistress’ ear,And draw her home with music.I am never merry when I hear sweet music.The reason is, your spirits are attentive—The man that hath no music in himself,Nor is not mov’d with concord of sweet sounds,Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;The motions of his spirit are dull as nightAnd his affections dark as Erebus:Let no such man be trusted. Music! hark!It is your music of the house.Methinks it sounds much sweeter than by day.Silence bestows that virtue on itHow many things by season season’d areTo their right praise and true perfection!Peace, ho! the moon sleeps with EndymionAnd would not be awak’d. Soft stillness and the nightBecome the touches of sweet harmony.

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Vaughan Williams called this enigmatic, unusual

work a “suite for solo viola, mixed chorus, and small

orchestra,” though as author Simon Mundy has

written, “it is more like an essay or a symphonic

poem.” The fact that its six sections are performed as a

continuous whole further reinforces this point of view.

“[I]n Flos campi, words were the starting point,

episodes from the (Old Testament) Song of Solomon,”

his second wife, Ursula, wrote. “The viola with its

capability of warmth and its glowing quality was the

instrument he knew best, and he used it fully in the six

sections that explore the sorrows, glories, splendours,

and joys of the Shulamite (the female protagonist in

the Song), the King, and the shepherd lover.”

The printed score includes six verses, one per

movement, drawn from the Song of Songs and set

in Latin (the English translation is provided in the

column to the right). They may be taken as hints

toward what Vaughan Williams wished to portray in

the music. Yet he did not call upon the chorus to sing

these or any other texts, but to use their wordless

voices as one the piece’s numerous components.

The première took place in London on October 10,

1925. Sir Henry Wood conducted, leading the Queen’s

Hall Orchestra, viola soloist Lionel Tertis (to whom

the piece is dedicated), and singers from the Royal

College of Music. So individual a piece bewildered the

public and critics alike. Perhaps their non-acceptance

lay partly with the use of a wordless chorus, a practice

that had gained acceptance in continental Europe

(Ravel’s ballet Daphnis et Chloé, for example) but

not in England. In a more recent assessment, author

Michael Kennedy regarded this piece as “the most

sensuous [the composer] ever wrote.”

Program note by Don Anderson

Flos Campi (Flower of the Field) for Viola, Chamber Choir, and Chamber OrchestraComposed: 1925

17min

I. Lento: As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters...Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples; for I am sick with love.

II. Andante con moto: For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone, the flowers appear on the earth, the time of pruning has come, and the voice of the turtle dove is heard in our land.

III. Lento: I sought him whom my soul loveth, but I found him not...'I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him I am sick with love'...Whither is thy beloved gone, O thou fairest among women? Whither is thy beloved turned aside? that we may seek him with thee.

IV: Moderato alla marcia: Behold his bed [palanquin], which is Solomon’s, three score valiant men are about it...They all hold swords, being expert in war.

V. Andante quasi lento: Return, return, O Shulamite! Return, return, that we may look upon thee...How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O Prince's daughter.

VI. Moderato tranquillo: Set me as a seal upon thine heart.

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THE DETAILS

Vaughan Williams composed the first two

movements of a piano concerto in 1926, but five

years passed before he produced a finale that

satisfied him. The first performance took place

on February 1, 1933, with Harriet Cohen as the

soloist and Adrian Boult conducting the BBC

Symphony Orchestra.

The concerto met a largely hostile reception.

Seeking to address what some listeners

considered the enormous difficulty of the piano

writing, and problems with balancing the piano

and the quite substantial orchestra he called for,

in 1946 Vaughan Williams, with the collaboration

of pianist Joseph Cooper, produced a version

with two solo pianos. He also took the

opportunity to revise the concerto in several

other respects. At this concert, you will hear the

original version for one solo piano.

In the toughness that pervades the outer

movements, the concerto resembles the brutally

dramatic Fourth Symphony, which Vaughan

Williams composed shortly afterwards. The

percussive piano writing in those same sections

calls to mind the music that Béla Bartók (who

expressed his admiration for the concerto),

Sergei Prokofiev, Paul Hindemith, and Igor

Stravinsky were producing at that time. Another

influence was the music of Johann Sebastian

Bach, a composer whom Vaughan Williams

esteemed highly. Its “modernity” has made it

more popular internationally than in England.

The three movements of the concerto are

performed as a continuous whole. The first

is a brisk, powerful toccata, laced with bold,

bracing humour. A solo cadenza provides a link

with the second movement, a lovely Romanza.

The piano writing is more conventional here,

and shows the influence of French composers

such as Claude Debussy. Flute, oboe, and horn

take centre stage in the orchestra, delicately

supporting the soloist.

The last movement begins abruptly and

reignites the drive of the first movement. It has

two sections: Chromatic Fugue, and Finale in

German Style. The pianist introduces the subject

of the fugue. The music plunges forward with

great energy and builds to a massive orchestral

climax. The concluding German waltz emerges

from a bold cadenza for the piano. Based on the

same theme as the fugue, it swirls and dances in

hearty fashion.

Program note by Don Anderson

Piano Concerto in CComposed: 1926–1931

17min

AN ENTHUSIASM FOR BACHEnglish pianist

Harriet Cohen (1895–1967) garnered a

reputation as an

advocate of early

keyboard music,

especially of Johann

Sebastian Bach, as

well as of modern

English composers. It may not be surprising

then, that Vaughan Williams dedicated his

Piano Concerto to her, for the original work

emerged during a period in which he was

preoccupied with Bach’s music. According

to one biographer, “while he wrote this

concerto, he had the Busoni transcriptions

of Bach very much in mind for that was the

way he wanted to write for the piano.”

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In 1909, the Greek Play Committee of

Cambridge University’s Trinity College chose

for its annual undergraduate production The

Wasps, a satirical stage work by one of the most

highly esteemed playwrights of classical Greece,

Aristophanes. Premièred in Athens in 422 BC,

the play is a pointed satire of the city’s legal

system, especially the citizens’ great love of filing

law suits against each other, and the officials

who rendered judgments in those proceedings.

These judges were the “wasps” of the title. They

frequently took far longer to render their verdicts

than necessary, due to the fact that the longer

they deliberated, the more they were paid!

Vaughan Williams was invited to compose

incidental music to accompany the Cambridge

production. It proved to be his first significant

theatre score, predated only by Pan’s

Anniversary, which he scrapped, and succeeded

by several others, including a handful of plays

by Shakespeare.

His extensive score for The Wasps lasted about

an hour and 45 minutes and required tenor

and baritone soloists, a male chorus, and

orchestra. Orchestral selections included an

overture, entr’actes, and ballet music. In 1912,

he prepared a five-movement concert suite for

orchestra alone.

The Overture is regularly performed on its

own. It is a potpourri of attractive melodies,

humorous and lyrical by turns, set in a polished

orchestral style that shows the influence of his

recent studies with Maurice Ravel. Aside from

a bit of buzzing at the start, it is not directly

descriptive, and Vaughan Williams made no

attempt to recreate the atmosphere of ancient

Greece. What he did succeed in doing was to

give his audience appropriately light-hearted

music to launch or conclude an orchestral

concert.

Author James Day wrote that it is “based for the

most part on ‘folky’ material, with themes which

hop about in which (musicologist Sir Donald)

Tovey aptly described as ‘rowdy counterpoint’,

worked out in simple sonata form and scored

for a modest orchestra.” In a performance of the

full play, the warm theme heard in the central

section of the Overture was associated with the

reconciliation between the character Anticleon

and his father, Procleon.

Program note by Don Anderson

Overture to The WaspsComposed: 1909

9min

The leader of the chorus of wasps, as performed by R.W. Pole, of the 1909 Trinity College Greek Play Committee production of The Wasps for which Vaughan Williams provided the music.

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THE ARTISTSLouis LortiepianoLouis Lortie made his TSO début in January 1978.

The highly-esteemed French-Canadian pianist Louis Lortie

has extended his interpretative voice across a broad range

of repertoire rather than choosing to specialize in one

particular style. The Times of London has identified the artist’s

“combination of total spontaneity and meditated ripeness that

only great pianists have.” Upcoming engagements include The Philadelphia Orchestra,

Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, OSESP Sao Paulo, Berlin Philharmonic, Adelaide

Symphony Orchestra, and WASO Perth. Louis Lortie is Artist in Residence of the Shanghai

Symphony Orchestra for the 2017/18 season, and was recently named the new Master in

Residence at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel of Brussels.

He has made more than 45 recordings for the Chandos label, covering repertoire

from Mozart to Stravinsky and Lutosławski, including a set of the complete Beethoven

sonatas and the complete Liszt Années de pèlerinage, named one of the 10 best

recordings of 2012 by The New Yorker magazine. He is recording all of Chopin’s solo

piano music for Chandos. Recent releases include the complete Chopin Waltzes;

Saint-Saëns’s Africa, Wedding Cake, and Carnival of the Animals with Neemi Järvi and

the Bergen Philharmonic; and Rachmaninoff’s complete works for two pianos with

Hélène Mercier.

Louis Lortie studied in Montreal with Yvonne Hubert, in Vienna with Dieter Weber, and

subsequently with Leon Fleisher. In 1984, he won First Prize in the Busoni Competition

and was also a prizewinner in the Leeds Competition. He has lived in Berlin since 1997

and also has homes in Canada and Italy.

Sarah JeffreyoboeTSO Principal Oboe Sarah Jeffrey joined the TSO in 2005.

Hailed by critics for her “exquisite solo work” (The Globe

and Mail), “luscious tone” (Toronto Star), and her sensitive

musicianship, Sarah Jeffrey is Principal Oboe of the Toronto

Symphony Orchestra. A regular soloist with the TSO, Sarah

has also appeared as soloist with numerous orchestras across

Canada, performing works by Bach, Mozart, Vaughan Williams, Marcello, Haydn, and

Mozetich. She is also an active recitalist and chamber musician, making frequent guest

appearances with the Amici Chamber Ensemble, the ARC Ensemble, and Trio Arkel.

For a biography of Peter Oundjian,

please turn to page 9.

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Teng LiviolaTSO Principal Viola Teng Li joined the TSO in 2004.

Since joining the Toronto Symphony Orchestra in 2004, Teng

Li has established herself as a diverse and dynamic performer

internationally. Along with her TSO solo appearances, she

has performed with the Curtis Symphony Orchestra, Munich

Chamber Orchestra, Shanghai Opera Orchestra, Canadian

Sinfonietta, and the Esprit Orchestra, among many others. Her performances have been

broadcast on CBC Radio 2, Toronto’s Classical 96.3FM, National Public Radio, WQXR

(New York), WHYY (Pennsylvania), WFMT (Chicago), and Bavarian Radio (Munich). Her

début album, entitled 1939, was released in June 2015 to great acclaim.

Ms. Li is also an active recitalist and chamber musician, participating in the festivals of

Marlboro, Santa Fe, Mostly Mozart, Music from Angel Fire, Rome, Moritzburg (Germany),

and the Rising Stars Festival in Caramoor. She is currently a member of Trio Arkel.

Teng Li is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. She has won

top prizes at the Johanson International and the Holland-America Music Society

competitions, the Primrose International Viola Competition, the Irving M. Klein

International String Competition, and the ARD International Music Competition in Munich,

Germany. She currently serves on faculty at the University of Toronto and The Phil and

Eli Taylor Performance Academy for Young Artists at The Royal Conservatory, and is also

the Artistic Director of the Morningside Music Bridge International Festival—a world-

class training program for young professionals. She plays on a 1703 Amati viola donated

generously to the TSO by Dr. William Waters.

A devoted performer of new music, Ms. Jeffrey has commissioned several chamber works,

including Chaconne for Oboe, Horn, and Piano by Erik Ross, and Rhapsody by Ronald Royer.

Ms. Jeffrey is a recipient of the Ontario Arts Council’s Chalmers Award for Creativity

and Excellence in the Arts, and teaches regularly at Canada’s finest music schools. A

passionate and devoted teacher, Sarah is on faculty at The Glenn Gould School at The Royal

Conservatory and the University of Toronto, and spends her summers at the Orford Arts

Centre and the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. She can be heard discussing the finer

points of the oboe on CBC radio, both as a performer and as a guest on several podcasts.

Sarah shares her life with her husband, TSO horn Gabriel Radford, their two young

children, Evelyn and Aidan, and Jack the cat. In her spare time, Sarah enjoys travelling,

cooking, swimming in cold lakes, hiking, and of course, the art of reedmaking.

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THE ARTISTS

Emily D’Angelomezzo-sopranoEmily D’Angelo made her TSO début in February 2011.

Described as having “a voice hued like polished teak” by The

New York Times, Italian-Canadian mezzo-soprano Emily

D’Angelo was born and raised in Toronto. As a member

of the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at

the Metropolitan Opera, the 2017/18 season will include

performances of Die Zauberflöte in concert with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the

mezzo soloist in Stravinsky’s Pulcinella with the Montclair Orchestra, and her role début

as Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia at The Glimmerglass Festival.

A winner of the 2016 Metropolitan Opera National Council Audition Finals, D’Angelo

was also a First Prize winner of the 2017 Gerda Lissner International Voice Competition,

the 2017 Innsbruck International Cesti Competition for Baroque Opera, the 2017

Canadian Opera Company Quilico Awards Competition, the 2016 American National

Opera Association Competition, the 2015 Canadian Opera Company Centre Stage

Competition, and, in October 2017, was the Second Prize winner of the 2017 Neue

Stimmen International Competition. D’Angelo received her Bachelor of Music in Voice

Performance from the University of Toronto, and is a graduate of the Ensemble Studio at

the Canadian Opera Company.

Carla HuhtanensopranoCarla Huhtanen made her TSO début in April 2016.

Soprano Carla Huhtanen is in demand internationally for

her soaring, translucent voice, winning stage presence, and

her diverse repertoire. Now living in the UK, Ms. Huhtanen

was last heard with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra in

Boulez’s Le soleil des eaux in Toronto and in Vienna. Recent

career highlights have included Opera Atelier’s production of Armide in Toronto and at

Versailles, Bach’s Mass in B Minor for the Grand Philharmonic Choir, Tapestry New Opera

Works Dora Award–winning production of Rocking Horse Winner, and Abigail Schulte-

Richardson’s Alligator Pie, also for the TSO. Notable career credits include Cunegonde in

Candide with the BBC Concert Orchestra in London and in Malta for the Valletta Festival;

Lisetta in Garsington Opera’s La Gazzetta; Serpetta in La Finta Giardiniera at the Barbican

Centre’s Mostly Mozart series; and performances at Teatro La Fenice in Venice, Welsh

National Opera, Teatro San Carlo in Lisbon, and with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.

Recording credits include Herbert’s Babes in Toyland with the London Sinfonietta for

EMI; Vivaldi’s Griselda and Sacred Music Vol. 3 for Naxos Records; the JUNO Award–

winning Mozart’s Magnificent Voyage and Music of James Rolfe on Centredisc.

Tyler DuncanbaritoneTyler Duncan made his TSO début in December 2009.

British Columbia–born and America-based baritone Tyler

Duncan enjoys international renown for bringing consummate

musicianship, vocal beauty, and interpretive insight to recital,

concert, and operatic literature. His 2017/18 season includes

return engagements with Les Violons du Roy, Toronto's

Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, and the Calgary Philharmonic; débuts with the Minnesota

Orchestra, Hartford Symphony Orchestra, National Philharmonic Orchestra in Strathmore,

MD; and two engagements with Ottawa's National Arts Centre Orchestra.

Mr. Duncan's considerable gifts in the realm of art song have earned him prizes from

the Wigmore Hall (London) and ARD (Munich) Competitions, the Prix International Pro

Musicis, and the Bernard Diamant Prize from the Canada Council for the Arts, among

others. He holds music degrees from the University of British Columbia, Germany’s

Hochschule für Musik (Augsburg), and Hochschule für Musik und Theater (Munich). He is a

founding member on the faculty of the Vancouver International Song Institute. Recordings

include the title role of John Blow’s Venus and Adonis, Bach’s St Matthew Passion with

Portland Baroque, Purcell works and Carissimi’s Jepthe with Les Voix Baroque, and a DVD

of Messiah with Kent Nagano and the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal.

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Lawrence WilifordtenorLawrence Wiliford made his TSO début in January 2009.

Lauded for his luminous projection, lyrical sensitivity, and

brilliant coloratura, American-Canadian tenor Lawrence

Wiliford is in high demand in concert, opera, and recital

repertoire. In addition to these performances with the

Toronto Symphony Orchestra, his performances during the

2017/18 season include Mozart’s Requiem with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra

and ProMusica Chamber Orchestra of Columbus, Handel’s Messiah with the Phoenix

Symphony, and Bach’s St John Passion with the Grand Philharmonic Choir.

He has performed in concert with the major symphony orchestras and early music

groups in the US and Canada. His recent appearances include Messiah with the Louisiana

Philharmonic, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and

Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra; the Evangelist in St Matthew Passion with the Calgary

Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre Métropolitain, and Toronto Bach Consort; Bach's

Mass in B Minor with Music of the Baroque, National Arts Centre Orchestra, Orquesta

Sinfónica Naciónal de Mexico, Oregon Bach Festival, and Vancouver Chamber Choir;

and Beethoven’s Mass in C Major and Stravinsky’s Pulcinella with the Houston Symphony.

28

THE ARTISTS

Elmer Iseler Singers

Lydia AdamsConductor & Artistic Director

Jessie IselerGeneral ManagerThe Elmer Iseler Singers made their TSO début

in May 1982.

The Elmer Iseler Singers (EIS), conducted by Artistic

Director Lydia Adams for the past 20 years, are now in their 39th season. This 20-voice

fully professional choral ensemble, founded by the late Dr. Elmer Iseler in 1979, has

built an enviable reputation throughout Canada, the United States, and internationally

through concerts, broadcasts, and recordings—performing repertoire that spans 500

years, with a focus on Canadian composers.

The Singers present a five-concert series in Toronto each season, and are featured

at concerts, workshops, and festivals throughout Canada. Touring is also a major

component of EIS activities, with two multi-city tours taken in the 2016/17 season—

one to western Canada and one to Atlantic Canada. Annually, EIS sponsors choral

workshops through their GET MUSIC! Educational Outreach Initiative for secondary

school conductors and choirs, concluding with a joint public performance.

The Elmer Iseler Singers are a 2014 National Choral Award recipient. Lydia Adams was

the Artist Recipient of the 2013 Ontario Premier’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. In

2017, the Singers were a JUNO Award Nominee in the “Classical Album of the Year:

Vocal or Choral Performance” category.

SopranoJodie AlcornAnne BornathAmy DodingtonGisele KulakCathy RobinsonAlison Roy

AltoClaudia LemckeVictoria MarshallLaura McAlpineLynn McMurray

TenorBen Jisoo KimEric MacKeracherMitchell PadyWill ReidMichael Sawarna

BassAlexander JozefackiNelson LohnesGraham RobinsonMichael ThomasPaul WinkelmansVictor Cheng (James T. Chestnutt Scholar, 2017/18)