Alumni Newsletter – May 2022
Greetings from Dr. Stephen Runge, Head, Department of Music
Hello from Sackville, where spring has arrived following a successful but challenging year in the Mount Allison Conservatory of Music. While we were again fortunate to be able to hold most of our lessons, rehearsals, and classes in-person throughout the 2021-22 year, there were nevertheless periods of online instruction and disruptions to courses and rehearsals necessitated by the continuing Covid-19 pandemic. Though by now, students and faculty are familiar with online learning and the intricacies of Zoom lessons and lectures, I think I speak for all of us when I say I hope 2022-23 will bring a more stable return to in-person learning and music-making.
While the beginning of the Winter term, in particular, saw many of our planned activities and concerts cancelled or postponed due to ongoing pandemic-related restrictions, several of our faculty were able to present live recitals in front of small but enthusiastic audiences in Brunton Auditorium. Our weekly Collegia musica featuring student performances also resumed, providing invaluable performance experience for these developing musicians. In March, we welcomed our third Bragg Artist-in-Residence: collaborative pianist and scholar Graham Johnson. Dr. Johnson took his first cross-Atlantic trip since the start of the pandemic to spend a week in the Conservatory and you can read more details about his inspiring visit below.
The Winter semester came to a close with energetic performances by the Mount Allison Symphonic Band, New Music Ensemble, Chamber Orchestra, Choral Society, and Elliott Chorale. Third- and fourth-year students presented successful credited recitals live in Brunton, but also live-streamed on the Music Department’s YouTube channel so they could be appreciated by friends and family not able to travel to Sackville. Earlier this month, in-person Convocation ceremonies were held for the Class of 2022 as well as for the Classes of 2020 and 2021 since Convocations were not held in those years. Please read on to learn about the accomplishments of our returning students as well as the Class of 2022 to whom we wish all the best in their future musical endeavours.
Congratulations to the following students who graduated in May:
BACHELOR OF MUSIC
Acton, Christina Rita (Minor English), with Distinction - North Vancouver, BC
Cameron, Emma Farquhar Young (Minor English), with Distinction - Meadowville, NS
Clancey, Fiona Kate, with Distinction - Dartmouth, NS
Dupuis, Mélanie Margo (Minor German), with Distinction - Fredericton, NB
MacDonald, Lauryn Ann (Certificate Theatre Arts), with Distinction - Middle Sackville, NS
MacGregor, Hayley Danielle - Westville, NS
MacLoon, Sarah Mae, with Distinction - Fredericton, NB
McGrath, Reade Michael - Fredericton, NB
Mulvihill, Daniel James - Albert Bridge, NS
Paquette, Samuel-Mathias (Minor International Politics), with Distinction - Ottawa, ON
Salmonson, Hope Aria, with Distinction - Head of Chezzetcook, NS
Strong, Caitlin Heather Frances (Minor French), with Distinction - Berwick, NS
Williams, Kristopher John Alexander, with Distinction - Nassau, THE BAHAMAS
Yin, Zeting (Jerry), with Distinction - Shanghai, CHINA
BACHELOR OF ARTS, MUSIC MINOR
Wood, Lauren Dawn (Minors English, French, and Music) - Moncton, NB
BACHELOR OF COMMERCE, MUSIC MINOR
Savoie, Hannah Dale (Minor Music) - Calgary, AB
Congratulations to our Graduates, Class of 2022!
The Department of Music appreciates the continued support of its Alumni. Please stay in touch with us, keeping us posted on your news and accomplishments. We also have a presence on social media, and hope you will follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Sincerely,
Dr. Stephen Runge
Graham Johnson as Bragg Artist-in-Residence
World-renowned pianist Graham Johnson joined the Mount Allison University community as the third annual Bragg Artist-in-Residence, March 8-11, 2022. Johnson is recognized as one of the world’s leading collaborative pianists and most active recording artists. He has had a long and fruitful relation with Hyperion Records, for whom he has recorded a 37-disc collection of the complete Schubert Lieder (more than 600 songs!) and the complete art songs by Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms, and Gabriel Fauré.
Currently the Senior Professor of Accompaniment at the London’s Guildhall School of Music & Drama, Johnson is also a renowned scholar who has authored several publications including the three-volume Franz Schubert: the Complete Songs (Yale, 2014) and most recently Poulenc: The Life in the Songs, released in August 2020. Over his 30-year career, Johnson has been Song Advisor to the Wigmore Hall Song Competition since its inception and has received several awards and honours including the Gramophone solo vocal award in 1989 (with Janet Baker), 1996 (Die schöne Müllerin with Ian Bostridge), 1997 (for the inauguration of the Schumann series with Christine Schäfer), and 2001 (with Magdalena Kožená). He was made an OBE in the 1994 Queen’s Birthday Honours list, the Royal Philharmonic Society made him Instrumentalist of the Year in 1998, and in 2000 he was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music.
As one of the most important pianists in the field of art song (music for voice and piano) and a renowned scholar, Graham Johnson’s visit was both exciting and illuminating. In addition to his work with our voice and piano students in master classes and private coachings, he spoke about his own fascinating journey from growing up in southern Africa to settling in London and becoming one of the world’s most renowned accompanists. He gave a fascinating talk on “Schubert in Love, in Sickness and in Health,” and the week concluded with a beautiful lecture-recital of Schubert Lieder, for which Dr. Johnson was joined by Mount Allison’s Dr. Dory Hayley (soprano) and Dr. Vicki St. Pierre (contralto).
The Bragg Artist-in-Residency is made possible with the Bragg Women Music Opportunities Fund, established in 2017 by John Bragg, Mount Allison alumnus and past Chancellor, and his wife Judy, also a Mount Allison graduate. The fund honours five women in the Bragg family who made significant contributions to music education including: Zillah Bragg, Sylvia Bragg, Kathleen (Bragg) Sherman (’52), Carolyn (Bragg) Glennie (’58), and Lorraine (Bragg) Moore (’70). It helps support performance and experiential learning opportunities for Music students and brings artists of international calibre to campus through the Artist-in-Residence program.
Welcome to Dr. Christina Haldane
Dr. Christina Raphaëlle Haldane will be joining Mount Allison’s Department of Music as Assistant Professor of Voice for a three-year term beginning in July 2022. Christina’s career spans the UK, Europe, Asia and North America, and she has performed for opera houses such as The Finnish National Opera, The Royal Opera Covent Garden, Scottish Opera, and Musica Viva Hong Kong. Her specialism is performing Handel’s heroines, comedic bel canto roles, and contemporary opera. Christina enjoys performing and curating recital and chamber music concerts, and she is often invited to perform with leading orchestras. Her exploration of contemporary music has led to many collaborations with composers, and she continues to bring their vocal works to life. She is a bilingual English and French speaker, and she is a New Brunswick native of Acadian heritage.
Christina’s current plans include a collaboration with her cousin, interdisciplinary artist Carl Philippe Gionet. Their project will diffuse Acadian culture to broader audiences, through the lens of a reimagined classical vocal music aesthetic, through the curation of Gionet’s arrangements of 12 Acadian Folk Songs. Activities include an album release through Leaf Music, publication of a songbook of musical scores through Les Productions d’OZ | Les Éditions Doberman-YPPAN, and a summer training institute for undergraduate voice majors hosted by Musique sur mer en Acadie in the Acadian Peninsula. This month, she created the lead role of Helen in Michael Rose’s new musical opera A Northern Light’s Dream with Toronto Operetta Theatre. Christina is also thrilled to have been selected as one of this season’s Export NB artists, a prestigious career development initiative with Music NB.
In 2019, Christina released a critically acclaimed debut album … Let Me Explain, a collection of Canadian art songs which explores folk, jazz and avant-garde styles, and in 2020 she was the lead artist for Icare, an interdisciplinary digital performance product produced through the Canada Council for the Arts Digital Innovation initiative, in partnership with CBC/ Radio Canada.
Christina has enjoyed a strong relationship with the Royal Opera Covent Garden. She performed the London premiere of Jonathan Dove’s Minterne in the Crush Room recital space and the role of Rapunzel in their production of Sondheim’s Into the Woods. As a cover artist for the Royal Opera, Christina has been engaged as Fiorilla in Rossini’s Il Turco in Italia, Sifare in Mozart’s Mitridate, Nella in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, and Silvia in Thomas Adès’ bold opera The Exterminating Angel (also for the Salzburg Festival). Christina’s performance of Silvia’s aria was streamed to over 50,000 viewers in the Royal Opera House Insights special on Adès’ exciting new opera.
In 2019, Dr. Haldane joined the faculty at Dalhousie University’s Fountain School of Performing Arts in Halifax, and we look forward to welcoming her to Mount Allison in 2022-23. She will now be closer to her home in Moncton, where she lives with her partner Patrice and their two diva dog Pomeranians.
2022 J.E.A. Crake Performance Award in Music awarded to Kristopher Williams (BMus ’22)
Flutist Kristopher John Alexander Williams from Nassau, Bahamas is the 2022 recipient of the J.E.A. Crake Performance Award in Music. This award is given to the graduating student who, in the opinion of the faculty of the Department of Music, has excelled in performance, and who has maintained high academic standing and contributed to the cultural life of the university community.
Kristopher began the Bachelor of Music program at Mount Allison at just 16 years of age, having completed a full International Baccalaureate program during his high school studies. Throughout his four years in the Department of Music, Kristopher distinguished himself by maintaining a solid academic record in addition to strong achievement in flute performance. As a flutist, Kristopher was recognized for the high level of his collaborative work, as well as his expressive and increasingly polished solo performances. His flute playing improved tremendously during his four years at Mount Allison, resulting in acceptances into graduate programs in Flute Performance at two of Canada’s most prestigious institutions, McGill University and the University of Toronto.
Kristopher took advantage of the many performance opportunities available to students in the Bachelor of Music program, consistently impressing with his musicality, his generous stage presence, and his interesting repertoire choices. Constantly on the lookout for more obscure flute music, Kristopher introduced his fellow students to the works of several African-American composers, as well as to music by several lesser-known Eastern European composers. Kristopher played an active and engaged role in the flute studio of the Department of Music, always ready to help younger students when they needed mentoring and advice. He has also been an inspiration for other students in the Department, showing that hard work and a love of music can take you very far in just a short period of time.
Outside of his studies at Mount Allison, Kristopher also made a mark on the musical life of the province of New Brunswick, performing as a member of the New Brunswick Youth Orchestra for three years. Last year, Kristopher won the NBYO concerto competition, and performed Georges Hüe’s Fantaisie for flute and orchestra at the Imperial Theatre in Saint John, the Fredericton Playhouse, and at Moncton’s Wesleyan Celebration Centre. In summer 2021, Kristopher was also featured on the Young Artist series of the Barachois Summer Music Festival.
Kristopher plans to spend a year at home in Nassau before continuing his flute studies at either McGill or the University of Toronto. His ultimate goal is to play flute professionally in an orchestra.
Emma Cameron (BMus ’22) is awarded the Mount Allison Music Scholar Prize
As one of the Music Department’s finest overall scholar-performers, Emma Cameron combines intellectual potential and music performance ability with her sincere interest in piano performance, early art music, and the works of William Shakespeare. Cameron studied piano with Dr. Stephen Runge over the course of her degree. She was awarded an ISRG grant for her project “Music Oft Hath Such Charm: Exploring the Role of Music in Three Shakespearean Comedies” (summer 2021) with Dr. Linda Pearse (Music) and Dr. Karen Bamford (English), which resulted in a paper presentation in the Department of Music in September 2021. In this project, Cameron considered the auditory culture of early modern England and explored how Shakespeare harnessed music’s ability to cross social classes in making the character of the Fool a relatable intermediary. Cameron has also served as a research assistant and team manager for Pearse’s SSHRC-funded summer research lab that brings researchers and students together from Queen’s, Laval, and Mount Allison universities; she will continue as manager of the Mount A team in May and June 2022.
With Cameron, Mount Allison once again demonstrates that its small and supportive campus environment teems with potential for cross-disciplinary collaboration between students and faculty specializing in different fields and offers transformative networking and learning opportunities for these same students with other institutions across Canada. These experiences have brought Cameron to accept a place in graduate musicology studies at Oxford University (Great Britain) where she will continue to combine her myriad passions for musicology and English literature.
Annika Williams (BMus ’23) is co-recipient of Marie Hammond-Callaghan history prize
Annika Williams was a co-recipient of the Marie Hammond-Callaghan Women's History Prize for her essay “Madness and Identity in Twentieth Century Opera.” The award is given to an upper-year student who best exemplifies Marie Hammond-Callaghan’s high standards of scholarly practice and dedication to study of the history of women’s experience and activism.
Williams’s work brims with intellectual curiosity, creativity, and brightness. For example, she composed a paper on musical responses to pandemics developed in the Proseminar in Music History class (Winter 2021, Dr. Pearse), presented it at the UNB Arts Matters conference (Spring 2021), and was recognized with an honourable mention. In the Fall 2021 semester, Williams completed an experiential learning project “Methods in Community Archives” in which she explored women’s agency and labour in the Sackville Paper Box Company, highlighting the role of Florence Davis in the success of this local company during the early decades of the 20th century.
Music Students Win Independent Student Research Grants
Annika Williams has also been awarded a university-wide competitive Independent Summer Research Grant (ISRG) to work this coming summer with Dr. Linda Pearse on her project “Witchy Wicked Women: Gender Representation in Early Opera,” in which she will consider the sorceress characters in three representative operas, Dido and Aeneas by Henry Purcell, La Liberazione di Ruggerio by Francesca Caccini, and Alcina by George Frederic Handel. Annika’s ISRG is possible through the generous funding of the J.E.A. Crake Foundation.
Noah Batten (BMus ’23) has been awarded an Independent Student Research Grant to study electronic music this summer, under the supervision of Dr. Kevin Morse. Noah’s project is titled “Plug and Play: Hardware Controllers in Electro-Acoustic Music” and is funded by the Universitas Fund.
Composition Program Updates and a new Joint Major in Computer Science and Music
Student composers wrote some excellent new music this semester under the supervision of Dr. Adam Hill, who taught our MUSC 2151 course during Dr. Kevin Morse’s sabbatical leave. Student compositions were featured at our twice-yearly New Music @ Mount Allison concert in Brunton Auditorium on April 4.
We have been working to develop and expand our Composition course offerings in recent years and are pleased to announce the creation of two new courses: MUSC 2171 Sound Recording Techniques and MUSC 3171 Introduction to Electronic Music Creation. These will both be offered in 2022-23, and will be supported by new hardware and software funded by the Crabtree Foundation Fund and the Bragg Women Music Opportunities Fund.
These two new courses will also form part of an exciting new degree option to be offered beginning in the 2022-23 academic year: the Bachelor of Arts Joint Major in Computer Science and Music. This new program responds to growing interest in technology among students and is unique in the Atlantic region. It builds upon increasing electronic music and music technology content in our Music courses, particularly the Music Composition courses, and connects these to Computer Science courses relating to sound.
The new BA Joint Major in Computer Science and Music would allow students to combine their interests and abilities in both technology and music, focusing on the practical applications of technology and the production of creative outputs that use technology. Students will also develop important problem-solving skills as they apply their programming skills to audio-related issues.
A critical component of this program is a capstone project jointly supervised by Music and Computer Science faculty. Students will create an artistic work that involves significant technology components (for example, using programming software, digital audio processing, or creating an interactive sound installation), or develop a computer program or application that involves significant music components. Students who complete this joint major might go on to pursue careers or further study in:
- Composition, particularly in electronic music
- Film, television, or video game music
- Sound design: delivery of audio recording formats
- Music-related software design and development
- Music analysis tools
- Recommendation systems (e.g., algorithms in Spotify)
- Other areas of computer science
Student News
Recent graduate Hope Salmonson (BMus ’22) has been keeping busy this year, writing new work for performers both within and beyond our department – including several professional commissions. In early May, Hope performed with the Glass Winds Ensemble in Halifax, before presenting Co-Constructed Meaning: Embracing Individuality and Community in Choral Music at the PODIUM Choral Conference in Toronto, May 19-23. Hope will then spend June at the LAMP Composition Academy in Lunenburg, NS, supported in part by Bragg Women Music Opportunities Funding. She will learn under world-renowned faculty and compose a new work connected to poetry from Michelle Sylliboy’s Kiskajeyi - I AM READY. Hope received offers of admission to graduate programs in composition at the University of Toronto, Western, and the University of Ottawa, and has accepted an offer from the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver. Follow Hope’s music here.
In March, Charles Gagné (flute) and Isaac Stepaniak (piano) participated in the Jeunesses Musicales New Brunswick Emerging Young Artist Tour, joining other young musicians from Université de Moncton and private studios in presenting a series of concerts throughout the province.
Emma Yee (alto) and Mélanie Dupuis (soprano) were accepted into the National Youth Choir of Canada as representatives for New Brunswick, under the direction of conductor Jean-Sébastien Vallée and apprentice conductor Thomas Burton. The 2022 NYCC Program and Tour took place May 8-20 with rehearsals at the University of Ottawa and concerts in several Ontario centres, concluding with a performance in Toronto in conjunction with the Podium 2022 Choral Conference.
Emma Yee, Mélanie Dupuis, and Amanda Godin will be participating in Opera NUOVA’s 10-day intensive training program in Edmonton, June 30-July 9, 2022.
Emma Yee, Mélanie Dupuis, Clare Lowe, Amanda Godin, and Annika Williams will be taking part in the Halifax Summer Opera Festival’s production of Gluck’s Armide, July 23-August 14. This production is under the direction of Andrew Pelrine and Nina Scott-Stoddard, with conductor Eszter Horvath and répetiteur Giancarlo Scalia. Emma has been offered the role of “La Haine”; Melanie will be singing the role of the “Démone Mélisse”; Clare will perform the role of role of “Démon Lucinde”; Amanda Godin will be playing the role of “Phénice”; and Annika has been offered the role of “Naïde”.
Amanda Godin will also be attending the Orford Music Academy in Quebec in June, studying under the tutelage of sopranos Nathalie Paulin and Aline Kutan.
Percussionist Manuel Obando Florez will be joining the Filarmonica Joven de Colombia for an orchestral residency with faculty members from the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and a European tour under the baton of conductor Andrés Orozco-Estrada, June 11-July 4, 2022. The tour will include concerts in Hamburg, Rostock, Cologne, Stuttgart, Freiburg, Mannheim, Wein, Wiesbaden, the Rheingau Musikfestival, and Amsterdam.
Mélanie Dupuis has been accepted into Master’s programs for vocal performance at the Université de Montréal and McGill University, and has decided to continue her studies at the University of Manitoba, studying under Tracy Dahl.
Christina Acton has been accepted into the Master of Music – Choral Conducting program at Memorial University of Newfoundland. Christina presented “I Am What I Am: Gender and The Voice” at the 2022 UNB Arts Matters Conference, April 1-3, 2022, winning an award for Best Research Presentation. The theme for this year’s conference was “Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: Building Relationships.”
Caitlin Strong has been accepted to the Master of Music program in Performance and Literature at Western, the MMus program in Performance and Pedagogy at Memorial University of Newfoundland, and the Master of Music with concentration in Performance program at the University of Ottawa.
Emma Cameron was accepted to Master’s programs in Musicology at the following universities: Cambridge, Dalhousie, King’s College London, McGill, Oxford University, and the University of British Columbia. She has accepted a place in graduate musicology studies at Oxford.
Lauryn MacDonald was the recipient of the 2021-22 Dorothy Carlisle Music Enrichment Award, an annual honorarium for a student with an interest in Music Education. She developed an Arts Exploration Day Camp for Sackville-area elementary school students, which took place on April 9, 2022. Lauryn was accepted into the 2022 Ellison Canadian Honour Choir, one of the online MusicFest Canada National Honour Ensembles. ECHC participants took part in the virtual preparation and presentation of choral works, under the direction of Len Ballantine. Following graduation, Lauryn will be working at sea with Carnival Cruise Line before applying to conducting and music education programs at Memorial University.
Fiona Clancey has been accepted to the Master of Journalism program at the University of King’s College.
Anna Gordon will be attending the course Theory and Analysis of Contemporary Music in Paris during the month of June, supported by the Bragg Women Music Opportunities Fund. The course is a “Summer at Eastman” program and will run in conjunction with the multidisciplinary arts festival ManiFeste. Anna has also received a Killam Fellowship to attend the University of Austin in Texas for a semester next year, under her program in math and music.
Rowan White worked as a Virtual Schools Tour Online Actor and Technician this past fall and winter term with Sackville’s Live Bait Theatre, supported through funding from Future Wabanaki. You can read more about Rowan’s internship here.
Faculty News
Paul Paré Award of Excellence awarded to Dr. Linda Pearse
Dr. Linda Pearse has been awarded a Paul Paré Award of Excellence for her research and creative activities that bridge the realms of music history, music performance, intercultural collaboration, and a historiographical rethinking on the construction of music historical narratives. Pearse is fascinated with intercultural encounter and the fraught nature of cultural identity – what role does music play when cultures clash, engage, and exchange? Her prior creative activities on domestic and international stages inform her present research to create projects that bring together scholars, artists, and students, espousing the messiness and disruption of intercultural encounter. These cross-disciplinary projects have resulted in musical recordings, documentary videos, performances, journal articles, presentations, and K-12 educational engagement.
Her long-standing trajectory of research on early European art music has produced a circa 800-page catalogue of trombone music (forthcoming, Brepols 2022), a recording on the Canadian label ATMA Classique of works stemming from this catalogue (funded by FACTOR and the Canada Council for the Arts; 2019), as well as performances, conference presentations, and invited chapter proposals. Her recent SSHRC funding (IDG 2021–23) supports a bibliography project with Queen’s and Laval Universities that challenges embedded narratives in European music history. A recurring six-week summer student research lab pays students to work on the bibliography; students then engage in course redesigns within Pearse’s music history courses, building their individual research into course content. Finally, Pearse’s work on intercultural collision and encounter resulted in How do we listen? a collaborative project that tells Angela and Judie Acquin’s (Wolostoqew) story about their grandmother, a survivor of the Shubenacadie Indian Residential School (SSHRC CG 2018–20). This project produced a video documentary (2020), two peer-reviewed articles (2019, 2021), and multiple performances for community and high school audiences. Congratulations Linda!
An upcoming book release by Dr. Elizabeth Wells
The daily grind of the modern professor can be stressful, chaotic, and at times seemingly impossible to organize. In her new book, The Organized Academic, award-winning scholar, pedagogue, and former Dean Dr. Elizabeth Wells offers realistic day-to-day techniques that promise to transform academic life. The book will be published by Rowman and Littlefield and will come out in the fall. Click here for more information.
Alumni News
Lucie Bauby (BMus ’19) will be starting a Master’s degree in flute performance at the University of Ottawa this fall. She will be studying with National Arts Centre Orchestra principal flutist Joanna G’froerer.
Esther Su Young Kwon (BMus ’21) will be transferring from her graduate program at the University of Toronto to The Glenn Gould School of The Royal Conservatory of Music for their Artist Diploma program. She will be continuing her studies with Nora Shulman.
Daniel Gardner (BMus ’16) and Abigail de Niverville (BMus ’15), who both completed graduate studies in composition following their graduation from Mount A, recently participated in a collaborative distance-speed-opera-creation event. The resulting video also featured MtA music alumni Jacqueline Miller (BMus ’17) and Kelsey Van Blarcom (BMus ’16). Click here to watch their creation. In addition, D’Arcy Blunston (BMus ’16) is currently the Artistic Associate and Production Intern of Lucky Penny Opera, the company that produced the event.
Adelle Elwood (BMus ’20), who studied composition during her time at Mount A, is making a name for herself as indie-pop artist Keeper E, creating new music and performing as a vocalist. Her debut EP, The Sparrows All Find Food, won New Artist of the Year at Nova Scotia Music Week in 2021, and she was on the CBC Music Top 20 chart twice in April of this year. Find out more about Adelle’s music here.
Baritone Branden Olsen (BMus ’17) will be joining the McPhee Artist Development Program at Calgary Opera for the 2022-23 season.
The Bells of Baddeck, an acclaimed Canadian music drama based on the story of Alexander Graham Bell and his wife Mabel, returns this summer in an innovative new production marking the centennial of Bell’s death. Composed by MtA Music alumnus Dean Burry (BMus ’94) in 2015, The Bells of Baddeck also features additional arrangements by Lydia Adams (BMus ’75, BEd ’76, hon DMus ’03). Other MtA Music grads appear in the list of cast and crew: Morgan Reid (BMus ’18) and Laura (McLean) Brandt (BMus ’09) will be sharing the role of Mabel Hubbard Bell; Emily O’Leary (BMus ’21) will perform a number of roles, including Catherine MacKenzie, secretary to Alexander Graham Bell. Robyn Cathcart (BMus ’99) is production manager and also plays the parts of Melville Bell, Alexander Graham Bell’s father, and Arthur McCurdy, Editor of the Cape Breton Island Reporter. Performances will take place August 2 to 20, 2022 at Parks Canada’s Alexander Graham Bell National Historical Site in Baddeck, Nova Scotia. For additional information, see bellsofbaddeck.com.
The Halifax Camerata Singers has a strong representation from Mount Allison alumni!
The choir’s general manager is Peggy (Forshner) Walt (BA ’81), and fundraising chair is Andrea (Dickinson) Mathis (BMus ’08).
Photo taken in Halifax, April 2022.
2022 Summer Academy of Music
In July, we will be very happy to welcome talented young musicians to campus for the ninth annual Summer Academy of Music, to be held July 10 to 16. Offered virtually for the past two years, the 2022 program will take place on-campus and see participants ages 14 to 19 enjoy an intensive program of lessons, courses, chamber music, master classes, and performances, culminating in a showcase recital at the end of the week. This year’s Academy faculty include Dr. Joël Cormier (percussion), Prof. Jennie Del Motte (aural skills), Prof. Nadia Francavilla (strings), Dr. Christina Haldane (voice), Prof. Peter Higham (guitar), Dr. Olivier Huebscher (brass), Prof. James Kalyn (winds), and Dr. Stephen Runge (piano). Late applications may still be accepted for this summer’s Academy, space permitting. More information can be found at mta.ca/music/summeracademy
