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About
Us
The
Chestnut Hall Camerata is a performing collective consisting
of
professional musicians, video and visual artists, poets, dancers and other disciplines based in
the Waterloo region.
Its mandates are to produce collaborative music projects dedicated to
creating a fresh interpretation of traditional works, and to foster the
music of established and emerging composers.
To achieve this, the collective creates new performance synergies with
contributions from other disciplines - eg. drama, dance, visual arts,
spoken word, and across different genres. The performance
practices, styles and traditions of each performer are given equal
voice, resulting in a fusion of styles with a dominant root in the
classical music tradition.
The Camerata is extending the musical experience beyond the concert
hall experience and into everyday life. Through video and
audio
recording and the Internet, along with printed media articles, radio
broadcasts, YouTube videos, podcasts, blogging and an interactive
website, the Camerata is working to create an experience that fuses
together live performance with these media, providing an intimate
extended experience of its music that becomes a part of the listener's
day-to-day listening.
The Camerata is building an audience base from traditional and
non-traditional sources. In addition to reaching out to the
traditional classical music audience, it is targeting those in Waterloo
region’s diverse business, technology, research, education and
culture communities who are seeking an enriched concert experience
different than what the traditional music industry has provided.
To assist its goals, the Camerata
creates partnerships and
synergetic associations with other organizations that share its goals
of integrating the community music experience.
Artistic Director
Earl
McCluskie received his classical music training at the University of
Western Ontario in Theory and Composition, and recording training from
the Tonmeister graduate program at McGill University.
As artistic director for the Chestnut Hall Camerata, he has produced
concerts including the Waterloo Region Choral Composes Song Circle in
2008, MICHAELMAS: A Numinous Feast for All Angels in 2009 (with
co-artistic director, Daniel Cabena and nominated for a KW Arts Award
in 2010) and A Mother’s Tale in February of 2010.
As producer for Chestnut Hall Music, he has produced CD recordings for
many musicians and ensembles, performers and composers including
Juno-nominated Timothy Corlis’ Notes Towards a Poem that Can
Never Be Written and Leonard Enns’ Nocturne from the DaCapo
Chamber Choir award-winning release ShadowLand, the Wellington Winds,
the Menno Singers, Greensleaves, Windjammers, Sandra Mogensen, Guelph
Symphony Orchestra, Michael Purves-Smith and Kevin Ramessar, and live
concert recordings for numerous ensembles and performers including the
KW Symphony.
Beyond the region, his projects include a co-production with
CBC
Radio-Canada's Espace Musique of Tempi con Variazioni with Helmut
Lipsky, Suzie LeBlanc and Melosophere premiered at l'Université
de Montréal and then presented in 2008 at the Quebec City 400
Anniversary celebrations, released on CD in the fall of 2009 and
winning a Prix Opus award in Quebec in 2010, and
recordings for Soundstreams Canada and the Art of Time Ensembles in
Toronto, including producing that latter's recent release of. Sgt
Pepper, a reimagining of the Beatle's classic featuring
performances by Andy Maize (Skydiggers), John Mann (Spirit Of The
West), Craig Northey (the Odds), and Steven Page (former lead singer
Bare Naked Ladies).. |
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