Orchestras Canada

Late last week, the Ontario Arts Council announced the winner of the 2012 Oscar Morawetz Award for Excellence in Music Performance: Toronto-based cellist Shauna Rolston. The $20,000 award was presented on January 30 at the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s New Music Festival, where Ms Rolston performed the world premiere of a new cello concert by WSO resident composer Vincent Ho. Widely recognized as one of Canada’s most unique musical talents, Ms Rolston has commissioned more than 50 new works for cello, performed in many of the world’s major concert halls and was the featured artist at the 1988 Calgary Olympics. In addition to her touring and performance schedule, Shauna is also Professor of Cello and Head of Strings at the University of Toronto and a Visiting Artist for the Music and Sound Programs at The Banff Centre.

Culture Days, a collaborative pan-Canadian volunteer movement to raise the awareness, accessibility, participation and engagement by all Canadians in the arts and cultural life of their communities, is moving forward.  A National Steering Committee, in collaboration with provincial committees, is mobilizing at the grassroots level to collaborate in the implementation of concurrent annual province-wide public participation events each September beginning in 2010. In support of these annual provincial events, Culture Days will drive a major annual national communications & public relations campaign to help re-position arts and culture in the public eye.
 
Culture Days was initiated and is supported by the Canadian Arts Summit in collaboration with Culture pour tous (producer of Quebec’s Journées de la Culture), The Banff Centre and with the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
 
Five provinces are lining up their efforts to be part of the Culture Days inaugural event in September 2010. These include Alberta (with Alberta Arts Days), Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario (with spOtlight) and Québec with the Journées de la Culture, which inspired Culture Days. Additional provinces and territories have expressed enthusiastic interest and we are confident others will join the collective effort soon.
 
For more information about the initiative, and to sign up for regular electronic updates, please visit here.