The Media Music Concert (MMC:IX) is a showcase of film, television and video game music arranged and performed by York music students.
This year’s arrangements include music from Zelda, Pocahontas, Star Wars, Studio Ghibli and more.
The Music Media Concert is in its ninth consecutive year and is organized by the Music Students Association at York University and the School of the Arts, Media Performance & Design.
Admission: $15 | $10 for students & seniors.
Box Office: Purchase tickets online or phone 416-736-5888
AmirKoushkani is an ethnomusicologist, composer, performer, and instructor of traditional Persian stringed instruments Tar and Setar. Dr. Koushkani’s training in Persian music began in Iran, where he was introduced to traditional Persian themes, under the tutelage of Master Dariush Pirniakan.
Amir Koushkani holds a Master’s Degree in Western Musical Composition and he also received a PhD in Ethnomusicology at York University, with a dissertation on the history and theory of the Iranian musical transcription. With specializing in on a different aspect of Persian music, over the last three decades he composed widely for theatre, orchestra, and various musical ensembles. He has recently published a two-volume study on the “Persian Avaz” in collaboration with Master Mohammad-Reza Shajarian and Professor Rob Simms at York University.
Admission is free.
Faculty Spotlight Series
To Fill the Dim Pause: Offerings for St. Cecilia
Compositions by Michael Coghlan
Michael Coghlan, piano
William Thomas, trumpet
Patricia Wait, clarinet
Ben Bolt Martin, cello
Leslie Fagan, soprano
Thursday, Jan. 30, 12:30 p.m.
Tribute Communities Recital Hall – Free
Admission is free. Maps & Directions
The Music at Midday series presents a recital featuring student soloists in the classical performance program.
Admission is free. Everyone welcome.
Professor Mark Chambers conducts the York University Symphony Orchestra in a concert featuring 2017 Concerto Competition winners.
2020 Winners
Christian Masucci-Facchini: Countertenor
Daniel Pasoff: Tenor Saxophone
Xingzhi Wang: Tenor
Admission: $15 | $10 for students & seniors.
Box Office: Purchase tickets online or phone 416-736-5888
An evening of improvisation in a participatory “open mic” set-up, hosted by the improve studios of Steve Koven.
Performers and observers welcome.
Admission is free.
The Accolade Trio is comprised of York Music Professors Patricia Wait and Mark Chambers and Elizabeth Acker.
Admission is free. Maps & Directions
ACCOLADE TRIO
Patricia Wait, clarinet
Patricia Wait is a clarinetist with extensive performance credits as a soloist, orchestral and chamber musician. She has appeared with many leading Canadian artists and ensembles, including pianist Anton Kuerti and clarinetist James Campbell; the St. Lawrence String Quartet, Prague String Quartet and Purcell String Quartet; and the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra. She is also an active clinician and adjudicator.
Mark Chambers, cello
Mark Chambers is a conductor, cellist and early music specialist who has performed extensively in the US and Ontario as both a chamber musician and orchestral player. His research interests include Baroque music, period instrument performance practice, the ‘Tartini tone’, and scordatura, altered tunings for strings. He has authored several articles for the American String Teachers Journal and is a contributor to the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. He teaches cello and viola da gamba and conducts the York University Symphony Orchestra.
Elizabeth Acker, piano
Elizabeth studied piano, harpsichord and jazz at York University and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts. She continued her piano studies with Slavka Dimitroff and James Anagnason and is comfortable playing classical, musical theatre, jazz and contemporary music. Elizabeth has been teaching in Toronto for over 30 years and has earned a superb reputation as an accompanist, chamber musician and coach, teacher and adjudicator. Elizabeth plays for the Niagara Symphony, VOCA Chorus of Toronto, various chamber groups and is a busy accompanist at York University, University of Toronto and the RCM in Toronto. In the summer, she plays chamber music at ‘Heaven’ in N.Y. State and is a coach at the Vermont Music and Arts Centre.
DAVE DOUGLAS : 2020 OSCAR PETERSON JAZZ ARTIST- IN-RESIDENCE
Award winning trumpeter and composer, Dave Douglas, is the Department of Music’s 2020 Oscar Peterson Jazz Artist-in-Residence. During his residency, he will deliver masterclasses for instrumentalists as well as coach small jazz ensembles.
This jam session offers a unique opportunity to hear Douglas in performance with faculty members in the Department of Music’s jazz program. Admission is free.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
DAVE DOUGLAS
Dave Douglas is a prolific trumpeter, composer, educator and entrepreneur from New York City known for the stylistic breadth of his work and for keeping a diverse set of ensembles and projects active simultaneously.
His unique contributions to improvised music have garnered distinguished recognition, including a Doris Duke Artist Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, an Aaron Copland award, and two Grammy Award nominations. Douglas’ career spans more than 50 unique original recordings as a leader and more than 500 published works. His current ensembles include: Dave Douglas Quintet; Sound Prints, a quintet co-led with saxophonist Joe Lovano; UPLIFT, a sextet including bassist Bill Laswell; Present Joys, a longstanding duo with pianist Uri Caine which recently added Andrew Cyrille as third member for a 2019 recording; High Risk, an electronic ensemble with Shigeto, Jonathan Maron, and Ian Chang; and the latest project, ENGAGE, a sextet with Jeff Parker, Tomeka Reid, Anna Webber, Nick Dunston, and Kate Gentile. Douglas is often engaged in special projects which include big bands, tributes, and multi-trumpet ensembles, such as Dizzy Atmosphere.
As a composer, Douglas has received commissions from a variety of organizations including the Trisha Brown Dance Company, Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, Norddeutscher Rundfunk, Essen Philharmonie, The Library of Congress, Stanford University and most recently, Monash Art Ensemble, which premiered his chamber orchestra piece Fabliaux in March 2014. He is currently completing a new work for the chamber orchestra Alarm Will Sound, which will premiere in May 2019.
Douglas has held several posts as an educator and programmer. From 2002 to 2012, he served as artistic director of the Workshop in Jazz and Creative Music at the Banff Centre in Canada. He is a co-founder and president of the Festival of New Trumpet Music, which celebrated its fifteenth anniversary in 2017. He is currently on the faculty at the Mannes School of Music and is a Guest Coach for the Juilliard Jazz Composer’s Ensemble. In 2016, he accepted a three-year appointment as the Artistic Director of the Bergamo Jazz Festival.
In 2005 Douglas founded Greenleaf Music, an umbrella company for his recordings, sheet music, podcast, as well as the music of other artists in the modern jazz idiom. Greenleaf Music has produced over 70 releases and will be celebrating its fifteenth anniversary in 2020.
“Dave Douglas is the unassuming king of independent jazz, a model of do-it-yourself moxie, initiative and artistic freedom.”
– Frank Alkyer, Publisher, Down Beat
The Music at Midday series presents a recital featuring student soloists in the classical performance program.
Admission is free. Everyone welcome.
An evening of improvisation in a participatory “open mic” set-up, hosted by the improve studios of Brian Katz.
Performers and observers welcome.
Admission is free.
Belly Dance as Mindful Movement for Stress Reduction
This movement-based workshop utilizes belly dance vocabulary designed for self-soothing. Learn movements that support the reduction of stress and anxiety symptoms. Participants will leave with applications on how stress responses can be experiences on a spectrum from hyper-arousal (feelings of overstimulation) to hypo-arousal (feelings associated with low-energy or burnout). Belly dance used as mindfulness offers gentle wavey movement designed to down-regulate physical stress responses. This workshop also combines more energizing vocabulary through shimmying and shaking as well as core engagement to support up-regulation of the nervous system, based on internal rhythm and percussion.
About the Facilitator :
Shaila is completing her Masters in Dance at York University. She concurrently training as a Dance Movement Therapist through the National Centre for Dance Therapy in Montreal. Her work focuses on belly dance practices that use sensuality as a healing tool within dance interventions. Her movement offerings look at building resiliency, decoupling stress responses and promoting body positivity. Shaila provides a unique framework that maps belly dance vocabulary for nervous-system regulation. Shaila has been an active member of the Toronto belly dancing community for over a decade, both as a performer and instructor. She currently works as a Health Educator and Training Specialist and enjoys offering students training on mental health and well-being.
The York University Chamber Choir
John Holland, Interim Conductor
Join the York University Chamber Choirs as they perform works by Mozart, Dvořák, Loomer and Zelenka.
Ticket Admission:$15 adults | $10 students & seniors
Box Office: Purchase tickets online or call 416-736-5888
York University’s World Music Festival is a cross-cultural celebration spotlighting musical traditions of five continents.
Produced by Professor Sherry Johnson, this global sonic tour presents a sampling of international cultures represented in York’s world music program.
The festival packs six free concerts into two days: March 12-13
On March 12, performances take place in two locations:
- Martin Family Lounge (MFL), 219 Accolade East Building
- Tribute Communities Recital Hall (TCRH), 112 Accolade East Building
10:30 a.m. – Celtic Ensemble (MFL)
11:30 a.m. – World Music Showcase (MFL)
1:00 p.m. – Cuban Ensembles with Escola de Samba (TCRH)
3:00 p.m. – West African Drumming: Ghana (TCRH)
6:30 p.m. – Caribbean Ensemble (TCRH)
Free admission.
Maps and Directions
Hollywood Old and New: ReDesigns for Student Engagement in eLearning with Gillian Helfield & Dan Becker
Thursday, March 12
12:00 – 1:30 PM
AMPD Faculty Lounge (GCFA 214)
Free
RSVP
Join us for this lunchtime talk about the evolution of “Hollywood Old and New”, a fully online class that offers students an understanding of Hollywood film genres from a historical and social perspective. In this talk, the presenters will discuss their pedagogical strategies for the new course redesign to facilitate student engagement in a large format class. This course is offered by the Department Cinema and Media Arts in the School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design.
Gillian Helfield lectures at York University, in Cinema and Media Studies in AMPD, Humanities in LAPS, and Canadian Studies at Glendon College. Though she has specialized in Canadian and Quebec Cinemas, other areas of academic interest include Genre Studies, Cultural Studies, Women’s Cinema, National Cinemas, Diasporic and Exilic Cinemas, Middle Eastern Cinemas, and Rural Cinemas. In 2006, her book Representing the Rural: Space Place and Identity, in Films About the Land, was published by Wayne State University Press.
In collaboration with AMPD, Gillian has developed and redesigned two large-enrolment online film courses, which have earned recognition from international eLearning associations (IELA) and the Teaching Commons at York University (York’s nomination for the STLHE Brightspace /D2L Innovation Award). In 2017, she received the AMPD eLearning Teaching Award.
Dan Becker is the Educational Designer and Developer for the Faculty of Education. He works extensively with instructors to operationalize educational theory and current research within courses that utilize technology. Dan develops learning experiences that engage students, build communities of inquiry and employ meaningful assessment strategies, while avoiding excessive effort on the part of the instructor. His approach of simplicity and depth has produced a variety of courses that are enjoyed by instructors and students alike.
York University’s World Music Festival is a cross-cultural celebration spotlighting musical traditions of five continents.
Produced by Professor Sherry Johnson this global sonic tour presents a sampling of several international cultures represented in York’s world music program.
The festival packs six free concerts into two days: March 12-13, 2020
The March 13th performance features The Balkan Music Ensemble in the Tribute Communities Recital Hall at 7:30 p.m.
Free admission.
