Congratulations to all the young people who submitted wonderful music-themed art work ideas to be considered for use on this year's Battlefords Kiwanis Music Festival program. The winner will be chosen this week.
Also look for other entries to be featured within the pages of the program and adorning the festival venues. Make sure to take the time to view all the wonderful images created by Battlefords youth when you attend festival sessions. The $7 printed program will be available at Sobeys around two weeks before the festival begins. Keep your eyes open around town for posters summarizing the festival schedules dates, disciplines, times and locations.
Over the last couple of weeks I began introducing the adjudicators for this year's festival. Ian Nelson, of Saskatoon, will offer his knowledge and skills in the area of speech arts to both individual performances and school groups. Our band students will benefit from the expertise of Edmonton's Larry Shrum.
Vocal adjudicator, Harold Wiens, is also a lecturer and workshop clinician. Wiens, professor emeritus, held the position of professor of music at the University of Alberta from 1975 - 2010. In 2006, he received a University of Alberta Faculty of Arts Undergraduate Teaching Award. Wiens completed his studies at the Nordwestdeutsche Musik-Akademie in Detmold, Germany, where he held a German Academic Exchange Fellowship for three years. Prior to that, he completed a BA at Wilfred Laurier University.
Wiens has appeared as a soloist and as a recitalist with orchestras and choral societies in cities in Germany, France, Ireland, Ukraine, Canada and the United States. He appeared on Canadian national radio and television and contributed to a Radio Canada International classical music recording. He has premiered many new compositions, including works written especially for him by composers Violet Archer, Gerhard Krapf, and Alfred Fischer. These works are featured on a recording released with the assistance of a grant from the Alberta Foundation for the Performing Arts.
During the past several years, Wiens has given masters classes and conference presentations in parts of Europe, Â鶹´«Ã½AV America and Asia. He has published his research on the role of voice training/development in managing stress and also its healing effect upon Parkinson's Disease. Currently, he is involved in a project designed to study the effects of voice training/healing upon individuals who suffer dementia.
The current schedule for music disciplines for the 2013 Battlefords Music Festival is: speech arts March 4 - 6, band March 7 - 9, voice March 10 - 15, piano March 16 - 19, strings March20 and gala March 22.
"If everyone started off the day singing, just think how happy they'd be." - Lauren Myracle, Shine
