CBC host Tom Allen’s latest ‘chamber musical’ tells the story of young Johann Sebastian Bach – who hadn’t really started composing yet and was actively screwing up terribly in his first job. After he got in a street fight and almost killed one of the students, he asked permission for time away. They gave him 4 weeks, but he was gone for 4 months. He walked 400 km north to a glittering port city where a wise old teacher lived, and while he was there, over Christmas, it’s entirely possible he fell in love. When he came back, he very quickly became the genius artist we still revere.
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The Amazing Artists that will be in this show are…..
Erika Raum began her career as a professional violinist at 12, and a few years later
won Joseph Szigeti International Violin Competition. That launched a chamber music
and solo career that has taken her all over Europe, North America and everywhere else.
She is a founding member of the ARC Ensemble (Artists of The Royal Conservatory),
and plays on their celebrated recordings, as well as maintaining a lively career as a
performer of new music at the same time as being mom to 4 children. Nothing to it.
Joe Phillips has been Principal Double Bassist with London Symphonia since 2007,
while simultaneously maintaining a career as a musical collaborator with so many
colleagues from so many corners of the musical world that if we started listing them
here you’d still be reading this when it’s time to go home. He also writes symphony
orchestra arrangements for people who flinch at that kind of thing.
As a child, Suba Sankaran studied South Indian classical singing & percussion with master drummer Trichy Sankaran, her dad. She teaches, composes and creates sound
design for theatre and film, all while maintaining a regular performing schedule with
Autorickshaw, FreePlay, and a solo career that most recently had her with the Whynot
Theatre production of Mahabharata at the Barbican Theatre in London, UK.
Lori Gemmell was Principal Harpist with the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony from
2000 until a few months ago, when there suddenly wasn’t one. She teaches at Wilfred
Laurier University and for the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. Lori plays often
with the Toronto Symphony and the National Ballet, as well as the Four Seasons Harp
Quartet, with trumpeter, Larry Larson, fellow harpist Jennifer Swartz, and has recorded
for Feist. Lori has several recordings and can often be seen thinking of what’s next.
Tom Allen was born in Montreal, went to three universities and earned 2 degrees. He
worked as a bass trombonist in New York City when there were still places you just
didn’t go, and in Toronto. He began working for the CBC on his 30 th birthday, a very
long time ago. He has written three books and created and hosted countless shows like
this one. In 2021 he wrote and produced a film starring RH Thomson. It, and any other
information you may want, is available at tomtomallen.com.
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