Cantabile

About Cantabile:

The mandate of Cantabile is to present high calibre performances of vocal music, sometimes with instrumental accompaniment, to the Ottawa public. There is also an emphasis on presenting Canadian works both newly written and archival and to make classical vocal music even more accessible to Ottawa audiences by continuing to programme these works with more current vocal music including those of Sullivan, Berlin, Gershwin, Porter and Andrew Lloyd Webber. A further objective is to produce these concerts in Ottawa at a reasonable cost in venues that are easily accessible to the general public and to the physically challenged. Since 1990, Cantabile has taken advantage of the Canadian Musical Heritage Society (C.M.H.S.) publications of archival Canadian music and has presented these interspersed with standard vocal fare.

The Artists

Gloria Jean Nagy is the founding director of the duo Cantabile, now in its eighteenth season. She holds a Master of Music in Literature and Performance from the University of Western Ontario and has been a vocal instructor at Carleton University since 1981. Since 1984 she has been a music instructor for the Ottawa-Carleton District Board of Education and Canterbury High School. She has frequently been seen and heard in concert as a vocalist, accompanist and choral conductor and tours Canada as a vocal and\or choral adjudicator as well as a conservatory examiner. She has appeared in numerous operatic productions including Opera Lyra's The Impressario by Mozart, Banff School of Fine Arts' Merry Wives of Windsor by Nicolai, and student productions of opera excerpts by Britten, Wolf-Ferrari, Mozart, Puccini, Wagner, Menotti, Verdi and others at the University of Western Ontario Opera Workshop and at the Liszt Ferenc Zeneakademia (Music Academy)in Budapest. She maintains a busy vocal studio producing as many as six student recitals and three studio workshops per season as well as conducting at least fifteen choral concerts a year. She has been broadcast many times by CBC Radio (local, national and international), Societ� Radio Canada and Rogers Cablevision and has delighted audiences in Canada, Hungary, Spain and France. She has appeared as soloist with the Nepean, Deep River, Brantford (twice), Montreal Repertory and UWO Symphony Orchestras. She is an active administrator for local chapters of ORMTA (Ottawa Region Branch past-president), NATS, Eastern Ontario Friends of Conservatory Canada and Canadian Music Showcase. She maintains membership in the Association of Canadian Choral Conductors (ACCC), The Canadian Federation of Music Festivals, the Association of Canadian Women Composers, the Federation of Canadian Music Festival Adjudicators and the Alliance for Canadian New Music Projects (ACNMP). She conducts the Amabile Singers of Nepean, The Kanata Choral Society (www.kanchoralsoc.icomm.ca) and the Unforgettable Hearts of the Churchill Seniors. Ms. Nagy published A Singer's Overview of Canadian Contemporary Vocal Literature, for the 1994 NATS convention in Montreal and it is now available through the Canadian Music Centre in Toronto for a small fee. In 2002, Ms. Nagy and pianist Dr. Elaine Keillor performed music by Toronto composer Mary Gardiner which is now available for purchase on CD through Conservatory Canada in London and Waterloo Music, 3 Regina Street, Waterloo, ON.
In 2006, Gloria Jean Nagy with pianist Elaine Keillor and cellist Joan Harrison made a CD for Carleton Sound of Canadian Music featuring works published in the Canadian Musical Heritage Society publications. The CD is called Musique: Canadian Music for Parlor and Stage and became available in November 2006 for purchase from the performers ($20) and at the Leaading Note Music Store(Frank at Elgin Streets).
2006 also marked the twentieth anniversary of the duo Cantabile. �Nagy and Piper were at most eloquent, producing sounds of incredible beauty... The program was singularly fascinating.�
,br> �Nagy�s voice has a beautiful swell to it which she uses with care and for poignant results.�
Jacob Siskind, The Ottawa Citizen
�Nagy and Piper came off glowingly as they returned to the stage.. slipped from the classical to the more recent show tunes without missing a beat.�
Craig Widdifield, The Record Sentinel and Tottenham Times
�... a voice that just doesn�t stop and who indeed would want it to. Her tonal colouring is superbe and her control is of a beautiful head tone quality.�
Dale Schwartz, CFMO, Ottawa
�Nagy�s voice had clarity, colour, vitality and focus. Her use in the Handel aria of trills and other ornaments showed not only a masterful comprehension ... but also a finely-honed technique.�
James Frederick Brown, The Brantford Expositor
Comments? Questions? E-mail [email protected]
or phone at (613)829-4402

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