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Four guest conductors to headline Oakville Symphony

De Clara conducting Oakville Symphony | Oakville Symphony
De Clara conducting Oakville Symphony | Oakville Symphony

The Oakville Symphony's upcoming 2021-2022 main concert series will feature four guest conductors. Each of the guest conductors, however, is also a shortlisted candidate to become the company's new music director.

Oakville Symphony hopes to open their 2021-2022 in November 2021, pending the reopening of the Oakville Centre for the Performing Arts. This reopening would mark the symphony's first live performance in almost two years since their last concert in early February 2020. (Their next concert was scheduled for April last year.)

In a statement today, the Symphony announced that current "Maestro Roberto De Clara​ will complete his immensely successful 24-year tenure with the Oakville Symphony in June 2021." The four guest conductors announced today will each present two performances between November 2021 and May 2022.

Oakville Symphony said their "musicians and patrons are looking forward to the first concert in November 2021 with even greater than usual anticipation after the cancellations resulting from the coronavirus pandemic."

The Guest Conductors

Concert attendees will be invited to provide feedback after each concert. The new Music Director/Conductor will take up their position with the Oakville Symphony at the start of the 2022-23 season. Below are short biographies of the four conductors, provided by the Symphony.

Pictured from left to right: Martin MacDonald, Pratik Gandhi, Lorenzo Guggenheim and Geneviève Leclair | Photo: Oakville Symphony
Pictured from left to right: Martin MacDonald, Pratik Gandhi, Lorenzo Guggenheim and Geneviève Leclair | Photo: Oakville Symphony

MARTIN MACDONALD

MacDonald will conduct the Oakville Symphony on ​November 6 and 7, 2021​. Martin MacDonald has served as Resident Conductor and Associate Conductor of Symphony Nova Scotia. He has guest-conducted extensively across Canada and made recordings for the CBC.

He has been awarded both the Heinz Unger Award and the Jean-Marie Beaudet Award for orchestral conducting. MacDonald holds a M.Mus. in Orchestral Conducting from McGill University and a B.Mus. in Cello from Memorial University, Newfoundland. His website is ​www.martinmacdonald.ca

PRATIK GANDHI

Pratik Gandhi​, ​Music Director ​​of the Rouge River Winds and Resident Conductor of the Toy Piano Composers Ensemble, ​will conduct the orchestra on ​February 5 and 6, 2022​. Gandhi served as Assistant Conductor at Symphony on the Bay (now Burlington Symphony Orchestra) and has guest-conducted other orchestras throughout Ontario.

He serves as Vice-Chair of the Concert Band Division at MusicFest Canada, and is a three-time winner of the Ontario Band Association’s Conducting Excellence Award. Gandhi ​holds a M.Mus. in Conducting and a B.Mus. in Music Education from Western University, and is pursuing a Doctorate degree at York University. His website is www.pratikgandhi.ca

LORENZO GUGGENHEIM

Lorenzo Guggenheim​, Founder and Music Director of the University of Toronto Campus Philharmonic Orchestra, will conduct on ​April 2 and 3, 2022​. Guggenheim has experience guest-conducting and assisting performances of symphonic repertoire, opera and new music with orchestras in Canada, the United States, Argentina and Chile.

He is about to complete a Doctorate in Orchestral Conducting at the University of Toronto where he was awarded a full scholarship and teaching position. Guggenheim holds a M.Mus. in Orchestra Conducting from the University of Washington, Seattle, and a bachelor’s from Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina, Buenos Aires, both in Orchestral Conducting. His website is ​​www.lorenzoguggenheim.com

GENEVIÈVE LECLAIR

Geneviève Leclair​, Assistant Professor (Conducting) at Berklee College of Music in Boston, will conduct the orchestra on ​May 7 and 8, 2022​. Her conducting experience includes many years with the Boston Ballet and as a guest with The National Academy Orchestra of Canada, National Ballet of Canada and the Guelph Symphony Orchestra.

Leclair was awarded the 2017 American Prize in Conducting (college/university) and received the Sir Ernest MacMillan Memorial Foundation Award in Orchestral Conducting in 2010. She holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Orchestral Conducting from Boston University, a M.Mus. and B.Mus. in Lute Performance from Université de Montréal. Her website is ​www.genevieveleclair.com

More information is available directly from the Oakville Symphony.


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Tyler Collins

About the Author: Tyler Collins

Tyler Collins is the editor for Oakville News. Originally from Campbellton, New Brunswick, he's lived in Oakville more than 20 years. Tyler is a proud Sheridan College graduate of both Journalism and Performing Arts.
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