ADJUDICATORS
List of 2020 Adjudicators coming soon. Adjudicators may be substituted without announcement.
Sharon Fitzsimmins
Sharon Fitzsimmins, Mus. Bac., B.Ed, is a respected educator, international adjudicator, clinician and conductor. She is past president of The Ontario Music Educators’ Association (OMEA) and was co-editor of The Recorder for 8 years, examiner for The Royal Conservatory of Music and a conductor at the National Music Camp of Canada .
She has received numerous teaching, professional development and leadership awards including Teacher of the Year. In November 2006, Sharon received the highest award from the OMEA, an Honorary Life Membership. In Feb. 2019 Sharon also received an Honorary Life Membership from the Ontario Band Association (OBA).Sharon is currently the Chair of the Concert Band Division for MusicFest Canada.
Sharon is proud to have taught for thirty years at Barrie North Collegiate where she conducted award winning bands and choirs. She has written three teacher resources and a collection of stories called It Made Me Laugh, It Made Me cry. Stories From the Music Room.
Brenda Zadorsky
Brenda Zadorsky (B.Mus. Hons, B.Ed W.C.A.M.) is co-founder and Artistic Director of Amabile Youth Singers, Prima and Amabile Young Women’s Ensemble. She is a highly sought after voice teacher, clinician, adjudicator and consultant. Along with John Barron, Brenda co-founded the Amabile Youth Singers in 1985. She continues to win numerous honours both nationally and internationally for her artistic leadership.
Most recently Brenda was inducted into Western University, Don Wright Faculty of Music Wall of Fame. This accompanies her induction into the London, Music Hall of Fame. Her extensive career as music consultant and teacher with the Thames Valley District Board of Education and the London and District Catholic School Board spanned some 35 years. Prior to retirement, Brenda taught music education methodology for the University of Western Ontario at the Don Wright Faculty of Music where she was consistently awarded certificates for outstanding teaching. She received the Don Wright Scholarship in Vocal Music, and in 2002, was presented with the Canadian Learning Tree Award.
She is presently principal of the Zadorsky School of Music and was co-founder and principal of the Victoria Academy of Music for sixteen years. Over the years, her students have consistently been awarded major scholarships at festivals as well as entrance scholarships to Canadian and American universities. Many have continued with performing careers in Canada and abroad.
Daisy Leung
Daisy is making her mark in Toronto as an accomplished collaborative artist whose love for chamber music and collaboration is apparent in her approach. She is employed as a collaborative pianist at the University of Toronto and at the Royal Conservatory of Music, as well as with the Toronto Children’s Chorus. For 20 years, she has taught piano, history and theory, and feels fortunate to be able to pass on her love of music to the next generation through teaching and adjudicating festivals across Ontario.
After starting piano lessons at the age of five with Betty Wong and then Wolfram Linnebach in Edmonton, she moved to Toronto to complete a degree with piano pedagogue Marietta Orlov, where she earned her Bachelor of Music at the University of Toronto. She has been privileged to play for many of today’s leading pianists, such as Jon Kimura Parker, Jane Coop and Marc-André Hamelin. Through her participation in U of T’s chamber music program and as a collaborative pianist, Daisy has also been afforded the opportunity to be coached by Steven Isserlis, Pamela Frank, Pinchas Zukerman, Steven Philcox, Carolyn Maule, Jamie Summerville, Laurence Lesser, Sylvia Rosenburg and Jacques Israelievitch.
Daisy has completed further studies at The Banff Centre, Algonquin Summer Institute, Aria Summer Music Festival and Scotia Festival of Music. She has been a recipient of awards and scholarships from institutions including the Canadian Music Competition, Edmonton Kiwanis Music Festival, Alberta College and the Royal Conservatory of Music.
Petya Stavreva
Praised for expressing “ultra-sensitive and highly refined pianism” (Quinte Society for Chamber Music), pianist Petya Stavreva is a DMA candidate at Western University, working with Prof. Leslie Kinton. She finished her Master’s Degree with Prof. Anton Nel at the University of Texas at Austin, where she received full scholarship and grant support from Canada Arts Council and the Webb Trust Fund from the Glenn Gould School. Before that, she was an artist-in-residence at the Banff Centre for ten weeks. Currently at Western, she is a four-time recipient of the Ontario Graduate Scholarship, as well as the Don Wright Graduate Entrance scholarship, and the Sherwood Fox Music scholarship.
Petya is currently based in Toronto, and has performed throughout Europe and North America both collaboratively and as a soloist. She is active as a collaborative pianist, and is described to have “extraordinary ability to place the sound of the piano exactly where the soloist needs it to be” (Quinte Arts Council Umbrella). After completing a tour in Italy for a series of chamber concerts, she finished a recording project at the Banff Centre, where she also collaborated with fellow emerging artists. Petya is quickly becoming in demand as an educator, and has been an adjudicator for the Kiwanis Festival in Toronto, the Pickering GTA Music Festival, the Brant Music Festival, the Kiwanis Festival in Ottawa as well as the Ontario Music Festival Association in Hamilton. Additionally, while undergoing training for the Royal Conservatory College of Examiners, she maintains a busy teaching studio in both London and Toronto/Mississauga. Petya also recently formed a teaching partnership with the Steinway Piano Gallery.
Petya has been a prize winner of numerous competitions in Canada and Europe such as the international competition “Franz Schubert” in Rousse, international competition “Music and Earth” in Sofia, among many others, and has performed concertos with the Toronto Sinfonietta Orchestra. Recently she performed at the Aeolian Hall in London, as part of the Emerging Classical Artist Series. Earlier last year, she collaborated with Canadian baritone Peter McGillivray for a recital as part of the Quinte Society for Chamber Music. Her upcoming engagements include various performances in the GTA and a recording project as part of a newly formed Duo Avante with pianist Todd Yaniw.
She obtained an Artist Diploma, studying with James Anagnoson at the Glenn Gould School on full scholarship, and obtained a Bachelor’s degree at the University of Toronto with James Parker and Marietta Orlov. She also attended the Taylor Performance Academy in Toronto with full scholarship, studying with Arshalouis Nersessian. Past festivals include Bowdoin Music Festival as a collaborative Fellow, Young Artist Program in Ottawa, the Banff Chamber and Solo Residencies, Nice Academy in France, and Toronto Summer Music Festival.
Rebecca Northan
Rebecca Northan is a professional actor, director, and theatre creator. Her company, Spontaneous Theatre, is responsible for creating several exciting shows that involve casting an audience member in a lead role (Blind Date, Undercover, Legend Has It). Her newest creation, An Undiscovered Shakespeare will premier at the Stratford Festival at the end of June. Rebecca has also made appearances in film & TV having guest-hosted on This Hour Has 22 Minutes, and played pleading roles in CTV’s “Alice, I Think“, and Showcase’s “The Foundation“. She also appears in the films, “Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium“, and “The Rocker“.
Rebecca also teaches improvisation privately, and for business.
Megan Jones
Megan Jones began her musical training at the age of 6 in Deep River, Ontario. Despite being from a small town, there was no shortage of inspiration in the field of classical music and Ms. Jones knew by the age of 9 she would be an orchestral musician. As a child Ms. Jones played in the Deep River Symphony Orchestra, the Ottawa Youth Orchestra and travelled to Ottawa for weekly lessons with Calvin Sieb. In 2000, Ms. Jones graduated from McGill University with a Bachelor of Music in violin performance after four years of study under violinists Richard Roberts and Yehonathan Berick.
Currently the concert master of Sinfonia Ancaster, Ms. Jones performs regularly with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra, the Kitchener Waterloo Symphony, the Windsor Symphony Orchestra and London Symphonia as well as being the principal violinist with Arcady Ensemble and the Jeans n Classics Rock Symphony. For the last decade Ms. Jones has worked alongside Maestro Boris Brott furthering the education of countless young musicians with the National Academy Orchestra of Canada both as a violinist and as the orchestra’s manager.
As a soloist Ms. Jones has performed with the Kitchener Waterloo Chamber Orchestra, the Timmins Symphony Orchestra, the Deep River Symphony Orchestra and Arcady Ensemble and has appeared on several occasions as a vocal soloist with the National Academy Orchestra.
Todd Wieczorek, DM
Known for his dramatic instincts and versatility as a performer, baritone Todd Wieczorek has performed roles with such organizations as the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, American Opera Theater, Indiana University Opera, Ente Concerti Cittá di Iglesias (Italy), The Bloomington Early Music Festival, Academia Europea dell’Opera, Opera Kitchener, Brampton Lyric Opera, Arbor Opera Theater, Opera Lirica Italiana, and as a soloist with Orchestra London, The Fanshawe Chorus, the Milton, Choristers, the Marion Philharmonic Orchestra, Symphony Hamilton, Ente Concerti Città di Iglesias, The Ingersoll Choral Society, St. Peter’s Basilica (London, ON), The Guelph Chamber Choir, and the Western Suburban Choral Union (Wheaton, IL). Recent projects included A Weill Songspiel with Grammy-Award winner Sylvia McNair.
Past performance credits are varied with such roles as the title character and Leporello in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Colline in La bohème, Alfio in Cavelleria Rusticana, Eddie in Bolcom’s A View from the Bridge, Dick Deadeye in Gilbert and Sullivan’s H.M.S. Pinafore, Angelotti in Tosca, and Bhaer in Adamo’s Little Women, working with such conductors as Robert Wood, Imré Pallo, David Effron, Timothy Vernon, Oliver Gooch, Gerald Fagan, Ward Holmquist, and Ted Taylor. Other credits found him as the title character in Gilbert and Sullivan’s Mikado, Judge Turpin in Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd, and Cold Genius in Purcell’s King Arthur
Mr. Wieczorek’s musical training started in his hometown of South Bend, IN. He went on to earn his BM in Voice Performance at Wheaton College’s Conservatory of Music, his MM from the University of Kansas, and finishing his DM at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music (Bloomington).
In addition to performing, Dr. Wieczorek holds the rank of Assistant Professor of Music, teaching Voice, Lyric Diction for Singers, and Doctoral Vocal Pedagogy, and coordinating the Friday @12:30 Concert Series at Western University’s Don Wright Faculty of Music. His students have gone on to sing in national and international young artist programs and study at prestigious graduate institutions in North America. He is a frequent guest clinician and adjudicator at music festivals across Ontario.
Shannon McCracken
Shannon McCracken is a singer, actor, voice-over artist and teacher. She has performed across Canada, and is equally at home in plays and musicals, film and television, and on the concert and cabaret stage.
Shannon runs a private voice studio in Peterborough, teaching classical, musical theatre, and popular styles. She believes in creating a positive, safe space to work and create, and promotes musicianship and technique in lessons, encouraging healthy singing that is free of tension, grounded, and truthful—no matter the singing style.
Shannon’s oratorio work includes Handel’s Messiah with the Peterborough Singers, the Grand River Chorus and Wilfrid Laurier University’s chamber choir and orchestra, Vivaldi’s Gloria with Choral Connection, and Bach’s Magnificat in D Major with the Northumberland Orchestra and Choir. As well as frequenting as a guest soloist for choirs and orchestras, Shannon has sung alongside Colm Wilkinson, and has been featured in cabarets at The Banff Centre, with New Stages, and at the inaugural Women of Musical Theatre Festival in Toronto. On the stage, some of Shannon’s favourite credits include: Esme in the world premiere of Buying the Farm (Port Stanley Festival Theatre); Galinda in Wicked, Amalia in She Loves Me (CMTP); Raising the Barn and Living History (Globus Theatre); Oklahoma! and The Sound of Music (Port Hope Festival Theatre); and Barbarina in The Marriage of Figaro (Opera Laurier).
Shannon is a proud member of the Canadian Actors’ Equity Association, holds an Honours BMus in Voice Performance from Wilfrid Laurier University, and is an alumnus of the Banff Centre’s Musical Theatre Professional Intensive, the Victoria Conservatory’s Advanced Singers Program, and the Theatre 20 Conservatory. When she’s not on stage, set, or in the booth, she’s either teaching from her home voice studio, or walking her dog in the woods.
Daniel Ramjattan
Daniel Ramjattan started performing on the guitar at ten years old in Stratford, Ontario, where he studied with Dave Santandrea and Wilma Van Berkel. Since then, he has built a multifaceted and widespanning career, both as a performer, teacher, researcher, and ambassador of new Canadian music.
Past performances have taken him to Vienna, Austria, Italy, and various locations across Canada, the United States, and Japan. He has also performed in festivals and venues such as the Alte Schmiede Kunst Verein contemporary music series, Vienna, the Livorno Music Festival, Italy, Ottawa Chamberfest, Toronto Summer Music, the 21st Century Guitar Conference, Ottawa, Stratford’s Inner Chamber, and the Toronto Contemporary Music Lab.
Daniel has received awards for his playing on the provincial, national, and international levels, placing second in the FCMF National Music Competition, receiving second place prize in the National level of the Canadian Music Competition, and First Prize in the Concours de Guitare Outaouais-Gatineau. He also received the Domaine Forget International Music Academy guitar award in 2013, as well as the first prize in the Open Level of the Ontario Music Festivals Association Provincial Guitar competition in both 2014 and 2016. He has also placed as a finalist in the Montreal International Guitar Competition and the Hamilton International Guitar Competition.
Daniel has received lessons and masterclasses from world-renowned guitarists such as Denis Azabagic, Jorge Caballero, Pavel Steidl, Sergio Assad, Lorenzo Micheli, Pepe Romero, Fabio Zanon, Bruce Holzman, Remi Boucher, Patrick Roux, and Jerome Ducharme. He also received the Nalini Perera Scholarship from the University of Ottawa, which permitted him to study with Lorenzo Micheli in Austria and Italy in Summer 2017.
Daniel has premiered dozens of new works by composers all over the world, and recently premiered a brand new set of six works for guitar and marimba at the Alte Schmiede Kunstverein, in Vienna, Austria, with percussionist Naoko Tsujita in January 2018. In the past, he has premiered works by John Armstrong (Canada), Ricardo Tovar Mateus (Colombia), Cristian Spataru (Moldavia), Alex Eddington (Canada), Daniel Mehdizadeh (Iran), Raphael Weinroth-Browne (Canada), and countless others, for a wide variety of ensembles and instrumentations. Daniel holds a Master’s degree and a Bachelor of Music Degree in classical guitar performance from the University of Ottawa, where he studied with the renowned composer-performer Patrick Roux. He also studied with world-renowned pedagogue Bruce Holzman in Tallahassee, Florida for a semester in Fall 2014. Daniel is currently pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree at the University of Toronto with Dr. Jeffrey McFadden, where he is studying the effects of teaching styles on music performance anxiety (or stage fright) in guitarists. He has given lectures on Music Performance Anxiety in Toronto and abroad, and currently performs as a freelancer and teaches in downtown Toronto. He also gives one-on-one coachings to musicians who struggle with music performance anxiety
Mark Payne