December 2023 Update

My goodness, it’s been a busy term! I’ve been juggling three different ensembles: Rouge River Winds, the UofT Wind Symphony, and covering the York Wind Symphony as well for the fall. As I considered the repertoire across the three groups, I realized that I had programmed quite a few pieces that had won the Howard Cable Memorial Prize in Composition over the years. To wit: Danny Choi’s Remembrance with RRW; Matthew Donnelly’s River Valley Sketches with UofT; and for the York Wind Symphony’s “Portraits of Canada” concert earlier this month, Swiftriver Passage by Paul Suchan, Autumn Down a Maple Lane by Chris Byman, and Portrait of Terry Fox by the late Quan Le.

My October concert with UofT featured and was named after Cable’s own Ontario Pictures, but it also included the Lake Superior Suite by Cable prize winner and my good friend Cait Nishimura. This performance brought a long journey with Cait’s piece full circle for me: I was in attendance at the work’s premiere in February 2018; I had conducted several movements with Rouge River Winds back in 2019, with Cait playing bass clarinet in the ensemble and her partner Brian playing piano; and I wrote a feature article about the piece for WASBE World magazine in 2021. My performance with UofT was the first to use Cait’s revised edition, and after the concert I presented her with the original edition of the score that was used for the premiere.

Pratik presents Cait Nishimura with the original score for Lake Superior Suite, October 20, 2023.

Cait and her podcast partner Dylan were also kind enough to invite me to be a guest on the Band Room Podcast back in September. Check out the episode here.