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Spring 2020 Adjudicators
Michelyn Wright - Vocal
Michelyn Wright received her Honours Bachelor of Music Education, and an Artist's Performance Diploma from the University of Western Ontario then her Master of Music in Voice Performance at the Mannes College of Music in New York City. Through these years she studied with such great teacher’s as Bernard Diamant, Lois Marshall, Dr. Darryl Edwards and Ruth Falcon. In 1997 she worked with Joan Sutherland and Richard Bonynge at the Britten Pears School. Michelyn has performed as a soloist with the Guelph Chamber Choir, the Kitchener Waterloo Symphony Orchestra, Toronto Operetta Theatre, and was a chorister with the Canadian Opera Company Chorus from 1998-2008. Michelyn has been an active Voice Teacher in Markham since 1997. She has been a member of the National Assoc. of Teachers of Singing since 1999 and was on the Ontario Chapter executive board for 15 years. In 2001 she was selected as one of 20 applicants to attend the NATS Intensive Program, a teacher training program for young voice teachers. For NATS Ontario, Michelyn is a past V. P. of Special Projects, where she created the Workshop, "Making the Cut", and was the Chapter Auditions Coordinator from 2007-2014. Currently, Michelyn is a Sessional Lecturer at the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto, teaching Voice Education to undergraduate instrumental music education majors. Michelyn has been an Artist Educator with the Canadian Opera Company Education Department, Vocal Music Director for the Unionville Theatre Company and a Vocal Instructor for the Bach Children's Chorus. Voice competition adjudication engagements include the Sault Ste. Maria Music Festival, Kiwanis Music Festival of Sudbury, Hamilton Music Festival, Peel Music Festival, Niagara Music Theatre and Voice Festival, Stamford Kiwanis Music Festival, Newmarket Lions Music Festival, South Simcoe Arts Council Music Festival, Music Alive and NATS Chapter Auditions. Michelyn’s students have been finalists at the OMFA Provincials, NATS Regional Auditions, NATS Ontario Vocal Showcase, Pickering GTA Music Festival, Newmarket Lions, Toronto Kiwanis, and North York Music Festivals and recently the 2019 ORMTA GTA Zones and Provincials. Her students have been Silver and Gold Medal Royal Conservatory of Music Winners, and many have continued in music after high school at the University level, attending such schools as, McGill University, University of Toronto, Western University and Wilfrid Laurier University. Michelyn’s Voice Studio in Markham is a warm, welcoming space where students can grow individually as singers and people. Michelyn’s students sing both Classical and Musical Theatre Repertoire and are encouraged to sing at Music Festivals and if appropriate take RCM examinations. Students will learn healthy technique that includes good breath management, vocal production, and body balance. They will perform repertoire that interests them to encourage expressive singing. Michelyn enjoys spending time with her husband and energetic and musical children, Tricia and Warren.
Photo credit: Bo Huang
Jarred Dunn - Piano (Junior & Senior)
Described by critics as “a piano sound-colour magician” (Muzikos Barai, Vilnius), “evocative and mystical” (New York Classical Music), "technically perfect" by Belarusian First Radio, and “a virtuoso with the most exquisite touch” (Freethought Today, Madison), Jarred Dunn is featured on the 2018 CBC Top 30 Under 30: Hot Canadian Classical Musicians (CBC) and in 2019 he hosted This is My Music. Mr. Dunn is the First Prize and Concerto Award winner of the 2018 Lithuanian International Chopin Competition (Vilnius), leading to his premiere with the Lithuanian Chamber Symphony in November 2018 and a finalist/prizewinner in the 1st Jan Hofmann International Competition in Kraków. His first recording, Chopin and Debussy, was produced by Dan Barker (Freedom From Religion Foundation) and recorded by Audio for the Arts (Madison, WI). He has been heard on the CBC, WQXR New York, Belarus First Radio Minsk, Freethought Matters TV and Freethought Radio-Television in Madison (WI).
Mr. Dunn has performed as a recitalist, chamber musician, and soloist with orchestras, and his career has included invitations to perform in Poland, Hungary, Belarus, Slovakia, Germany, Spain, Portugal, France, Malta,The Czech Republic, England, United States, Canada, China, and Australia. He enjoys playing solo recitals, and in his repertoire are over thirty concertos. He has appeared as a concerto soloist with the Torun (Poland), Etobicoke (Toronto), Niagara (St Catherine's), Rose (Brampton), Vilnius Chamber Symphony (Lithuania), Eurasian Chamber (Berlin), Budapest Chamber (Hungary), and State Radio and Television Minsk (Belarus) Orchestras.
Noted by Tonebase Piano as “a revered peagogue,” Mr. Dunn has given lectures, workshops and master classes at University of Puget Sound (Seattle), MTNA Seattle, Canadian Music Centre (CMC), Chopin University of Music (Białystok), Vilnius Academy Pre-College (Lithuania), ORMTA branches across Ontario, Collegeum Musicum Conservatory (Toronto), North York Suzuki School (Toronto), International School of Music in Sydney, and Ravenswood School in Sydney (Australia). His articles have been published in the Canadian Music Educators’ Journal and Canadian Music Teacher. Of special importance to him was research at the former site of Auschwitz-Birkenau and music during the Holocaust, culminating in an article about Anita Lasker-Wallfisch (former cellist of the Auschwitz Women's Orchestra).
He has adjudicated in competitions including the Burlington, Davenport, Peel, North York, Stirling, Rockland, Merriam, and the Discover Canada National Research Competition in Poland. He holds top prizes from the Grand Prize Virtuoso (London), Verona Zinetti International, D. Vincenzo Vitti, and Rome Academy Award Competitions (both in solo piano and chamber music). In 2013, he received the Teacher Recognition Award from the Retired Teachers of Ontario and in 2012 at the University of Toronto he received the W.O. Forsyth Graduation Award, given to the most meritorious pianist graduating (BM, BEd). He has received numerous scholarships and awards for his scholastic, musical, and pedagogical achievements. He graduated with distinction from the Academy of Music in Katowice, where he studied with Prof. Anna Górecka (MM, Post-Grad Dip) and took an Artist Diploma at the Bydgoszcz Academy of Music, in the piano class of Prof. Katarzyna Popowa-Zydroń. In New York he studied with Jacob Lateiner, Yoheved Kaplinsky, and Dorothy Taubman.
Photo credit: Bo Huang
Younggun Kim - Piano (Intermediate & Recital)
Younggun Kim is a pianist known for his blazing technical capacity and a
lush sound supported by a natural phrasing sense (Timothy Gilligan, New York Concert Review), who has performed across North America and Europe. He is active as a soloist, and chamber musician; recently he joined his alma mater, University of Toronto, as faculty member. He is also a sought-after adjudicator.
His solo performances in the 2019-2020 season include a solo appearance with Georgian Bay Symphony, as well as other solo and chamber concert engagements in Seoul, Vancouver, and Toronto. He is also featured in many other chamber music series, including the Korean-Canadian Chamber Concerts, Music Friends in Vancouver, and the Arts and Letters Club.
The winner of various prizes including San Antonio International
Competition, Concours International de Piano Francis Poulenc and Doctor of Musical Arts Recital Competition at the University of Toronto, he also received various prizes and scholarships from the Canada Council for the Arts, University of Toronto, Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University, the Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory of Music, Canadian Music Competition, Shean Competition, the
Alice and Armen Matheson Graduate Scholarship, Anne Burrows Foundation and Winspear Fund. Upon completion of the doctoral degree, Younggun was chosen as the recipient of the Tecumseh Sherman Rogers Graduating Award worth $25000, which is the largest award that the University of Toronto, Faculty of Music offers.
He has also been closely involved since 2011 with the Health Arts Society,
providing classical music concerts to audiences who no longer can make it to concert halls. A Toronto-based Canadian citizen from South Korea, he finished his undergraduate degree at the Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory of Music with Professor Marietta Orlov, Master’s Degree at Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University under the guidance of Professor Boris Slutsky and the Doctor of Musical Arts Degree at the University of Toronto with Professor Marietta Orlov.