Stellae Boreales – An Ottawa Suzuki Strings Violin Ensemble

Excitement is  building amongst the members of Stellae Boreales - and amongst their friends and family - on May 23 they set off on a performance tour of New York City!  It's going to be h-u-g-e fun:  we're travelling down by bus (we'll be 56 - a full coach!), staying at the Sheraton Lincoln Harbour, and before we even check in we're hoping to catch a Circle Line cruise to get a feel for the city from the water.  There are four performances planned during the tour...and lots of other fun activities...so you can look forward to regular updates from our blogging team!

The culmination of the Ottawa Kiwanis Festival is always the Highlights Concert.  Stellae Boreales enjoyed a very successful Kiwanis festival this year.  Many individuals competed and achieved excellent results.  The ensemble received first place in  STRING ENSEMBLE - SUZUKI GROUP PLAYERS in  TWO OR MORE PARTS and were invited to perform at the highlights concert.

As the ensemble is off to New York in less than a week, rehearsal time is at a premium.  Conditions were not ideal but they rehearsed never the less, in a corridor, backstage, before the concert began!

Five members of the Intermediate Performance Group competed in different classes this week,  receiving excellent comments and results.  Three advanced to the trophy classes on Friday afternoon where Simi won the George Piers Trophy for Junior Strings and Alisa won the Matthieu Froment Savoie Trophy for Intermediate Strings. This morning Stellae Boreales performed in the Suzuki String Ensembles class along with several other senior ensembles and were awarded first place.

All four members of the Senior Performance Group have been busy competing  in the Kiwanis Music Festival this week, individually and as an ensemble.  This  morning they played Concerto for Four Violins in B minor by Vivaldi receiving a mark of 93 and very encouraging comments from the adjudicator.

During the week three members of the group advanced to the trophy classes which were held this evening.  Congratulations to Christina who won the Edythe Young Browne Trophy Class for Senior Strings.

Next week several members of the Intermediate Performance Group will be competing in Junior and Intermediate string classes.

January 10th was a very fun day for the Stellae Boreales members. We spent the afternoon playing at two retirement homes. It was really fun to play both concerts. The seniors seemed really pleased with our performances. We played our repertoire from our first Stellae Boreales concert of the 2008-09 season. We didn't have our pianist which made it a bit harder, but it was still exciting.

During both performances our audience was surprised at how young some of the musicians were. Both groups, intermediate and senior performances group did a good job playing at both concerts. After we had played, some of the musicians went to talk to the seniors that lived in the retirement homes and gave them cards with information on the group. I also felt good after the concerts when they came to thank us for playing for them .

D.S.P

My first concert in Stellae Boreales was a blast! When we first arrived at the church, we started to practise all our pieces.  It was a lot of fun to practise and play together.  We also heard the senior performance group play. I really loved the Vivaldi Concerto in B minor.  Later, we had dinner and dessert.  Most of  the dishes were delicious.

After dinner, our concert finally started! At the beginning, the intermediate performance group, my group, played a piece by Bartok, Sicilienne by Faure and Fantomen by Ost. After that, there were beautiful solos, followed by the Senior flute ensemble.  At the end, all members of Stellae Boreales played 3 pieces:  Sleigh Ride by L. Anderson, Csardas by McLean and Romance by Shostakovich. My friends in the audience were very impressed. Their favorite piece was Sleigh Ride.

What an exciting concert!

M-S. P. (10yrs)

On Sunday October 5th  Stellae Boreales performed in a benefit concert called "By Youth For Youth" supporting school children affected by the China's earthquake.  It was at Carleton University.  The proceeds will be used to deliver sports equipment and musical instruments to the schools.  It was a great privilege for us to perform as we traveled to China just three months ago. Our first piece was Romance by Shostakovich while our second was "The Butterfly Lovers"  which is a famous Chinese piece we learnt especially for our trip.  Other performers included other string musicians, pianists, vocalists and dancers.  The pieces were a mix of classical and Chinese folk music.  It was a very successful concert and a very worthwhile cause. LT (14yrs)

The Stellae Boreales ensemble regrouped for the exciting new season on a dark and stormy first weekend of September at the Long Island RCMP camp ground. The camp is fabulous and has a huge central cottage with a fully equipped kitchen including a hall for rehearsals and a dining area overlooking the Rideau River. Several small sleeping cottages surround the main cottage. Although a number of the ensemble were newcomers, Kit Barham, Rosemarie Klimasko, and Liko Yamane pulled everyone together and we practiced for many wonderful hours on our pieces. Yes, lots of practice time, but we had other fun too, we had the chance to cook a delicious meal (planned and organized by Vicky Barham), play soccer and enjoy many board games. Even though we had bad weather, it showed that we can all work together and thrive in a new and difficult situation, especially with help from all the volunteers. Hopefully we will get a chance to share the same experience next year, because we all know there is no better place to practice than with your friends in a nice camp ground. E.T.  15years (New photos have been added to the gallery. Just click on and of the latest photos, to the right of this post, and it will take you there)

On the second day of our trip in Beijing, me and my dad wanted to go out for a walk to the Forbidden City. First, we tried to catch a taxi cab. All drivers pretended they did not even see us. No-one stopped to drive us. Then we went to the subway station. We bought a ticket and took the train. When we reached our destination, the exit of the station was filled with people. Some of them were selling umbrellas. They were selling them for a good reason. It was raining very hard outside. We did not want to go for a walk under pouring rain and waited for a while, hoping the rain would end soon. After some time waiting we decided to go back. We hoped there would be more people selling umbrellas as well. When we got back to our station we saw even more people hiding from the rain. We bought two umbrellas for 20 Yuan, while the seller was asking only 10! That was lack of understanding from our side! But we made one Chinese person happy. When we opened our umbrellas, dad's one broke right away. The seller pretended he did not see anything. I guess, our umbrellas did not have good warranty. We rushed to the hotel under pouring rain, trying to get to our hotel as soon as possible. But it was not that easy. The whole way from the subway station to our hotel became more like a river. The water reached up to my knees and in some places up to my waist. Some people fell into the water with a big splash. I could hear it from far away. Finally, we came to our hotel, all wet and tired, but happy that we did not drown in this flood. AK

Hier, le 15 juillet 2008, le groupe a été profondément privilégié de pouvoir assister à un fantastique spectacle d'acrobaties chinoises. Non seulement avons-nous été témoins des acrobaties incroyables, mais nous avons profité des numéros qui étaient extrêmement visuellement artistiques. Il y avait des pirouettes, des culbutes et des roulades, toutes presque parfaitement coordonnées ainsi que plusieurs pyramides humaines qui se constituaient d'une pure harmonie et d'un ballant exceptionnel de la part des acrobates. Au début, je n'avais aucune idée à quoi m'attendre. Tout ce que je connaissais était la situation familiale des familles chinoises : à cause de la surpopulation, chaque couple a seulement droit à un enfant. À cause de ceci, les parents poussent leur enfant unique le plus possible afin d'assurer son succès pour faire honneur à la famille. Comme je m'y attendais, dans le spectacle d'acrobaties se trouvaient plusieurs jeunes acrobates qui avaient évidemment été élevés de cette manière. Le niveau de perfectionnisme qu'ils ont atteint était étonnant, et je peux affirmer avec certitude que j'ai vu des choses auxquelles je ne m'attendais absolument pas... Comme dernier numéro, cinq motocyclistes exécutaient des trucs dans une seule sphère métallique, tous en même temps! C'était non seulement impressionnant, mais assez épeurant à mon goût. L'odeur de gaz était un simple prix à payer pour voir de telles acrobaties! En général, j'ai eu une expérience très positive en Chine et c'est encore difficile à absorber que nous sommes allés faire une tournée en Chine. D'un côté, j'ai hâte de retrouver mon rythme de vie au Canada, mais la Chine va certainement me manquer! CS-D