Latest news with #WSO
Winnipeg Free Press
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Orchestral expressions
Back in 2004, the front page of the Free Press Arts & Life section (then called Entertainment) ran a glowing tribute by Morley Walker to one of the most august careers in Manitoba's arts sector. Rita Menzies was retiring. Some expected she'd make more time for favourite pursuits — cooking, travel, family, opera, art— especially after such an eventful finale to a long career. The year before, Menzies — who'd been with the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra for 24 years as its first general manager — had been tapped to take the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra's reins in an interim capacity. Jeannette Menzies photo Rita Menzies on a trip to Reykjavik, Iceland. On the face of it, the move may have seemed improbable. The WSO was 10 times the size of the MCO and had a $3-million deficit. But Menzies' reputation — her crack command of budgets and structures, coupled with a soft, deft touch for people and politics — preceded her. 'There were a lot of highfalutin people who came in and absolutely burned out within a month,' recalls violinist and WSO concertmaster Karl Stobbe. 'I really have to give (Rita) credit for saving the WSO in a time when people were not sure it could be saved.' Amazingly, the WSO finished its 2003-4 season with a considerable surplus. Walker playfully cast aspersions on her resolve to retire after this success: 'Oh, did she not tell you? She has accepted an honorarium to run the Agassiz Summer Chamber Music Festival in June … But in July, she plans to take it easy. Honest.' What's that saying about best-laid plans? Before long, the retiree was the annual fest's director, a role she held for a full 11 years. She also returned as the WSO's interim executive director in 2006 and served as Agassiz's board president until her death in June at 83, after a short battle with cancer. 'How fitting that Rita worked in the frontline of Winnipeg's arts community until a few weeks before her passing — she was always keen to contribute and to help others,' says Agassiz artistic director Paul Marleyn. 'She developed (Agassiz) and she worked every day — her famous and proudly Mennonite work ethic. Rita had extraordinary values, values about which she never preached.' Jennifer Menzies Photo At Ponemah Beach, Menzies and granddaughter Olivia work on art projects. Menzies took up drawing and watercolour painting in retirement. Rita Menzies' career charts the rise of a certain type of pillar in Manitoba's arts and cultural life. The late 1960s and early 1970s were a coming-of-age for Canadian culture, with the government using the Centennial to invest heavily in the sector. However, the path to the MCO's emergence was often far from smooth. For seven lively years, the MCO (founded in 1972) was administered as a volunteer-driven passion project, operating out of insurance manager Bill Stewart's office. 'Maybe I was paying more time to the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra than I was to my business,' says Stewart with a chuckle. 'It became apparent … that we would have to get some kind of administrative help.' MCO's early history is hard to separate from Westminster United Church — a stronghold of a broadly liberal Protestantism, known for its deep love of classical music. Its congregation criss-crossed with MCO's audience and with its beautiful acoustics and central location, the church eventually became the organization's primary venue. It had a celebrated organist in Don Menzies, who held the post from 1966 until 2022. Just down the road, his wife Rita — born in Kitchener, Ont., in 1942 — taught math and English at Kelvin High School. She was also an accomplished organist and her musical passion was about to make its way to the centre of things. Jeannette Menzies photo Menzies (right) with her husband Don in France. Though technically retired, Menzies ran the Agassiz Summer Chamber Music Festival for eleven years. By the late 1970s the MCO was operating out of another makeshift office. The hum of a typewriter — clattering out accounting reports, marketing plans and musician contracts — filled the basement. 'I have vivid memories of a filing cabinet and card table propped up in the laundry room,' recalls Jeannette Menzies, a Canadian diplomat, former ambassador to Iceland and Rita's daughter. 'We loved having her around when we were young and hearing the sounds of classical music at home.' But for Menzies, juggling a young family — which included daughters Tanis and Jennifer as well as Jeannette – was only half of it. As well having suddenly traded in English lit for budget sheets, Menzies had to learn and quickly master the art of balancing those budgets. 'She told me once that the first thing she did every morning was read the entire business section of the Winnipeg Free Press,' says Stobbe, who got to know Menzies in the 1990s while playing with the MCO. JOE BRYKSA/FREE PRESS In 2003, Menzies (right) moved from the MCO to the struggling WSO as Interim Director, seen here in 2004 with violinist Claudine St Arnauld. Potential funders, donors and board members — Menzies was, by all accounts, always on the hunt for allies and resources to better the organizations she led. With its footing now secure, the MCO could find a proper office and finally start delegating. By the 1990s, the orchestra had hired Elise Anderson as its office manager, Jon Snidal as its designer and systems manager and violinist Boyd MacKenzie as its concert manager. 'Find(ing) good people. That was a real strength of hers,' says Vicki Young, Menzies' successor at the MCO. 'To bring on people like Elise and Jon and Boyd — I think is pretty incredible.' All of them are still associated with the MCO in some way, while today a new generation of staff and musicians carries the torch, including Sean McManus, executive director since 2023. The original team supported the orchestra through a showing at the Winter Olympics in Calgary, tours across the world and countless commissions of new Canadian music. Supplied Menzies was an accomplished organist, which can be traced back to her early practice sessions at the family piano. The MCO was also earning a rep as a solid stop for famous touring soloists, with Joshua Bell, Marc-André Hamelin and Liona Boyd all sharing the stage with the orchestra in those years. When Young assumed the MCO's reins in 2003, she had a rarity in her hands: a classical ensemble with loyal employees and musicians, a consistent streak of balanced budgets and a deeply engaged, supportive audience base. '(Rita) was always thinking ahead and setting a really good foundation for what was to come,' says Young. Over the next 20 years, the MCO saw a continued streak of balanced budgets, more growth and further professionalization of its board, touring and movement towards more multicultural priorities. It benefited not just from Menzies' foundation but something more ineffable. Menzies was valedictorian at her Grade 12 graduation. Veteran staff will tell you about a cultural throughline at the MCO — a democratic ethos with a strong, trusted leader acting as first among equals — that they trace back to Menzies. 'She was described as kind of having a calming effect on an organization,' says her daughter Jeannette. 'I saw her as a trailblazer. But I think my mom would probably be mortified (to hear that) because she really would give equal credit to Jon, Elise and others.' Though Menzies' so-called retirement was packed with Agassiz commitments and volunteer work, her tireless sense of industry found rhythm in the pastimes she loved most. She was known as an extraordinary cook and a lifelong learner, picking up watercolour painting in retirement. As a consummate hostess and longtime member of the Westminster Concert Organ Series Committee (founded by her husband in 1989 and running until the pandemic), she prepared many dinners for guest organists and the receptions following concerts. The couple sometimes oriented their many trips across the world around performance opportunities for Don and made regular pilgrimages to the Ottawa area to see their granddaughters, Grace and Olivia Kennedy. 'Behind everything was Rita's love of life, her family, music, the arts, of people and of the Winnipeg community,' says Marleyn. Menzies with her daughters Tanis, Jeannette and Jennifer. 'She avoided the stage and public attention, yet somehow quietly lead her workplaces with elegance, industry, effectiveness … Rita gave us all such a magnificent example of what the qualities of honesty, kindness, hard work and love can achieve.' Conrad SweatmanReporter Conrad Sweatman is an arts reporter and feature writer. Before joining the Free Press full-time in 2024, he worked in the U.K. and Canadian cultural sectors, freelanced for outlets including The Walrus, VICE and Prairie Fire. Read more about Conrad. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Miami Herald
09-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Miami Herald
Latin American trio joins WSO quartet for concert
A Wichita Symphony Orchestra-sponsored concert this week could serve as an introduction to a type of music that may be new to even the most seasoned ear. The Alejandro Brittes Quartet will join with a WSO string quartet to present Chamamé, which mixes Argentinian and Brazilian folk rhythms with classical music. In an email interview, Brittes talked about the music and the concert. Q: What drew you to Chamamé, both as a listener and a performer? A: I was born into a Chamamé cradle, immersed in an environment where music was always the soul of our home, especially Chamamé. From an early age, my parents took me to dances, even as a baby, in the Moses basket. I would stay there, listening intently to the chords that filled the air while they danced, immersed in that sound, which became the soundtrack of my life. Chamamé was my lullaby. It was love at first sight, a deep and immediate connection with this music. My earliest memories are of a huge accordion in front of me while the musicians, who passed through my house – my father, who was a manager of musicians coming from the countryside of Argentina to Buenos Aires, always hosted them – played and rehearsed nearby. I was surrounded by musicians from the moment I can remember. And from the very beginning, I knew I wanted to be a musician, too. I remember picking up vinyl album covers and pretending to play an accordion, feeling like part of that magic. With my toy brass guitar, I would accompany, in my imagination, the musicians' rehearsals. This deep love for music and for Chamamé is what has guided me to this day. At 12, my artistic godfather, Fito Ledesma, gifted me an accordion. With it, I began my musical journey, doing what I love most: celebrating Chamamé. Q: What are its characteristics, compared to other genres of music? A: This is a topic I love to talk about, especially the elements that gave rise to this genre that I now have the opportunity to share in the United States. Chamamé is a genre of music that connects and transcends. It represents the positive encounter of two cultures: the musicality and cosmogony of the Guarani indigenous people and the Baroque music taught in the Jesuit reductions by the priests. We can say that Chamamé is a Latin American reinvention, with a trajectory of 400 years of formation, being a genre that is built through collective memory and oral tradition. The rhythm, with its 35 million admirers in southern Brazil, the Argentine coast, Paraguay, northern Uruguay, and part of Bolivia, is an integral part of the identity and life of the people from where I come. Chamamé has some beautiful peculiarities in its formation that I would like to share. The Guaranis are deeply musical. When a child is born, they perform rituals in an anti-clockwise direction so that their gods and the universe send a melody, which will be the name that the child will carry throughout their life. In other words, music comes before everything, and only then do they give the child an earthly name. In the aspect of the connection between the universe and the earth, the Guaranis sing in high tones to connect with the universe and dance by stamping their feet on the ground, using percussion instruments to communicate with Mother Earth. … Chamamé, I believe, is the result of a process of collective election, fueled by collective memory and ancestral elements, which for some reason, makes sense for life, in all its forms. Chamamé is, therefore, one of the few genres — of course, others may serve the same purpose — but it is a music through which we can still connect with the universe and transcend, without losing its historical relevance and position in the music market. Q: What can we look for in your concert with the WSO string quartet? A: First of all, for me, André and Carlos, it is an honor to collaborate with the Wichita Symphony. In fact, we are very excited about this moment. I believe that this meeting will be an incredible experience in which we will explore together the repertoire of '(L)ESTE,' an original album of ours, with adaptations of arrangements and also creation of new arrangements by harpsichordist Fernando Cordella, who is one of the great names of Latin American Baroque, and we have been performing this beautiful concert in Brazil with an ensemble composed of harpsichord, violins, double bass, viola da gamba, cello, oboe, accordion, seven-string guitar and percussion. What we can expect from this concert is a vibrant connection, where all of us and the Wichita Symphony quartet will do our best so that the audience can experience a little of the beauty of Chamamé and transcend with us. We are very excited about what is to come! Q: Is it a contrast to have Chamamé music with a string quartet or is it a natural marriage of styles? A: Certainly, it is a natural marriage! I'd like to tell you that the first chamamés were recorded with orchestras. Only later, with the great European immigration of the 19th century and the arrival of the accordion, did Chamamé begin to be played and recorded with guitar, accordion, bass and double bass. This naturalness also relates to the historical aspect: In the Jesuit missions, the Guaranis formed orchestras and toured Europe. They were, by the way, excellent musicians, composers and luthiers of Baroque instruments. We had a great battle here that led to the destruction of the missions, but what was learned remained with the survivors, who applied all the knowledge they had gained and kept small orchestras in the villages, towns and communities. Of course, it was difficult to transport an orchestra from one settlement to another, and with the arrival of the accordion and its versatility, the genre began to take on its current form. But I dare say that Chamamé is returning to its origins, being played with classical instruments, while still preserving the popular essence and the instruments that are part of the genre's current identity. Q: What are your projects in the next few months? A: We have some projects in sight. Soon, upon arriving in Brazil, I will have several shows with the renowned accordionist Raúl Barboza, who, in my opinion, is the most important Chamamé accordionist, and part of the genre's old guard. Also, in August, we will hold the second edition of the Noite Chamamé Festival in the city of Erechim, in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. In September, we will have three concerts with the Orquestra Sinfônica de Campo Grande. After that, I will have several concerts with the trio, and we plan to take the '(L)ESTE' concert to Argentina in October and November. At the beginning of next year, we will return to the United States for a small tour. If you go Wichita Symphony Orchestra with Alejandro Brittes Trio When: 7:30 p.m. Monday, July 14 Where: Somewhere Works, 235 N. Emporia Tickets: $29 for general admission, from 316-267-7658 or the WSO box office at Century II
Scoop
08-07-2025
- Politics
- Scoop
Marlborough Votes To Establish Separate Water Organisation
The Marlborough District Council has voted to establish a separate organisation to deliver water services in the region. The decision to form a Water Services Organisation (WSO) was passed by eight votes to five at an extraordinary council meeting on Monday. The government's Local Water Done Well policy required councils to come up with a financially sustainable water service delivery plan by 3 September. Mayor Nadine Taylor said it was an incredibly important decision for the region. "We have decided to take a once-in-a-generation opportunity to do things differently. To build better three waters infrastructure and provide greater intergenerational equity, spreading the costs over the long term," Taylor said. "By setting up a new, water-focused organisation, it will be easier to sustainably deliver efficiencies and savings for residents on council's drinking and wastewater supplies." During consultation with the Marlborough community, a slim majority of the roughly 45 submissions wanted a water delivery unit to stay within the council. And some councillors agreed. Defeated councillors Brian Dawson, Deborah Dalliessi, Allanah Burgess and Sally Arbuckle all said there was not enough information to convince them that a separate water services organisation could deliver services better than the council's in-house unit. The Marlborough District Council was in the minority for its preference of a standalone organisation, although not all councils had voted on it yet. Of New Zealand's 65 territorial authorities, only three have preferred a standalone WSO - Selwyn, Queenstown Lakes, and Marlborough. Nearly 68 percent, or 44 councils, preferred a multi-council organisation, joining up with neighbouring districts to deliver water services. The remaining 18 preferred to keep water services in-house. A WSO joining Tasman and Nelson services was briefly floated, but was shelved after Nelson mayor Nick Smith ruled out collaboration on water without a full Nelson-Tasman council amalgamation. Nelson and Tasman both eventually voted to keep their water services in-house, leaving Marlborough without a neighbour to join with. Taylor said having a separate organisation focused solely on Marlborough's water would keep the service in the hands of the experts who knew it best. "The new WSO will have a singular focus on the delivery of water infrastructure and be better positioned to attract the specialist staff we will need in the future," Taylor said. Removing water assets from the council books would free up resources to focus on other services, while allowing the new WSO to borrow against those assets at a lower cost than the council could. "Costs will be spread over a longer period of time through borrowing, leading to lower water charges when compared to retaining water services internally at council," she said. The organisation would be council-owned, the board of directors would be council-appointed, and its direction would be set with a legally binding Statement of Expectations. The governance setup would keep the organisation accountable to Marlburians, the council said. The council said any profit made from the WSO would be reinvested back into the water network. By 2034, Marlborough would need $410m of investment in water infrastructure. Nearly all the townships required upgrades to pipelines, pump stations and wells. "Many of Picton's and Blenheim's stormwater assets have an expected life of less than 10 years," Taylor said. "In addition we have requests from the community to provide new water reticulation services, for example in Ward, Rarangi and Dry Hills in Blenheim." The new organisation would be established on 1 July 2026, and become fully operable by 1 July 2027.
Scoop
07-07-2025
- Business
- Scoop
Council Votes To Establish New Water Services Organisation
Marlborough District Councillors today approved the establishment of a new water services organisation (WSO) to deliver drinking, wastewater and stormwater services to the people of Marlborough. The decision continues the Local Water Done Well process, as mandated by the current Government. Mayor Nadine Taylor said it was a very important decision for the region. 'We have decided to take a once-in-a-generation opportunity to do things differently to build better three waters infrastructure and provide greater intergenerational equity, spreading the costs over the long term.' 'The Government requires councils to financially ringfence their water services and by setting up a new, water-focussed organisation it will be easier to sustainably deliver efficiencies and savings for residents on Council's drinking and wastewater supplies.' 'Costs will be spread over a longer period of time through borrowing, leading to lower water charges when compared to retaining water services internally at Council.' 'Other notable benefits are the new WSO will have a singular focus on the delivery of water infrastructure and be better positioned to attract the specialist staff we will need in the future.' 'By removing three waters debt from Council's books, we will have an improved ability to deliver other key Council activities to support the Marlborough community, including responding to and funding unforeseen circumstances such as natural disasters.' Mayor Taylor noted that almost all of Marlborough's townships need upgrades to pipelines, pump stations and wells, with treatment plant upgrades required in Blenheim, Havelock, Riverlands and Awatere. 'Blenheim, Havelock, Riverlands, Seddon and Renwick also need wastewater upgrades. Many of Picton's and Blenheim's stormwater assets have an expected life of less than 10 years. In addition we have requests from the community to provide new water reticulation services - for example in Ward, Rarangi and Dry Hills in Blenheim.' 'While Council has done a good job of building and maintaining its current three waters infrastructure, a big step change is required if we are to face head-on the challenges of the future,' she said. 'This step change is best delivered through a new water services organisation.' Council received 44 submissions on its Local Water Done Well proposal. The WSO would be incorporated from 1 July 2026 with a one year transition to full operations from 1 July 2027. Marlborough District Council will be its sole shareholder, appoint its board of directors and set its direction via a binding Statement of Expectations, holding it accountable to the people of Marlborough. Council will also establish a water services governance and oversight committee made up of the mayor, the three committee chairs and chief executive. Notes The Government's Local Water Done Well process requires all councils to develop a Water Services Delivery Plan (WSDP) by 3 September 2025 which describes how drinking water, wastewater and stormwater services will be delivered in ways that are financially sustainable, meet regulatory quality standards, meet water quality standards and support housing growth and urban development. Other considerations include: • New ring-fencing rules that require water delivery services to be financially separate from Council's other functions and activities. • Water services being subject to new economic regulation and a consumer protection regime. • Access to the Local Government Funding Agency to help fund the needed investment in water infrastructure. By 2034, $410 million of investment is needed in Marlborough's water infrastructure. The renewal list for pipelines, pump stations, treatment plants and dams is considerable. About $45 million of water assets, $20 million of wastewater assets and $45 million of stormwater assets are due for replacement within the next nine years. The renewal profile will likely increase as assets built in the 1950s and 60s, including much of Blenheim and Picton's stormwater network, requires replacement over the next 40 years.
CTV News
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- CTV News
Windsor Symphony Orchestra offering free summer concert series once again
The Windsor Symphony Orchestra (WSO) is once again offering a free summer concert series. You are encouraged to bring your own lawn chairs, blankets, or picnic baskets to enjoy the sweet sounds of the WSO. Here's where you can catch the group:
