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Looking Glass Ensemble

The Looking Glass Ensemble is an interdisciplinary collective founded by clarinetist Christine Carter and dance artist Shannon Litzenberger, spotlighting collaboration and co-creation among a diverse group of artists. The interdisciplinary nature of the ensemble underpins the creative practices of its members, the originality and accessibility of its performances, and the diversity of artists with which the Ensemble can collaborate. The performances of The Looking Glass Ensemble are imagined as multi-layer concerts, allowing for audiences to experience the novelty of multiple art forms, including music, dance, poetry, and film, in the recognizable and accessible context of music presentation. We value art not only as a creative product but also as a process that brings about new ways of knowing and relating in the world.

Program: ‘Everything Is Green’

The Looking Glass Ensemble is an interdisciplinary performance collective founded by clarinetist Christine Carter and dance artist Shannon Litzenberger. In collaboration with Canada’s trailblazing pianist Gregory Oh and award-winning cellist Vernon Regehr, “Everything is Green” pairs newly imagined interdisciplinary creations, including Randall Woolf’s breathtaking “Everything is Green” and Arvo Pärt’s equally exquisite “Spiegel im Spiegel,” with whimsical repertoire for the clarinet, cello, and piano trio combination by Ludwig von Beethoven and Vivian Fung.

Looking Glass Ensemble (Christine Carter and Shannon Litzenberger)

Program: ‘Walking into Blue

Looking Glass Ensemble co-founders Christine Carter and Shannon Litzenberger join forces with genre-defying cellist Diederik van Dijk and Juno Award-winning pianist Florian Hoefner for “Walking into Blue.” This innovative program crosses the boundaries of musical styles and artistic disciplines, including influences from jazz, folk, minimalism, and classical music. Moving across oceans and eras, it also features original choreography by Litzenberger and original compositions and arrangements by Hoefner.

Co-Founders

Shannon Litzenberger

Shannon Litzenberger is an award-winning dancer, choreographer and director based in Toronto. Her work explores our relationship to land, the politics of belonging, and the forgotten wisdom of the body. She collaborates frequently with the Dark by Five ensemble and the wind in the leaves collective. Her imaginative productions have been presented across Canada and the US and she has collaborated with some of Canada’s most celebrated artists including Marie-Josée Chartier, Lorna Crozier, Christopher Dewdney, Susan Aglukark, David Earle, Ravi Jain, Don McKay, charles c. smith and Michael Greyeyes, among others. She has been an invited resident artist at Soulpepper Theatre, Toronto Dance Theatre, Harbourfront Centre, Atlantic Ballet Theatre, Banff Centre, and Saskatoon’s Remai Modern. Shannon is the recipient of the Jack McAllister Award for accomplishment in dance, the recipient of a 2019 Chalmers Arts Fellowship and a twice-shortlisted finalist for the prestigious KM Hunter Award. Her recent work World After Dark was nominated for a 2019 Dora Mavor Moore Award.

Christine Carter

Clarinetist Christine Carter has performed at venues across the globe, from Carnegie Hall to the Sydney Opera House. She is the clarinetist of the critically acclaimed Iris Trio and Dark by Five inter-arts ensemble, and regularly collaborates with Duo Concertante, with whom she has released two albums on Marquis Classics. Her performances have been praised for their “striking expression” (Bremen Wester Kurier), “seductive tone and effortless fluidity” (The Clarinet), and “golden legato” (Fanfare Magazine), and her debut recording with the Iris Trio was featured by CBC as a top ten classical release. She has also performed extensively as an orchestral musician, including engagements with the New World Symphony, Montréal Symphony Orchestra, Symphony Nova Scotia, and Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, and under the batons of some of the world’s finest conductors, such as Lorin Maazel, Michael Tilson Thomas, Kent Nagano, and Fabio Luisi. She holds a Doctor of Musical Arts from Manhattan School of Music and is Associate Professor of Music at Memorial University in St. John’s. Christine is a Buffet Crampon Artist.

Collaborators

Gregory Oh

Gregory Oh tends to wander the genres, appearing in places from the legendary Berlin techno club Berghain to Lincoln Centre. Recently he conducted RUR A Torrent of Light (Nicole Lizée/Nic Billon) for Tapestry Opera, The Cave (Tomson Highway/John Millard) for the Luminato Festival, Toshio Hosokawa’s The Raven at the University of Toronto, Ride the Wind with Roscoe Mitchell, appeared as the piano soloist in Scott Good’s Hands of Orlac with the London Symphonia and Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, toured Rwanda and the UK with Neema Bickersteth and Century Song (Volcano), and was featured as conductor and pianist at the Shanghai New Music Festival. He also has also worked with and performed the music of hundreds of composers including Steve Reich, Phillip Glass, John Adams, Kaija Saariaho, Frederic Rzewski and Jörg Widmann. Other credits: Continuum, the Canadian Opera Company, Native Earth, Canadian Stage, Soulpepper, New Music Concerts and San Diego Opera. He teaches at Memorial University of Newfoundland and NYO Canada and programs the Music Garden at Harbourfront Centre.

Vernon Regehr

An avid performer and teacher, cellist Vernon Regehr serves on the faculty of the School of Music at Memorial University and the Tuckamore Chamber Music Festival, and has been invited to festivals and concert venues across North America and Europe. His solo album, Full Spectrum, features Canadian works for unaccompanied cello including Lamentations, winner of an East Coast Music Award for Composition of the Year. Recently he commissioned and premiered Andrew Staniland’s Calamus song cycle with soprano Jane Leibel, and is currently collaborating with author and filmmaker Kenneth J. Harvey to reimagine the cycle as a collection of short films.  Regehr is also the conductor and musical advisor to the Kittiwake Dance Theatre.

Diederik van Dijk

Diederik van Dijk is a Dutch-Canadian cellist with a broad range of musical activities and interests who is equally at home on the baroque and the modern cello. Based in Utrecht, the Netherlands, he divides his time mostly between chamber music and orchestral playing. With a practice spanning four centuries of music history and crossing over into various genres, his musical life has taken him from the Amsterdam Concertgebouw to stages in Newfoundland, to performing internationally at Early Music festivals. Diederik is a core member of baroque ensemble Combattimento. He is frequently engaged as principal cellist with the Nieuwe Philharmonie Utrecht. In recent years he has also performed with Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, the Orchestra of the 18th Century, the Metropole Orkest, Holland Opera, and the Pacific Baroque Orchestra. Diederik studied cello with Ian Hampton, Eric Wilson, and Marc Destrubé, and baroque cello with Viola de Hoog, acquiring in the process a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Historical Instruments. Every day he is grateful to be able to share his love of music with fellow musicians and audiences.

Florian Hoefner

Born and raised in Germany, trained in New York City and now based in Canada, Juno Award-winning jazz pianist and composer Florian Hoefner draws from a myriad of influences that culminate in his unique brand of modern jazz. Praised as a “composer-bandleader of insightful resolve” by the New York Times and a “harmonically daring pianist … reaching toward new sonic territory” by Downbeat, Florian Hoefner continues to make waves as an inventive creator and performer of exciting contemporary jazz. He has released 6 albums under his own name and many more as a sideman. “Desert Bloom,” the second album with his trio with Andrew Downing and Nick Fraser, won a 2023 Juno Award for Jazz Album of the Year and was nominated for 2 East Coast Music Awards. As a touring artist he has played at venues and festivals on 5 different continents and has worked with musicians including Kurt Rosenwinkel, Norma Winstone, Joe LaBarbera, Jerry Bergonzi and Seamus Blake. He is the winner of 3 East Coast Music Awards, 2 MusicNL Awards, 2 ASCAP Young Jazz Composer Awards, and the Stingray Rising Star Award at the Montreal Jazz Festival. Florian currently serves as Assistant Professor of Jazz Studies at Memorial University in St. John’s, NL.

Rob Power

Rob Power is an active chamber musician, soloist, improviser, orchestral player, composer, teacher, and instrument builder. He has performed with new music ensembles, folk artists, improv groups, world music ensembles, and over twenty Canadian orchestras. Along with performances in Europe, Asia, Africa, South America and the United States, he has appeared at festivals across Canada from Whitehorse to St. John’s. Rob has collaborated closely with many world renowned musicians, including Rivka Golani, Trichy Sankaran, Russell Hartenberger, Mika Yoshida, Beverley Johnston, Mark Fewer, Sal Fererras and John Wyre. Rob is a regular participant in Newfoundland’s Sound Symposium, and his playing can be heard on dozens of CD recordings. Currently, Rob is an Associate Professor of percussion at the MUN School of Music, where he maintains a vibrant studio of talented percussionists, and directs the renowned Scruncheons Percussion Ensemble.

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