BEHIND THE SCENES

Together, we’ll combine our deep roots in the Vancouver, Canadian, and international contemporary music scenes to offer a festival on the cutting edge of new music.

International Society for Contemporary Music

Since its founding in 1922, the International Society for Contemporary Music has been the world’s premier network for new music. Each year, its festival is hosted in a different city around the globe. In 2017, the Canadian League of Composers and Music on Main welcome more than 50 countries for a festival of new music and an 8-day celebration of new ideas, new collaborations, and new fusions.

Canadian League of Composers

The Canadian League of Composers was founded in 1951 in Toronto to promote new music in Canada and to advance the professional interests of composers. Representing over 450 composers across the nation, the CLC is active in the Canadian music community, presenting concerts, offering prizes and scholarships, petitioning for support of the arts and enhanced arts funding, setting suggested commissioning rates for composers of new music, and advocating for composers with music presenting organizations and the private sector, as well as at arts councils and government. The CLC is home to the ISCM Canadian Section, which is the official national representative of Canada within the ISCM.

Music on Main

Since its founding in 2006, Music on Main has presented more than 250 concerts of interesting, engaging, classical, new, and genre-bending music for Vancouver audiences. It’s a concert series that takes place in Vancouver’s most vibrant neighbourhoods with a promise of great music in casual but stimulating environments, with top-flight musicians, an ear for contemporary music, and refreshing concert formats. A compelling vision and a growing local, national, and international network of creative musicians drive the notable success of Music on Main.

David Pay, Artistic Director

David Pay is the founder and Artistic Director of Vancouver’s Music on Main for which he has earned an international reputation as one of today’s leading-edge classical and contemporary music programmers. Since 2006, the series has produced more than 250 classical, new, and genre-bending music events with nearly 600 musicians and over 50 world premieres, leading The Huffington Post to write that Dave’s programming has “spanned the range of human experience.” He has served on faculty at The Banff Centre and Capilano University, and programmed the Canada:NEXT opening gala for 2015’s Classical:NEXT conference in Rotterdam. In addition to his work at Music on Main, he is serving concurrently as the Artistic Director of ISCM World New Music Days 2017.

Morna Edmundson, Administrative Director

Morna Edmundson is one of Canada’s best-known choral conductors and an experienced arts administrator with a strong reputation for excellence. She is Artistic Director of the Vancouver-based Elektra Women’s Choir. Recognized with many awards for her leadership and dedication to choral music, she currently serves as a Board member of Chorus America. Her arts administration experience includes roles with the 1993 IFCM World Symposium on Choral Music and 2001 World of Children’s Choirs Festival and Symposium, both held in Vancouver, and eleven years as Administrative Director of MusicFest Vancouver. Morna is the Administrative Director of ISCM World New Music Days 2017.

Jim Hiscott, President, ISCM Canadian Section

Jim Hiscott earned a Master’s Degree in Theoretical Particle Physics before switching to music composition. His compositions have been performed across North America, in Europe, Brazil and Asia by many artists including the Hilliard Ensemble, the St. Lawrence String Quartet, the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, and Philadelphia’s Relâche. Jim has performed his own works in the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s New Music Festival, Toronto’s Big Squeeze Festival, and on the main stage of the Vancouver Folk Music Festival. He has also written for non-European instruments such as erhu, dizi, tabla, Balinese gender wayang quartet, and Cuban Latin band. He has been President of the ISCM Canadian Section since 2011.