Archive for the ‘CD Reviews’ Category

The printed program of Mrs. Widder’s 1844 Soiree Musicale, a formal concert at her lavish Toronto home, lists eleven musicians performing opera, parlour ballads, and glees. This information helped trace the networks which drew a working tenor and leisured Lady and Gentlemen Amateurs into a brilliant program balancing aesthetics with social politics. The Widder program reveals how conventions linking class and gender with musical genre and local issues shaped the […]

Legend of the First Rabbit with Robert Cram, flutist, and Julian Armour, cello, Studea Musica CD (1999). La légende du premier lapin, un projet conjoint entre Studea Musican et la Galerie Jeannine Blais, comprend un disque compact, avec narration en anglais et en français, et un livre d’histoire illustré. La légende amérindienne canadienne choisie pour cette œuvre met en scène Glouscap, personnage clef de la culture wabanakie qui transformait la […]

Canadians at the Keyboard, Carleton Sound CD-1008 (2000). “Canadians at the Keyboard, featuring Elaine Keillor, is a valuable listening companion to the Historical anthology of Canadian Music. The recording is an eclectic collection of piano and organ compositions and transcriptions spanning from 1791-1939. The program notes are meticulously written and offer an excellent summary of important historical information. Dr. Keillor’s playing is clean and direct, and there are many outstanding […]

To Music: Canadian Song Cycles. With Wanda Procyshyn, soprano. Carleton Sound, 2010. Collaborator with Wanda Prochshyn in recording of nine song cycles by Canadian composers, never previously recorded. Excerpts from Reviews include: 1) Richard Todd of Ottawa Citizen, 11/9/2010 – 4 stars. “…there is likable and engaging music here, expertly sung by Procyshyn and sympathetically accompanied by Keillor. Only two of the nine composers represented in this collection are living. […]

Remembered Voices, with Ralitsa Tcholakova, violin, Carleton Sound CD-1012 (2008). Scott Locke of the IAWM Journal 16/1 (2010) – “Remembered Voices, featuring violinist Ralitsa Tcholakova and pianist Elaine Keillor, presents a somewhat unusual program at first glance, but the liner notes reveal a number of connective threads neatly tying the program and artists together….”  John S. Gray in The Whole Note (Feb.-March 2009) – “As a violin and piano recording, […]

A Little Knight Music: Selected Works by Sir Maurice Grove Taylor. With Birgit Knecht, violin, Joan Harrison, cello. CD Enterprising Rabbit, 2012. General Sir Maurice Grove Taylor, KCB, CMG, DSO (1881-1961) led a fascinating life, retiring at the age of 60 as commanding officer of the Royal Engineers in England. His passionate avocation, though, was to compose music. As a child he had been surrounded by music because his father […]

Sounds of North: Two Centuries of Canadian Piano Music. 4-CD set, Gala Records, GAL-108, 2012. A four-CD survey of Canadian piano works spanning 200 years.  John Teraud says: “Thank goodness there is someone like Keillor, a devoted contributor to the storehouse assembled by the Canadian Musical Heritage Society, champion of women composers, the musical traditions of First Nations and of new music. Keillor has an unaffected, elegant playing style that neatly […]

By a Canadian Lady: Piano Music 1841-1997, Carleton Sound CD-1006 (2000). Jon Gonder in CAML Review 29/1 – “The title of this disc aptly describes the intent of this recording: it is a collection of piano music written entirely by female composers of Canada. A total of 18 selections are included in a variety of styles…. Dr. Keillor has admirably designed and performed this compilation, and it stands as a […]

Views of the Piano Sonata, Carleton Sound CD-1002 (1998). “The unassuming title of this disc, Views of the Piano Sonata, hardly does justice to the pianist, whose fine ‘view’ achieves the triple coup of introducing four substantial yet infrequently heard works by women writing in that genre, of presenting an opportunity for comparison with compositions by male peers, and of offering the listener a fresh listening experience in the form at […]