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• Question and Answers – Friday, November 1, 2024 at 7:00 pm
• Home for the Holidays – Friday, December 6, 2024 at 7:00 pm
• Sinfonia Masala – Friday, March 21, 2025 at 7:00 pm
• Let’s Dance! – Friday, May 9, 2025 at 7:00 pm

An evening with two different answers to the eternal question of existence, as asked by Charles Ives’ mystical masterpiece. The texts in Mahler’s Rückert-Lieder respond  to the question with their evocations of love and music, while the finale  of Mendelssohn’s “Reformation” Symphony seeks to banish any existential doubts with its resolute declaration of faith.

• Charles Ives – The Unanswered Question  
• Gustav Mahler – Rückert-Lieder, with Christopher Dunham, baritone
• Felix Mendelssohn – Symphony #5

Meet the Artist — Jeffrey Pollock talks to Christopher Dunham.

Indian Classical music meets Western Classical music!  Sinfonia Ancaster’s first concert of 2025 brings a vibrant blend of musical traditions, taking its inspiration from masala (Indian spice mix), as it fuses Indian Classical music and Western orchestral sounds.

Meri Sakhi Ki Avaaz (My Sister’s Voice) by Reena Esmail is the centrepiece of the concert, a gorgeous work that beautifully blends the emotionally expressive vocabulary of the Indian raga tradition with the sounds of a symphony orchestra, and featuring two award-winning sopranos: the multi-faceted and ground-breaking Vidita Kanniks and Bethany Hörst, recipient of the Jacquleine Desmarais Award. Hamilton-based tabla player Sajan Prem takes a star turn in Testament, another Esmail work that weaves a tale of emotions and cultures.

The concert ends with Antonin Dvořák’s cheerful and boisterous Symphony No. 8!

• Jean Sibelius – Belshazzar’s Feast
• Reena Esmail – Testament, with Sajan Prem, tabla
• Reena Esmail – Meri Sakhi Ki Avaaz (My Sister’s Voice), with Vidita Kanniks, Indian classical singer; Bethany Hörst, soprano
• Antonin Dvorak – Symphony No. 8

PRE-CONCERT TALK: Come to the lobby at 6:00 pm before the concert to hear Jeff, Vidita and Bethany discuss points of connection between Western and Indian classical music traditions.

WATCH THE VIDEO: Listen to Reena Esmail describing her composition, Meri Sakhi Ki Avaaz (My Sister’s Voice) and Vidita Kanniks talking about her upcoming performance.

A dance party, orchestra style! Glorious ballet music by Pugni, Tchaikovsky and Gounod anchors this concert’s first half. After intermission, a “mix tape” of social dances that includes Márquez’ irresistible Danzón #2 will have you grooving in your seats! More about the concert…

• Cesare Pugni – Pas de Quatre (1845)
• Pyotr Illyich Tchaikovsky – Swan Lake: Theme and Waltz (1876)
• Charles Gounod – Ballet music from Faust (1869)
• Peter Warlock – Capriol Suite (1926)
• Samuel Coleridge-Taylor – Danse nègre from  African Suite (1898)
• Florence Price – Juba Dance from Symphony No. 1 (1932)
• Arturo Márquez – Danzón #2 (1994)

Ticket-holders can present their ticket for a 10% discount before the concert at these participating restaurants in the Ancaster BIA: the Coach and Lantern, India Village, Brassie Pub, Famiglia Restorante, and Symposium Cafe (dine-in only).

Pre-concert chat with Music Director Jeffrey Pollock and the composers in the lobby at 6:00 pm

Sinfonia is proud to present this concert dedicated to the land on which the Memorial Arts Centre sits and the people who first lived on that land. Beethoven’s 6th symphony — a work that celebrates the composer’s love and experience of Nature — begins the evening.

The entire second half features works by Turtle Island composers that also glorify the natural world: Cree composer Jessica McMann’s work Miskwa’s Mountain Home, Anishinaabe composer Spy Dénommé-Welch’s Rouge Winter and the world premiere of Mohawk composer Dawn Avery’s Indian Territory, a Sinfonia Ancaster commission.

Ho-ho-ho! Sinfonia Ancaster presents a spectacular concert filled with festive holiday arrangements, a Christmas story, and an audience singalong! Special guests Strata Vocal Ensemble will add extra sparkle and magic to this evening that will appeal to the child in us all.

“Women hold up half the sky.” — Mao Zedong

​In honour of International Women’s Day, this concert celebrates the musical achievements of women composers and performers. Pulitzer prize winner Caroline Shaw’s work Entr’acte for String Orchestra, a wistful piece with a touch of the absurd, opens the concert. Concertmaster Megan Jones and viola coach Elspeth Thomson are dual soloists in Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante, a glorious musical conversation filled with virtuosity and joy. The concert concludes with the turbulent 3rd symphony of Louise Farrenc, the only female professor at the Paris Conservatoire in the 19th century, who fought for and was eventually given pay equal to her male counterparts. This Third Symphony is her masterpiece.

Click here to download the concert program for Half the Sky.

Sinfonia Ancaster is thrilled to be joined by Ancaster’s own, world-renowned pianist Valerie Tryon for this performance of the much beloved Piano Concerto by Edvard Grieg. Tchaikovsky’s brilliant Symphony #2, a piece inspired by Ukrainian folk songs, brings our season to a triumphant conclusion.