About

Musique Royale is pleased to welcome the brilliant violin and piano duo meagan&amy back to our Nova Scotia. Individually, the pair have had interesting and exciting careers. Amy has won numerous positions and awards including the famous Eckhardt-Gramatté National Music Competition, an artistic residency at La Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, the McGill Concerto Competition, and the Sylva Gelber Foundation Music Award. Meagan performs regularly as a collaborative pianist for top international musicians such as Andrew Wan, concertmaster of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra; Stefan Dohr, Principal Horn of the Berlin Philharmonic; and cellist Matt Haimovitz, among many others.

We previously heard the duo in Mahone Bay when they were winners of the first “Pan-Canadian Recital Tour”, which saw them performing 50 recitals across all thirteen Canadian provinces and territories from 2019-2020. The duo will return to Nova Scotia for three performances where they interpret music by Dinuk Wijeratne, Marjan Mozetich, Camille Saint-Saens, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Their Musique Royale performance in Lunenburg is on Friday April 29th at 7:30 pm, at Central United Church (136 Cumberland St).

Program:

Fantasy No. 1 in G minor - Florence Price (1887-1953)
Sonata No. 21 in E minor, K 304 - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

• I. Allegro
• II. Tempo di Menuetto

Sonata No. 1 for Violin and Piano - David L. McIntyre (b. 1952)

• I. Allegro robusto
• II. In modo calmante
• III. Presto spiritoso

Danse Macabre - Camille Saint-Saens (1835-1921)
L’esprit chantant (“Singing Spirit”) - Marjan Mozetich (b. 1948)
Nocturne - Lili Boulanger (1893-1918)
Road Movies - John Adams (b. 1947)

• I. Relaxed Groove
• II. Meditative

Moto Perpetuo - Dinuk Wijeratne (1978)

About the artists

Amy Hillis, violin

Amy Hillis challenges artistic norms in order to build and cultivate community relationships inside and outside the concert hall. As a soloist, she has commissioned and premiered new Canadian works by Jocelyn Morlock, Nicole Lizée, Carmen Braden, Randolph Peters and Jordan Pal. Amy has “a rich, warm sound and has mastered the violin with such ease, that it is impossible to ignore her passion in performance” (Ludwig Van Montréal). She is winner of the Eckhardt-Gramatté National Music Competition, an artistic residency at La Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, the McGill Concerto Competition, and the Sylva Gelber Foundation Music Award.

As part of the meagan&amy duo, Amy was selected as winner of the inaugural “Pan-Canadian Recital Tour” to perform 50 recitals across all thirteen Canadian provinces and territories. Her duo’s debut album titled Roots demonstrates the connections between select Canadian compositions and works from the traditional canon of classical repertoire. Amy is also a founding member and manager of the prairie-based Horizon String Quartet. During seven different tours, the HSQ has performed over 200 interactive concerts for more than 10,000 young people in 100 different Canadian cities.   Amy is currently Assistant Professor and the Helen Carswell Chair in Community-Engaged Research in the Arts at York University. She holds a Doctor of Music in Violin Performance from McGill University, completed under the guidance of Axel Strauss and with the support of the Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). She completed her Master of Music at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music with Ian Swensen and her Bachelor of Music at McGill University with Denise Lupien. While growing up in Regina, Amy studied with the concertmaster of the Regina Symphony Orchestra, Eduard Minevich.

Amy performs on the 1902 Enrico Rocca violin, on loan from the Canada Council for the Arts Musical Instrument Bank.

Meagan Milatz, piano

Meagan Milatz, pianist, has appeared as soloist with Canadian orchestras including the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, Regina Symphony Orchestra, l’Orchestre symphonique de Sherbrooke and McGill Symphony Orchestra. Meagan is one of CBC’s “30 hot Canadian classical musicians under 30”, 2019 edition. Meagan embarked on a 50-concert, Canada-wide tour for the 2019/20 concert season alongside violinist Amy Hillis as the duo “meagan&amy, as winners of the first-ever Pan-Canadian Partnership Recital Tour offered by Jeunesses Musicales Canada, Debut Atlantic and Prairie Debut.

Meagan performs regularly as collaborative pianist for top international musicians such as Andrew Wan, concertmaster of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra; Stefan Dohr, Principal Horn of the Berlin Philharmonic; and cellist Matt Haimovitz, among many others. Meagan was top prize winner in the Shean Piano Competition, CFMTA National Piano Competition, McGill Classical Concerto Competition and Canadian Music Competition.

Meagan is Artistic Director of the concert series Sans Souvlaki série de l’instrument of Concerts noncerto and has directed more than 25 performances in 2020-2021. She has been featured as collaborative pianist with leading musicians from the Montreal Symphony Orchestra including Todd Cope, Principal Clarinet; Paul Merkelo, Principal Trumpet; Andrew Wan, Concertmaster; Anna Burden, Associate Principal Cello; and Stéphane Lévesque, Principal Bassoon. Meagan began her studies in Saskatchewan with Cherith Alexander and holds a McGill master’s degree studying piano with Ilya Poletaev and fortepiano with Tom Beghin. Meagan has also studied collaborative repertoire under the tutelage of Philip Chiu and was recipient of a Sylva Gelber Music Foundation Award.

For more please visit: https://www.meaganandamy.com