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Search Results for: Virtual Choir of Joy

LOS ANGELES MASTER CHORALE MUSIC DIRECTOR EMERITUS PAUL SALAMUNOVICH DIES AT AGE 86

April 4, 2014 by Libby Huebner Leave a Comment

Los Angeles, CA – April 3, 2014 – Acclaimed Grammy®-nominated choral conductor and Los Angeles Master Chorale (LAMC) Music Director Emeritus Paul Salamunovich, whose artistry touched millions of people around the world through recordings, live performances, college and university clinics, and the numerous film scores on which he conducted and sang, has died at age 86 from multiple complications due to West Nile virus.
 
The California native and long-time North Hollywood resident was Music Director of the Los Angeles Master Chorale from 1991 to 2001, Director of Choral Music at St. Charles Borromeo Church in North Hollywood for 60 years (1949-2009), an esteemed music educator who held academic posts at Mount St. Mary’s College and Loyola Marymount University, and an adjunct professor at the USC Thornton School of Music. 
 
His death comes in the midst of the Chorale’s 50th Anniversary Season, which opened with a multi-media retrospective concert at Walt Disney Concert Hall highlighting the signature works associated with each of the four music directors who have led the Chorale since its inception in 1964, including for Salamunovich Gregorian chant, works by Maurice Duruflé, Morten Lauridsen’s O Magnum Mysterium and the remarkably prescient hymn The Lord Bless You and Keep You. 
 
The New York Times declared the chorus “one of America’s top vocal ensembles” during Salamunovich’s final season with the Chorale in 2001.  A major force in the resurgence of interest in choral music, he championed such leading contemporary composers as Morten Lauridsen, Dominick Argento, Ariel Quintana and Libby Larsen, helping to expand the depth and breadth of the choral music repertoire.  His remarkably fruitful collaboration with Lauridsen, in particular, resulted in the Chorale’s Grammy®-nominated recording Lux Aeterna and ultimately helped to propel Lauridsen to become the most frequently performed American choral composer in modern history.  Salamunovich also guest-conducted throughout the world and prepared choirs for such notable conductors as Igor Stravinsky, Robert Shaw, Bruno Walter, Eugene Ormandy, Alfred Wallenstein, Sir Georg Solti, Zubin Mehta, Carlo Maria Giulini, Valery Gergiev and Simon Rattle.  In addition, he conducted choral music on the scores for more than 100 film and television projects, including The Godfather and ER, and sang on the sound tracks of Judgment at Nuremburg, Universal, 1961, and How the West was Won, MGM, 1962, among many others.
 
“All of us in the Los Angeles Master Chorale family mourn the loss of Paul Salamunovich and extend loving condolences to the entire Salamunovich extended family,” said LAMC President and CEO Terry Knowles.  “Paul’s impact on the Chorale was long, deep and powerful.  Any success our organization enjoys today is rooted in Paul’s artistic leadership.  We honor his memory, and we will never forget him.”
 
“Paul was one of a handful of conductors who created and shaped the sound of choral music in America,” said LAMC Music Director Grant Gershon, who succeeded Salamunovich at the choir’s artistic helm in 2001.  “As both a teacher and performer he was hugely influential, and his signature choral sound lives on through the many conductors and choirs that he inspired.  In particular, his legendary work with LAMC composer in residence Morten Lauridsen is the epitome of a successful composer-conductor relationship, and together they brought international acclaim to the Los Angeles Master Chorale.  He was my friend and colleague, and I have always been hugely grateful for his support and advocacy when I took over the reins of the Chorale.  We will miss him.  He was a giant in the field of choral music.”
 
Salamunovich, a protégé of legendary choral conductor Roger Wagner, has been inexorably tied to the Los Angeles Master Chorale since the beginning, having been a founding member and Assistant Conductor from its inception until 1977, as well as an integral part of its various choral precursors.
 
Born on June 7, 1927, in Redondo Beach, California, Salamunovich attended St. James Elementary School, where he sang in a boys choir steeped in Gregorian chant, providing an early foundation for his career and nurturing his life-long passion for Gregorian chant.   He had the good fortune of watching Wagner conduct his first concert with the Wagner Men and Boys Choir, which was presented at St. James Parish.  When Salamunovich was about 13 years old, his family moved to Hollywood.  He began singing for Richard Keys Biggs at the Blessed Sacrament Church and formally met Wagner, who invited him to watch his choir rehearse at St. Joseph’s Church in downtown Los Angeles.  Salamunovich rode the streetcar to downtown by himself on several occasions to observe Wagner, who took note of the regular visitor and invited him to sing with his choir.  Following his graduation from Hollywood High School in 1945, Salamunovich enlisted in the Navy, serving in Pearl Harbor after World War II.
 
He moved back to Los Angeles after completing his enlistment at age 19 and was asked by Wagner to join his newly formed Los Angeles Youth Chorus, which included among its members 13-year old Marilyn Horne and 14-year old Marni Nixon, and which in 1948 evolved into the Roger Wagner Chorale, of which Salamunovich was a founding member.  At Wagner’s urging, Salamunovich enrolled at Mt. St. Mary’s College to study music and then launched a career in choral conducting.  Notably, Salamunovich took over Wagner’s choir director post at St. Charles Borromeo Church in 1949 when Wagner left to focus on other conducting interests; Salamunovich retained the post for 60 years until his retirement in 2009.  Wagner, impressed by Salamunovich’s considerable skills, continued to utilize him and tapped him to be Assistant Conductor of the Roger Wagner Chorale from 1953 to 1977.  
 
Then, in 1964, Wagner – with the support of the Los Angeles Junior Chamber of Commerce and local businessmen Z. Wayne Griffin, Harrison A. Price, Donald J. Nores and Marshall A. Rutter – formed another new chorus, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, which became a founding resident company of the Music Center just as construction on its first home, the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, was being completed.  Again, Wagner selected Salamunovich, who was a founding member of the independent professional choir, to be its assistant conductor, a position he held until 1977 when Salamunovich resigned to pursue other leading positions he was then being offered.
 
Although it was expected by many that Salamunovich would succeed Wagner as the Chorale’s Music Director, an appointment for which Wagner himself lobbied, Salamunovich’s schedule prevented consideration of the possibility and the Board of Directors instead selected Scottish opera conductor John Currie as Wagner’s successor.  In 1991, after Currie’s somewhat turbulent tenure concluded, Salamunovich accepted the position as music director of the Los Angeles Master Chorale.  He immediately began rebuilding the Chorale’s Wagner era signature “pyramid” choral sound anchored by rich robust bass and capped by shimmering soprano. Having led many of the Chorale’s rehearsals while he served as Wagner’s assistant, Salamunovich had had an indelible impact on the Chorale’s early sound. The press heralded his return and his efforts, stating, “The panache is back; Paul Salamunovich has restored the L.A. Master Chorale to its former glory” (Los Angeles Times).
 
By the end of Salamunovich’s tenure 10 years later in 2001, he was resoundingly lauded for developing the Chorale’s “wide dynamic palette” (Los Angeles Times) and “sterling, precise singing” (Daily Variety).  Critics further declared, “For the past decade (the Chorale) has reached new heights under the baton of Music Director Paul Salamunovich” (Pasadena Star-News), and Salamunovich has “sharpened and refined his choral instrument to a virtually unbeatable level” (Los Angeles Times).
 
But of all of Salamunovich’s remarkable accomplishments during his long and productive career, he is most closely associated with the extremely productive relationship he shared with Morten Lauridsen, who served as the Chorale’s first composer in residence from 1995 to 2001, and whose critically acclaimed choral “blockbusters” Lux Aeterna, O Magnum Mysterium and Ave Maria, all written for the chorus, are among the works included in the Chorale’s 1998 Grammy®-nominated, best-selling recording “Lux Aeterna” conducted by Salamunovich.  Under Salamunovich’s direction, the lush recording, with its “radiantly beautiful music,” (Wall St. Journal) and “affecting emotional pull” (Daily Telegraph), elevated the Master Chorale and Lauridsen to international prominence.
 
Salamunovich was also noted for his keen interpretations of renowned 20th century French composer Maurice Duruflé’s works for choir and orchestra.  In particular, they collaborated on a 1967 performance of Duruflé’s Requiem, Op. 9, for which Salamunovich prepared the St. Charles Borromeo Choir and the composer conducted.  Significantly impressed by Salamunovich’s talents during their only time working together, Duruflé kept a picture of the two of them that still hangs in his home in Paris, which is curated by the Duruflé Society.
 
For his final season with the Chorale in 2000-2001, Salamunovich conducted five concerts, including a rare performance of the Mass in C# Minor by Vierne for double organ and choir with renowned organist Frederick Swann at the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles.  The other concerts, held at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, featured choral works by Mozart, Britten, Kodály, Parry, Verdi, Argento, Duruflé, Susa, and Pinkham, among others.  The Chorale also gave two joint performance of Bach’s B Minor Mass with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra at UCLA’s Royce Hall and the Alex Theatre in Glendale.  And for his finale as Music Director, Salamunovich conducted four of his favorite pieces:  Verdi’s Stabat Mater, Holst’s Hymn of Jesus, Neilsen’s Hymnus Amoris and, of course, Lauridsen’s Lux Aeterna.  He managed to accomplish all this while successfully battling lymphoma, diagnosed at the beginning of the season.
 
Following his retirement, Salamunovich continued his close relationship with the Chorale, regularly attending the chorus’s concerts and galas, and returned to the Chorale as a guest conductor in a sold-out concert of some of his favorite choral works during the Chorale’s second season in Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2005.
 
As a conductor and former singer, Salamunovich’s musical contributions spanned the spectrum from classical, pop and jazz to folk and new age music with such diverse artists as Stan Kenton, Liz Story and Cirque de Soleil.  He conducted countless live performances; sang or conducted on more than 20 recordings, including three with the Los Angeles Master Chorale; helped to shape the lives of thousands of students as a faculty member at Loyola Marymount University for 28 years and at Mt. St. Mary’s College for 18; provided training to tens of thousands more around the world as an in-demand clinician; and helped provide spiritual fulfillment to countless others as Music Director of the St. Charles Borromeo Church in North Hollywood. Salamunovich also served as Conductor in Residence at the University of Western Australia in Perth and the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music in Rome.
 
Salamunovich’s other film credits include conducting choral music on the scores of Angels and Demons, First Knight, Air Force One, A.I., Peter Pan, Flatliners and The Sum of All Fears, among many others.   Earlier in his career, he sang on the motion picture soundtracks of The Great Imposter, Universal, 1960; The Last Sunset, Universal, 1961; The Spiral Road, Universal, 1963; Captain Newman, M.D., Universal, 1963, Dead Ringer, Warner Bros., 1963; War Lord, Universal, 1965; The Trouble with Angels, Columbia, 1965; Angel in My Pocket, Universal, 1965; and The Last of Sheila, Warner Bros., 1973.
 
With the choir at St. Charles Borromeo he recorded five albums of sacred music and was featured on Andy Williams’ 1969 recording of “Battle Hymn of the Republic” as well as on Williams’ 1986 NBC-TV Christmas Eve Special hosted by Henry Mancini and Doc Severinsen.  In addition, in 1985 the St. Charles Borromeo Choir was invited by the Papal Church Music Society to tour Europe in conjunction with the 8th International Convention of Sacred Music, which included a private audience with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican Palace.  In 1987, the church’s choir sang at the City of Los Angeles’s official reception for the Pope, and the following year it became the first American choir invited to sing High Mass for the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul at St. Peter’s Square in Rome with the Pope presiding.  It holds the distinction of being the only parish choir to be so honored.
 
Among numerous accolades, Salamunovich received a Papal knighthood as a Knight Commander in the Order of St. Gregory the Great from Pope Paul VI in 1969; the “Distinguished Artist Award” from the Music Center of Los Angeles in 2005; the “Lifetime Achievement Award” from the American Chorale Directors Association in 2000; and the Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice, known as the “Cross of Honour,” the highest medal that can be awarded by the Papacy to the laity in 2013.  He was inducted into the Loyola Marymount Faculty Hall of Fame in 2012.  He also holds honorary doctorates from Loyola Marymount University and the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota.
 
Salamunovich is survived by his wife of nearly 64 years, Dottie, sons John of Houston, Texas, Stephen of Seattle, Washington, Joseph of Glen Ellyn, Illinois, and Thomas of Vail, Colorado.  He is also survived by his older brother Joseph of Studio City, son-in-law, Gordon Goodman, daughters-in-law Claire, Sheila, Meredith and Nancy Salamunovich, 11 grandchildren and 4 great-grandchildren.  His daughter, Nanette, preceded him in death in 1977.  Public services are pending and the burial will be private.
                                                                        # # #

COMPOSITION SPOTLIGHT ~ by Jack Senzig

August 9, 2013 by philip copeland Leave a Comment

COMPOSITION SPOTLIGHT ~ by Jack Senzig
 
Welcome back to the Composition Spotlight.   Each week we look at a piece or 
two of the best choral works posted in the Composition Showcase here on 
ChoralNet.  This is where we store a treasure trove of works that your choirs will 
love to sing and your audiences will love to hear.
 
Conductors, the Composition Showcase is an unique service we have created 
for you.  Members of the Composers of Choral music Community on ChoralNet 
are allowed to share only their three best works in any one voicing.   The more 
traditional sources of new repertoire like sampler packs, workshops or huge 
websites, don’t provide you with such a well honed tool to cut through the 
thousands of pieces you look at each year.  
 
By self-selecting only the best, we give you a window into each composer’s work.  If you like what you find you can 
click a link to that composer’s website for a more comprehensive look. 
Composers, join us! There are many benefits beyond the opportunity to 
display your works on ChoralNet!  Our community is more active than all other 
ChoralNet communities combined.  We regularly share ideas on marketing, 
contests, software use, the commission process, publishing and much more.  We 
are a community of professional friends.  We share our successes and support 
each other.  Many collaborations and commissions have come through our 
community and many composers have received performances of their works 
because of the relationships forged in our forum.  Critique, mentoring and 
opinions are available for the asking.  Check out the Community Home page 
for terms and conditions, goals etc.
 
This week a tutorial on how to use the Composition Showcase is in 
order.   The easiest way to get there is to click on the blue text link in this 
article but there are other easy paths.   Simply add /showcase after the 
www.choralnet.org  web address in your browser and hit return or enter.  You 
can also choose the lilac colored “Communities” tab at the top of most ChoralNet 
windows.  Then click on Composers of Choral Music.    Join the community by 
clicking on the Forum tab and then the “Join this community” button.   You can 
leave the community at anytime.
 
Once at the Composition Showcase you can navigate by clicking on the links 
to the voicing pages, composer  INDEX, SEASONAL works and the FEED (see 
below).  The FEED is particularly useful if you have already spent a lot of time 
browsing and just want to check back and see what is new.   Try it out.
SATB  SAB  SSAA  SSA  SA  TTBB  UNISON  INDEX  SEASONAL  FEED
Once you arrive on a voicing page you can search for works by scrolling or by 
clicking “command f” on a Mac or “control f” on a PC.   Be sure to click on the 
Virtual or Choir recordings of the works and view the PDFs provided.  
 
Depending on your browser settings, the PDF will either immediately download when 
clicked or open in your browser.  Please be respectful of copyright.  Contact the 
composer by clicking on their name in the work’s description.  Cost is frequently 
well below what you will pay from a music distributer and you don’t have to deal 
with the problems of Scorch or other proprietary e-print software.
If you like the works that have been featured in these articles you can click 
on the Silver Platter Award Recipients for links to all of the works and the 
Composition Spotlight articles.  We have also added a new page to display
recordings of members’ works and their choir performances.  That can be found 
on the Member Recordings page.
 
Feel free to scroll through the list of our community members and contact them 
with questions about their works or to discuss commissioning new works.   
Contact me by commenting below or send me a message on ChoralNet.
We hope you enjoy the works we offer to you on this our Silver Platter!

Filed Under: Others

GUEST BLOG: “Conference Reflections: Chicago” by Paul Carey

March 8, 2013 by Scott Dorsey Leave a Comment

CONFERENCE REFLECTIONS: CHICAGO by Paul Carey
 
Today I am concluding my four weeks of Saturday blogposts on ChoralNet- thanks to Scott Dorsey and Tim Sharp for this opportunity. I've been recapping my personal memories of recent ACDA national conferences in hopes that my stories will help you decide to get in on the national ACDA experience and join us in Dallas. It's still not too late to join us at this amazing conference! Click here to get in on the action. And by the way, the weather forecast right now is for mid-sixties Tuesday and then sunny and mid-seventies the rest of the conference week!
 
Over the last three Saturdays I have shared my personal memories of ACDA LA (2005), Miami (2007), and Oklahoma City (2009). I hope you have enjoyed them in all their personal, odd, and anecdotal glory. Today I am recounting ACDA 2011 which was held in my hometown of Chicago.
 
Well yes, this one felt weird-to be home for a national ACDA and be about 15 minutes away via the "El". I certainly had some fun a few weeks before the conference when Tim Sharp and Mike Scheibe asked me to blog about why folks should come to Chicago ACDA, and I will take full credit for the massive influx of people deciding at the last last moment to join us!  In a town which lacks a central arts district such as Dallas has, Tim, Mike, and their committees still found ways to keep the Chicago conference venues navigable; no small achievement.
 
Amidst all the amazing music-making two things made this conference personally memorable to me. The first was the opportunity to meet someone I guess you could call an outsider; someone totally outside of our ACDA American (and sometime Canadian) realm – I am speaking of Irishman Michael McGlynn, the founder of Anúna, the amazing Irish ensemble. Michael was here to promote his Anúna International Choir School and also scope out the lay of the land in regard to our U.S. choral world. Much of what we do left him quizzical, yet all along he had amazing commentary as an outsider looking in on our process. Michael is very intelligent, cuts quickly to the chase, and is very witty. Over the days of the conference he and I and many fellow composers such as Sydney Guillaume and Reg Unterseher (at times joined by conductors such as Phillip Copeland and Nick Cummins) shared a lot of amazing meals, stories, and ideas for the future of what we do.  Michael blogs, and here is his droll take on what happens when an ACDA conference main hotel is invaded on its final day by the organizers of a gigantic St Paddy's Day parade (yes, we are big on the St. Paddy's here in Chicago, and we do dye our river so bright green that you might think isotopes are involved):
 
My experiences to date in the USA have been pretty limited or unrealistic. They usually involve moving daily from place to place on tour with my choir Anúna, or attending business meetings that don’t allow you to get a sense of a city or town except in the most superficial way.  This was one of the reasons why I was very happy to stay in Chicago for a week, although it hadn’t struck me that it was also St. Patrick’s week, and that the city has a huge Irish-American community, ably represented by my friend and local guide Eamonn Cummins.
 
My non-choral moments included an architectural boat trip in sub-zero temperatures that was pretty thrilling, a sublime and unexpectedly joyful visit to Old St Patrick’s Church and a silent rugby match being beamed into a bar full of people dressed in green that were oblivious to the unfolding tragic Irish drama on the screen. There was a green river, plastic shamrocks, and hopeful tee-shirts with various slogans on them indicating that the wearer needed some form of close physical congress with you because they were pretending to be Irish for one day only. Maybe they weren’t pretending … having left a country soaking in a mire of negativity, these good-humoured and well-behaved revellers have redefined what it means to be Irish.  Ireland isn’t just a place anymore. It’s a state of mind.
 
Michael will be at Dallas to meet more American folk and promote his Anúna International Choral Singing School which will be held this June. Maybe you will run into him.
 
Because we had so many folks at Chicago ACDA you needed to grab a seat fast for certain events. I remember being only "on time" for  James Jordan's interest session, only to be told by a very firm Edie Copley that the room was full, and don't even think of entering.  Edie is awesome and that day she was channeling her inner Chicago cop persona – very funny.
 
So I learned to be early, really early for some sessions. One that was truly amazing was the Weston Noble session moderated by Geoffrey Boers. I had heard Weston give an absolutely amazing address to ACDA Western Division in Tucson not long ago and knew that I wanted to be in on this Chicago session (if you'd like to read Weston's ACDA Tucson ACDA session, he shared it on my personal blog, much of it virtually verbatim awhile back.)
 
People were floored by the wisdom and sincerity of Weston as he gave what seemed like a TEDTalk about mirror neurons and their effect on interpersonal communications as well as what we should know about them while guiding our rehearsals and performances. Boers' was brilliant in guiding the session.  This was truly memorable!
 
Let me leave you with something far more humble. On the last night or next to last night (memory fails) I wound up NOT doing anything "big", and not networking with folks from across the land. In a very random way I wound up at a cheap little Chinese restaurant with two Illinois buddies, Sarah Graham and Paul Laprade (Paul, by the way, has a great new group called Elysian Voices, they have a bright future). We spent two or three hours just enjoying some very average food but great conversation and fellowship that evening. I will remember that evening with Sarah and Paul just as much as I will remember the "big" events of Chicago ACDA 2011. And this is another reason you should come to Dallas. There are big moments and, seemingly, little ones awaiting you, what they are and when they happen we don't always know. But staying at home is the worst thing, we can't position ourselves for amazing things unless we get ourselves out there into the great unknown. I hope you have enjoyed these sometimes quirky anecdotes of mine, and that in reading them, you might be enticed to come to Dallas ACDA 2013!
 
Hope to see you there,
 
Paul
 
P.S. Ahem. Please consider attending my panel session on new things really groovy conductors and composers are doing these days. It's Thursday 10:30 AM at the Sheraton  San Antonio Ballroom. My panel members are Buddy James, Deborah Simpkin King, Reg Unterseher, Abbie Betinis, and Joan Szymko- very cool people!
 

Filed Under: Others

Composition Spotlight: Orpheus with His Lute

September 14, 2012 by Scott Dorsey Leave a Comment

COMPOSITION SPOTLIGHT ~ Jack Senzig
 
(Each week we look at a piece of useful repertoire from the ChoralNet Community Composition Showcase.  A variety of voicings and levels of difficulty will be presented. Enjoy!)
 
Orpheus With His Lute by Brian Holmes for SSA, Bb trumpet and piano
Level: High school sophomore women’s choir and higher
Uses: Spring concert or thank-you to a special music booster.
This piece would program well with: Ruth Elaine Schram ‘s "A Red Red Rose" available from JWPepper   and Sheet Music Plus.
 
Brian Holmes’ Orpheus With His Lute is a refreshing piece that dares you not to smile at the beauty of the writing. Three simple treble lines move together in triadic harmony with a flowing trumpet part that brightens the texture even more. Your audience will love this and the parents of your young singers will beam with pride.  Read the score and listen to the recording. Right-click or control-click to open each in a new window.
 
Many of the pieces is the Composition Showcase have lovely honest recordings like this one. They are performances recorded by a real-world choir and shared with the composer. Some composers are not so lucky and must rely on a virtual recording or no recording at all. Please share recordings and performance dates with us. Starting a dialogue with a living composer can add to the experience for your singers, allowing them a depth of appreciation they may not get from the standard repertoire.
 
Orpheus With His Lute is available from the composer.
 
(Original publication: September 16, 2012)

Filed Under: Others

Profile of Sri Lankan Choral Conductor Soundarie David

July 8, 2011 by Richard Allen Roe Leave a Comment

By Seline Augustine

COLUMBO, SRI LANKA — Soundarie David Rodrigo is the consummate
musician who transformed the Western music scene in Sri Lanka by
starting and directing a femal’e ensemble, Soul Sounds, the first
choir to perform and win awards internationally over the last few
years. She was the first Sri Lankan to be on the panel of the Asian
Choir Games held in Korea. She has toured with Soul Sounds
Australia, Kuwait, India, France, China and last year the U.S. and
Malaysia.

An Associate of the Royal College of Music in piano performance
and piano accompaniment, Soundarie is the recipient of the SAARC
Woman of Achievement Award, Zonta Woman of Achievement Award and
the Japanese Bunka Award. With a Masters in Intellectual Property
Law from UCAL, Berkeley, she is a concert pianist and violinist,
and a member of Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka and also the
Interkultur Foundation. She is currently the Deputy Director of the
SAARC Cultural Centre, Colombo. Excerpts from an interview.

On training in Royal College of Music

I guess my training and my ability to relate to singers stems
from my experience while I was at the Royal College of Music, as I
was the resident accompanist for the French Song class, and also
worked with a lot of singers and their vocal coaches. So it not
only enhanced my ability to sight read, but also taught me how to
work with singers.

I did my post graduate studies in Piano at the RCM, so I was
there for 1 1/2 years. It was a great experience, and I am thankful
to all my professors in London. Following that, I was awarded a
scholarship to participate at the Hereford Summer School for nearly
four years, and I kept going back to London.

On balancing law and music

I work a normal 9-5 job, and also lecture part time at the
Colombo Law Faculty. My evenings are full of music, and my weekends
practically 15 hours of music, which gives me virtually very little
time to relax. I enjoy trying to balance both my law and my
music.

However, my passion is music, so I guess it is inevitable that
sometimes unintentionally that takes priority. I am blessed with
people all around who understand this, and everyone has been very
supportive.

I perform regularly with Ramya de Livera Perera on select
repertoire for two pianos and our duo concert in Tata Theatre,
NCPA, Mumbai, this April too drew critical acclaim.

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