February 22, 2025 - Church of the Redeemer
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To honour the legacy of our long time artistic director and further our mission of championing the Canadian opera artists of tomorrow, Toronto City Opera will host the 2nd annual Macina Voice Competition
Competition Highlights
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Monetary prizes to be distributed at the discretion of the adjudicators
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Consideration for future performance opportunities with Toronto City Opera
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The opportunity for young singers to perform for a jury panel of opera industry experts and a live audience
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Audience Choice Prize as voted by the audience. ​​​
APPLY -
Deadline January 5th, 2025
​This competition is a chance for singers to submit videos and be heard by the Toronto City Opera artistic team for consideration in the competition and future opportunities.
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HOW TO APPLY:
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Open to in-training or trained opera singers age 40 and under as of application deadline
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Send videos of two contrasting arias (each aria filmed in one take) via Youtube links to macina@torontocityopera.com by January 5th 2025​​​
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Recordings should be no more than 1 year old
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Self-made quality recordings are acceptable for pre-screening round
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Approximately 8 singers will be selected to take part in the live competition on Feb. 22nd, with winners selected by a jury of opera professionals
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“Discovering and nurturing local/Canadian talent has always been important to me. It is my goal that this competition will allow TCO to further this mission by providing performance opportunities and industry networking in addition to the prize money.” -Jennifer Tung - Artistic Director, Toronto City Opera
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“My thanks to TCO for launching the voice competition in my name. This is an excellent opportunity to enable the young singers to continue to improve their singing and performance skills. I wish them all the best." - Giuseppe Macina , Former Artistic Director, Toronto City Opera
Adjudication Panel
- To Be Announced
Jennifer Tung is the Artistic Director of Toronto City Opera, a Dora nominated conductor (Gould's Wall), and assistant conductor of the Mississauga Symphony Orchestra. In 2020/21, she was selected as a conducting fellow in the inaugural year of the Women in Musical Leadership program. She has conducted with the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival, Opera McGill, Okanagan Symphony Orchestra, Calgary Philharmonic and Kamloops Symphony. In 2023, Jennifer conducted the world premieres of Show Room (Rodney Sharman/Atom Egoyan) and Of the Sea (Ian Cusson/Kanika Ambrose). Jennifer is on faculty at Toronto’s Glenn Gould School.
Ivan Estey Jovanovic is the accompanist / Music Director at TCO. He completed his BMus and MMus in piano performance at the Belgrade University of Arts. In 2004, he joined Belgrade Opera Orchestra as répétiteur and concert pianist and in 2005 joined their staff as a principal vocal coach. In 2013 he completed his MMus. in Collaborative Piano at the UofT, won the Gwendolyn Williams Koldofsky Prize in Accompanying, then joined UofT’s Opera Division as a vocal coach and pianist. He is a vocal coach and harpsichordist in UofT’s Early Music Department and Schola Cantorum and the vocal coach/harpsichordist with Toronto Lyric Opera.
History
Giuseppe Macina took Toronto's oldest opera workshop and transformed it in 1967 into the Toronto Opera Repertoire (later Toronto City Opera) in partnership with Toronto's public school board, presenting a whole repertoire of fully staged operas with the greatest detail and musical integrity. He retired as Artistic Director in 2013. In 1977, he was awarded the Jubilee Silver Medal by Queen Elizabeth II for his contribution to Italian culture in Canada. In December of 2005, Mr. Macina was made a member of the Cavagliere Ordine della Croce della Stella della Solidarietá Italianat, the equivalent of a knighthood, bestowed by the Italian government.
2024 Macina Competition participants
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Hannah Crawford*, Simon Genga*, Midori Marsh*, Colin Mackey, Jacob Abrahamse, Alex Mathews, Elias Theocharidis, Ellen McAteer
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*Grand Prize Winners