Toronto Symphony Orchestra Associate Concertmaster Etsuko Kimura chats with a young music lover, in a pre-pandemic photo. Kimura now shares music with students through the TSO’s virtual programming. Photo by Jag Gundu
“The Toronto Symphony Orchestra and the Art Gallery of Ontario … have often collaborated in the past and have recently done so again in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, devising a series of virtual school visits inviting young people to experience some of the riches both institutions have to offer without having to pay for an in-person visit,” writes William Littler in Saturday’s (6/5) Toronto Star (Canada). “The TSO is only one of the sister institutions with which the AGO is partnering in the Virtual Schools Program…. Half-hour sessions have been offered three times a day…. In the session I watched, Grade 9 to 12 students were invited to examine a 1993 lithograph by Canadian artist David Blackwood, titled ‘Loss of the Flora S. Nickerson,’ and listen to parts of Vivaldi’s ‘The Four Seasons,’ played by Toronto Symphony associate concertmaster Etsuko Kimura…. Both the Art Gallery of Ontario and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra have invested heavily in outreach activities during the pandemic…. Among the Toronto Symphony’s other projects is a season finale livestream titled ‘Sarah Jeffrey Plays Mozart,’ … with the orchestra’s principal oboist performing with a group of her colleagues under the direction of concertmaster Jonathan Crow.”
