JANE HAYES, M. Mus. B. Mus., ARCT; Director of Keyboard Studies (piano, chamber ensemble, keyboard skills, theory)
Since her debut with the Toronto Symphony, Jane Hayes’ concerts have taken her across Canada, the United States and Europe. Her early studies were in her native Ottawa and she went on to study with such notable pianists as Bela Siki, Menahem Pressler, Pierre Sancan, and Patricia Parr. She can be heard frequently on CBC radio and has recordings available on the Fanfare, EMI, Centrediscs, ATMA, Artifact, CBC-Musica Viva and CBC SM5000 labels.
Jane Hayes’ repertoire spans baroque through contemporary solo and chamber music. For years, she was a favorite collaborator of cellist Harvey Shapiro in the Victoria International Festival of the Arts and has partnered such fine instrumentalists as violinists Eugene Fodor and Daniel Heifetz, cellists Andras Diaz and Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, and flutists Julius Baker, Carol Wincenc and Bonita Boyd among others. But as a performer and teacher, Jane has been noted for her involvement in making contemporary music accessible to audiences, students and teachers.
In 2002, as a founding member of the Vancouver-based Turning Point Ensemble, Jane endorsed the group’s mission – to increase the appreciation and understanding of music composed in the past hundred years and to initiate a renewal of Canadian twentieth century music with the building of new repertoire by outstanding composers. To that end, Jane has premiered dozens of new works written for her, for the Turning Point Ensemble and her two-piano Yarilo Ensemble. She has also been a featured artist on five CDs devoted to the music of Canadian composers – Remember Your Power (the music of John Burke), Strange Spheres (music of Rudolf Komorous), Disasters of the Sun (the music of Barbara Pentland, with Judith Forst), Expressivity (solo piano music of Christopher Ludwig), and Far Other Worlds (the music of Euphrosyne Keefer). A publication and CD of three early solo piano works of Barbara Pentland will be ready in September 2010 through Avondale Press.
In addition to being the Director of Keyboard Studies at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Langley, Jane maintains a busy performing and adjudicating schedule. Now Past-President of the Canadian Music Festival Adjudicators’ Association, she regularly travels to both small and large Canadian centres to judge solo and chamber competitions, including the E-Gre competition, Pacific Coast Music Association Competitions, and provincial and local festivals. As a performer, she frequently appears in a collaborative capacity. She has currently partnered with clarinetist Francois Houle, appearing recently in recital at the National Arts Gallery in Ottawa. The coming months will find her with the Turning Point Ensemble as part of the Cultural Olympiad, with violinist Marc Destrube in Artsway concerts, and in chamber concerts at the Silk Purse, VCC, and on Vancouver Island and she will be involved in various recording projects. She will end the season with a performance of the Grieg Concerto with the Fraser Valley Symphony. Her performances consistently receive rave reviews. As Lloyd Dyck wrote in the Vancouver Sun, “her performance had such an impact that I wanted to hear it again, right away.”
