Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony

^{Summer 2025}

Distinguished by innate musicianship, a gift for communication, and an irresistibly joyous spirit, conductor Rafael Payare began playing horn in Venezuela’s El Sistema program at age 14 and started his formal conducting studies in 2004 with José Antonio Abreu. Since winning Denmark’s prestigious Malko Competition for Young Conductors in 2012, his career has advanced rapidly. He was Chief Conductor and Music Director of the Ulster Orchestra from 2014 to 2019; has served as Principal Conductor of the Castleton Festival, founded by his mentor the late Lorin Maazel, since 2015; became Music Director of the San Diego Symphony in 2019, and three years later became Music Director of Canada’s Orchestre symphonique de Montréal. In recent years, Payare has conducted many of the world’s most prestigious orchestras, including those of New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Zurich, Berlin, Vienna, London, Munich, Hamburg, and Paris, besides making important opera debuts at London’s Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; the Glyndebourne Festival; Stockholm’s Royal Swedish Opera; and the Royal Danish Opera.

Godwin Friesen is a pianist and composer from the Canadian Prairies, exuberantly discovering where a life in music can take him. Winning the 2022 Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal Competition has led to several collaborations with the orchestra in his current hometown of Montreal. First prize in the 2023 Trondheim International Competition with the Rilian Trio (Daniel Dastoor and David Liam Roberts) has opened doors to professional engagements in Europe and across Canada. Godwin’s musical formation began with singing and playing in the Friesen Family Band. An early piano teacher, Sheila Wright, introduced him to composing; his new compositions inspired by the Psalms have become an important element of his performances, including in his recent duo tours organized by Prairie Debut. After five formative years learning from pianist Bonnie Nicholson in Saskatoon, he studied with John O’Conor at the Glenn Gould School in Toronto and then with Henry Kramer and Jean Saulnier at l’Université de Montréal, where he finished a master’s in 2024.

Timothy Hutchins, Principal flute of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra since 1978, is regarded as one of the world’s renowned flutists. He is a favourite of audiences and critics, who consistently praise his artistry. 

  

From the New York Philharmonic Orchestra to Japan’s premiere NHK Symphony Orchestra in Tokyo, Hutchins has appeared with these and many other renowned orchestras. 

  

He was offered the principal flute position of the New York Philharmonic at the age of 28, and later the same position with the Boston and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestras, where he was principal flute for the 2003 – 2004 season, but Hutchins chose the unusual career step of declining these offers. This resulted in over 70 recordings with the OSM under Charles Dutoit and Kent Nagano, both as Principal flute and as soloist. He is also heard on many other recordings including with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, under Seiji Ozawa, Vladimir Ashkenazy and Leonard Bernstein, with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra under Mariss Jansons and with other orchestras as soloist. 

  

Hutchins is a very highly regarded pedagogue and juror at major international competitions. Teaching at McGill University, and in masterclasses across Canada, the USA, Japan and in the UK, his students have won positions with leading orchestras around the world and become highly successful pedagogues and performers.