From the Editor

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Last February 14, La Scena Musicale helped spread romantic cheer over the telephone through our fourth annual Singing Valentines fundraiser. Thanks to all those who donated in greater numbers this year, increasing the amount raised and the number of Valentines delivered by 20 percent. Thanks also to our singers; new singers soprano Mirjana Milovanovic and mezzo Kathrin Welte joined our regular volunteers, mezzo Priscilla-Ann Tremblay, soprano Janice Goodfellow and yours truly as the tenor.

There is something special about delivering a LIVE song one-on-one. Our singers reported how moved our Valentines were. Some cried, while others asked for us to sing into their voice mail to keep the song for posterity. Music can have that effect.

So, why not offer a LIVE song or aria for birthdays and Mother’s Day? To place an order, all you need to do is make a small donation. Please visit www.lascena.ca, email donation[at]lascena.ca or call 514-948-2520.

All donations now go into our 2014 Fundraising Fund Campaign, which will have an even greater impact this year. The Quebec government recently made changes to the Mécénat Placements Culture program allowing arts charities like La Scena to raise funds first and then apply for the matching program. These changes are explained in Philip Ehrensaft’s article on Art & Economy.

Piano and organ are the theme for this April-May issue, and we meet the Queen of classical piano improvisation, Venezuelan pianist Gabriela Montero, who appears at the Montreal International Music Competition as a performer and a judge of the new Improvisation Prize. The new Pierre Beïque Organ at Maison Symphonique is inaugurated in May; see Christine Lee’s report. We also celebrate this year’s anniversaries, including those of Marc David with the Longueil Symphony Orchestra, Wanda Kaluzny and the Montreal Chamber Orchestra, Lorraine Vaillancourt and the NEM, Miklós Takács, and I Medici. Our Aria of the Month is the memorable “Nessun dorma” from Puccini’s Turandot. Our second annual Spring Festival guide and picks, jazz section, concert previews and regional calendar round out a jam-packed issue.

New starting this issue is a supplement of English and French translations that is being sent to our paying subscribers; we hope you will consider subscribing and re-subscribing to La Scena.

Finally, by the end of 2014, we hope to update and redesign our award-winning website scena.org to be able to handle more traffic and to be a tool to unite the arts community. We invite you to help shape our new website by taking the survey at www.scena.org.

Next: our annual guide to Canadian Summer Festivals.

Have a great musical spring!