Ted Runcie, Composer-in-Residence

Born in Jamaica, growing up in Scarborough, Ted is a graduate of MacGill University in composition and conducting.

Over the years Runcie has composed a varied body of work including chamber music, solo instrumental works, choral works, art songs and symphonic works. He plans to write a series of operas on Caribbean subjects as well as to continue writing his series of ‘sinfoniettas’ based on Jamaican history.

His Jamaica Quartets No. 1 & 2 have been recorded by SPO’s ensemble-in-residence, the Odin Quartet.

 As a conductor and music educator, Ted was appointed Music Director of the Hsinchu Philharmonic Orchestra and the Hsinchu Philharmonic Youth Orchestra in Taiwan. He teaches at Yuteh and Chang Gung University in Taiwan.

Learn more about Ted and his music at: https://tedruncie.com

Chris Meyer

I have followed an unusual path in my musical training. There was no prodigious start or discovery of talent at a young age – in fact, I resisted any attempt to be educated musically. One thing I remember is trying out one of the very early musical-notation programs for my Commodore 64, drawing pictures with musical notes and listening to the resulting sounds. Little did I realize that work would have qualified for an arts council grant. It was not until I was a teenager when my parents brought home a synthesizer (Ensoniq ESQ-1) that I discovered the value of having some musical training. However, soon after starting piano lessons, I discarded the synthesizer and schmaltzy pop songs, and became fascinated with classical music.

My introduction to classical music came from two sources. My parents would listen to Choral Concert on CBC radio every Sunday morning – a program I continued listening to until the retirement of Howard Dyck. The other source was the musical soundtracks to Looney Tunes cartoons. Alas, do the youth of today have pictures of Bugs and Elmer dancing in their heads when they hear Rossini’s Barber of Seville or listen to Wagner’s Tannhauser?

Throughout high school, I diligently worked on my piano studies and became interested in composition under the encouraging eye of James Carswell. Despite progressing rapidly, by the time of graduation I was still of modest ability, leading me to choose a scientific path for my university studies. At the University of Toronto I completed a degree in physics – my other lifelong interest – and then set off to teacher’s college to become a high school science teacher. It was there that I met Ronald Royer.

Ron has nurtured many young musical talents under his guidance at the University of Toronto Schools. From him I took a few composition, counterpoint and orchestration lessons, which marked the end of my “formal” musical education.

Bruno Degazio: Biography

Bruno Degazio is professor of Digital Tools in the Classical Animation program of Sheridan College, recently voted top animation school worldwide by Animation Career Review magazine.
He has extensive experience in cinematic sound design, including special-effects for the Oscar-nominated documentary film, The Fires of Kuwait and music for the IMAX films Titanica and CyberWorld-3D, as well as many other films and television dramas.
As a researcher in computer applications for the arts he has published papers on music composition using fractals and genetic algorithms. He is the author of The Transformation Engine, a software system for music composition and data sonification. He is currently investigating the algorithmic combination of OpenGL graphics with computer music composition.