BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Steven Hacker, Treasurer
Carol Baker, Secretary
Ken Clark, Director
Bruno Degazio, Director
Daniel Gibson , Director
Tamara Hermann, Director
Ally Ladak, Director
Steve Newman, Director
Bob Soja, Director
David Livingston, Past President Emeritus
ORCHESTRA
ARTISTIC DIRECTOR | RONALD ROYER
Conductor, Composer, Musician, Educator, and Producer
Ronald Royer is a multi-talented musician who is active as a conductor, composer, cellist and recording producer. Born in Los Angeles into a family of professional musicians, he began his career as a cellist, performing with such ensembles as the Toronto Symphony, Utah Symphony, Pacific Symphony, and American Ballet Theatre Orchestra, as well as working in the Motion Picture and Television Industry in Los Angeles during the 1980’s. He has had the opportunity to work with a diverse group of prominent artists, such as Julie Andrews, Emanuel Ax, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Joshua Bell, Ray Charles, Andrew Davis, Placido Domingo, Gregory Hines, James Horner, Henry Mancini, Lalo Schifrin, Frank Sinatra, The Modern Jazz Quartet, Smokey Robinson, Michael Tilson Thomas, Sarah Vaughan, Dionne Warwick, Andrew Lloyd Webber, John Williams, and Stevie Wonder.
Mr. Royer is presently serving as the music director and conductor of the Scarborough Philharmonic. He has conducted the Winds of the Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra for the Canadian Panorama recording, and Sinfonia Toronto for the recordings Premieres, with violinist Conrad Chow, and The Hollywood Flute, featuring flutist Louise DiTullio. He has conducted the Toronto Studio Orchestra, made up primarily of musicians from the Toronto Symphony and the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra, for the children’s movie Gooby. He has also conducted film scores for The Happy Couple and The Dog. In 2015, he was hired by the Stratford Symphony to conduct Loreena McKennitt’s first full-length symphony concert. Mr. Royer has appeared as guest conductor of Sinfonia Toronto, Niagara Symphony, Canadian Sinfonietta, Toronto Sinfonietta, Stratford Symphony, Mississauga Symphony, Sinfonia Mississauga, Oakville Chamber Orchestra, and the Susquehanna Symphony (Maryland, USA).
His concert music has been performed by over 65 orchestras, including the international iPalpiti Orchestra in Disney Concert Hall (Los Angeles, USA), Sinfonia Finlandia (Finland), Bohuslav Martinu Philharmonic Orchestra (Czech Republic), Athens La Camerata (Greece), Joensuu City Orchestra (Finland), and Members of the Wurttemberg Chamber Orchestra (Germany). Canadian performances have included the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, Victoria Symphony, Thunder Bay Symphony, Hamilton Philharmonic, Orchestra London, and Symphony New Brunswick. The Ontario Festival Symphony Orchestra performed his composition Exuberance on tour in China (and can be viewed on YouTube). He has served as the composer-in-residence for Sinfonia Toronto, Mississauga Symphony, Brantford Symphony, Toronto Sinfonietta and the Scarborough Philharmonic. Mr. Royer has worked in film and theatre, and this includes (with co-composer Kevin Lau) the score for Gooby, starring Robbie Coltrane and Eugene Levy.
Performers on recordings featuring his music include the Los Angeles Studio Orchestra, Bohuslav Martinu Philharmonic, iPalpiti Orchestra, Sinfonia Toronto, 13 Strings of Ottawa, HornPipes Duo, Chamber Music Society of Mississauga, Triofus, flutists Louise DiTullio and Nora Shulman, oboist Sarah Jeffrey, clarinets Kaye Royer and Jerome Summers, violinists Conrad Chow and Aaron Schwebel, cellists Coenraad Bloemendal and Simon Fryer, trumpeters Brunette Dillon, Barton Woomert and Steven Woomert, hornist Gabriel Radford, and pianists Aaron Dou, Rachel Kerr, and Lydia Wong.
Mr. Royer is an advocate for music education and is married to SPO Principal Clarinetist, Kaye Royer.
For more information, check out Mr. Royer’s newly-designed website – www.ronaldroyer.com