William Rowson, Principal Conductor
Movie Magic, April 27, 2025
(Guest Conductor, Autumn Colours, October 19, 2024)
We are very pleased to announce that Bill has accepted our invitation to be the Principal Conductor of Waterloo Chamber Players. Please view Bill’s Introduction Video.
Conductor William Rowson is hailed as one of Canada’s most compelling and versatile young artists. He has worked with orchestras across Canada and currently serves as the Artistic and Executive Director of the Sudbury Symphony Orchestra, as well as being the Music Director of the Stratford Symphony Orchestra. Recent guest conducting highlights include appearances with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra, the Guelph Symphony Orchestra, the London Classical Soloists (UK), the Regina Symphony, and the Victoria Symphony, as well as return engagements with both the Saskatoon and Vancouver Symphony Orchestras.
From 2016-2018 Bill was the Assistant Conductor of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, becoming the orchestra’s Associate Conductor in 2019. He has led the Grammy and Juno award-winning ensemble in over 160 performances. To great acclaim, he conducted and hosted the VSO’s inaugural Sunset Beach outdoor concert to a crowd of over 14,000 as well as working with such artists as Chris Botti, Pink Martini, Troupe Vertigo, Cirque de la Symphonie, Arrival from Sweden (Abba), The Hot Sardines, Enchantment Theatre Company, Fred Penner, Magic Circle Mime Company, Platypus Theatre, Chris Hadfield, Classical Kids, as well as films with live orchestra.
Bill is also an active composer, whose original works and orchestral arrangements have been performed by orchestras and ensembles throughout Canada, the US and Europe, and have been broadcast in over 20 countries. His recent work Short Variations on Waves was featured on the 2021 Juno Award winning album Mosaïque by the Ensemble Made in Canada, and his Fanfare for Canada’s 150th was premiered by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Thomas Dausgaard. This performance has been viewed 142,000 times on YouTube. 2021 saw the world premiere of a new work for the Vancouver Symphony called The Carnival of OUR Animals, written in collaboration with the VSO Indigenous Council, it showcases the music and stories of the Coast Salish peoples. Upcoming projects include the 2023 premiere of a new children’s opera Frog Song, produced by Here for Now Theatre and the Stratford Symphony, as well as a new work for the Victoria Symphony.
A strong advocate for orchestral music, Bill is dedicated to exploring new ways of bridging the classical music experience into the 21st century through creative programming, community-oriented collaborations, socially engaged concert experiences, and utilizing social media and digital platforms to connect with new audiences. Bill is also committed to music education of the highest calibre, having produced, and written several symphonic educational programs and by working with youth ensembles throughout BC’s lower mainland as well as working at the Glenn Gould Professional School, and the National Academy Orchestra of Canada. Bill is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and the University of Toronto. He lives in Sudbury, Ontario with his wife Yvanna, and their two daughters.
Matthew Jones, Guest Conductor
WCP in Concert with the Grand Philharmonic Choir Chamber Singers
March 2, 2025
Conductor, recorder virtuoso and cellist Matthew Jones is proud that his career has spanned the length and breadth of Ontario as the current artistic director to the Etobicoke Philharmonic Orchestra, Kitchener Waterloo Chamber Orchestra and the newly minted Kitchener Waterloo Youth Orchestra, and conductor laureate with Timmins Symphony Orchestra in the North East of Ontario.
Matthew graduated from Wilfrid Laurier University where he studied Cello performance. His conducting studies include the Conductor’s Institute at The Hartt School, University of Connecticut, and the Oregon Bach Festival under the guidance of Helmuth Rilling. Among his earliest conducting experiences were those with Waterloo Chamber Players from 1999 – 2001.
Mr. Jones enthusiastically advocates for the Arts in the community and beyond. Under his leadership, the Timmins Symphony Orchestra was awarded the Prestigious Betty Webster Award for its contribution to Orchestral Music in Canada.
Matthew has enjoyed conducting the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony on several occasions, Sault Ste. Marie Symphony, and Georgian Bay Symphony as a guest conductor and working with the North Bay Symphony as part of a conductor exchange.
Matthew delights in performing as a Recorder soloist and has performed with Waterloo Chamber Players several times. He is particularly proud of his CD, Just Pipes in partnership with Organist, the late Jan Overduin.
Matthew was honoured to serve as a board member for Orchestra’s Canada, Canada’s national voice of the Canadian orchestral community. It has been Matthew’s great pleasure to serve all Canadian Orchestras by advocating for the continued support of symphonic music at the municipal, provincial, and federal levels of government.
Mark Vuorinen, Artistic Director, Grand Philharmonic Choir
WCP in Concert with the Grand Philharmonic Choir Chamber Singers
March 2, 2025
Mark Vuorinen is Artistic Director of the Grand Philharmonic Choir, The Elora Singers and the Elora Festival. He is also Associate Professor and Chair of Music at Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo, where he is responsible for the choral music program. He holds a master’s degree in music from Yale University School of Music and Institute of Sacred Music, and earned the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from University of Toronto.
An advocate for new music, Mark has given premieres and Canadian premieres by many composers including Barbara Assiginaak, John Burge, Timothy Corlis, Jonathan Dove, Reena Esmail, Stephanie Marn, Robinson McClellan, Tawnie Olson, and James Whitbourn.
Concert highlights include performances of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem, Arvo Pärt’s Credo and Passio, Richard Einhorn’s moving soundtrack, Voices of Light, as an accompaniment to the silent film The Passion of Joan of Arc, and the Canadian premiere of Craig Hella Johnson’s oratorio Considering Matthew Shepard.
A recipient of many awards, Mark was named the E. Stanley Sedar Scholar at Yale University and is a recipient of the Elmer Iseler National Graduate Fellowship in Choral Conducting from the University of Toronto. In 2016, Mark received the Leslie Bell Prize for Choral Conducting from the Ontario Arts Council and a National Choral Award (Outstanding Dissertation) from Choral Canada.
Mark’s research interests include the study of contemporary choral literature from the Baltic states, and in particular, the music of Arvo Pärt and Veljo Tormis. Mark was an invited lecturer at the Arvo Pärt Project’s Sounding the Sacred conference in New York City in May 2017. He is published in Circuit Musiques Contemporaines, The Research Memorandum Series of Chorus America, and Principles of Music Composing of the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre.
