Brandon-born violinist Ehnes opening WSO season

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 16/09/2022 (1252 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

While musician James Ehnes is highly sought-after on the international stage, the Brandon-born violinist is making a quick stop in Manitoba this weekend to kick off the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s 75th anniversary season.

Ehnes is scheduled to perform at Centennial Concert Hall Saturday evening, starting at 7:30 p.m., where he will be tackling Ludwig van Beethoven’s Concerto in D major under the direction of conductor Daniel Raiskin.

Talking to Sun on Thursday afternoon from Toronto, in between flight transfers, Ehnes said he’s excited for this opportunity, especially since he hasn’t set foot in Manitoba since the summer of 2019.

“Like they say, there’s no place like home and there’s also a lot of people who I’m looking forward to seeing,” he said over the phone. “So that will be special too.”

Ehnes revealed that a lot of the friends and colleagues he’s eager to reunite with are members of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, an organization that he’s been working with for decades.

Throughout this time, Ehnes has taken part in plenty of concerts and tours under the WSO umbrella, which is a dream come true considering that he grew up watching this group of musicians perform whenever they would drop by Brandon.

“And that was always a very important part of my childhood, just getting to go to those concerts and later getting to play with them,” he said.

Ehnes started his violin studies at age five, becoming a protégé of Canadian violinist Francis Chaplin at age nine and making his official orchestra debut with L’Orchestre symphonique de Montréal at 13.

From there, Ehnes began touring and studying with musicians in both Canada and the United States, eventually moving his way onto the international scene by serving in the string section of various high-profile orchestras in cities like Vienna and Prague.

This kind of exposure has allowed Ehnes to become a highly decorated player in the music industry, since he has 11 Junos, two Grammys and a 2021 Gramophone award for artist of the year.

The violinist has been spending a lot of 2022 touring Europe, trying to make up for all shows that were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Despite all this globetrotting, Ehnes managed to squeeze in some high-profile studio sessions earlier this year, contributing to the soundtrack of Disney’s latest Star Wars streaming series “Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

Following Saturday’s concert in Winnipeg, the 46-year-old is planning to hop back on a plane Sunday morning, since he already has some performances booked in Japan, South Korea and the United Kingdom over the next couple weeks.

“It’s kind of a crazy itinerary, but for a lot of these shows … they’re concerts that had been scheduled during COVID times, so they’re trying to fit them in as best they can,” he said.

While his return to Manitoba will be short-lived, Ehnes said it’s still a “great honour” to open Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s 75th anniversary season with such an impressive slate of musicians scheduled to follow him over the next couple months.

This line-up includes Polish-Russian conductor Andrey Boreyko (Nov. 5), Canadian trumpeter Chris Fensom (Feb. 18, 2023) and American flutist Demarre McGill (March 4, 2023).

To view the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s 2022-23 schedule in its entirety, and to purchase tickets to any of these upcoming shows, visit wso.ca.

» kdarbyson@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @KyleDarbyson