Women On the Verge

Elizabeth McDonald, Emily Martin, Kathryn Tremills

Women on the Verge

By Elizabeth McDonald

The trio Women on the Verge (WOV) is winding up a successful 2018-19 season that included receiving $20,000 in Canada Council funding. WOV was formed in 2016 by American soprano Emily Martin, Canadian soprano (and QAC member) Elizabeth McDonald and Canadian pianist Kathryn Tremills. WOV was created with a focus to tell the stories of women in song. Their own personal roles of performers, academics, and mothers have shaped their artistic choices as a trio by choosing musical stories that are relevant to contemporary culture, not just in music, but in society—politically, socially, and culturally.

Their past season was centred around their first commissioned work Blue of the Distance by Canadian composer and Toronto Symphony Orchestra associate composer Emilie Lebel. The text of Blue of the Distance for two sopranos and piano “explores themes of migration, displacement, and the experience of women caught in this turmoil.” Lebel has set, found and collected words from over 140 news articles describing events of displacement; in particular, words to describe women, which were then mapped onto an essay by Rebecca Solnit, The Blue of Distance, using erasure techniques on her text. The premiere took place in March 2018 at the Canadian Music Centre and raised over $400 for the Prince Edward County Syrian Refugee Fund.

WOV has now toured Blue of the Distance throughout Alberta and Washington State, as well as London, UK, Reykjavik, Iceland, and Paris, FR and, have been featured on Classical King FM in Seattle, WA, all with the support of the Canada Council.

In addition to performing, the members of WOV have offered master classes in voice and piano as well as lecture-recitals on arts entrepreneurship at universities in the cities they tour, including the Universities of Calgary and Lethbridge, and Pacific Lutheran University (Seattle), Guildhall School of Music and Drama (UK), Bucknell University (PA), and the Iceland University of the Arts. WOV also work to encourage the performance of new classical works. In Toronto, they recently hosted the first Canadian songSlam, which encourages composers to write a five-minute song for voice and piano to be premiered in a competition setting with prizes totalling $2,000.

Make sure to follow WOV on Instagram and Facebook (@womenonverge) for an inside view of their work and for exciting announcements for the upcoming seasons. You can also find them online at womenontheverge.ca