Partner Orchestra
Mississauga Symphony Orchestra
Denis Mastromonaco, Music Director
Year founded: 1972
The Mississauga Symphony Orchestra (MSO) was founded in 1972 as the Mississauga Symphonic Association, an amateur community ensemble. Comprised of a combination of amateur musicians and professional section leaders, the MSO has earned the reputation as the best hybrid orchestra in Canada.
Based out of Hammerson Hall, a world-class theatre that is at the heart of Mississauga’s Living Arts Centre, the MSO offers entertaining and increasingly sophisticated programs from the classic and popular repertoires of symphonic music, all performed to the highest artistic standards.
The MSO has continued to serve its original mandate to provide performance opportunities and personal development to talented amateurs, while combining excellence and education by assisting young professional performers and composers through solo performance opportunities, commissions, and mentoring.
Photo credit: Ian Muttoo
Alex Eddington
Birthplace: Toronto, ON
Current home: Toronto, ON
Toronto-based composer, theatre artist, and educator Alex Eddington has heard his music performed by a diverse list of musicians, including the Brantford Symphony Orchestra, Mississauga Symphony Orchestra, Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra, Cathedral Bluffs Symphony Orchestra, Continuum, Toy Piano Composers Ensemble, junctQìn keyboard collective, Da Camera Singers, Toronto Chamber Choir, violinist Conrad Chow, and soprano Kristin Mueller-Heaslip. He was the Composer-in- Residence for the Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra (SPO) from 2008 to 2010.
Alex’s many pieces for young musicians include Living Soul, which was premièred by over 100 students of the Suzuki String School of Guelph. His string quartet miniature, Talking with Strangers, was recorded by the Quatuor Bozzini as part of their Composer’s Kitchen studio-lab. His folk-song collage, Saturday Night at Fort Chambly, will be featured on an upcoming CD recording by the SPO.
As a playwright and actor, Alex has performed several of his own original plays across the Canadian Fringe festival circuit and at Toronto’s SummerWorks Festival. He recently premièred Life List, a walking tour show combining storytelling, birdwatching, and live music. As a sound designer, he has worked with theatre and dance companies across Canada.
Alex Eddington is also a music and drama teacher, workshop leader, cyclist, and bird enthusiast.
Dancing About Architecture
Toronto Symphony Orchestra
November 18, 2017
Mississauga Symphony Orchestra, Mississauga
In 1994, Mississauga mayor Hazel McCallion announced an international competition to design a tall residential building that would redefine the skyline of Mississauga, Ontario. Ninety-two submissions and more than a decade later, the winning design was unveiled. The two Absolute World towers have oval floors that rotate as they rise, curving 209 degrees of a circle to create undulating shapes that seem to be moving. Within days, the curvaceous larger tower was nicknamed “Marilyn Monroe”. These buildings tickle me whenever I see them, whether I’m glimpsing at them from the highway or standing under them by the Living Arts Centre. This is architecture that dances in the wind; here is my idea of the music they might be dancing to.
I would like to thank the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and the Mississauga Symphony Orchestra for the opportunity to turn glass and steel into music, for world-class musicians to play in beautiful concert halls