Newfound Music Festival XXII
Newfound Music Festival XXII
Guest artists Keith Hamel and Megumi Masaki
January 30-31, 2025
Newfound Music Festival, now in its 22nd year, is an annual festival that invites students, alumni, and faculty to share their "Newfound ideas" with the School of Music community. Join us for workshops, a symposium, special guests, concerts, and a final gala performance. This year's guest artists will be Keith Hamel and Megumi Masaki. Read more about them below.
Newfound Music Festival XXII Schedule
Symposium
Thursday, January 30, 12pm-4pm
Suncor Energy Hall
FREE and open to the public!
Hear presentations and performances from School of Music faculty, students, and alumni.
Newfound XXI Gala
Thursday, January 30, 7:30pm
D.F. Cook Recital Hall
Join us for the Newfound Music Festival gala performance featuring School of Music faculty, students, and alumni.
Mainstage Concert with special guests Keith Hamel and Megumi Masaki
Friday, January 31, 7:30pm
D.F. Cook Recital Hall
Join us for an exciting program from our special guest artists Keith Hamel and Megumi Masaki.
About the Newfound Music Festival XXII guest artists
Keith Hamel
Keith Hamel is both a composer and computer music specialist. Dr. Hamel writes acoustic and electroacoustic music, and has been awarded many prizes in both media. Many of his recent compositions focus on the interaction between live performers and computer-controlled electronics. He has been commissioned by many national and international ensembles and organizations, and his works have been performed in Canada, the U.S., Asia and Europe. As an active computer music researcher, Dr. Hamel is the author of the NoteAbilityPro music notation software used for music engraving and publishing. He is an associate researcher at the Media and Graphics Interdisciplinary Centre (MAGIC) and at the Institute for Computing, Information & Cognitive Systems (ICICS).
Megumi Masaki
Megumi Masaki is an innovative pianist, interactive multimedia performing artist, educator and curator. For over thirty years, she has established a reputation as an internationally recognized “mind expanding” (Frettabladid) interpreter of new music with “electric and intimately sensitive musicianship” (BroadwayWorld Ireland). Her work explores new models of interaction and integration of sound, image, text and movement in multimedia works through new technologies, including hand-gesture-motion tracking to generate and control live-electronics and live-video, 3D visuals, piano controlled computer game, AI, e-textile sensors and active infra-red tracking.
Megumi is a Full Professor of Piano at Brandon University’s School of Music and the director of its New Music Ensemble and New Music Festival. In collaboration with Knowledge Keeper Barb Blind and Michif curator and writer Cathy Mattes, Megumi founded the Brandon University Indigenous New Music Festival. She is also on faculty at the Casalmaggiore International Festival Italy, Chetham's International Summer School and Festival Manchester UK and at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.