The four members of VC4, (Beth Silver, Amahl Arulanandam, Bryan Holt, and Sarah Gans) are all cellist friends who met in Toronto, and their lives have been connected in many ways since then.  They all attended the University of Toronto and McGill University and participated in the National Youth Orchestra of Canada training programme.  They have played together in various configurations but have not been able to collaborate in this fashion until now.  The four members have shared many life experiences over the years, and now are able to share this unique musical experience.

About VC4’s Digital Series Concert:
This programme was inspired by the feeling of coming out the other side of the COVID-19 pandemic and celebrates reconnecting with friends.

The theme and variations composed by Beth Silver are based on a melody collected by Jewish-Ukrainian ethnomusicologist Moishe Beregovski in the early twentieth century.  This quartet is part of a group of works commissioned by Prof. Anna Shternshis and the University of Toronto with the purpose of bringing to life some of Beregovski’s recently resurfaced notes and sketches.  These notes were confiscated by the USSR, and Beregovski died thinking his collections had been destroyed.  Beregovski’s correspondence indicates that he asked composers to incorporate pieces of Jewish musical folklore into their compositions in the way Bartók and Stravinsky had previously done, but his wish was never fulfilled.  The variations were written with this in mind; in the styles of famous composers he would have been familiar with.  The writing attached to this particular melody translates to “I planted vegetables in my little garden” and was collected by Ida Shaykes from Lerner Visnshaftler in Kiev in 1946.  Shaykes was one of very few women ethnomusicologists associated with Beregovski, and was trained by him to continue his work.

Members of VC4 also attended McGill University with Kaitlyn Raitz, a wonderful cellist and composer who now resides in Nashville.  Her music is heavily inspired by both Western Classical music and traditional Bluegrass and American folk music.  She remains a dear friend to this day which makes it all the more special that the ensemble is able to perform her music.

Grieg’s Morning Mood and Jocelyn Morlock’s The Violet Hour are about the sunrise – a peaceful, beautiful moment of the day that symbolizes rebirth and renewal. The works by Kaitlyn Raitz call back to a time in the past that was idyllically happy and peaceful.  The Goltermann Serenade is a moment of serenity and the Matz movement is an energetic party.

Biographies of the members of VC4:

Beth Silver
Beth Silver (M.Mus) is thrilled to be part of a community in which she can thrive on her intuition and creativity. As an involved freelancer based in Toronto, she is admired for expressive, compelling playing and her abilities to paint in many colours through her instrument and capture character and spontaneity in music – especially amidst interactive chamber settings. A lover of many genres, Beth is equally at home in a traditional classical ensemble as she is in a band arranging and exploring new voices for cello. Recently, she has also assumed the role as North America’s foremost (i.e. only) klezmer fiddle-style cellist.

​Performances with various chamber projects have brought her to festivals around the world, including Salzburg’s Kammermusik Festival, Ottawa Chamber Festival, Toronto
Summer Music Festival, Glatt und Verkehrt Festival in Austria, Glasgow’s Celtic Connections Festival, Festival Napa Valley, Ashkenaz Fest, Tirgan Festival, and
Klezkanada. She has been presented across Canada by Jeunesses Musicales, Prairie Debut, and Debut Atlantic as part of the Ladom Ensemble.

She is the recipient of grants from the Canada Council and Ontario Arts Council and her awards include the 2014 Ben Steinberg Musical Legacy Award recognizing musical
achievement in the Canadian Jewish community. She is currently arranging settings of Jewish refugee songs for BBC’s documentary on Jews in Muslim lands.

Beth enjoys spending non-musical time painting, reading, practicing horticulture, and doing yoga, and lives in Toronto’s west end with her cat Sica.

VC2
VC2 Cello Duo is an innovative ensemble that captivates audiences through their performances of classical masterworks, unknown gems and boundary pushing music.
Comprised of cellists Amahl Arulanandam and Bryan Holt, CBC Music calls VC2 “a tight unit, with excellent intonation and expression.” They present artistically challenging, yet accessible programs in venues ranging from intimate cabarets to Roy Thomson Hall. As respected cellists, they have performed as part of leading music organizations including the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Canadian Opera Company Orchestra, National Ballet of Canada Orchestra, Esprit Orchestra, Soundstreams, Art of Time Ensemble, Continuum Contemporary Music, New Music Concerts, Music in the Barns, Thin Edge New Music Collective, Tapestry Opera and others. The duo have been
featured artists at Toronto Summer Music Festival, soundSCAPE Festival (Italy), Women’s Musical Club of Winnipeg, Ottawa Chamberfest, Indian River Festival, New
Works Calgary, Ottawa New Music Creators, 21C Music Festival, Ritornello Festival, and the Prairie Cello Institute.

Committed to the creation of new works by living composers, especially those from their home country of Canada, VC2 commissioned five Canadian composers to create works based on the Beethoven Cello Sonatas project. In addition to their performances, VC2, with the generous support of the Ontario Arts Council, recorded these works and in fall 2018, released the album Beethoven’s Cellists which CBC Radio calls a “first-rate” recording.

In the fall/winter of 2019/20, VC2 embarked on a tour of the Western Canada, presented by Prairie Debut, which included a brand-new commission, Heist, by
Chinese-Canadian composer Vincent Ho.  The duo has also toured with Debut Atlantic (2018) in support of their debut album. Entering their fifth year, VC2 will be recording their second full-length album that will be comprised entirely of Canadian cello music, celebrating the diverse compositional voices Canada has to offer.

Sarah Gans
Sarah Gans, cellist, is currently based in Toronto, Ontario. From 2016 to 2019 Sarah served as the Assistant Principal Cello of the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony. Prior to this, Sarah graduated with a Master of Music from the Juilliard School where she studied with Darrett Adkins. There, she was the recipient of the Irene Diamond
Graduate Fellowship as well as awarded the Grunin Prize in Cello.

In 2014 Sarah received her Bachelor of Music from McGill’s Schulich School of Music where she studied with Matt Haimovitz. At McGill Sarah was a recipient of the Lloyd Carr-Harris String Scholarship, and upon graduation, was awarded the Salsinger Tani Gold Medal in Music Performance as well as recognized for Outstanding Achievement
in Cello Performance. Sarah has spent her summers at festivals such as the Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, the Banff Centre’s Masterclasses for Strings, and the
Toronto Summer Music Festival.

---