Norman Segalowitz - Academic Advisor

Norman Segalowitz is Professor of Psychology at Concordia University and Associate Director of the Centre for the Study of Learning and Performance, is currently assembling a team that will include scholars from many different disciplines. The Academic Advisory Team will be collaborating closely with the School on issues regarding the development of artistic and performance abilities in young children. The Team will also be conducting research to better understand the nature of artistic development.

Prof. Segalowitz holds a B.Sc. from McGill and a doctorate degree from Oxford. He has twice served as Chair of the Psychology Department at Concordia University. He conducts research on the mental processes that underlie the acquisition of complex skills, such as those involved in learning a second language or in musical performance. He is also interested in how the sciences of the mind can contribute to an understanding of how second languages can be more effectively taught.

Sandeep Bhagwati - Academic Advisor

Sandeep Bhagwati is a composer and intermedia artist. He received his Diplom at Musikhochschule Munich and was a Research Fellow at IRCAM Paris, ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe and IEM Graz. His compositions in all genres have been performed at leading festivals worldwide such as the 2006 World New Music Festival, at the Venice and München Biennales, märzmusik Berlin, Vienna Modern, Sangat Mumbai etc. His 5 music theatres/ operas have been staged at venues such Centre Pompidou Paris, Munich and Darmstadt State Operas. He was Composer-in-Residence at several renowned festivals and at the Beethoven Orchestra Bonn. He has founded and directed interdisciplinary festivals such as A*DEvantgarde Munich (since 1991, biennial) and Klangriffe – Festival for Risky Music (2003). He has also directed and participated in long-term intercultural music exchange projects with Indian and Chinese musicians and leading European and Asian Musicians (Ensemble Modern, Nieuw Ensemble, Chai Found Music Workshop Taipei). After many projects with children in Austria, Germany and Great Britain, he was invited by Simon Rattle to lead Workshops for Children in Berlin in 2004/2005 (with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra). From 2000-2003 he was Professor of Composition and Multimedia at Karlsruhe Music University.

As a Canada Research Chair at Concordia he directs matralab, a research institute dedicated to the analysis and creation of interdisciplinary, intermedia, intercultural and interactive work. His current research/creation work centres around a „comprovised" new music theatre work comprising permutational dramaturgy, on-screen movement cues and real-time orchestra scores as well as a work for wandering musicians in complex architectural and acoustic environments. His new opera for children "Princess Süssüsan" will be premiered on February 22, 2008 at the Opera of Bonn / Germany.

Nancy Loo - Honorary Academic & Artistic Advisor 

Nancy Loo is one of Hong Kong’s most versatile artists; as pianist, radio programme host, actress and writer. She was a recipient of the “Ten Outstanding Young Persons Award” in 1978. She is currently on the piano faculty of the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Baptist University, and Hong Kong Institute of Education.  Apart from giving lectures and master classes, she has also been on the panel of judges for awards and competitions.

Nancy Loo received her master degree from the Juilliard School of music, and later studied at the Royal Northern College of music. Her teachers include Betty Drown, Misczyslaw Munz, Adele Marcus, Ryszard Bakst, Derrick Wyndham, Vlado Perlemeuter and Guido Agosti. She won first prize at the “Rina Sala Gallo International Competition” in Italy, and was a prizewinner at the “Marguerite Long International Competition”, “Viotti International Competition” and the “Premio Jaén”.

Miss Loo has appeared as soloist with the Juilliard Orchestra, Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Zagreb Radio Symphony Orchestra, Thessaloniki State Orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra and the National Philharmonic of the Philippines. In Hong Kong, she has played with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, Hong Kong Sinfonietta and the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra. She was featured in Hong Kong Arts Festival’s “Nancy Loo and Friends” and “Alone for a second”.

In addition to founding the piano and woodwind sextet “Les Six”, she has also worked with local and visiting artists in chamber music concerts. A keen performer of contemporary music, she participated frequently in the annual “Musicarama” and the “ISCM World Music Days Festival”.  In 2007, she was presented in a solo recital of contemporary Chinese composers’ piano music by Hong Kong Composers’ Guild.

She has participated in multi-media performances such as Kung Chi-shing’s “M Garden”, “City Inside A Broken Sky”, “Destiny Travels”, and in drama productions including “The Music Factory” with Chung Ying Theatre Company.  She also performed with CCDC in “The Rite of Spring” and “Testimony”, and was the pianist and music director in “The Vagina Monologues” with Spring-Time Experimental Theatre.

Miss Loo is the presenter of RTHK Radio Four’s “Belle Nuit”, “Cantilena”, and “Children’s Corner”, the only classical radio program for children in Hong Kong.

As a narrator, She has performed in “Peter and the Wolf” with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra, “Babar the Elephant” and “Carnival of the Animals” with Hog Kong Sinfonietta, “The Blue Planet” with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, and “The little Mermaid” with the Hong Kong City Chamber Orchestra.

She has played for film soundtracks, including “Bauhinia”, and “The Sound of Love”. She has also published two books. Her CDs include a piano solo album of Christian music, “Ambush” and “Moonlight on Spring River” with the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra, piano works by local composers and the Brahms Hungarian Dances with violinist Leung Kin Fung.

Dr. Candace Y. W. Lee , MD, PhD, FRCPC, FACC, FACP, FCP, CSPQ - Honorary Advisor

Dr. Candace Lee obtained her M.D. degree from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario and completed her residency in internal medicine, subspecialty residency in adult cardiology, and Ph.D. studies at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Dr. Lee subsequently pursued fellowships in clinical pharmacology at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, USA and at the University of Toronto, and a fellowship in cardiology at the Montreal Heart Institute.

Prior to returning to Canada, Dr. Lee held the rank of Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. She is certified in internal medicine and cardiology (by the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada and the American Board of Internal Medicine), in adult transthoracic echocardiography (by the U.S. National Board of Echocardiography), in clinical hypertension (by the American Society of Hypertension Specialists Program), and in clinical pharmacology (by the American Board of Clinical Pharmacology). She also holds specialist certificates in internal medicine and in cardiology by the Collège des médecins du Québec, and a certificate in clinical research from Mayo Clinic.