A r t i s t i c D i r e c t o r s
Kathleen van Mourik, a native of Alberta, is in high demand as a vocal coach and collaborative pianist, and is known for her inter-disciplinary collaborations with artists, actors and dance. Ms. van Mourik completed a Bachelor of Music degree at the University of Calgary before moving to the Netherlands, where she studied lied and chamber music at the Hilversum Conservatory under Hans Broekman and received the Uitvoerend Musicus degree. Upon returning to Canada, she completed a master of music degree in piano performance with Vladimir Levtov at the University of Calgary. Other important teachers include the late Greta Kraus and Rudolf Jansen. She has also studied with Martin Isepp at the Banff Centre and completed a residency there with her husband, pianist Charles Foreman. As a two-piano team, they have commissioned works by various composers, and have completed a CD of French two-piano music, released on the Arktos label in May 2005. Kathleen recently completed a CD of Russian songs with soprano Michèle Cusson. In addition to her work with Mountain View, she maintains an active performing schedule, and has appeared across Canada, as well as in the United States, Belgium and the Netherlands. Her work is regularly broadcast on national and regional CBC Radio, and she has also appeared on radio and television in the Netherlands.
Charles Foreman was born near Chicago, where he was a
scholarship student of Rudolf Reuter at the American Conservatory. He holds degrees from Indiana University and the University of Toronto and completed post-graduate work at the Juilliard School with Abbey Simon. Appointed professor of piano at the University of Calgary from 1973 – 2009, Foreman was a visiting scholar at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, in 2002. In 1982, he won the Canada Music Council Award for best recorded chamber music with Robert Aitken and Per Øien. He was a founding member of the Shawnigan Trio, which concertized extensively in Germany to rave reviews, and made two recordings for Antes Edition. In 2001, Foreman concluded his “Sounds of a Century” project, ten recitals of twentieth century piano music, one for each decade, a series the Calgary Herald called “monumental…heroic, but illuminating”. Mr. Foreman completed his first cycle of the thirty-two Beethoven sonatas – a first for Calgary – in the spring of 2005 and his cycle of the solo works of Chopin – a Canadian first – in the spring of 2009. Foreman still teaches at the Mount Royal Conservatory in Calgary, a position he has held since 2008.
