Maestro Enterprises International
In 1985, Maestro Daniel Eby, came to Toronto, Ontario and decided that since he was in a new country, he would begin a new venture. Maestro Daniel had been a student of vocal pedagogy for over 25 years and loved working with classical singers. He decided to set up a studio for voice lessons and classical singing lessons and become its primary teacher of vocal technique.
The name New School of Classical Vocal Studies was chosen to express Maestro Daniel's desire to reform the process that most singers go through when they decide to leave the vocal mainstream and become classical singers.
Maestro Daniel was a graduate of the famous Curtis Institute of Music, where during his four years there, a large percentage of the classical singing students did not survive their pedagogical experience, including Maestro Daniel. He was convinced that there was a better way to learn to sing classical music so he proceeded to spend another twenty years to find out what he had missed during his years spent at Curtis.
In Toronto, without the Canadian Government subsidizing his programs, Maestro Daniel quickly decided that the best way to encourage talented young singers to study classical music was to make voice lessons affordable.
In 1986 Maestro Daniel began what was called the NSCVS Scholarship Program.
Many talented young singers took part in this program, including Bryn Duyn of Phantom of the Opera fame, Robert deVrij, a magnificent lyric baritone, who after learning how to sing high notes, thought he should become a tenor, much to the Maestro's chagrin, and in 1989 a group of seven young voices who came to the NSCVS studio, some from the Etobicoke School of the Performing Arts and others from the St. Michael's Choir School, all of whom had already at their tender ages voices in a serious state of decline. Subsequently, each of these singers took advantage of the NSCVS Scholarship Program to improve their classical vocal prowess, and discovered through the Maestro's unique pedagogical approach, their true classical voices, which were in most cases, truly wonderful.
These seven singers remained studying in the NSCVS studio long enough to prepare their voices for what was to become a series of classical performances of Mozart's “Don Giovanni” as the youngest adult cast ever to sing this operatic masterpiece. Their average age was 19. Foremost among this group was the soprano who sang the role of Donna Anna, for she has proved, to the best of the Maestro's knowledge, to be the only cast member to have pursued a career as an opera singer. Her name: Othalie Graham.
After five years of intense vocal study at NSCVS, an average of two or three classical singing lessons per week, one Toronto publication described Othalie's voice in the following manner, “Ms. Graham unleashed a voice of absolute power and purity that it sent shivers down the author's spine and that a voice like hers was worthy of the World Stage.” This type of unusually powerful singing was fairly typical of NSCVS’ students, depending of course on how much rehabilitative work was necessary. Other members of the Don Giovanni case who demonstrated a high level of vocal maturity were Federico Gonzalez, Brian Khan, Tim Isherwood and the ever so delightful lyric-coloratura Lynn Bell.
Students
Concerts Produced
Voice Lessons Given
Performances
In the fall of 1993, soon after the completion of our Don Giovanni production, one of my students referred a young tenor to me by the name of Jeffrey Hallili. Jeffrey was an outstanding musician for his young age of 15 and he developed very rapidly as a voice student. During his three years at NSCVS, he performed in our operatic cabaret review, The Magical Journey from Mozart to Musicals on many occasions and as well in quite a few operatic recitals. When he departed from our singing studio on his way to New York, he truly sounded as good as the young Jose Carreras. During his tutelage with the Maestro, he often sang with Othalie Graham in various performances and as well with the well known Canadian mezzo-soprano Florence Maltese who often compared Jeffrey's voice favorably with that of her own father's, the great Italian tenor Ferruccio Tagliavini.
Both Jeffrey and Othalie have spent the last few years as fellow students at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia, a testament to the solid singing lessons and technique they received at the New School of Classical Vocal Studies in Toronto. Jeffrey was earlier featured in the February edition of Opera News.
In recent years, NSCVS has had the opportunity to develop the voices of Kennon Saari, tenor, Anna Bateman, a coloratura soprano, A.J. Stewart, from boy soprano to lyric baritone and Julia MacKenzie, coloratura soprano, all whom have been recipients of the NSCVS scholarship program.
In December of 2001, the School produced a main stage production of Menotti's Christmas Opera Amahl and the Night Visitors at the Du Maurier theatre, in downtown Toronto, with sets, costumes and orchestra.
Presently, the school is reviving its cabaret production of The Magical Journey from Mozart to Musicals to provide performance opportunities for its students and as well for a number of talented Canadian singers.
Suffice it to say that over the twenty years that Maestro Daniel has been teaching classical vocal techniques and classical singing lessons in Toronto, quite a few exceptional voices have been trained at the NSCVS where VOCAL EXCELLENCE IS THE GOAL.
As a footnote to this brief school history, the New School of Classical Vocal Studies has had the pleasure of working with a number of extremely talented older artists who for one reason or another may have given up their aspirations to be professional singers. They nevertheless learned to sing classical music on a very high level and among them most notably was Ms. Kathryn Kossow, a mezzo soprano who with the right training in her youth, could have certainly had a major operatic career. There have been others over the years including Ms. Tatiana Podluska, Mr. Tom Fleming, Ms. Mariana Dhima and the late Mr. Randy Lecky and Mr. Henry Irwin.
