When
Sunday, November 20th at 2pmWhere
Quest University, Multi Purpose RoomTickets
Adults & Seniors: $20All Students by Donation
Available At:
Billies Bouqet
Quest University Main Office
About
Kelly Coubrough - Soprano Kelly Coubrough has experience in many genres of music including opera, new music, and musical theatre. In January and October 2010, she performed in a newly composed touring opera The Lives of Lesser Things by Isaiah Bell in Alberta. Kelly is in her seventh season with the Vancouver Opera Company chorus, and has been a featured soloist with various choirs including the Whistler Singers, the Sea-to-Sky Singers, the Durham Philharmonic Choir and, most recently with the Vancouver Bach Choir and Orchestra at the Orpheum in Vancouver, BC. Kelly played the role of Cassie in the Squamish, B.C. production of A Chorus Line, and she sang the role of Gretel in Hansel und Gretel in Edmonton, Alberta with OperaNUOVA. Other professional credits include: Jenny Hildebrand in Street Scene, Mrs. Jenks in The Tender Land, and creating the role of Grace for the premiere of The Midnight Court with Queen of Puddings Music Theatre, in Toronto. Kelly also enjoys sharing her knowledge and experience through teaching private singing lessons out of her home in Squamish, BC, and as the director of the community choirs: The Sound Youth Chorus and The Sound Children’s Chorus. She has also worked with the Quest University choir and presented a workshop and Masterclass on “Vocal Health the Secrets of Singing.”
Laurel Parsons - Piano
Before coming to Quest in 2009, Laurel Parsons taught music theory and/or aural skills at the University of British Columbia, the University of Oregon, Kwantlen University College and, most recently, Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario. At Queen's, she served as faculty advisor for all first-year music students, and the School of Music student body named her the department's "Best Professor" for 2007-08.
Laurel's dissertation involved historical, literary and musical analysis of 20th-century British composer Elisabeth Lutyens's opera The Numbered. During her Ph.D. studies at UBC, she was awarded a 3-year Doctoral Fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and was recognized for excellence in teaching upper-level music theory classes with a UBC Graduate Teaching Award.
Throughout her years of dissertation research, Laurel was struck by the lack of attention paid to music by composers who happen to be female. As a result, she is currently writing and co-editing a book of analytical essays on music by women composers. In recent years, she has also become fascinated by the representation of Inuit culture and the Arctic in Canadian concert music, and considers her voyage 300 km north of the Arctic Circle to the University of Tromsø in Norway to deliver a presentation on this subject the highlight of her international-conference-paper-delivering career. Other interests include the neuroscience of music, music and medicine, and the relations between music and language.
As well as teaching music and humanities courses at Quest, Laurel conducts the choir and looks forward to establishing instrumental groups as the student body continues to grow.
Outside of Quest, Laurel enjoys serving as Chair of the North Vancouver Community Arts Council. But her favourite non-Quest activity is spending summers with her husband, four children and Labrador retriever on beautiful Savary Island, collecting beach glass, hiking the trails and obsessively doing 1000-piece jigsaw puzzles.
