DIAMOND o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2007-06-07 published
BURSTON,
J.
Margaret
On Wednesday, June 6, 2007. Maggie
BURSTON, composer, activist,
healer, and counsellor, beloved wife of Ben
BURSTON.
Loving mother
and mother-in-law of Varda and David
FENTON of Peterborough,
Daniel BURSTON and Sharna
OLFMAN of Pittsburgh, and Jonathan
BURSTON of Stratford. Dear sister of the late Leah
NEWMAN,
Miriam
COHEN,
Eddie
DIAMOND, and Esther
BAROUH. Devoted grandmother
of Adam, and Gavriela. At Benjamin's Park Memorial Chapel, 2401 Steeles
Avenue West (3 lights west of Dufferin) for service on Friday,
June 8, 2007 at 1: 00 p.m. Interment Community Section of Pardes
Shalom Cemetery. Shiva 575 Avenue Road #601, commencing Sunday,
June 10 daily from 2: 00 p.m. If desired, donations may be made
to the Maggie Burston Memorial Fund for the Allergy and Environmental
Health Association and the Givat Haviva Education Fund Israel
c/o The Benjamin Foundation, 3429 Bathurst Street, Toronto, M6A 2C3,
416-780-0324. At both the Funeral Service and the Shiva you are
respectfully requested to refrain from wearing any scented grooming
products.
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DIAMOND o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2007-07-17 published
She cherished them all
By Val ROSS,
Page R1
Bluma APPEL gave advice to so many people in the arts - from
producers to mere reporters - she couldn't possibly remember
all their names. No matter, to the Toronto-based philanthropist
who died on Sunday of lung cancer at the age of 86, everyone
was "dear."
That endearment even applied to the trainload of comedians whom
APPEL and Byron
BELLOWS, her personal assistant and long-time
friend, joined en route to the annual Canadian Comedy Awards
in London, Ontario
"I don't think she missed an awards," says Mark Breslin, comedy
impresario.
APPEL helped to establish the awards, started in 2000, and supported
a $10,000 bursary for emerging comics; as with all of her widely
dispersed acts of philanthropy, the amount wasn't huge, but the
impact was.
"It's the only time I can think of," Breslin says, "that anyone
from the Canadian establishment took comedy seriously."
Establishment? Emerging from a hard-working, Montreal Jewish
family, Bluma
LEVITT entered the philanthropy world thanks to
what she called "indulgence" from her husband, entrepreneur-millionaire
Bram APPEL.
In her early adulthood, she tried her hand at so many ventures
- women's suit designer, political adviser, investor in theatre
projects - that she seemed confident about knocking on any door.
"We've been in her apartment on Hazelton Avenue [in Toronto's
Yorkville district] when she's gone to her phone and called the
Prime Minister's Office to find out about support for one of
our tours," says Marshall Pynkoski, co-artistic director of Opera
Atelier.
APPEL was an early supporter of his 22-year-old company, he says,
because "she was looking to invest in people and organizations
where her money would make a difference, it would make a return.
She was very much Bram's wife."
Over the years, she became Opera Atelier's most influential patron,
and not just in financial terms: She restructured the board,
and shook down other patrons. "From the minute she gave, she
felt she could ask other people. She told us, 'You identify givers,
then you encircle them.' " Pynkoski did not realize that two
weeks ago, when she wrote a $25,000 cheque that wiped out the
company's deficit, it would be one of her last acts.
APPEL was a woman of strong opinions. Last December, when Canadian
Stage was planning to mount a production of My Name Is Rachel
Corrie (a play about the young antiwar protester who was crushed
by an Israeli Defence Force bulldozer,)
APPEL's was one of the
loudest voices warning of the play's potential anti-Israeli effect
on public opinion.
Few were surprised when Canadian Stage, whose main venue is the
Bluma Appel Theatre, cancelled the production. "She would never
fail to tell me if she loved or hated something," says Marty
Bragg, the company's artistic producer. "But she was one of us.
Her second sentence to me the day I met her was, 'Don't ever
forget, Marty, I'm a producer too.' "
Producers are people who put talents and money together, and
at this she excelled. She was breakfasting with Friends in Niagara-on-the-Lake,
Ontario, in 2002, Bellows recalls, when the group learned that
Willowbank, a stately home built in 1834, faced demolition. American
descendants of the owner wanted to save it, but could not get
charitable status in Canada.
"Bluma said, 'Give me your cellphone,' " Bellows says. "She called
lawyers, and in a week we'd launched American Friends of Canada."
Willowbank was saved, and is now the home of the School of Restoration
Arts (the only one in North America), which offers courses in
architectural heritage preservation.
A former art student,
APPEL was keenly interested in the Ontario
College of Art and Design. Two years ago she launched an annual
design scholarship. "Her generosity was personal," Ontario College
of Art and Design president Sara
DIAMOND says. "She came to the
students' shows, she was involved. We all thought she'd be around
for a long time."
Helen BURSTYN is chair of the Ontario Trillium Foundation, the
last board on which
APPEL served. "She gave away hundreds of
thousands of dollars, but she was careful,"
BURSTYN says. "She
helped by telling people, in effect, 'You'd better not miss this,
it's special.' And she was wickedly funny."
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DIAMOND o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2007-08-01 published
DIAMOND,
Edward
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DIAMOND o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2007-08-18 published
'Brilliant alchemist' inspired Toronto and its artists
Conductor's determination transformed the Canadian Opera Company
- and made its new home a reality, writes Sandra
MARTIN
By Sandra MARTIN,
Page
S10
Everything about Richard
BRADSHAW was big: his personality, his
intellect, his appetite for ideas and experience, his ambition,
his optimism, his heart and his faith in God. He lived in Toronto
for fewer than 20 years, but his impact was huge. His vision
and determination built the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing
Arts, one of the world's very best theatres for ballet and opera,
both acoustically and architecturally. He transformed a regional
opera company into an internationally recognized one; he gave
us our first full production of Richard Wagner's Ring Cycle
he pushed the artistic boundaries of who should direct and perform
opera. He made opera the hottest ticket in town.
Tall, grey-haired and bold, with florid cheeks and eyes encased
in black Buddy Holly glasses, Mr.
BRADSHAW was both an artist
who could inspire his musicians and an entrepreneur who could
sell his vision. Asked in an interview which came first during
what he liked to call "the 30 years war," making music or building
an opera house, he replied: "In the middle of the night, I worry
about money. When I get up in the morning, I look forward to
conducting."
Writer Margaret Atwood captured that dual capacity in an e-mail
message from Scandinavia. "Richard
BRADSHAW was one of a kind.
He was passionate about the work itself - whatever it might be
- and set the highest standards for it. But he was playful and
innovative as well, and a joy to work with. We saw the premiere
of The Handmaid's Tale in Denmark together - and I could just
hear him thinking about how he would do it if he could get it
to Toronto - which he did, triumphantly. His specialty was making
silk purses out of the sow's ears handed to him time and time
again by our mingy politicians. Nobody could make two cents stretch
as far as he could.... The best tribute to him will be to try
to match his commitment to excellence, and his grand vision of
what we can be - as opposed to what we sometimes all too drearily
are."
Richard James
BRADSHAW was born in Rugby in the British Midlands,
the only child of Alfred James
BRADSHAW, an accountant, and his
wife, Florence Mary
(DUNKLEY.)
When
Richard was quite small,
the family moved to Higham Ferrers in Northamptonshire. From
his father, an amateur musician and a dedicated rereader of Charles
Dickens, he inherited a love of literature. His mother passed
on her acutely sensitive ear - he once scored 100 per cent in
an aural exam.
When Richard was 8, his parents took him to a piano performance
of Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, and it stuck as his earliest
musical memory. As a boy, he was also learning to play the piano
and the organ. By the time he was 12, he had a paying job playing
the organ at the local church. Two years later, he took at least
symbolic steps toward his career goal when he conducted a rehearsal
of Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony with the Kettering Orchestral
Society. But music was not his entire life. He loved sports,
especially cricket and rugby, and collected stamps and indulged
in the peculiarly British pastime of trainspotting.
To please his accountant father, who wanted him to have a broad
educational background, he studied English literature at the
University of London, graduating with an honours degree in 1968.
At the same time, he was continuing his musical education, playing
the harpsichord, organ and even the flute and studying conducting
privately with Sir Adrian Boult.
After university, he returned home and founded Music at Higham,
serving as its musical director for four years. Then, with his
entrepreneurial juices flowing, he moved back to the capital
and founded the New London Ensemble and conducted the Saltarello
Choir from 1972 to 1975. He said later (in a Toronto Life profile)
that these years were "among the most wonderful" in his life
because there was government money for the arts, and he felt,
with the confidence of youth, that he "could do anything."
What he needed, though, was a boost so that he could work with
a major orchestra. That came in the usual way: a combination
of luck, talent and chutzpah. A musician friend's father heard
him and introduced him to conductor Sir Colin Davis, who was
intrigued enough to attend one of Mr.
BRADSHAW's rare London
concerts. Sir Colin then called the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic,
which had already declined to hear Mr.
BRADSHAW conduct, and
secured him an audition. Mr.
BRADSHAW won a fellowship to work
with the prestigious orchestra and went on to Glyndebourne in
1975 as the chorus director of its opera festival. That was where
he made another fortuitous connection, with administrator Diana
HEPBURNE-
SCOTT.
They were married on June 30, 1977. In many ways,
she was Mr.
BRADSHAW's antithesis - shy, intensely private -
but also his steadying counterbalance - ironic, stalwart, commonsensical.
It was an extremely rare rehearsal or performance that didn't
find her quietly sitting in the audience, listening and watching
intently.
That same year, he was invited to join the San Francisco Opera
as resident conductor, a position he held for the next dozen
years, mostly under Kurt Herbert Adler as general director. Mr. Adler,
a Teutonic maestro who controlled every aspect of the company,
from costumes and sets to maintenance budgets, was a grandiose
influence on Mr.
BRADSHAW.
While working at San Francisco Opera,
Mr. BRADSHAW often accepted appointments as a guest conductor,
which is how he first came to the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto
in 1988, to conduct Tosca.
In 1989, he was hired as the Canadian Opera Company's chief conductor
and head of music, arriving just in time to see the elaborate
plans to build a ballet and opera house in midtown Toronto jettisoned
by the provincial government because of cost overruns and fundraising
shortfalls. He was promoted to artistic director in 1994 after
the abrupt and choleric departure of Brian
DICKIE, the man who
had hired him four years earlier, and was named general director
in January, 1998, making him the first musician to lead the Canadian
Opera Company since Ettore Mazzoleni in the late 1950s.
He conducted more than 60 operas during his tenure with the Canadian
Opera Company and kept up a steady off-season life travelling
around the world as a guest conductor. While he was criticized
for not putting more Canadian operas on the stage - he refused
to compromise his musical standards to nationalist fervour -
he did commission at least two homegrown operas, The Golden Ass
and The Scarlet Princess. Meanwhile, he continued the composer-in-residence
program established by predecessor Lotfi Mansouri and spiced
up the lineup of crowd-pleasing operas such as Carmen, The Barber
of Seville and Rigoletto with edgier modern offerings, including
Bluebeard's Castle, Salome and Jenufa. He also persuaded talented
and innovative directors from film and theatre to work in opera.
Mr. BRADSHAW was "so passionate" about such provocative and novel
approaches to presenting both new and classical work, according
to film director Atom Egoyan. After seeing Mr. Egoyan's Exotica,
Mr. BRADSHAW approached him about directing Salome.
"He was a brilliant alchemist who was able to put together designers
and directors and singers. That was his craft," Mr. Egoyan said
yesterday between preproduction meetings for his next film, Adoration.
"And then he was able to respond to the production and colour
the orchestra to accommodate the vision he is seeing on the stage.
He was the glue that put it all together."
Salome and François Girard's production of Oedipus Rex with Symphony
of Psalms (which won eight Dora Mavor Moore awards in 1997) attracted
younger audiences, and Mr.
BRADSHAW's decision to take productions
such as Robert Lepage's double bill of Bela Bartok's Bluebeard's
Castle and Arnold Schoenberg's Erwartung to the prestigious Edinburgh
Festival won the company international acclaim that resounded
in the box office back home. He would return to these directors
when he undertook his audacious scheme to present a full Ring
Cycle -- all 17 hours of it -- in 2006 to coincide with the opening
of the opera house.
Journalist Barbara Amiel, a devotee of Wagner, has seen the Ring
Cycle in Bayreuth, Munich, London and Berlin, among other places.
"Musically,
BRADSHAW's
Toronto
Ring matched any of them and in
places, exceeded some," she said in an e-mail message this week.
"To do this with any orchestra would be magnificent. To do this
with a Canadian orchestra that essentially had to learn a new
language is a miracle," she said. "He sweated musicality and
that orchestra he loved mopped it up. All the young musicians
he laboured over and encouraged (they look like none of them
have seen the other side of 30) are as much his monument as the
bricks and glass of his opera house."
And it very definitely was his opera house. Architect Jack
DIAMOND
has been widely praised for designing an auditorium that has
glorious acoustics and ambience and a building that embraces
audiences and the city, but it was Mr.
BRADSHAW's vision and
grit that made it happen.
"What was extraordinary about Richard was his relentless optimism,"
said Kevin Garland, former executive director of the Canadian
Opera House Corp. and now executive director of the National
Ballet of Canada. "He never gave up and never stopped being determined
that it would happen and never stopped badgering governments
to make sure that they knew it was important to support the arts."
Richard James
BRADSHAW was born in Rugby, England, on April 16,
1944. He died in Toronto of a heart attack on August 15, 2007.
He was 63. He is survived by his wife, Diana, two children and
extended family.
A day in the life
There must have been times when Richard
BRADSHAW was in resting
mode, but they aren't on record. In 2003, I shadowed him for
a day that began before 9 a.m. with a planning meeting for the
Ring Cycle, followed by a press conference to announce the new
season, a lunchtime lecture at which he twisted a few fundraising
arms, a Bay Street meeting with architect Jack Diamond before
the Canadian Opera Company board's building committee, a quick
trip home for dinner, during which he snatched time to play Bach's
Goldberg Variations on the piano before heading to the Hummingbird
Centre to oversea a rehearsal of A Masked Ball that lasted until
almost midnight, when he headed home for a stack of paperwork
and a large Scotch before climbing into bed. The next day, he
was at it again, except he also conducted the orchestra at the
dress rehearsal of Jenufa.
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DIAPER o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2007-06-18 published
DIAPER,
Edwina
Doris
Louise
Peacefully, after a brief illness, on 12 June 2007, in Portsmouth,
England, aged 82. Born in Portsmouth on 10 June 1925, Edwina
trained at Salisbury Teachers' College after the war and later
graduated from Queen's University (B.A. and
M. Ed.). World traveller,
cat-lover, and keen gardener, she had a long and eclectic career
as a teacher, first in England, then in Ottawa, at various schools
in the Kingston area, as Education Officer at the Prison for
Women, and overseas in Zambia, in London, as well as in Nigeria
and Lesotho. Edwina is survived by Dennis, her husband of 58 years
her children Oriel (George
MacLENNAN) in Halifax, Megan (David
CAMPBELL) in Kingston, Charles (Carol
PARKIN) in Glasgow and
Mark (Birgit
EGGERS) in Berlin; her granddaughters Georgia
CAMPBELL,
Charlotte EGGERS, and Emilia
EGGERS; and her nephew the Rev. Clive
CLAPSON
(Katie
CLAPSON) and her great-nieces Lucy
CLAPSON and
Cecilia CLAPSON in Scotland. She was predeceased by infant twin
grand_sons Benjamin and Daniel
CAMPBELL in 1985. A memorial service
and interment will take place at noon on 19 July 2007 at the
Church of the Resurrection in Drayton, Portsmouth, England, with
a reception to follow. In Edwina's remembrance, donations may
be made to Domino Theatre in Kingston, to Oxfam Canada, or to
the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
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DIAS o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2007-01-02 published
GERRARD,
William "
Bill
Faux"
(Veteran of World War 2)
Eighty-three years young, Bill passed away peacefully on December 31,
2006. Predeceased by his wife Yvonne of 51 years (1997). Bill
is remembered always for his generosity of spirit, and calming
influence on all. His legacy extends through his sons Greg and
Andy, daughters-in-law Sandy and Janice, grandchildren Matthew,
Amy, Nathan, Simon, and great-granddaughter Megan. The family
wishes to express appreciation to Doctors
BROWN and
BAYLEY and R.N.
Antoinette
DIAS at Princess Margaret Hospital. The family will
receive Friends at the Scott Funeral Home 'Brampton Chapel',
289 Main St. N., Brampton, (905-451-1100) on Wednesday, January 3rd
from 2-4 and 7-9 p.m. A funeral service will be held in the Chapel
on Thursday, January 4, 2007 at 10 a.m. Cremation to follow.
In lieu of flowers, donations to the Princess Margaret Hospital
Palliative Unit are appreciated. You are invited to sign Bill's
Book of Condolences at www.scott-brampton.ca
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DIAZ o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2007-10-04 published
Housekeeper's death at Mississauga mansion treated as foul play
By Omar EL
AKKAD and Jessica
RAFUSE,
Page
A15
The death of Jocelyn
DULNUAN, a Filipino-born, 27-year-old housekeeper
found inside a multimillion-dollar mansion on Monday, is likely
the result of foul play, Peel Regional Police say.
That sums up just about everything homicide detectives are willing
to say.
"The location was targeted for a specific reason that I am not
prepared to comment on today," Inspector Norm
ENGLISH, head of
the homicide bureau, said yesterday at a terse news conference.
"I do believe, though, that there was property taken from the
residence, however this needs to be determined after doing a
proper walk through with the homeowners," he said.
Ms. DULNUAN came to Canada last year on a work visa and worked
as a nanny in various locations across the Greater Toronto Area
before moving into the massive Mississauga home as a housekeeper,
Insp. ENGLISH said.
Both Ms. DULNUAN and the home - estimated to be worth more than
$10-million - may have been targets, he said, adding that Ms.
DULNUAN's
mother, who lives in Hong Kong, has been notified of her daughter's
death.
But as to what condition Ms.
DULNUAN's body was in, the cause
of her death, what items were taken from the home and a host
of other questions, Insp.
ENGLISH would only reply: "I'm not
prepared to discuss that."
Peel police spokesman Constable Adam
MINNION said homicide detectives
can sometimes choose to withhold information so as to not compromise
an investigation. "If [homicide detectives are] reluctant to
provide information, they must have their reasons," Constable
MINNION said. "Every situation's different. There must be something
they've seen there."
Police received a 911 call around 5 p.m. on Monday from one of
the homeowners inside the home. The homeowners, Vasdev (Dave)
CHANCHLANI and his wife
Jayshree, were not home at the time of
the incident, Constable
MINNION said.
Police have not yet publicly named any suspects.
At several Toronto churches with strong Filipino followings,
no one recognized Ms.
DULNUAN by name or photo yesterday.
She was also not registered with Intercede, a group that advocates
for the rights of domestic workers and caregivers.
"We've been getting calls all day," said counsellor Columbia
DIAZ, who is hoping to use the agency's contacts to get in touch
with Ms. DULNUAN's
Friends. "A lot of Filipina maids are worried
and want to know more, but there's not much that we know."
Ms. DIAZ said many caregivers and domestic workers prefer to
work in populated areas instead of secluded homes with limited
contact with the outside community.
Jo ACUNA, owner of Brampton-based Sunrise Placement Services,
said live-in nannies tend to apply for a work permit under the
federal live-in caregiver program.
The program stipulates that such employees must work in a private
home and be provided a private, furnished room within that home.
Ms. ACUNA said the largest portion of such workers arrive from
the Philippines, usually after first working in Hong Kong.
A representative from the Philippines consulate in Toronto said
the consulate has been in contact with Ms.
DULNUAN's mother,
who is trying to arrange the transportation of her daughter's
body back home.
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