>> Guest Artists Archive

>> 2008-2009 Season

>> Concert Programmes

>> Meet the Muscians

Guest Artists

Kenneth Lavigne

Our audiences are always delighted when Ken Lavigne sings with the Palm Court Orchestra, the last time in October 2006. Ken started his career shortly after leaving the University of Victoria, where he studied music. His focus was purely classical at the time, pursuing Opera roles and Oratorio concerts while honing his craft with frequent study in New York and the U.K.

Since then, he has earned credits with symphonies and orchestras across Canada and the U.S. from prize-winning performances in Ireland to the special honour of performing for Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in his hometown of Victoria B.C. He was also a founding menber of the talented tenor trio group Romanza.

Ken’s successful debut record saw him return to the style that got him singing in the first place, musical theatre. “It is a genre with lasting appeal not to mention beautiful melodies.

Ken will lend his thrilling tenor voice to some old favourites at the Palm Court Light Orchestra’s October 2008 concert, O Danny Boy.

Conductor Charles Job hit a homer pairing his polished 28-piece orchestra with Chemainus tenor Ken Lavigne. Lavigne proved he could be called Canada’s Pavarotti.
Wednesday, October 18, 2006 - News Leader

Marianne Olyver

Marianne is the director and principal soloist of her own salon orchestra in Britain. She began to play the violin at the age of 12 and just one year later was accepted into the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. At age 17 she became the first girl invited to lead the Youth Orchestra. She studied in London and Geneva with Max Rostal, Alfredo Campoli and Emanuel Hurwitz CBE. Inspired by the audience reaction at concert encores to the kind of light music that used to be heard in grand hotels and tea houses in the first half of the 20th century, she gathered together some like-minded friends and established the Marianne Olyver Salon Orchestra in 1990.

Marianne has gone on to establish herself as the leading Light Music exponent of her generation. She explains, “We to break down the traditional barrier between players and audience. When we perform it’s like a family gathering with people getting up and dancing.”

Nancy Washeim

[bio to come]

“…cannot say enough good things about soloist Nancy Washeim, who I had not heard before. She has a lovely voice, uses it intelligently and has dazzling control: the score contains a couple of …top D's, which she hit with quite spectacular accuracy.”  Deryk Barker review, October 28, 2007.