March Break Piano Artistry Camp 2026

Faculty

March 1-6, 2026

Terence Dawson

Canadian pianist Terence Dawson has received repeat invitations to give both concerts and master classes from coast to coast across Canada, as well as in the USA, England and Asia. His versatility as a soloist and chamber musician resulted in a respected career anchored by his professorship at the University of British Columbia, where he served as Chair of the Keyboard Division and taught piano, chamber music and collaborative studies for 33 years. His musicality has been described as “lucid” (Globe and Mail), and his performances as “stunning” (Vancouver Sun), possessing “trademark elegance and technical flair” (Georgia Straight). He has appeared as concerto soloist with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, The National Arts Centre Orchestra, CBC Curio Ensemble, and with numerous artists and ensembles in Vancouver, BC and beyond. He has recorded for CBC radio and television, and on disc for EMI Virgin Classics, Bravura and Skylark. Dr. Dawson recently retired and has moved to the Ottawa area.

Jarred Dunn

Jarred Dunn captivates audiences in Europe, North America, and Australia as a recitalist, chamber musician, and concerto soloist. He is heard on CBC/Radio-Canada, Classical 96.3, Radio France, FranceMusique, WWFM, WQXR New York, and elsewhere. A Laureate of the Lithuanian Chopin (First Prize, Concerto Award), Hoffman, Vitti, Zinetti, and Rome International Competitions, he records for Lexicon and ATMA labels. His recording Górecki’s World of the Piano was nominated for the 2025 Prix Opus Modern/Contemporary Album of the Year. He has collaborated with pianists Anna Górecka and Maria João-Pires, cellists Marc Jaermann and Jessica Korotkin, and the Atma Quartet.

He gives lectures and master classes at Juilliard, Peabody Prep, Mannes, Oberlin, Royal College, Guildhall, Mannes Precollege, SMU, Vilnius Conservatory, among others. He is Artistic Director of Kallmünz Summer Piano Festival, teaches at numerous summer programs, and is a juror of national and international competitions. He is the author of Górecki’s Solo Piano Music (Bloomsbury) and numerous articles. He regularly gives lectures at research conferences and has received many awards for his scholarly, artistic, and pedagogical achievements. He studied with Katarzyna Popowa-Zydroń, Anna Górecka, Andrzej Jasiński, Dorothy Taubman, Jacob Lateiner and Yoheved Kaplinsky, and later worked with Andrei Gavrilov and Maria João-Pires. For more information, visit www.jarreddunn.com.

Meagan Milatz

Meagan Milatz, pianist, is winner of the prestigious 2025-2028 Mécénat Musica Prix Goyer and the 2024 Prix Opus “Discovery of the Year”. She is “a remarkable pianist with a seemingly limitless palette of expression” (Le Devoir). Meagan regularly shares the stage with top international musicians including Andrew Wan, concertmaster of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Stefan Dohr, Principal Horn of the Berlin Philharmonic, cellist Matt Haimovitz, and mandolinist Avi Avital. Meagan is co-artistic director of HausMusique since 2022, along with cellist Cameron Crozman.

Awarded the 2024 Prix Choquette-Symcox by Fondation Jeunesses Musicales Canada, Meagan’s recent engagements have included performances with Olivier Charlier, Michel Michalakakos, Cho-Liang Lin, Peter Hanson, Olivier Charlier, Pablo Hernán Benedí, Steven Dann, and tubist Øystein Baadsvik, among others. Internationally, Meagan has performed at the New Ross Piano Festival in Ireland in 2023 - the first Canadian musician to be invited - as well as at the Edeta Arts International Chamber Music Festival where she appeared in concert in Spain with violinists Wolfgang Redik in 2024 and Kai Gleusteen, concertmaster of the Orchestra del Gran Teatre del Liceu of Barcelona, in 2022. Meagan recently embarked on a 2024 European recital tour with cellist Cameron Crozman in Italy, France, Malta, and Portugal.

Meagan has appeared as a soloist alongside orchestras such as the Edmonton, Regina, Saskatoon, Sherbrooke, and McGill Symphonies. Meagan was top prize winner in the Shean Piano Competition, CFMTA National Piano Competition, and Canadian Music Competition, and the recipient of a Sylva Gelber Music Foundation Award. Her performances are regularly broadcast on CBC/Radio-Canada.

Meagan has a recording contract for nine albums of solo and chamber music with ATMA Classique. She recently recorded an album of music for fortepiano and natural horn alongside Louis-Pierre Bergeron, released in December 2023. For the 2019/2020 season, Meagan undertook a 50-concert, Canada-wide tour alongside violinist Amy Hillis as the duo “meagan&amy”, winners of the first-ever Pan-Canadian Partnership Recital Tour offered by Jeunesses Musicales Canada, Debut Atlantic, and Prairie Debut.

Meagan began her studies in Saskatchewan and holds a Master’s degree from McGill University. She is grateful to her teachers and lifelong mentors Cherith Alexander, Ilya Poletaev, Philip Chiu, and Tom Beghin with whom she was greatly privileged to study the fortepiano. Enthusiastic about helping the next generation of young musicians, she is a passionate faculty member of the “Session sonates violon et piano” of Camp Musical du Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean. Meagan lives in Montreal where she loves biking, reading outside whenever possible, and enjoying the occasional tasty pastry.

Nicole Presentey

Native of Ottawa, Nicole Presentey began studying the piano at age four.  She made her recital debut several years later in Ottawa and then in Toronto at Heintzman Hall and the Royal Conservatory of Music where she was a full scholarship student. She made her orchestral debut at age twelve performing Mozart Piano Concerto K271 with the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra.  Recipient of numerous prizes in Canada, she went on to compete successfully in several international music competitions, including the prestigious Royal Overseas League Competition which gave her the opportunity to play at Queen Elizabeth Hall in London as well as the honour of being presented to Queen Elizabeth II. Her performances as a soloist, chamber musician and duo pianist have been heard in this country, the United States, Europe and Scandinavia.  Radio-Canada, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Radio Italia have recorded her concerts for broadcast, and she has made numerous television appearances on several Canadian networks.

After receiving her early musical training in Ottawa and Toronto, Nicole Presentey entered the Vincent d’Indy School in Montreal at age fifteen and graduated with a BMus specializing in piano performance, which was followed by graduate studies at the Université de Montréal.  Her teachers included Yvonne Hubert, Natalie Pepin, Beveridge Webster and Sister Kathleen Devlin. She also participated in master classes with Monique de la Bruchollerie, Guido Agosti, Bela Nagy, Luiz de Moura Castro, Helena Costa, Konrad Wolff and Gyorgy Sebok. In 1979 she was invited by Maria Curcio, renowned pupil of Artur Schnabel to study privately with her in London, England. With the support of the Canada Council, she remained with Curcio for three years, perfecting her art until family circumstances required a sudden return home. The unexpected passing of her father catapulted her into the world of high-tech, and she became CEO of the family business, a successful company operating in the field of information security and meteorological instrumentation.

Her performances are now rare but sought after, and have elicited praise from critics such as Jacob Siskind: “Presentey seemed at one with the spirit of Schubert…giving the melodic lines a sense of effortless freedom rarely encountered, making the drama under the surface of the melodies bubble and ferment without disturbing the line… These were performances of the very highest calibre, musically and emotionally…soaring effortlessly far above the general level…spontaneous music-making of the very highest order.” Eric Dawson described her performance of the Grieg Piano Concerto at the National Arts Centre at age sixteen: “She took an overplayed warhorse and returned to it all the sparkle and verve we had forgotten it contained. Her playing was beyond praise. Every movement spoke of her involvement with the music and her command of the most difficult passages was nothing short of amazing. She has all the presence and style of the great romantic artists we now can only read about.”

Currently living in Ottawa, Nicole Presentey maintains an active private piano studio. In 2001 she joined Carleton University’s School for Studies in Art and Culture: Music where she is an Associate Piano Performance (Classical) Faculty Member. In 2003 she founded and continues to direct the Carleton University Chamber Music Ensembles. Taking into account the wide-ranging repertoire offered by the Carleton University library, her ensembles present twice yearly concerts featuring music from the 16thcentury to the present day, with an emphasis on stylistic integrity, historical understanding and natural expression. Regular inclusion of new work by up-and-coming young composers is an ongoing goal of the program.

Her chamber music background is wide-ranging and began at an early age. She studied cello with Joyce Sands and performed for a number of years with the Ottawa Board of Education Orchestra where she was on first desk. The OBE recorder ensembles gave her years of performing experience in the baroque repertoire playing tenor and bass recorder. Her studies in chamber music were furthered during her university years where she also gained experience in vocal accompaniment and coaching. Studying under Maria Curcio, the renowned coach of Peter Pears and Benjamin Britten and partner of Elizabeth Schwarzkopf allowed her to further expand her understanding of the role of the pianist in vocal ensemble playing. Upon her return to Canada in 1982 she formed a piano trio including partners John Gaszi and Pavel Symczyk-Marjanovic. Upon the sudden passing of John Gaszi, violinist Evelyn Chadwick joined the trio and the ensemble gave numerous concerts in the NCR. She has also performed over the years as a duo pianist with several notable partners, including Claude Labelle with whom she gave concerts for the CBC in the late 1990’s and most recently in 2018 at Chamberfest with James Parker. In 2019 she was involved in recording “Escape”, a cello sonata composed and performed by Anita Pari for a CD that was sponsored by Carleton University and performed at Chamberfest 2019.

In 2016 Nicole Presentey was designated a Royal Conservatory Certified Teacher, specializing in elementary, intermediate and advanced piano. She is a member in good standing of the Ontario Music Teachers Association, Ottawa branch, as a bilingual teacher of piano, solfege and theoretical subjects. Part of her extensive practice is devoted to reducing muscular pain and stress caused by overwork and misunderstanding of the mechanics of piano-playing. Her ongoing goal is to assist students gain freedom in music-making.

Nicole Presentey is sought after as an adjudicator and clinician, soloist, collaborative pianist and chamber musician.  Many of her students have pursued graduate and post-graduate studies in music, achieving successful careers as soloists, orchestral musicians, chamber players, composers and teachers. For her numerous students, many of whom achieved the highest national recognition of excellence but who chose to pursue other careers, the love of music continues to sustain and nourish them and their children, hopefully adding to the audience of the future.

Nicole’s involvement with Ottawa Chamberfest as an Artistic Advisor fulfils her desire to support and nurture young talent and in 2007, she initiated and continues to produce Rising Stars, a component of the annual festival that showcases up and coming musicians from the National Capital Region. Many alumni who received their start on this important local platform have gone on to pursue careers on the national and international scene.

A graduate of the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute, Nicole has performed as continuo on numerous occasions in various Toronto venues and continues to pursue further studies in early music.

March 15-21, 2026

Carson Becke

Canadian Pianist Carson Becke has performed extensively in Canada, Great Britain, Continental Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and the Caribbean.  A versatile pianist, he is at home as a recital and concerto soloist, chamber musician, and vocal collaborator.  He is also the director of Pontiac Enchanté, a concert series in Luskville, Quebec.  After moving to the United Kingdom in 2005 to study at the Purcell School for Young Musicians, Carson completed his undergraduate studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London.  Following studies in London, he completed a master’s degree (M.Phil.) in performance and musicology at the University of Oxford, supported generously by the Sylva Gelber Music Foundation of Canada.  He completed his doctorate (D.Phil.) in musicology at Magdalen College, University of Oxford. His doctoral studies were supported by the Canadian Centennial Scholarship Foundation.

Carson’s doctoral studies were centered on the music of Richard Strauss.  As a result of his interest in Strauss, Carson has released two albums, featuring Strauss’s early piano music and lieder (with mezzo-soprano Wallis Giunta), which are available in hard copy on his website store and on streaming platforms.  His interest in Strauss was generated by a deep interest in music written in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries more generally, and one of his missions as a pianist is to bring to light some of the music from that period that has escaped twenty-first century attention.  Composers that he has included in recent programmes include Julius Reubke, Vincent D’Indy, Alexander von Zemlinsky, and Rebecca Clarke.

As a vocal collaborator and chamber musician, Carson has shared the stage with Jack Liebeck, Robert Pomakov, Wallis Giunta, Lavinia Dames, Hinrich Alpers, Arnold Choi, Paul Marleyn, and the Ironwood Quartet, among others.  As a member of the Dolmen Ensemble, he toured the UK, Malta, Australia, and New Zealand on behalf of the Royal Over Seas League.  He forms one half of Duo Octavian, a two-piano ensemble that he co-founded with fellow pianist Suren Barry in 2016.  Duo Octavian seeks to expand the two-piano repertoire with their own arrangements of various works and with arrangements/commissions by other performers/composers. They co-authored a new two-piano transcription of Johannes Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem, which they premiered with the Ewashko Singers in 2019. The duo has also presented the Canadian premieres of two arrangements by Russian pianist Dmitri Alexeev, including a concert suite from George Gershwin’s opera Porgy and Bess, and Stravinsky’s The Firebird. They are currently working with the critically acclaimed composer Christopher Goddard to commission a new work for two pianos.  

Carson is an experienced composer and arranger: his orchestral composition Three Nocturnes was the winner of the BBC Proms/Guardian Young Composers Competition in 2007, and his short melodrama On Death (based on poetry by John Keats) was performed by members of the BBC Symphony Orchestra on BBC Radio 3.  He has written a number of virtuoso piano transcriptions of orchestral music and art song, which frequently appear on his concert programmes. His transcriptions include a Tosca Fantasy (based on themes from Puccini’s Tosca), Gustav Holst’s ‘Jupiter’ from The Planets, Gershwin’s ‘Someone to Watch Over Me’, and assorted lieder by Strauss and Wagner.  Some of these scores are available for perusal and purchase on his website store.

Through the Covid-19 pandemic, Carson remained busy, and participated in a number of musical projects that used technologies to work around the necessary global lockdowns. In collaboration with the Gustav Mahler Society UK, he released a video album of lieder from Mahler’s Des Knaben Wunderhorn that is available to view on YouTube, and on the Pontiac Enchanté website.  He was a jury member for the Ottawa Steinway Gallery Online Piano Competition, the Steinway Canada Young Artist Virtual Piano Competition, the Canadian Music Showcase, and the University of Ottawa Concerto Competition.  He also created a virtual lecture series on a range of musical topics for the Rideau Chorale, an Ottawa-based community choir.  

Carson lived in the United Kingdom for fifteen years: first in London, and then in Oxford.  In 2019 he moved back to his hometown of Ottawa, Canada, where he currently lives with his partner Madeline, and their energetic dog Jerry.  When he is not engaged with his various musical pursuits, he is an avid outdoorsman: in the wintertime, he is a cross-country skier and snowshoer, and in the summertime a canoeist and hiker.

Philip Chiu

Renowned for his “pianist-painter” artistry that transforms sound into vivid colour (La Presse), Philip Chiu is recognized as one of Canada’s most distinctive pianists, celebrated for his brilliant technique, poetic sensibility, and captivating stage presence. Winner of the 2023 JUNO Award for Best Classical Solo Album and the first-ever recipient of the Mécénat Musica Prix Goyer, one of Canada’s largest classical music prizes, he has earned a reputation for performances that combine virtuosic mastery with an instinctive ability to create genuine connections with audiences.

A sought-after soloist and chamber musician, Chiu has performed across Canada, the United States, Japan, and France, appearing in major venues and festivals and collaborating with many of today’s foremost artists, including James Ehnes, Emmanuel Pahud, Régis Pasquier, Noah Bendix-Balgley, Bomsori Kim, Johannes Moser, and the New Orford String Quartet. His longstanding duo with violinist Jonathan Crow has become beloved among chamber music audiences, and his commitment to bringing music to communities nationwide is reflected in more than fourteen extensive cross-Canada tours with Prairie Debut, Jeunesses Musicales Canada, and Debut Atlantic.

Chiu’s discography underscores both his deep affinity for the classical tradition and his dedication to amplifying contemporary voices. His JUNO-winning album Fables (ATMA Classique) and its successor Voyages—a tribute to his birthplace of Hong Kong—form part of an ambitious triptych project weaving works by Ravel and Debussy with new commissions from Canadian composers such as Anishinaabekwe artist Barbara Assiginaak and Alice Ping Yee Ho. He has also recorded John Burge’s 24 Preludes for Solo Piano (Centrediscs), Tapeo with cellist Cameron Crozman (ATMA), Night Light with flautist Lara Deutsch (Leaf Music), and a collaboration with Pentaèdre honoring Jacques Hétu. His recordings for labels including ATMA Classique, Warner Music, Analekta, Leaf Music, and Centrediscs are frequently broadcast on BBC Radio 3, France Musique, ICI Musique, and CBC Music.

Authentic, imaginative, and deeply human, Philip Chiu continues to redefine what it means to be a classical pianist in the 21st century—an artist whose performances invite listeners on an emotional journey while affirming his role as both a cultural storyteller and a leading ambassador for Canadian music.

Shoshana Telner

Canadian pianist Shoshana Telner has performed as soloist and chamber musician across Canada and abroad.  She made her solo orchestral debut with the National Arts Centre Orchestra at the age of 16, and has since performed with orchestras including the Quebec Symphony Orchestra, The National Academy Orchestra, the Boston Classical Orchestra, the Cambridge Symphony Orchestra, and the York Chamber Ensemble. Shoshana has performed recitals at numerous summer festivals including the Ottawa Music & Beyond Festival, the Elora Festival, the Kincardine Summer Music Festival, the Waterside Summer Series, the Brott Music Festival, and the Blueridge Chamber Music Festival. She is a founding member of the Toronto based TakeFive Ensemble, a piano quintet with members of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.

Shoshana received a Bachelors degree on full scholarship from Boston University, a Masters degree from The Juilliard School, and a Doctorate in performance from McGill University.  She has taught piano and coached ensembles at Wilfrid Laurier, McGill, and York Universities, and currently teaches at McMaster University.  Shoshana frequently gives masterclasses and adjudicates competitions.  Shoshana’s recordings include the six Bach Keyboard Partitas (Centaur Records), the Grieg violin/piano sonatas with Jeremy Bell (Chestnut Hall Music), selected Mozart Sonatas and Sonatinas (The Mozart Effect), and selected solo works of Canadian composer Colin Mack (Cansona Arts Media). Her latest CD, the early works of Robert Schumann, will be available on Centaur Records in 2025.