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After more than 30 years of distinguished music-making, the Aldeburgh Connection has decided to pack it in. This month it will give its final concert. The organization was created by pianists and life partners Stephen Ralls and Bruce Ubukata, and presented most of its concerts at Walter Hall at the University of Toronto. The “Aldeburgh Connection” relates to the close relationship the organization always had with the Aldeburgh Festival and its founders Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears. Ralls worked at the festival as a rehearsal pianist for Britten’s opera Death in Venice, and both Ralls and Ubukata were frequent visitors to Aldeburgh over the years.
The main purposes of the Aldeburgh Connection were to promote Britten’s music, concentrate on both the words and music of art song literature, and not least of all, to give fine Canadian singers a showcase. All three goals were magnificently realized year after year.
When I was music director at CJRT-FM in Toronto in the 1980s we often recorded and broadcast concerts by the Aldeburgh Connection. They became some of our finest broadcast hours.
In this video Gerald Finley, by now an international star, is featured in music by Vaughan Williams with Stephen Ralls at the piano.
The Aldeburgh Connection was unique and it will be greatly missed. Best wishes to Stephen and Bruce for many more fruitful years of life and music!
Paul E. Robinson
