Staircases

Alison MacKay

Creator

Alison Mackay played violone and double bass with Tafelmusik from 1979–2019, and has remained active in the creation of multi-disciplinary and cross-cultural programming for the orchestra. A number of her projects, which include The Four Seasons, a Cycle of the Sun; The Galileo Project; House of Dreams; and Tales of Two Cities: The Leipzig-Damascus Coffee House have been made into feature documentary films and have toured extensively around the world. In 2006, her children’s adventure, The Quest for Arundo Donax, was awarded the JUNO Award for Children’s Recording of the Year. Under her leadership, Tafelmusik has sponsored two city-wide arts festivals: the 2005 Metamorphosis Festival was a presentation of music, art, dance, film, and theatre inspired by the stories in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and the 2008 Sacred Spaces, Sacred Circles Festival was a celebration of architecture and arts in the worship spaces of many cultures in the city of Toronto.  She is the recipient of the 2013 Betty Webster Award for her contribution to orchestral life in Canada.  

Jonathan Woody

Narrator, singer & composer

American bass-baritone Jonathan Woody is a versatile and dynamic musician who maintains an active schedule as a performer and composer across North America. Cited for singing “with resonance and clarity” (Washington Post), he appears regularly as soloist with historically informed orchestras. In the 2021/22 season, he served as Artistic Advisor for the Portland Baroque Orchestra. An accomplished chamber musician, Woody often performs as a member of the Choir of Trinity Wall Street, and has recently performed in collaboration with Kaleidoscope Ensemble and TENET Vocal Artists, among others. Jonathan has participated in premiere performances of works by leading composers. 

Woody’s compositional voice blends 17th- and 18th-century inspiration with the minimalism and socially conscious subject matter of today.  

Jonathan is committed to racial equity in the field of the performing arts, and currently serves on Early Music America’s Task Force for Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Access.

Presently living on traditional Lenape lands now known as Brooklyn, NY, he holds degrees from McGill University and the University of Maryland, College Park.