Career Development Award
The WMCT’s Career Development Award (CDA) is presented every three years to an exceptional young Canadian musician (or small ensemble) embarking on a professional performing career. The award includes a $25,000 cash prize as well as the opportunity to give a recital in the Music in the Afternoon concert series. The CDA is a project of the WMCT in partnership with CBC Radio Music and Société Radio-Canada/ICI Musique, and it is funded by the WMCT Foundation.
2021 CDA Winner, Accordionist Michael Bridge
Michael starred in the first Music in the Afternoon livestream on November 12, 2021. This CDA award represents two firsts – the first accordionist, and the first awardee who has performed for us before receiving the CDA. We were thrilled to hear him again (in person!) in his CDA-winner recital in our 2022-23 Music in the Afternoon season.
History of CDA Winners
Scholarships
Historically, the WMCT has supported young Canadian musicians with scholarships, awards, and performance opportunities. In 2000, the Women’s Musical Club of Toronto Foundation was established and now provides funding for these awards. Annual undergraduate scholarships are awarded at the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto, and The Glenn Gould School, The Royal Conservatory of Music. Also at the U of T Faculty of Music, a Graduate Fellowship was established with a gift of $25,000 from the WMCT and the WMCT Foundation, and matched by the University of Toronto, to create an endowment that will sustain an annual award for an outstanding graduate student in Performance. Special summer music scholarships are also awarded.
2022-2023 Scholarships
Violinist Daphné Bourbonnais is this year’s scholarship winner at the Glenn Gould School, studying with Erika Raum in the Artist Diploma Program.
Daphné was born in Rimouski, Québec, and started playing violin at the age of 4. She completed a bachelor’s degree (2018), a chamber music diploma (2019) and Master’s degree with distinction (2020) at the Conservatoire de musique de Montréal.
Daphné has been a member of the National Youth Orchestra of Canada (2017 and 2019) and the Orchestre de la Francophonie (2016 and 2018). In February of 2019, she joined the Orchestre symphonique de l’Estuaire.
Passionate about movement, Daphné practices yoga and teaches classes for musicians, strongly believing that yoga is not only an excellent form of injury prevention, but a discipline perfectly complementary to music.
Pianist Lynna Bao is the recipient of this year’s Centennial Scholarship at the Faculty of Music, U of T. Lynna is in her fourth year as a piano performance major, studying under Lydia Wong.
In addition to solo performance, Lynna has broad experience in piano-vocal, piano-instrumental and piano-quartet settings. She has won numerous awards in her young career, including a Gold Award in the 2018 Canadian Music Competition. Upon graduation, Lynna plans to pursue graduate studies in performance as well as venture into composition and music technology.
Lynna is the founder and president of the U of T Tolkien Club, which promotes appreciation and a deeper understanding of author J.R.R. Tolkien’s life and works, and hopes to research Tolkien’s constructed languages.
Isabella Czyrnyj is our graduate award winner at the University of Toronto. Isabella is currently studying with Miles Jaques, completing her Doctor of Musical Arts degree in clarinet performance. She has previously studied with Charlene Zimmerman and John Bruce Yeh at the Chicago College of Performing Arts, and with Shauna Barker and Kimball Sykes at the U of T. A native of Ottawa, Isabella has performed with ensembles throughout Canada and the United States, including the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Ottawa Symphony Orchestra, and the Civic Orchestra of Chicago. She can be heard on the world-première
recording of Stacy Garrop’s Mythology Symphony as a member of the CCPA Symphony Orchestra.
Isabella is also a strong proponent of music education. As well as teaching privately, she has participated in wind quintet performances in Chicago area schools and performed with the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra Winds for their School Education concerts.
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