Chris Votek is an acclaimed cellist, composer, arranger, producer, and sound engineer living and breathing music in Los Angeles. He is a disciple of the legendary Indian violinist Dr. N Rajam, much of his work involves adapting the oral tradition of Hindustani raga to the cello and the cross-pollination of Western and Indian Classical Traditions. 

As an intercultural music translator he has arranged symphonic music with Neelamjit Dhillon for Ustad Zakir Hussain, notably his Triple Concerto for Tabla, Bansuri, and Sitar with orchestra premiered by the Symphony of India in 2023. Votek’s original chamber and electroacoustic compositions have been presented at REDCAT, the Hammer Museum, Clockshop, and SF Soundbox. His string quintet Memories of a Shadow received critical acclaim “superbly blending raga melody with early European polyphony”. 

A sought after touring and studio cellist, Votek has performed or recorded with a diverse array of artists, including Sigur Ros, Julia Holter, PARTCH ensemble, The Marias, Chris Martin, Homayoun Shajarian, Haushka, Father John Misty, Wild Up, Mamak Khadem, Arabic Orchestra MESTO and many others.

Recipient of Cyril and Elizabeth Challice Fund for Musicians.

Sumudi Suraweera (born 1982) received his PhD in ethnomusicology from the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, in 2010, with research focused on Sri Lankan Low-Country traditional drumming. Prior to that, he completed a Bachelor of Music in jazz, specializing in drums.

Based in Sri Lanka since 2010, Sumudi founded Musicmatters, a performance-oriented music school for children that has grown to be one of Colombo's premier music institutions. In 2023, he took on the role of director for the jazz program at the Musicmatters Institute of Jazz Studies, providing jazz education for Sri Lankan youth musicians looking to hone their skills.

As a performer, Sumudi has been actively involved in a range of local projects through the Musicmatters Collective, which is dedicated to fostering an experimental and improvised music scene in Colombo. His own ensembles include Baliphonics, Serendib Sorcerers, Musicmatters Transcoastal Collective, Koku Samagama, and the Musicmatters Trio. His solo drum set recordings also showcase his ongoing exploration and research into adapting traditional Sri Lankan drumming to the drum set.

Recipient of Banff Centre Artists' Awards.

STATHIS//DAVEY//KIM are a Melbourne based collective of three female composers who have an extensive multi-instrumental practice including the use of analogue synthesizers. Their practice spans large scale fully immersive sound installations, to live electronic music performance.

SDK’s site-responsive installations are presented in expansive settings where nature and human-made structures co-exist. They interact with site by using features present (rock faces, bodies of water and architecture) as surfaces from which to bounce sound off, creating delays and rhythms. Furthermore the trio incorporate diegetic sounds as key voices in the work, allowing them to work with, instead of overriding the environment.

Stathis//Davey//Kim’s sound is presented in multi-channel diffusion, sonically mapping a new awareness of the physical space. Audiences are placed directly into the center of their sound worlds, as the work shifts and moves around them. Conceptually Stathis//Davey//Kim explore the paradoxes of site, the beauty and sparseness, the functional and the fantastical, natural and manufactured and in all this question human’s impact on ecologies. Their work allows audiences to experience a unique aspect of site, where sound, nature and architecture interact. For audiences, these types of singular sonic experiences bond the location to memory through the extraordinary experience of immersive sound and music.

Recipient of Banff Centre Artists' Awards.

Drawing from Newfoundland folk roots and contemporary jazz influences, Jessica Spurrell is a Toronto-based singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. Her 2024 EP, A Blessing, A Pearl, explores adolescent heartache through striking prose, woodwinds, harp, strings, and synth.

In 2021, Jessica was awarded the SOCAN Foundation Young Canadian Songwriters Award for her song, Bury Me. She was subsequently selected for the 2022 TD Incubator for Creative Entrepreneurship, as well as the 2023 Folk Music Ontario Developing Artist Program. Most recently, Jessica participated in the 2024 Intercultural and Creative Music Fellowship through Humber Polytechnic. Under the creative direction of composer and sitarist Kiya Tabassian, she and 6 other fellows worked for 14 weeks to create an interdisciplinary music project for performance at the Aga Khan Museum in Toronto.

Jessica thrives on collaboration as a composer, lyricist, and performer. She also has a keen interest in music production and recording technology. Jessica is a recent graduate of the Bachelor of Music program at Humber Polytechnic, where she explored styles such as Jazz and Latin music. Jessica has called many places home, including Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and Germany.

Recipient of John W. Kieley Endowment for Emerging Musicians.

Neda Samavati is a composer-guitarist based in London, Ontario. She is currently a PhD candidate in Music Composition at the University of Western Ontario, building on her academic background with an MA in Music Composition from Tehran University of Arts.

In 2024, she was selected as an emerging composer for the Widening the Circle at the Tuckamore Music Festival (2024–2025 season) and received the Future Award from the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra, 2024. In 2023, she was commissioned by the Northern Tornadoes Project (NTP) to create a new work inspired by scientific data. In 2020, she reached the semi-finals of the 5th Guitar Composition Competition Fidelio in Spain.

Beyond composition, Neda is an active classical guitarist with a strong interest in ensemble performance and colaborative experimentation. She is always seeking out new artistic experiences that challenge and expand her creative voice.

Her music is shaped by a wide range of interests—including physics, astronomy, literature and painting. She continually finds ways to bring these disciplines into her work, whether through structural inspiration, poetic themes, or visual elements.

Recipient of Banff Centre Artists' Awards.

Maryam Rahmani is an Iranian born Santur player who has been living in Adelaide since 2019. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Playing Traditional Music from Tehran University. 

Maryam’s musical journey began with playing Santur when she was 12 years old, and she had the chance to get lessons chest to chest from the masters in Iran. The journey took on a more academic approach when she attended university, which gave her the opportunity to explore various aspects of Iranian classical music.

Passionate to discover her hometowns unique sounds, she started to play Kamancheh which is another bowed string instrument form Iran, and also dutar (Persian word for “two strings”), a traditional lute-like instrument known for its resonant sound from Khorasan(North-East side of Iran), that allowed her to unmask the other side of traditional music.

Enthusiastic about the intricate interplay of rhythm and poetry, Maryam’s love for literature and poetry naturally led her to explore Persian meters and their integration into music. During her university years, she delved into the study of tombak (the Iranian goblet drum), enriching her understanding of rhythm. Fascinated by rhythmic patterns, she also embraced the art of flamenco dance when she came to Adelaide, blending the worlds of Persian and Spanish rhythms in her creative pursuits.

Recipient of Frelyn Memorial Endowment.

George Rahi is an artist and composer based in Vancouver, unceded Coast Salish territories. He works with speculative instruments and technologies as a method of exploring acoustic and digital anomalies, modes of listening, and spatial and architectural thinking. His work includes installations, instrument making, solo + ensemble performance, and works for radio, theatre & public spaces. Recent presentations have included: Artificial Sonification exhibition (Matera), Stavanger Konserthus, Kunst-Station Sankt Peter (Cologne), Fusebox Festival (Austin), Institute for New Music (Salzburg), and Orgelpark (Amsterdam). His work has been supported by awards such as the Lab30 Audience Award, Canada Council for the Arts Guest of Honour (Frankfurt), and through mentorships with artists such as Dewa Alit and Trimpin. He has been an artist in residence at Elektronmusikstudion (Stockholm), Bergen Centre for Electronic Arts, Locus Sonus Research Group (Aix Marseille University), and hcma architecture. He is currently working towards a new album of contemporary gamelan music with Insitu Recordings, an arts collective and recording label based in Bali.

Recipient of Banff Centre Artists' Awards.

I am a composer, improviser, vocalist and cellist who grew up in northern China and has studied and worked in the US for seven years. My works span classical, folk, jazz, improvisation, multimedia, poetry, dance, environmental studies, and studies of psychiatry and trauma. I usually found my voice in the ocean of historical gaps, and I aim to create narratives that reveal and reflect on what has been hidden or forgotten by our society.

I have also dedicated myself to environmental activism and education through working with scientists at the White Mountains and NOAA on translating environmental data, sounds from acoustic monitoring devices, and recordings into music and multimedia performances using acoustic and digital instruments. These interdisciplinary collaborations stimulate a more organic musical language that can speak to more diverse audiences and younger generations.

As a performer, I enjoy playing and learning musical traditions such as indigenous and folk music in Southern/Southwestern China, Kabuki Theater, African drum and dance, jazz and improvisation, and more. I have played with musicians from North and South America, West Africa, Asia, and Europe and embraced the energy, rhythms, and history of diverse countries and cultures, which constantly nurtures my intellectual and emotional strength.

Recipient of Walter and Estelle Painter Endowment.

Ekaterina is a versatile singer, composer, and multi-instrumentalist skilled in percussion, guitar, zhaleika, and recorder. Her voice ranges from Eastern European ritual singing to Western classical and contemporary alternative genres. A York University BFA Honours graduate, she explored Balkan, East Slavic, and Near Eastern music, which shapes her work with ensembles like Blisk, Polky, and Meden Glas.

She’s performed at major festivals including Winnipeg, Calgary, and Canmore Folk Festivals, APAP in New York, Ireland’s "Your Roots Are Showing," and Folk Alliance.

Ekaterina also composes for theatre, film, and animation. Her work appears in Birdbone Theatre’s Broomdance (2024) and films like Motherly (2021), VRDLK (2022), and In the Heat (2023).

Her latest project, Vedmah, blends dark electronic music with folklore and witchcraft traditions, crafting a dystopian sonic world where ancient rituals meet modern metal, mythology, and immersive storytelling.

Recipient of Michael Davies Scholarship Endowment Fund.