Valentine’s Day (February 14, 2022) will be sweeter when we welcome Itzel Avila, a well-established violin maker in Toronto, the President of the Canadian Makers Forum (the Canadian association of professional violin and bow makers) and a participating member of the Oberlin Violin Makers Workshop (USA).
Itzel was born in Morelia, Mexico, where she began training as a violinist and violin maker and then graduated in violin performance from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). With a scholarship from the Government of Canada, her education continued at the University of Montreal where she completed a Master’s degree in violin. As a violin and bow maker and restorer, Itzel further perfected her skills by studying in Cremona, Italy, San Francisco, US, and again in Montreal, under the guidance of world-class violin makers and continues making the instruments the way Stradivarius and Guarneri did. Her repertoire of instrument exhibitions includes: Cuvée Darling (Cremona, Amsterdam), Violin Society of America (Indianapolis,), Forum des fabricants, Sweet Water Music Festival (Owen Sound), among others. From a rough radial cut of a trunk to a precisely carved, assembled, and tuned musical instrument, everything happens in her workshop, all by hand in the Upper Beaches. Being a performer, Itzel “strives to craft instruments that are comfortable to play and organically adapt to the hands, technique and demands of their player. They are also characterized by their immediate response, and their balanced and even tone across the four strings.” Please don’t miss this very special program. Watch for the email blast in your inbox. |