Measha Brueggergosman-Lee

The Honourable Mayann Francis Faith in Action Award Recipient 2023

Measha Brueggergosman-Lee’s career effortlessly embraces the broadest array of performance platforms and musical styles and genres. She has presented innovative programs at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center in New York, Washington’s Kennedy Center, London’s Wigmore Hall, both the Konzerthaus and Musikverein in Vienna, Madrid’s Teatro Real, as well as at the Schwarzenberg, Edinburgh, Verbier and Bergen Festivals with celebrated collaborative pianists Justus Zeyen, Roger Vignoles, Julius Drake, and Simon Lepper. Her first recording for Deutsche Grammophon, Surprise, includes works by Schoenberg, Satie and Bolcom. Her subsequent disc Night and Dreams, which features songs by Mozart, Brahms, Strauss, Schubert, Debussy, Duparc and Fauré won several awards including a Juno. Her recording of the Wesendonck Lieder with Franz Welser-Möst and the Cleveland Orchestra earned her a Grammy nomination. In 2018, Measha released her memoir “Something Is Always On Fire,” published by Harper Collins and its debut landed on the best-seller’s list.

Measha did not slow down during the pandemic. She produced a series of livestream “COVID concerts” in April 2020 and when the world went into lockdown, she produced over 30 music videos for various organizations and donated her newest album, Measha JAZZ, to her fans in order to encourage them through the global crisis. She composed original music for World News Day and was the music director for the radio drama The Christie Pits Riot. She was also the executive producer and director of Forgotten Coast, a 30-minute television episode (broadcast on CBC Gem) that tells the story of her Black Loyalist heritage through the lens of Hip Hop artist Jay Vernon, with orchestrations by Aaron Davis and Edwin Huizinga for the National Arts Center Orchestra in Ottawa with Alexander Shelley conducting. In addition to her touring schedule as a recitalist, Measha will mark her 2023/24 season with three landmark recordings of song cycles by Robert Fleming for the Canadian Art Song Project, a remix album born of The Measha Series featuring a host of multi-lingual, multi-national hip hop artists, a work written for her by Canadian-Dutch composer Jaap Nico Hamburger, the premiere of a newly commissioned work for soprano, jazz trio and brass orchestra by Aaron Davis set to the poetry of Margaret Atwood from her most recent book of poetry, Dearly. Measha will also star opposite Canadian actor, François Arnaud (The Borgias) in a feature-length operatic film written by James Darrah and Christopher Rountree for Long Beach Opera. Measha Brueggergosman-Lee appears regularly on primetime TV and holds several honorary doctorates and ambassadorial titles with international charities. She is currently in her second year of a Masters in Theology and also serves as the brand ambassador for the Canadian National Institute for the Blind (CNIB) and continues to stretch the boundaries of classical music performance and outreach in her ongoing role as the permanent Artist In Residence for the Canadian opera company, Opera Atelier.