2026 Pickering GTA Music Festival

2025 was an exciting year for my festival. We celebrated our 25th anniversary with adjudicators who had been in the festival as students previously.

Dr. Kathryn Tremills, our senior piano adjudicator was  the fist student to represent us at the OMFA Provincials in the Open Piano class and win to attend the National Music Festival. She first adjudicated in the Pickering GTA and has adjudicated at OMFA Provincials and been back many times.

I was fortunate to find Anthony Rodrigues to handle all our vocal classes. He was comfortable with all the different styles we offer now.

All the junior and intermediate piano classes were adjudicated by Dr. Charissa Vandikas beautifully for her first time adjudicating a local festival. Charissa and her 3 brothers grew up in this local festival and have competed at the Provincials many times. Their parents are also teachers and adjudicators. Charissa has just completed her doctorate at McGill. 

David Shewchuck adjudicated our junior strings and also competed in PGTAMF as a student.

Senior and lower strings  were handled by Sonya Nanos Hodgson. Sonya represented Pickering GTA so many times at Provincials I have lost count as a student and has been a frequent adjudicator at OMFA for chamber and strings.

Hiring these adjudicators confirmed my belief in the work of 25 years and was much like having family return. I have been so fortuante to have many supportive families and teachers over all these years. I still run this festival by myself and without the pleasure of seeing these students mature into wonderful musicians I would not be encouraged to keep going.

I have used the same venue for all these years as well and am grateful to Grace Presbyterian Chirch for all they do for us including helping me shovel off my car in a blizzard.

I moved my website to Ciniki last year and find Andrew's help so valuable. Having statistics to draw on is very helpful for this report.

There were a total of 363 registrations last year, 345 were live and 18 virtual entries and 43 studios were represented. This was an increase from 327 the previous year..

There were 102 recommendations for OMFA with 53 alternates and 93 registrations after following through with the competitors, teachers and parents. I had many thankyou notes describing their pleasure in attending Provincials. We were well represented at OMFA with 45 of our competitors winning or placing in their classes-nearly half!

Over the years I have only had to cancel one day due to an ice storm. Our dates of the first 2 weeks in February have worked well for us.The Church I use is very close to the 401 and a Go Station and easily accessible.

Pickering GTA Music Festival has been a member of OMFA for all of these years and I am grateful for the support I can draw on. I look forward to seeing new and familiar faces in February. You can reach me best by emailat pgtamf@gmail.com with any questions. Please refer to the rules and regulations for OMFA as well when selecting your repertoire.

Martha Gregory,
Executive Director
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Contact us at: pgtamf@gmail.com or (905) 839-9801