“Ozipko’s playing is well controlled, with sharp attacks and smooth glissandi, . . .”
Randy Hutton, The Calgary Herald, (1975)

 

“. . .the first advocate of the avant-garde in our province . . .”
Piotr Grella-Mozejko, Alberta Views, III:4 (July/August, 2000), p. 32.

 

Mr. Jerry Ozipko is the offspring of a family of several amateur and professional musicians. His paternal grandfather, Ivan (John) Ozibko, was an amateur violinist who passed on his musical talents to at least four sons and one daughter, who later came to make practical use of their musical abilities. His grandmother Euphemia was a trained singer who often performed in church and at various social gatherings.

 

Joseph, John James (Jerry’s father), Vasyl (William/Bill) and Michaelo (Michael/Mike) were all amateur violinists who later came to play other instruments as well. While still living at home, they formed, first, a family band, and then their own individual dance bands in order to help support the family income. Jennie became the professional of the group – she learned violin on her own, eventually utilizing her talents as a member of the Edmonton Philharmonic Orchestra. During World War II she came to learn the trombone and performed as a member of the RCAF Band that toured all over the country. After the War she played both instruments, as well as the viola, as needed in the Philharmonic. When the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1952, she became the orchestra’s first librarian. Jennie was also the composer of the family. She published several songs during the war years. All of these family members would play a part in Jerry’s eventual musical development.

 

Inspired by his father’s fiddling, Mr. Jerry Ozipko began to study the violin at the age of seven with Mr. G. Nikelwitz and won many awards in a variety of talent competitions over the years. While growing up he played many times in his father’s Ukrainian Dance orchestra called the Melody Kings. He also played, on occasion, in his Uncle Bill’s band, the Travelling Rangers. Bill had by then exchanged the violin for the banjo, which would be his favoured instrument for the remainder of his life. In Bill’s band he sometimes got to play with his cousin Elmer, an accordionist.

 

During his junior year at Victoria Composite High School, Jerry Ozipko was suddenly thrust into the world of theatre arts when he was asked to fill the unspoken part of a gypsy fiddler in Thornton Wilder’s comedy The Matchmaker. In the spring of 1963, he needed an accompanist for a performance in the school lit, at which time he made the acquaintance of Ronald Hannah. The two would become lifelong friends. That same year, he also became acquainted with a budding piano virtuoso named Michael Massey. Both Ron and Michael were in their senior year at the time.

 

Later, in the fall of 1963, Jerry Ozipko changed violin teachers, entering the studio of esteemed Edmonton music educators Ranald and Vera Shean. Mr. Shean’s strict, disciplined pedagogical style had a profound influence on his development as a violinist. At that time, Mr. Shean invited Jerry to become a member of the second violin section of the Edmonton Junior Symphony Orchestra, which was then under his direction. The next summer, Jerry was privileged to be able to attend a weeklong workshop for orchestra at Mount Royal College in Calgary. The conductor was the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra’s new Conductor and Music Director, Brian Priestman.

 

When Jerry Ozipko enrolled in the University of Alberta as a science major in 1964, a career in music was not his primary direction in life. However, he was persuaded to make the change by his soon-to-be teacher, Thomas Rolston, who heard him play in an informal setting. These proved to be critical years in his formal musical development. He became exposed to a wide variety of musical styles, genres and performance opportunities. His first year proved to be an artistic and cultural watershed for him. He made his solo orchestral début performing the Violin Concerto No. 2 in E Major, BWV 1042, by Johann Sebastian Bach. He also was exposed for the first time to the glorious wonders of chamber music.

 

The 1965-66 academic year provided some new directions in Jerry’s musical development. He wrote his first original composition, though it was brief – a Cadenza for the “Adagio” slow movement of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 3 in G Major, K.V. 216, which he was to perform with the Music Department’s St. Cecilia Chamber Orchestra that year. Unfortunately, he was not allowed to include his own cadenza. He also became a strong supporter of the student composers of the Department of Music, in particular John Lewis (an English major who would go on to become a prominent composer of electroacoustic and computer-generated music in England and who would leave this life all too soon) as well as Vernon Murgatroyd, much to the chagrin and disapproval of the faculty administration.

 

Jerry’s junior year in the Department of Music introduced new challenges to his musical and artistic development. He auditioned for and obtained a position as Second Violinist with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra under the Musical Direction of Brian Priestman, who had remembered him from the workshops at Mount Royal College a couple of years before. During that academic year he performed The Lark Ascending: Romance for Violin and Orchestra by Ralph Vaughn Williams with the St. Cecilia Chamber Orchestra and presented his Junior Recital in the spring. Jerry was also included among the very first Canadians to receive instruction in the Suzuki Method of string pedagogy through the Society for Talent Education founded by his teacher and pedagogue, Professor Thomas Rolston. He also sang in the University of Alberta Mixed Chorus and accompanied them on their annual Spring Tour that year. Then in the summer of 1967, he performed with the Banff Festival Orchestra where he received his only musical commission – a re-harmonization and orchestration of O Canada, our nation’s anthem, to commemorate Canada’s Centennial Year when the orchestra went on tour around Alberta.

 

His senior and graduation year (1967-68) presented yet more unique challenges and opportunities. In conjunction with preparations for his Senior Recital in the spring of 1968, he was privileged to lead a string quartet that was coached by the University of Alberta’s first Artists-in-Residence, the internationally acclaimed and prestigious Hungarian String Quartet from Budapest.

 

Upon graduation he immediately pursued graduate studies in violin and music education at Northeast Missouri State University (now renamed Truman State University), where he received a two-year Graduate Assistanceship and served as Concertmaster of the orchestra. During his first year, he performed the technically challenging Violin Concerto, Op. 35 by Peter Tschaikowsky. Along with his duties as instructor of violin for junior students, he was able to perform as First Violinist with the Quincy (Illinois) Symphony; participate in workshops in Suzuki conducted by the late John Kendall, the American champion of the methodology; attend master classes conducted by Max Rabinovitsj, the Concertmaster of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra; and compete in the Young-Artists Competition presented by the St. Louis Symphony, where he played Samuel Barber’s Violin Concerto, Op. 14. That spring the student orchestra went on a tour of northeastern Missouri, accompanying various senior high school troupes presenting a variety of Broadway musicals as part of their end-of-the-year events.

 

It was during this academic year that he had his first exposure to live avant-garde music performances by the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra including Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima by Krzysztof Penderecki, Pithoprakta by Iannis Xenakis and Ionisation by Edgard Varèse. The revolutionary sonic palette of these works had a profound effect on his still burgeoning musical tastes. This just happened to also be the only time he ever attended a concert where the staunchly conservative US mid-west audience soundly booed the majority of the works. He was also exposed to a newly emerging technological innovation – the analogue musical synthesizer – in a concert presented by (then) Walter Carlos performing on the Moog with the St. Louis Orchestra. At NE Missouri State he studied composition with Dr. Frederick Kirchberger and Dr. Thomas Ritchie. During the summer of 1969, Jerry was awarded a fellowship enabling him to study chamber music with the Yale String Quartet and composition with Joan Panetti at the Yale University Summer School in Norfolk, CT. As a result, he became an Ellen Battel Stoeckel Scholar of Yale College – a prestigious title that he is able to append to his name.

 

Jerry was so impressed with what he experienced with respect to school music programmes in the United States that during his second year of graduate school, he shifted his emphasis from violin performance to music education. Along with a solo performance of Ernest Chausson’s Poème for Violin and Orchestra, and while still working on a Graduate Recital programme, he completed his Master of Arts in Music Education with student teaching at a secondary school in Ottumwa, IA. Though a relatively small school in terms of enrolment, it had a student Orchestra that met every morning Monday through Friday at 7:00 a.m. The Choir rehearsed during the noon hours and the Concert Band rehearsed after school. What so impressed Jerry was that each student involved in music received a minimum of a half-hour private lesson from his or her respective Instructor/Director once a week. He completed his graduate year with a short recital tour through several communities in north central Missouri prior to his graduation.

 

Upon his return to Edmonton in the spring of 1970, Jerry’s musical training and experiences did not suddenly come to a halt. Upon obtaining his Alberta Teaching Certification, he was hired by the Edmonton Public School Board to provide Music Instruction for students at Garneau Junior High School and Strathcona Composite High School, which had both a Concert Band and a student Orchestra. He returned to the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra for one more concert season in the Second Violin section. During the 1970-1971 seasons, the ESO became the first Canadian Symphony Orchestra to play with a rock band when they performed a concert with Lighthouse. Jerry took up trumpet studies with John Iltis at the University of Alberta (where he also played in the percussion section of the Concert Band), and began private studies in composition with Violet Archer. This year he also commenced a series of diverse musical collaborations. During the next several years, Jerry played violin in several recording sessions of musical sound tracks composed by Roger Deegan for nature and documentary films by local filmmaker Albert Karvonen. He also played in many televised productions by the ITV Concert Orchestra conducted by local jazz musician and arranger Tommy Banks. Many of the international stars that were featured soloists in these presentations included the likes of Henry Mancini and Hagood Hardy, among many others.

 

The summer of 1971 presented Jerry with what would prove to be among his most memorable musical experiences. He had the privilege of attending the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, CA that summer, and among other activities, the orchestra in which he played First Violin, under the direction of Maurice Abravanel performed all three of Igor Stravinsky’s major ballet scores – The Firebird, Petrushka and Le Sacre du Printemps all on one concert programme! In addition, he performed Olivier Messiaen’s Quatuor de la fin du temps (Quartet for the End of Time). A second orchestral concert featured Ein Heldenleben by Richard Strauss. Among the members of the orchestra that summer were clarinetist James Campbell, ESO percussionist Brian Jones, and Canadian violist and tenor John Barnum. The concertmaster, Hyo Kiang, now teaches at the Juilliard School of Music. His violin instructor that summer, Berl Senofsky, on the faculty of the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, MD invited Jerry to study with him. He declined. That was one of the few regrets Jerry has ever had.

 

Early in 1972, Jerry founded “Synapse: New Music Chamber Ensemble,” strictly designed for the performance of contemporary music and especially music by members of the European avant-garde. The name for the ensemble was very carefully chosen. A “synapse” is defined as “a junction of two nerve cells, consisting of the minute gap across which impulse passes by diffusion of a neurotransmitter.” The Synapse: New Music Chamber Ensemble was created “to fill the gap,” so to speak, in performances of music from the late romantic era to the music of our time. The most significant performances occurred in 1975, with works by Henk Badings, John Cage, Andrzej Dobrowolski, Morton Feldman, Anestis Logothetis, Otto Luening, Toshiro Mayuzumi, Krzysztof Penderecki, Steve Reich, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Anton Webern (among others) being performed in a series of concerts in Edmonton and Calgary. The names and number of personnel in the ensemble varied depending upon the specific works to be presented. Many times there were more musicians on stage than there were public attendees in the audience, but not always. Although Synapse never formally disbanded, the ensemble had, for all intents and purposes, died away by the end of 1978. Jerry also had the opportunity to perform at a cabaret with the Calgary-based rock band Stratus Faction during that year.

 

The year 1975 provided Jerry with yet more new and varied musical experiences. He composed his first live, interactive electro-acoustic composition, Binary Tangents for Solo Violin and Two Tape Recorders; he participated in violin master classes presented by Hungarian Violin Virtuoso Katö Havas, Alberta College Artist-in-Residence; and he took formal lessons in guitar with instructor Maurice Mireau.

 

In 1977, flautist Jonathan Bayley, composer/organist/pianist Reinhard Berg, and sound poet/artist Oliver Botar founded Otherwise, an ensemble “devoted to performing group improvisations in non-jazz contemporary idiom.” Jerry was invited to perform with them on several separate occasions between 1977 and 1980, which he did with great enthusiasm. That same year saw the formation of the Alberta Composers’ Association under the leadership of Calgary composer Richard Johnson. Along with Violet Archer, Ron Hannah and Malcolm Forsyth, Jerry was a Founding Member of that short-lived organization, which lasted a mere two years.

 

Early in 1979, Jerry got to conduct the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra in a Pops Concert. He “purchased” the opportunity through a fund-raising auction effort put on by the orchestra and sponsored by ITV (now Global).

 

The 1983-85 academic years saw Jerry enrolled in the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Graduate Studies where he worked on a Ph.D. programme majoring in Microcomputer Applications in Music and Education. For personal reasons, he was unable to complete the programme and obtain his degree.

 

Between the years 1970 and 1985, along with his public school teaching duties and frequent symphonic performances, Jerry presented many public recitals – several of them devoted entirely to contemporary music. Between 1982 and 1985 he played First Violin in the revived Edmonton Philharmonic Orchestra and was privileged to have been able to perform Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante in E-flat Major for Violin, Viola and Orchestra, K.V. 364 on several occasions with violist Mary Clarke.

 

At the urging and encouragement of Violet Archer, several of her students, namely Gordon Nicholson, Ron Hannah, Reinhard Berg, Jerry and Helve Sastok, formed a society to promote the performance of their own and other contemporary music works. Hence was born the Edmonton Composers’ Concert Society in the summer of 1985.

 

In the spring of 1986, Jerry resigned from teaching with the Edmonton Public School Board. During the months which followed, while working at several small part-time jobs, he endeavoured to establish StudioOZ, a private school for the instruction of electronic and computer music, but the venture never really got off the ground due to a lack of knowledge of and experience with necessary and applicable business practices.

 

In the autumn of 1988, Jerry was offered a teaching position in Chetwynd, BC with School District #59, Peace River South, based out of Dawson Creek, BC. He accepted a transfer to Tumbler Ridge in the fall of 1990.

 

During the summer of 1991, Jerry traveled to the Orient with a group of BC teachers on a special educational programme. While in Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand and Malaysia, he learned much about the musical cultures of those nations and returned with several native folk instruments. He continued teaching with School District #59 until December, 1995, when he suffered from burnout and resigned.

 

Since his return to Edmonton in the summer of 1996, Jerry has taken up private violin instruction for Sherwood Park School of Music, where he became the Director of Programme Development in 2001. In 2005, he established a small Suzuki Violin Programme at École Campbelltown Elementary School in Sherwood Park, AB. He has also rejoined the Edmonton Composers’ Concert Society where he served as Secretary for several years and then in 2005 became the society’s President. Throughout that time he has been able to continue his musical journalism writing with over 100 articles to his credit. Since 2004 he has also been able to revive his performing career with presentations of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Concerto in D Minor for Two Violins, Strings and Continuo, BWV 1043 and Concerto No. 1 in A Minor, BWV 1041 with the Wye Chamber Orchestra.

 

In the spring of 2008, Edmonton Composer and Educator Piotr Grella-Mozejko conceptualized the idea of organizing a local Avant-garde experimental music performance ensemble for the express purpose of presenting graphic and conceptualized contemporary works by European and North American composers. What emerged was the newly created Edmonton Improvisatory Ensemble, whose original personnel consisted of Grella-Mozejko on Piano, Jerry on Electric Violin, Composer/Educator and Saxophonist Charles Stolte, and Dancer Gerry Morita, seconded from the Mile Zero Dance Company. They met together for the first time on Tuesday, August 26 to rehearse and begin preparations for a public performance debut as part of the local contemporary Explorations Concerts Series on Saturday, September 5 at the Stanley A. Milner Library Theatre.

 

On the heels of their marvelously successful première performance, where they had been re-named Ensemble Eyes/Ears on the programme, it became very apparent that the ensemble needed not only a new name that would better express the artistic nature of the performers’ collective, but the group needed to become even more multi-media in their presentations in order to better express their artistic goals. With the addition of Mezzo-Soprano and Actress Michelle Milenkovic and Visual Artist Felix Plawski to the line-up, the second requirement was readily attained. Since the ensemble was for all intents and purposes, “nameless,” after a series of discussions and consultations, the members of the group collectively agreed upon the name Ensemble Mujirushi. “Mujirushi” is the Japanese name of a retail store that sells “no name” products. Under the auspices of the Edmonton Composers’ Concert Society as part of the society’s New Music Alberta Concert Series, Ensemble Mujirushi made its formal debut concert with their new name and expanded personnel on Saturday, November 29, again at the Stanley A. Milner Library Theatre.

 

The ensemble specializes in the performance of contemporary conceptual and graphic scores that more often than not resemble abstract illustrations or paintings and is exploring the possibilities of performing elsewhere in Canada and internationally. In June of 2009, the ensemble performed at The Works Art and Design Festival.

 

From November 17 through November 28, Ensemble Mujirushi was privileged to perform on a tour of Europe called Smash the Mainstream. Concerts were presented in Ghent, Belgium (November 18); in Kraków, Poland as part of their Audio Art Festival 2009 (November 21); in Warszawa, Poland at the prestigious Fryderyck Chopin University of Music as a presentation during the institution’s 200th Anniversary Celebrations (November 22); in Gdansk, Poland at the Stanislaw Moniuszko Academy of Music (November 23); in Lodz, Poland at the Galeria Manhattan as part of the Audio Arts Festival on Tour (November 25) and at the Grazyna and Kiejsut Bacewicz Academy of Music (November 26); and in Katowice, Poland at the Mieczyslaw Karlowicz Academy of Music(November 28).

 

2010 proved to be another successful year for the ensemble despite several sudden and surprising changes in personnel. Following the departures of Charles Stolte, Michelle Milenkovic, Gerry Morita and Felix Plawski, the ensemble was able to recruit Chenoa Anderson (Flutes), Allison Balcetis (Saxophones), Ian Crutchley (Composer/Computer Synthesist and Melodica) and Helen Pridmore (Singer) as eventual replacements. In June, the ensemble again performed at The Works Art and Design Festival. Then on September 12, there was a performance at the Kaleido Family Arts Festival as part of the “Arts on the Avenue” (118th Avenue) local initiative.

 

From October 4 through October 16, Ensemble Mujirushi was privileged to perform on its first ever Canadian Tour. Six concerts were presented in Lethbridge, AB as part of the “Music at Noon” Concert Series at the University of Lethbridge (October 4); in Saskatoon, SK, opening the David L. Kaplan Concert Series at Grosvenor United Church (October 8); in Montréal, QC at Sala Rossa in the opening concert of the BradyWorks Concert Series (October 10); in Kitchener-Waterloo, ON as a co-production of the First United Church Noon Concert Series and Wilfred Laurier University (October 12); in Thunder Bay, ON as part of the New Music North Concert Series at Lakehead University (October 13) and at Gallery 345 in Toronto, ON (October 16). The tour was another artistic success.

 

In September of 2011, Jerry performed a programme of light classical music including works by Ludwig van Beethoven, Fritz Kreisler, Jules Massenet, Peter Tschaikowsky and others at the Kaleido Arts Festival with the esteemed pianist and accompanist Sylvia Shadick-Taylor.

 

Jerry’s journalistic career began back in high school, where he served as the Features Editor of his high school newspaper The Vic Argosy during his senior year. During that same time he was also the photography editor of the high school yearbook. Over the following years, while a university student, then a graduate student and eventually a professional musician and public school music educator, and most recently as a private instructor of violin, he continued to provide articles of both an academic nature and of the more popular variety to many publications including: Index (NE Missouri State Student Newspaper), The Missouri Journal of Research in Music Education, The Gateway (University of Alberta Student Newspaper), SYNEX: The Synthesizer Exchange Newsletter, X(ECCS)-Rated News: The Official Newsletter of the Edmonton Composers’ Concert Society, Proceedings of the IVth International Human Science Research Conference (1985), Proceedings of the Fifth International Human Science Research Conference (1986), Chetwynd Echo, Pioneer News (Chetwynd, B.C.), Research Forum, SEE Magazine (including four special cover stories), Signature (Programme Notes for the ESO In-House Magazine), anacrusis (Journal of the Association of Canadian Choral Conductors), Edmontonians, Prairie Sounds, The Alberta New Music & Arts Review, Muziek 21, MusicWorks, Polish Panorama Polska and VUE Weekly. In 1987, he designed the original logo for the Edmonton Composers’ Concert Society and was awarded a small cash award for the endeavour.