about
  

Cortland Music  provides live, mostly Classical-style music for special events. Cortland Music is based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and is strongly connected to Dalhousie University's Department of Music. Rachel Matthews (solo cello), The Cortland Duo, The Cortland Trio, and The Cortland Quartet are all recognized locally by event planners, venue managers, and music and wedding industry professionals, as upholding the highest standards in musicianship and professionalism. Boasting a repertoire of over two hundred titles, including all the classical "hits", the Cortland Music library adds new pieces every month to ensure all their listeners are entertained! Flute is also available to fill the first violin position, creating flute & string groups. While all Cortland Music groups can play some Celtic music, The Cortland Duo is also available as fiddle & cello, and can play classical and/or fiddle music. To learn more about the different size groups and instruments available, click "groups" in the menu above. 

The majority of Cortland Music's private engagements involve providing music for wedding ceremonies and cocktail hours, and a variety of academic and corporate functions. Cortland Music musicians have also provided music for many dinners, fundraisers, parties (anniversary, staff, birthday, Christmas, etc.), marriage proposals, funerals and memorial services, graduation ceremonies, and other functions.

Rachel Matthews, cellist  Rachel began her cello studies at the age of ten with Joan Chandler and Adam Mueller through the Dartmouth Schools Music Department. Her talents were further shaped by Prof. Christoph Both (Acadia University) and Shimon Walt (Dalhousie University). She was a founding member of The Jubilee Quartet. In 1997, she completed advanced studies in cello performance through Le Domaine Forget in Quebec, then returned to Halifax to become the Principal Cellist of the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra in the 1997-1998 season. In 1999, she won the String Rose Bowl (top prize) at the Kiwanis Music Festival. A Dean’s List and multi-scholarship student, focused on cello performance, she graduated from Dalhousie University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music in 2000. Her busy schedule includes free lance work (live and studio) with various groups in the Atlantic region, including a very special appearance with Kanye West in Halifax, September 2006, opening for the Rolling Stones. She is also a Teaching Assistant at Dalhousie University in the Music Department, and teaches cello privately from her home. She resides in Dartmouth near Shubie Park with her husband Gordon Sweet, and their four-year-old daughter, Georgina (Gina).

Rachel Matthews, business owner/operator  Rachel is the Owner/Operator of Cortland Music, and is the friendly, helpful, trusted, easily-reached primary contact, for all current  and prospective clients. After Rachel managed The Jubilee Quartet through almost nine years of success, including over 350 weddings, and over 350 happy brides, the group disbanded, and she moved on to run her own successful music business. Cortland Music was created by Rachel in the summer of 2006 to manage The Cortland Quartet and her sister groups. Rachel continues to manage and perform with The Cortland Quartet, The Cortland Trio and The Cortland Duo, for special engagements, but Cortland Music's most popular booking is now solo cello. Rachel has now performed at over 400 weddings, and over 250 other functions. Having Rachel's experience, detail orientation, and excellent organizational skills in your corner, will ensure you receive professional service, and ultimately, the music at your special event will be exactly how you want it.

Gina Burgess, violinist Gina's ancestral lineage is full of many people who were very rich in musical talent. For example, her paternal grandparents directed the Dorian Hall Music Academy in Windsor, Nova Scotia. Gina is proud to be living the family tradition, sharing the gift of music with her audiences. Gina began her violin studies at the age of five at the Maritime Conservatory of Performing Arts, with Mrs. Joy Yoon. She has studied at numerous music festivals and camps, including Domain Forget, ARIA International Summer Music Academy, and Scotia Festival of Music. Under the direction of Philippe Djokic, Gina received her Bachelor of Music degree from Dalhousie University in 2006. During her time at Dalhousie, she was recognized with a number of scholarships, including Nova Scotia Talent Trust Awards and String Music Atlantic Awards, she won second place in the Kiwanis String Rose Bowl Competition, and won first place in the Canadian National Music Competition with the Quantum Quartet. Gina has performed as a soloist with many Atlantic Canadian emsembles, including Symphony Nova Scotia. In addition to being a founding member of The Jubilee Quartet, Gina was also Concertmaster of the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra, the Halifax Symphony School Orchestra, and is currently Concertmaster of the Chebucto Symphony Orchestra. 
  
A mutli-faceted music performer, Gina has been awarded great recognition for her virtuosity in several specialized styles of violin performance, including Baroque (a classical style), Gypsy-jazz, Klezmer, Flamenco, and East Coast style fiddle music. As part of the Halifax-based, critically acclaimed, Gypsy-Jazz ensemble "Gypsophilia", Gina has toured through the Canadian National Jazz Festivals circuit, and has been nominated for numerous Music Nova Scotia, and East Coast Music Awards (ECMAs). As a fiddler, Gina was recently chosen to represent East Coast Canada, in Iqaluit's foremost annual cultural celebration "Toonik Time Festival". Gina has recently enriched her musicianship with several private, specialized, Baroque violin lessons in Toronto from Jeanne Lamon, Music Director for Canada's Baroque music treasure, the renowned Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra. While in Toronto, she also continued her music education studies at the University of Toronto, where she worked as a free lance musician, teaching and performing with various groups in the Toronto area. Gina now resides in her native Halifax, and enjoys her busy schedule of teaching and performing. 

Celeste Williams, violinist  Celeste began studying the violin at the age of four, and at the age of six she was welcomed into the studio of Prof. Philippe Djokic of Dalhousie University. Two years later Celeste made her debut with a professional symphony orchestra. Since then she has performed across Canada, Western Europe, Scandinavia and Asia, and appears regularly as soloist with symphony orchestras.  In the summer of 2006 she was awarded a full scholarship to study and perform in Shanghai, China.  

Celeste is a three-time winner of the String Music Atlantic Rose Bowl, and has been a finalist and top prize winner in national and international competitions.  Performances as soloist with orchestra have been as diverse as the Beethoven Triple Concerto and Mozart violin concertos, to the virtuoso George Waxman arrangement of the Carmen Fantasie and violin score from the film "The Red Violin". In 2007 she was concertmaster for a joint orchestra in Boston - nearly 200 musicians from Nova Scotia and New England Conservatory performed Stravinsky's Firebird Suite.  

Celeste is grateful for the support of Nova Scotia Talent Trust, String Music Atlantic, and private organizations, and studies under Prof. Lukas Hagen of the Hagen Quartet at Mozarteum University in Salzburg, Austria. She performs on her violin made in Turin, Italy by Eduardo Marchetti in 1912.    

Kinley Dowling, violist  Kinley began studying the violin at the age of nine with Jen Clements in PEI. She switched to viola at the age of thirteen. She soon joined the New Brunswick Youth Orchestra, and later the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra. In 1997 she played with the Singing Strings, representing Canada at the International Society for Music Education conference, held in Amsterdam. Kinley was honored to take Megan Bain's place as the violist in The Jubilee Quartet in 2005. In May 2007, Kinley graduated from Dalhousie University, where she studied viola with Philippe Djokic, and earned a Bachelor of Music degree (major in Performance). 

She has performed and recorded with many different artists, such as Hey Rosetta!, Jenn Grant, Anne Murray, the PEI Symphony Orchestra, J.P. Cormier, Scott MacMillan and Rose Cousins. Kinley has also performed at the East Coast Music Awards, Much Music Video Awards, Canadian Showcase for the Grammy Awards, South by South West Festival, and many summer festivals across Canada.

Melissa Doiron, flute  Musically gifted from a very young age, Melissa was exposed to many insturments and experiences, but ultimately chose the flute at the age of eight. Melissa began her scholarship studies at Dalhousie University's Music Department in 2001. During her time there she was first chair of both the Dalhousie Orchestra, and Dalhousie Wind Ensemble, and she studied with Christine Feierabend. In 2004, she was recognized as top performer, and was spotlighted as a soloist in the Dalhousie Symphony Orchestra's esteemed Concerto Night. Melissa was also awarded the Don Wright Music Instruction scholarship in her last year of study at Dalhousie, when she was also the president of the Society for Dalhousie Music Students - Society of the Year for 2003-2004. Melissa finished her undergraduate studies at Memorial University of Newfoundland in 2007, when she graduated with her conjoined Bachelor of Music and Bachelor of Music Education degree. She is now a senior high school music teacher in the HRM and runs a private flute studio at her home in Bedford, offering instruction to individual students and workshops to school groups. She also continues to share her beautiful flute music, as she regularly appears with The Chebucto Symphony Orchestra, and several busy Halifax-based chamber groups, including The Cortland Duo, Trio and Quartet.