For the purposes of increasing public awareness of the climate crisis and inciting action, multidisciplinary artist, Deborah Carruthers -- serving as the inaugural 2017 Artist in Residence at the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies, UBC -- teamed up with institutional science researchers as well as the UBC School of Music to create an interdisciplinary work combining sound, science, and visual art. This online exhibition documents the artist's process as well as the work's premiere performed by the UBC Symphony Orchestra (UBCSO) under the baton of Dr. Jonathan Girard, Director of Orchestras, UBC.
In 2019, Ana Sokolović participated in UBC Library’s Canadian Women Composers Collection by submitting original sketches and manuscripts documenting the compositional process for the musical work "Il divertimenti barocco." The composition was to be premiered by the Nova Scotia Symphony; however, the premiere had to be cancelled due to COVID-19. Ana met with Dr. Jonathan Girard, Conductor, University of British Columbia Symphony Orchestra, in the fall of 2020 and agreed to allow UBC’s student symphony orchestra to debut the work. The resulting online performance (December 16, 2020) documents (1) musical excellence at UBC’s School of Music, showing young musicians brilliantly performing a work that had never been heard before and (2) how young musicians navigated the demands of performing live under the constraints of the first pandemic of the 21st century.