A new art song cycle by Canadian composer Jana Skarecky titled Light and Shadow will see its premiere at Toronto’s Heliconian Club on April 25, 2026. The song cycle sets to music texts by Kate Marshall Flaherty which were inspired by Skarecky’s photos.
Jana Skarecky is both composer and visual artist, and her art work include paintings and photographs. Flaherty’s five poems were inspired by Jana’s photographs of Iceland.
The photographs in Light and Shadow were exhibited at the annual Luminous photography show at the Heliconian Club. The opening reception incorporates Ekphrasis, in which artists from other genres, including poetry, music, and dance, respond to the works on display. At Luminous in October 2025, Kate Marshall Flaherty wrote a poem in response to one of Jana’s photographs, which began their second collaboration.
The song cycle will be performed by mezzo-soprano Chelsea Cushman and pianist Dora Krizmanic at the Heliconian Club as part of their Music for Planet Earth concert.
The four artists — Jana Skarecky, Kate Marshall Flaherty, Chelsea Cushman, and Dora Krizmanic — worked together previously on Heartwood, a cycle of four songs, in 2025:
Creators
Jana Skarecky, composer & photographer
Jana Skarecky was born in the Czech Republic, and came to Canada with her family at the age of ten. She is a member of the Art Section of Toronto’s Heliconian Club, and regularly exhibits her paintings and photography at Heliconian Hall.
Her art work has been commissioned and appears in private collections throughout Canada and the US. Her paintings have also been exhibited at the Adamson Estate in Mississauga, by Visual Arts Mississauga and the ACA Gallery in Toronto, as well as in Kitchener-Waterloo, Brampton, Bath, Stratford, New York, and Odense, Denmark.
As a composer, she holds an ARCT from The Royal Conservatory, a Bachelor of Music from Wilfrid Laurier University, and a Master of Music from the University of Sydney in Australia. Her music has been commissioned and performed throughout North America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan.
She is also a music educator who has been part of the Royal Conservatory faculty since 1985.
Most recently she performed her piece Forest Sanctuary for piano and singing bowls at the ORMTA Teachers’ Concert in Burlington. The Enchorus children’s choir conducted by Catherine Richardson also sang her piece Song of the Four Seasons.
Kate Marshall Flaherty, poet
Poet, performer, and editor Kate Marshall Flaherty has published eight books of poetry. She has more than two decades’ experience as a creative writing teacher, poetry editor, and fiction editor. She is the in the house editor for Quattro Books, and is the current Writer-In-Residence at the Heliconian Arts and Letters Club.
Performers
Chelsea Cushman, mezzo-soprano
Chelsea Melamed Cushman earned her Bachelor of Music degree from Lawrence University, followed by a Master of Music degree from the San Francisco Conservatory. She holds a Doctoral degree in Voice from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (CCM). At CCM, she performed the roles of Dorothée in Cendrillon and the Page of Herodias in Salome.
Notable performances include the premieres of Prince Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus with Toronto City Opera and the titular role in Cenerentola with COSA (Centre for Opera Studies & Appreciation Canada), and the Canadian premiere of Jake Heggie’s song cycle “Camille Claudel: Into the Fire”. She sang on the PARMA records release of 17 songs for mezzo by Canadian composer Monika Gurak.
In addition to her performing career, Chelsea works as an Adjunct Assistant Professor, Voice at the Shenandoah University Conservatory.
Dora Krizmanic, piano
Dora Krizmanic is a graduate of McMaster University, where she earned a Master of Divinity, and is a PhD Candidate at the University of Toronto, St. Michael’s College. She is the Organist and Music Director at St. Paul’s Anglican Church in Uxbridge, and previously served in a similar post for more than two decades at High Park – Morningside Presbyterian Church.
Concert Details
The concert is part of the Heliconian Music Section’s annual tribute to our Planet Earth. The program also includes:
- Three Songs of Innocence by Arnold Cooke for soprano, clarinet and piano;
- For the Trees, a piano trio by Kye Marshall.
Find tickets and other details [HERE].
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