Canadian Armed Forces guests to perform at National Armed Forces orchestras’ concerts in Madona and Ādaži

On 8 October at 18:00 at the Madona Culture Centre and on 10 October at 18:00 at the Ādaži Culture Centre, the Latvian National Armed Forces orchestras will open their concert season with “Northern Mosaic”. 

The concerts will feature musicians from the Latvian National Armed Forces Army Orchestra and the Latvian National Guard Orchestra, together with special guests from the Canadian Armed Forces - Captain Marie-Perle Broadley, Commanding Officer and Director of Music of La Musique du Royal 22e Régiment (The Band of the Royal 22e Régiment), and Master Corporal Anna Ding, horn soloist. The concerts will be led by Captain Marie-Perle Broadley and Major Andis Karelis, Chief Conductor of the Latvian National Armed Forces. 

Captain Marie-Perle Broadley is the Commanding Officer and Director of Music of La Musique du Royal 22e Régiment and the only woman to lead a French-language Regular Force military band in the Canadian Armed Forces. Her military career spans nearly four decades, beginning in 1987 as a flutist with the Canadian Army Reserve before joining the Regular Force in 1998. During her career, she has served with Army, Navy and Air Force bands across Canada. She has held several prominent conducting and leadership positions, including Director of Music of the Ceremonial Guard in Ottawa and Commanding Officer and Director of Music of the Canadian Armed Forces Central Band. She was the first woman to hold these leadership positions. In 2021, she also became the first Canadian military woman invited to conduct the United States Army Field Band at the prestigious Midwest Clinic international conference for conductors and ensemble leaders in Chicago, USA. Captain Broadley holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) and has pursued further studies in arranging, composition and orchestration. 

Master Corporal Anna Ding is a Canadian horn player and military musician serving with La Musique du Royal 22e Régiment near Québec City. She has extensive professional experience performing with orchestras and various wind chamber ensembles, as well as in contemporary music projects. Anna has performed with several orchestras in Québec, and in 2022 she toured with the National Youth Orchestra of Canada, receiving its Award of Excellence. She holds a Bachelor of Music in Performance from the University of Toronto. 

The concert “Northern Mosaic” is a story of two countries, their music and their people, who, despite the great geographical distance between them, meet through a shared musical experience. 

The concert programme is designed as a musical mosaic bringing together works by Latvian and Canadian composers, Latvian folk songs and the atmosphere of northern landscapes. The programme will feature music by Canadian composers Robert Buckley, Elizabeth Raum and Mike Lett, as well as works by Latvian composers Andrejs Jurjāns and Marina Vidmonte. 

A special place in the programme is given to Robert Buckley’s Symphony No. 3, “Québec Mosaic,” which musically portrays the four seasons of Québec - autumn, winter, spring and summer. In the third movement of Elizabeth Raum’s “Sherwood Legend,” “The Unabashed Scoundrel,” the horn solo reveals a virtuosic and theatrical musical character. 

Latvian music will be represented by Andrejs Jurjāns’ “Barkarolla,” presented this year as part of a special anniversary year commemorating the composer, as well as the Latvian folk songs “Ej, saulīte, drīz pie Dieva” and “Kur tu teci, gailīti, mans” in an arrangement by Canadian Armed Forces musician Mike Lett. The programme will also feature “Man dziesmiņu nepietrūka” by Marina Vidmonte, a musician of the Latvian National Armed Forces Army Orchestra. 

Admission to the concerts is free of charge. 

Canada is the framework nation of NATO’s multinational brigade in Latvia. NATO’s presence in Latvia continues to develop, and since 2024 the multinational brigade has operated as part of NATO Multinational Division North, strengthening the Alliance’s deterrence and defence capabilities in the region. 

The visit of Canadian Armed Forces musicians demonstrates the close cooperation between Latvia and Canada not only in the fields of security and defence, but also in military music, further promoting international cooperation. 

Information prepared by:
Inga Meijere
Senior Communications Specialist
National Guard of the Republic of Latvia
Phone: +371 29299329
E-mail: inga.meijere@mil.lv