Omega String Trio

The Omega Trio is made up of three of Canada’s finest chamber musicians, who first came together as a string trio (violin, viola, cello) through a love of playing together, and a wish to play the little-heard repertoire for this combination, some of it by the most famous composers. Named after a now-defunct garage for repairing French cars in Vancouver (don’t ask), they have performed in unusual spaces, including dilapidated private homes, luxurious mansions, cathedrals and small churches, as well as in traditional concert venues. Their repertoire comprises music from the 18th century to the present day, including masterworks by Schubert, Beethoven and Schnittke.

Beethoven - Trio in E-flat, Op. 3
Gideon Klein - String Trio
Schubert - String trio in B flat, D471

Praised for her "meltingly beautiful solos" and "depth and insight," cellist Pamela Highbaugh Aloni has been an Associate Professor at UVic since 1991 where she teaches cello, chamber music, and string pedagogy. She is a founding member of the award-winning Lafayette String Quartet which performed together for 37 years before taking their final bow in August of 2023.

In those years, the Lafayette quartet enjoyed a rich musical life together with the same four members. Highlights of their years include a celebration in 2000 performing all sixteen of Beethoven’s string quartets, a 30th anniversary Shostakovich Cycle, a Second Viennese School project, commission of five new quartets by women composers, and the initiation of the Lafayette Health Awareness Forum. Their CBC recording “Death and the Maiden” was awarded “Outstanding Classical Recording of the Year” by the Western Canada Music Awards.

A native of California, Pamela served as principal cellist with the Detroit’s Renaissance City Chamber Players. She was a Ford Motor Company Artist in Residence at the Center for Creative Studies Institute of Music and Dance and a faculty member at Oakland University. She earned her BMus and MMus degrees from California State University, Northridge and Indiana University. Her principal teachers include Peter Rejto, Janos Starker and Paul Katz.

An enthusiastic and devoted teacher, Ms. Highbaugh Aloni served for ten years on the faculty at the Courtenay Youth Music School and Festival and has been the coach for the Greater Victoria Youth Orchestra cello section since 2004. She performs both as a soloist and recitalist and has been a guest artist with the Vetta Ensemble of Vancouver, Victoria Chamber Orchestra, Victoria Summer Festival, Festival of the Sound, Sooke Philharmonic, Eine Kleine Summer Music, Chamber Music San Juan, and served as principal cellist with the Galiano Ensemble from 2000-2018. Pamela plays on a George Craske cello made in England, 1850.

Violinist Marc Destrubé is a musical polymath - soloist, chamber musician, concertmaster, orchestral leader and teacher - whose career straddles the contemporary and ‘early music’ worlds. Marc grew up in Victoria BC and started violin lessons at 9. Following studies at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, he attended the University of Toronto and the University of Western Ontario and became an active freelancer. He was a founding member of Tafelmusik in Toronto and was soon invited to play with leading early music orchestras and ensembles in Europe. He has travelled the world and made dozens of recordings as co-concertmaster of the Orchestra of the 18th Century. He’s led the Belgian ensemble Anima Eterna, the Academy of Ancient Music and the Hanover Band. He’s toured with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and is concertmaster of the Oregon Bach Festival Orchestra. He’s been concertmaster of the CBC Radio Orchestra and music director of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra.

Today, he’s a member of the Axelrod String Quartet, quartet-in-residence at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C., which plays on the museum’s exceptional collection of Stradivari and Amati instruments; Vancouver’s Turning Point Ensemble, which specializes in contemporary music, and the Microcosmos Quartet, whose repertoire ranges far and wide. He is Artistic Director of the Pacific Baroque Festival (Victoria).

Violist Yariv Aloni is acclaimed by critics for his “impeccable technical accomplishments, exquisite phrasing and superb viola playing”, and as having “a huge, singing tone and a rare depth and nobility of feeling”.

He performs in numerous chamber music concerts, festivals and recital series and currently plays with both the Omega String Trio and the Victoria Piano Quartet.

As the violist of both the AVIV and the PENDERECKI quartets, he has performed in many of the world’s renowned concert halls including the Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Centre in New York, the Louvre in Paris, Tonhalle in Zurich, Alte Oper in Frankfurt. He has recorded for the United, Marquise, Tritonus and the CBC labels.

Yariv Aloni is the Music Director of the Victoria Chamber Orchestra, the Greater Victoria Youth Orchestra, and the Sooke Philharmonic Orchestra. His appearances as a guest conductor include the Victoria Symphony, the Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra, the West Coast Symphony in Vancouver and the Civic Orchestra of Victoria.

Yariv Aloni studied viola with David Chen at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem, Daniel Benyamini, principal violist of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, and Michael Tree and the Guarneri String Quartet. He was a finalist at the François Shapira competition in Tel-Aviv and has won numerous awards from the American-Israel Cultural Foundation, as well as the Israel Broadcasting Authority award for chamber music performance.

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