Ari Hooker

Currently in his third year as a student of David Moroz at the University of Manitoba, Ari Hooker has garnered a number of local awards both for his virtuosic piano playing and for his attractive and engaging compositions. Ambitious and overflowing with ideas, one of Ari’s major accomplishments in his first year of formal training was a side project: writing and performing a major symphonic work, his first Piano Concerto. (The performance, available on YouTube, involved the labour intensive preparation of an electronic “orchestra”.) Much of his output is available to enjoy and to purchase through his website, including his most recent work, “The Halifax Suite” for piano four hands, his monumental “Sonata Epica” for cello and piano, a set of miniatures for cello and piano entitled “24 Aperitifs”, and a set of eight lullabies for solo piano entitled “Schlafenmusik”. He is also a gifted improviser, a skill he puts to good use at the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, where he has been employed for a number of years as a class pianist, as well as at Bethesda Church, where he attends and serves regularly. As a chamber musician, he has participated in ScotiaFest and there is a growing demand for his sensitive and solid support as a vocal and choral accompanist. His wide-ranging musical interests span everything from classical performance to popular piano stylings to transcription to constructing lo-fi electronic beats, and he was the keyboard player for the local band, “Training Wheels”, whose songs were heard on local radio and can be streamed on Spotify.