Stuart Hamilton

(September 28, 1929 – January 1, 2017) was an award-winning Canadian accompanist, vocal coach, and opera producer based in Toronto.

As a piano accompanist, he had performed alongside internationally celebrated artists such as: Isabel Bayrakdarian, Mary Lou Fallis, Maureen Forrester, Elizabeth Benson Guy, Ben Heppner, Rosemarie Landry, Richard Margison, Dustin Lee Hiles, Stuart Howe, Lois Marshall, Roxolana Roslak, and Mary Simmons.

[2] Born in Regina, Saskatchewan, in the city's General Hospital, Hamilton grew up in a house at 2325 Angus Street near what later became known as "The Crescents" neighbourhood[3] His mother, Florence Hamilton (née Stuart; 1893–1983) was from North Dakota and worked as a nurse (she later remarried under the surname Twiss).

His father, James Shire Hamilton (1897-1954), was from Galt, Ontario (now part of Cambridge), and worked as a corporate lawyer.

A few years later, in 1937, the Hamilton household would welcome another addition, Patricia,[4] known in the family as "Patsy", who would grow up to become a famous Canadian actor of "Anne of Green Gables" fame.

[5] Despite being born at the very beginning of the Great Depression in Canada, in the hardest-hit Prairie Provinces, Hamilton seems to have grown up in relative comfort and happiness.

He began his piano performance studies at The Royal Conservatory of Music with the Chilean-Canadian composer, pianist, and teacher Alberto Guerrero.

In 1948, to help support his studies, he worked for $2.00 per night as a uniformed usher at Eaton Auditorium, Canada's premier concert stage.

After a false start working for Herman Geiger-Torel at the Royal Conservatory Opera School, Hamilton accepted an offer from soprano June Kowalchuck, founder of Hamilton Opera Company, to become their chorus director, rehearsal pianist, and occasional conductor, which he did for a period of five years.

The other days of the week Hamilton spent in Toronto, coaching Elizabeth Benson Guy,[10] Maureen Forrester,[11] and Lois Marshall.

The show was performed in Buffalo,[14] New York for six weeks, in Toronto for six months, and he later toured across Eastern Canada with a final run in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island.

[17][18] After a second New York recital in 1968,[19] and a third one in London's Wigmore Hall in 1971,[20] Hamilton decided not to further pursue a concert career and concentrated his efforts on the Toronto classical music scene.

[21] In winter 1974, he was the music director of an abridged La bohème which ran two months at The Theatre in the Dell in Toronto.

[22] In 1974, Hamilton initiated the annual Opera in Concert series at the St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts in Toronto, acting as artistic director, producer, and accompanist.

His aim was to use the large pool of talented local singers by offering them opportunities to learn and perform rarely produced works.

His brother Captain Peter Hamilton worked as a commercial aircraft pilot, and died in the tragic Air Canada Flight 621 crash at Toronto Pearson International Airport in 1970.

[45] Patricia Hamilton who recently retired from a wonderfully long career in theatre and television after 12 years at the Shaw Festival.