In her other life as a concert violinist, Rebecca van der Post has performed extensively throughout Europe and North America, commissioning, developing, broadcasting and recording new and diverse repertoire for string quartet, mixed chamber ensembles, and solo violin. Originally from the United Kingdom she gradually migrated to Toronto following a series of residencies at the Banff Centre for the Arts that simultaneously catalyzed her great love of the Canadian wilderness and cemented her commitment to contemporary and experimental chamber music. A founding member of the Madawaska String Quartet and the principle violinist of Arraymusic from 1999 to 2014, she has toured throughout Europe and North America appearing in major international festivals such as Aldeburgh, Belfast Sonorities, Strasbourg New Music, Parry Sound Festival of the Sound and the Festival Ibero-Americano in Puerto-Rico and perfoming with artists such as Leslie Kinton, Siegfried Palm, Robyn Schulkowsky, Anton Lukoszevieze and Stephen Clarke. Some of the highlights of her musical life have included a private recital for the Prime Minister of Thailand, duo recitals in former East Germany with Thomas Adès, the “hard hat” concert for the inaugurations of Koerner Hall in Toronto, a midwinter tour to the Outer Hebrides to bring chamber music to children with severe learning difficulties and the world premiere of a violin concerto written for her by British composer Peter Cowdrey and televised live from the Aya Sophia as part of the Istanbul International Festival.

Rebecca’s interest in critical social and political theory has arisen quite organically from her first-hand experience of many different systems of social organization and many forms of governance, ranging from the constitutional monarchy of the symphony orchestra to the direct democracy of the string quartet and the spontaneous anarchic formations of free-improvisation. Now enrolled in the interdisciplinary PhD in Humanities at Concordia University, Rebecca draws on her life in music to consider the nature of non-alienated experience. Her current research investigates the experience of sensory and creative engagement and explores the political, social and environmental significance of the subtle alterations in our state of being that characterise the creative working process.