This website is devoted to the original musical compositions of Deborah Sumner. Deborah is one of the founding members and the resident composer of Encore! Women's Choir. She is also an associate composer at the Canadian Music Centre and in the fall of 2018 Deborah was one of four Canadian composers selected to participate in a bi-annual reading session with Elektra Women’s Choir in Vancouver, BC. More recently, Deborah conducted a small choir of 10 women (dubbed Sorella) while they endeavored to record three of her compositions. Little Blue is one of the pieces recorded by Sorella - a piece about the fragility of our world.
Deborah began her musical career by studying voice, flute, piano and composition at the University of Victoria in Victoria, BC. She then spent 2 years teaching at the Victoria Conservatory of Music, before finally embarking on a 20-plus year career as an elementary school music teacher in the Cowichan Valley.
Deborah has a long history of collaborating with other musicians. Besides her work with Encore! and Sorella, she previously performed as a member of the Pacific Opera Victoria, the women's quartet Obwa, the women's quartet Coru and as a member of the folk trio Jiminy (alongside Gail and Ed Peekeekoot). With the exception of the Pacific Opera Victoria, at one point or another Deborah found herself composing or arranging for all of the aforementioned groups. So, it should come as no surprise that in the future Deborah hopes to see her compositions made available to anyone interested in performing them.
Throughout her career, Deborah spent many years conducting children's choirs - a task that often included directing some of the most elaborate musical theatre productions ever performed in her school district. Yet, despite her many commitments, she still somehow found the time to compose, arrange and perform on her own solo recordings, including an LP, EP and several singles. These compositions, recorded at Zac Cohen’s Woodshop Recording Studio in the Cowichan Valley, are illustrative of yet another aspect of Deborah's diverse musicality. The songs themselves might be best thought of as falling somewhere between Schubert, Gordon Lightfoot and Carole King.
In short, Deborah has composed for children's choirs, orff ensembles, women's quartets, choral groups, folk trios, her own albums and a wide variety of different instrumentation. She is truly an accomplished composer.
Have a listen to a selection of Deborah’s solo recordings on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Deezer or at the at link below:
Check out the YouTube link below to hear a selection of Deborah’s early collaborative work with Obwa!
Deborah, along with the three other members of Obwa (Gail Peekeekoot, Cathy Janakis and Laura Cardriver), contributed their own melodies and ideas to nearly every composition and arrangement they performed. The locally popular group was also a wonderful showcase of their individual vocal talents.