James Ehnes may be soaking up the sun in his adopted hometown of Bradenton, Florida, but the 32-year-old Brandon, Manitoba–born violinist hasn’t forgotten Canada. After all, his native country has been good to him: five Juno Awards, an honorary doctorate from Brandon University, and a fellowship in the Royal Society of Canada.

Vancouverites feel a particular affinity with the former prodigy; it was our own Vancouver Symphony Orchestra that accompanied him on his Grammy-and-Juno-winning 2006 CD of violin concertos by Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Samuel Barber, and William Walton. The love evidently flows both ways.

“It’s always great working with Bramwell [Tovey, the VSO’s music director],” the amiable Ehnes tells the Straight in a call from his home. “I’ve known Bramwell for a very long time—he’s probably one of the most important musical influences in my life. I started working with him when he first came to Canada and was music director in Winnipeg.”¦We’ve worked a lot together over the years, and it was always something that I wanted to do: a recording with Bramwell. So it was a great process. The orchestra really played so well.”

The fact that this acclaimed recording is on the CBC Records label begs the question: what does Ehnes make of all the changes to CBC Radio 2, which include the dismantling of the 70-year-old CBC Radio Orchestra?

“There have been a lot of movements in lots of departments of the CBC away from support of classical music, and of course I can’t help but take this extremely personally,” says the normally mild-mannered performer, his voice rising. “The CBC Radio Orchestra—that’s an orchestra that I’ve played with a number of times over the years.”¦I’m not happy about the situation.”¦Where I grew up, the only opportunity to hear classical music was CBC. And they seem to be quite proud of saying ”˜We’re retaining classical programming from 10 [a.m.] to 3 [p.m.] on weekdays.’ But that’s when I was in school. I heard so much great music before school and after school.”¦If classical music is gone [from the CBC] or kept in those hours, then that’s it. You’re cutting off a form of music, a form of education, to almost the entire country.”

The speech hints at the sensitivity and passion Ehnes will bring to the Vancouver Academy of Music stage from Tuesday to Friday (April 15 to 18), for a series of morning performances that will include Jean-Marie Leclair’s Sonata Op. 9, No. 3, Béla Bartók’s Rhapsody No. 2, and Richard Strauss’s Violin Sonata Op. 18, accompanied by pianist Andrew Armstrong.

If the program sounds a bit disjointed, it’s because Ehnes wanted it that way. “I like my recital programs to be very varied,” he explains, pulling himself together and adding, with quintessentially Canadian modesty: “They’re just three pieces I enjoy a lot that show off different aspects of the violin, and that, to me, set a nice mood for the rest of the day.”