Ernest Seitz

Canadian composer, songwriter, pianist, and music educator (29 February 1892 – 10 September 1978). He published some of his work under the pseudonym "Raymond Roberts" because he did not wish to be associated with popular music. His most famous work is The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise, which he co-wrote with Eugene Lockhart. Some of his other notable songs include Laddie Boy (1932), When Moonbeams Softly Fall (1935), and The Sky's the Limit (1943). Seitz was active as a concert pianist from 1914 through 1945, being most active during the 1920s and 1930s. He made a total of 18 appearances with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra at Massey Hall during his career, performing major works by such composers as Sergei Bortkiewicz, Frédéric Chopin, Anton Rubinstein, and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. He retired from performance in 1945 and from teaching in 1946. For the rest of his life he served as president his of family's business, an automobile dealership in Toronto. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in London in 1954 and in 1984 Ernest Seitz Park was opened in Toronto.