2. Oscar Peterson Plaque - 21-23 Park Road

This house at 21 and 23 Park Road was the site of the Advanced School of Contemporary Music set up by legendary Canadian jazz musician Oscar Peterson along with fellow jazz stars Ray Brown and Phil Nimmons. Formerly a boarding house, the school opened here in the 1960s after starting out in Peterson’s Scarborough basement. Though Toronto did not have a reputation as being a hot spot at the time, it was home to quite a few jazz players, some surely helped by their work at the school, and many of the big jazz acts would stop in the city when touring.

Next door to the Peterson house is Asquith Green, a small park that includes a narrative sculpture by artist John McEwan called Patterns for the Tree of Life. Installed in 1989, it has three parts. Atop a terrace there is a postmodern frame of an old one-storey Ontario house, an homage to the kind typically found all over the province and relics of pioneer days. Two howling wolf silhouettes are below on the green, as well as a small deer. Take a close look at the black iron fencing atop a small mound as it includes two inscriptions that read, “In the faces of our Children / In the sounds of our voices”.