CITYCarol SIngSaturday, december 6, 2:00 pmWith gord Martineau, Deborah Hay,Ted Dykstra, choirs, brass.an annual benefit for the Daily Bread/Churches-on-the-Hill Food BanksCarolS BYCanDlelIgHTSunday, december 14, 4:30pma traditional candlelight choralpresentation featuring choirs andmusicians of Yorkminster Park.nIne leSSonS& CarolSSunday, december 21, 4:30pmFollowing the historic tradition ofKing’s College in Cambridge.FREE ADMISSIONDoors open at 3:30pm.Child care for children 5 years and under.Bossin and Hammond are two of the most skilled songwriters tocome out of the first wave of the Canadian modern folk music movement.Bossin writes in a deliberately political and historical manner,taking politics and cultural issues as subjects for his clever andamusing songs. Hammond’s work is more introspective, mining herfamily history, in particular her mixed French and English background,for truths found amidst the conflicts and encounters that arepart of the Canadian experience. Hammond is based in Toronto, butBossin now lives on the West Coast, and any chance to see these twofolk legends perform together is not to be missed.A Grand “Midsummer”: Looking ahead to the new year, onJanuary 16 and 17 the Grand Philharmonic Choir Female Chorusjoins the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestra for “A MidsummerNight’s Dream,” a concert title which in January is going to seemeither like wishful thinking or rubbing it in. But the music selectionis excellent: Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music; Mendelssohn’sfamous incidental music for the above play and selections fromPurcell’s The Fairy Queen. Purcell never set Shakespeare’s poetry,but The Fairy Queen has great moments of humour, pathos and thecomposer’s peerless text settings.Tafelmusik Orchestra and Chamber Choir present a Beethovendouble bill from January 22 to 25. The orchestra plays Beethoven’sFifth Symphony, and then are joined by the choir for his Mass in C.Guest conducting is the Montreal Symphony Orchestra’s Kent Nagano.Both pieces were written in the first decade of the 19th century.The Mass in C was composed for the Austrian ruler Prince NikolausEsterházy II in 1807, and has the classical structure of liturgical workscomposed by Mozart and Haydn under similar conditions and royalpatronage. At the premiere there was a scene – the prince was notsufficiently appreciative of the piece, perhaps -- and Beethoven leftthe concert venue in a fury, a breach of royal protocol that would havebeen unthinkable, and professionally fatal, to the older composersmentioned above. Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony captures unforgettablythe spirit that led the composer to assert his humanity and freedomagainst the patronage system to which most European composers hadbeen forced to submit for centuries.Benjamin Stein is a Toronto tenor and lutenist. Hecan be contacted at choralscene@thewholenote.com. Visit his website at benjaminstein.ca.PETER MAHONSales Representative416-322-8000pmahon@trebnet.comwww.petermahon.comYorkminster Park Baptist Church1585 Yonge St., (1 block north of St. Clair Ave.(416) 922-1167 | yorkminsterpark.com28 | December 1 2014 - February 7, 2015 thewholenote.com
Beat by Beat | Early MusicFirst Rate,Serious Stuff!DAVID PODGORSKIIn deference to holiday tradition, I’ll mention the Messiahs first:Tafelmusik’s sing-along Messiah will be at Roy Thomson Hall at2pm on December 21 this year, while Aradia’s Dublin Messiah willhappen on the December20 at 7:30 at St. Anne’s Anglican Church.These are the only two Messiahs in Toronto I think you need to see. Ifa Messiah was all you were planning on catching over the holidays,please turn the page!Right. Now if you’re serious about music, and you want to findsome first-rate medieval, Renaissance, and baroque music this holidayseason, or if you’re just looking for an antidote to every saccharineChristmas carol you’ve been subjected to in every shopping mallyou’ve been to since the beginning of November, keep reading.You certainly might find something new in the Toronto Consort’sChristmas concert, “The Little Barley-Corne,” a program of Yuletidehits from Renaissance Europe. This program is based on the Consort’sfifth album of the same name, which although, or indeed perhapsbecause, it included very few tunes that were immediately recognizableas traditional Christmas carols, was a breakthrough hit forthe Consort, and quickly established them as a Toronto-based earlymusic group that deserved to be taken seriously. It will certainly bea special treat to revisit this seminal album again after 15 years. TheToronto Consort performs The Little Barley-Corne December 12 to 14at Trinity-St. Paul’s Centre.Caprice: Another early music group that deserves our attention isEnsemble CapriceMontreal’s Ensemble Caprice, a recorder-based baroque ensemble thatquickly gained recognition on the Montreal scene for their free, and attimes bizarre, interpretations of Telemann and Vivaldi. This group cantypically be trusted to blow the roof off the concert hall. Caprice willbe coming to Ontario to present their Christmas program “BaroqueChristmas Around the World,” which features Arcangelo Corelli’sChristmas Concerto, some 17th-century South American songs, traditionalcarols and music by J. S. Bach and Handel. It also has thepotential to be more subdued than a typical Caprice concert – a roofraisingChristmas concert being somewhat blasphemous in the eyes ofthe concertgoing public – but I can guarantee the group will performwith panache. This all takes place at the Port Hope United Church inPort Hope December 12 at 7:30pm and in Barrie December 14 at GraceUnited Church on December 14 at 2:30pm.Poculi Ludique: If you’re looking for something completely outthere as an alternative to Christmas carols and the Messiah, or ifyou’re just something of a medievalist, consider checking out thisgroup of medieval-revival performers and musicians: the PoculiLudique Societas (or the “Cup and Game Society”). This group will beperforming selections from the York Mystery Plays on December 13BILL BLACKSTONEthewholenote.com December 1 2014 - February 7, 2015 | 29
