INTRODUCTION TO OUR
INTRODUCTION TO OUR SUMMER MUSIC FESTIVAL GUIDE Welcome to the "green pages", WholeNote's annual summer music festival guide in our June issue. "Let your fingers do the hopping" this summer and use our gµide to choose which festivals to jump around to. This is your one-stop resource. It includes: a 4-page, I 02-festival chart listing information (and websites) for each summer festival; profiles, in their own words, of 17 diverse festivals; detailed concert listings for festivals taking place between June I and July 7; and several short feature articles to whet your appetite. There is also summer festival coverage in the other parts of the magazine this month, including our cover stories, mention of festivals in many of our regular columns, and advertising throughout. dates refers to a festival that has concerts intermittently between the listed dates, for example once a week or only on weekends. Summer music festivals offer a wonderful opportunity to hear extraordinary music in out-of-the-ordinary settings: barns, like Westben, Grand River and Elora; the open air, like Lanaudiere; outdoors in the city, such as the Downtown and Uptown Toronto Jazz Festivals, and Baroque Montreal. We hope these green pages will help you take advantage of the summer's bounty! Hop to it! A glorious summer awaits! Catherine Muir A word about "A la Carte" -our festival chart, commencing on page G4. It covers festivals in Canada, mainly in Ontario and Quebec but also major festivals in other provinces. It includes mainly classical, jazz, and world music festivals, but we also incorporated folk, blues, celtic festivals and more. Festivals are listed alphabetically within each region. The Ontario region, because it is our home base, is divided into four zones, as you can see from the adjacent map - southwest, central, east, and north. One of the four zone numbers on the map appears next to the name of each Ontario festival in the chart. This way you can use the zones for deciding which festivals to get sidetracked by along the way if you are planning a trip to a certain part of Ontario this summer! We're aware that alphabetical listings are not as helpful as dates when planning a musical excursion. So we've also included, below, a list of festivals by starting date. Note that a dash(-) between the dates refers to a festival that is inclusive of those days and an ellipsis( ...) between the May 25 ... Jun 1 B Montreal Chamber Music Festival, PO Jun 02- Jun 05 Orangeville Blues and Jazz Festival. ON Jun 03-Jun 05 Muhtadi International Drurrrning Festival, ON Jun 03-Jun 12 Northern Voices Choral Festival, ON Jun 05 ... Jun 19 Music in the Orchard, ON Jun 10-Jun 19 Barrie Jazz and Blues Festival, ON Jun 10-Jun 12 Brass in the Grass, ON Jun 12 Hamilton International Tattoo, ON Jun14 ... Jun 18 The Enbridge Mozart Effect, AB Jun 17 .•. Aug 12 Banff Summer Arts Festival. AB Jun 17-Jun 19 Barbados on the Water, ON Jun 17 ... Aug 12 Collingwood Music Festival, ON Jun 17-Jun 19 Markham Village Music Festival ON Jun 17 ... Sep 25 Music at Sharon, ON Jun 17- Jun 19 Taste of Little Italy, ON Jun 18 Brampton Folk Festival, ON Jun 18 Up Town Country Festival, ON Jun 23- Jun 26 Montreal Baroque Festival PO Jun 23-Jul 03 Ottawa International Jazz Festival, ON Jun 24-Jun 26 Grand River Baroque Festival, ON Jun 24-Jul 03 TD Canada Trust Toronto Downtown Jazz Festival. ON Jun 24-Jun 26 Tottenham Bluegrass Festival, ON Jun 25 ... Aug 27 Dumaine Forget International Festival, PO Ju.n 25- Jui 03 Festival de Musique Anglaise, PO Jun 26 ... Jui 31 Festival Alexandria, ON Jun 26 ... Sep 18 Summer Music in the Garden, ON Jun 29 ... Jui 27 Festival Mozart Plus, PO Jun 29- Jui 06 Waterloo Viola Camp Concerts, ON Jun 30- Jui 10 Montreal Jazz Festival, PO Jui 01 ... Aug 18 Brott Summer Music Festival, ON Jui 01-'" Jui 03 Extravaganza! A Feast for the Senses, ON Jui 01 ... Sep OS Unionville Surrvner Concert Series, ON, Jui 02-Jul 24 Huntsville Festival of the Arts, ON, Jui 02-Aug 01 Westben ·Concerts at The Barn, !r
merry MEETINGS Ill Olivier Fortin: Continuo motion E-mail interview by Masha Buell Hello Olivier! Where are you now? And what does _vour summer look like? Thanks for your email! I'm on the road in northern Ontario, but I am happy to let you know what my "crazy" schedule will be in the next few months! May 23rd: a three-harpsichord concert with Skip Sempe and Pierre Hanta"i in Brest, France; June 3-10: teaching at the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute; June 22-29: concerts - Montreal Baroque Festival and Demaine Forget; July 10: concert in St-Michel-en-Thierarche (France) with Capriccio Stravagante; July 16: concert in Madrid (Spain) with Capriccio Strav\l gante; July 28-31: 4 concens at Stratford Summer Music Festival with Masques Ensemble and soprano Cassie Webster; August 2- 4: Christma recording in Montreal with Masques for Analekta: August 13- 22: US tour with Tafelmusik; August 31- September 5: Germany (lrsee) with Tafelmusik. I think that's most of it. Have to find some time to practice here and there and also enjoy the sun! Home is ... '! Home is Montreal, in our beautiful Little Italy area. But my partner lives in Paris, where I spend lots of time during the year, especially in summer. Who are you expecting to encounter over the sw11111er? In Europe I'll be working with Skip Sempe's ensemble, Capriccio Stravagante. It's more or less always the same people, some of whom l met when I studied in Amsterdam 6 years ago. I also work with a fantastic young ensemble, Opera Quarta, which specializes in trio sonata repertoire. They are based in London/Amsterdam. The first violinist of this ensemble, Sophie Gent, also workS-with my Montreal ensemble, Masques: I work with Sophie on both sides of the Atlantic. The Christmas ' co and the Stratford concert, Masques with Cassie Webster. will include musicians I work with in Toronto, like violinist Genevieve Gilardeau (we made our "debut" together more than 10 · years ago), luthenist Lucas Harris, and violinist Aisslinn Nosky. I also work with Aisslinn occasionally and her ensemble I Furiosi. Compare s11111111er to the rest of the year? Summer is a great time for musicians. For those like me who teach- I teach in Quebec's Conservatory of Music - it's a time you don't have to worry about being home every week or so for your students. I don't want co be misunderstood - I love teaching! But in the summer so many great festivals happen all around and we get fantastic opportunities to travel. I play 70 percent of my conceits during the summer season. The best thing is that you get to know people over the years and then you keep working with the ones you like the most, wherever they live! How is it. travelling as a harpsichordist? Sometimes you have great surprises, like sometimes an instrument that can barely be called a harpsichord. You usually don't have time to explore the instrument and anyways, in the case of a bad instrument, it is better not to fight with it for too long .... You take a deep breath and make the best you can out of it. I am very, very difficult with the choice of instruments and sometimes I get quite unhappy. And tuning- tuning is just part of the job. All this is pan of a harpsichordist's life: if you travel, you have to accept it. So what· your idea of a hot iday? One great thing is that I sometimes use the opportunity of summer concerts to stay where work brings me. For instance, after the concert that I have in Madrid this summer, I will probably go for a few days in the Sevilla region and enjoy a few days off. )UNE 1 - )ULY 7 2005
