And back to RTHI love the way that season launches and pressconferences have morphed over the years we’ve beendoing this stuff. Ten years ago a TSO season launchwould have attracted 30 TSO staffers, about the samenumber of sponsors, and maybe 15 ink-stainedwretches from media, mainstream and otherwise.Someone from the TSO would have introduced somekey sponsor who would have read a quick speechand then the music director would have tried tosound spontaneous as he made his way through themedia package that was going to be handed out atthe end of the launch anyway, so no real need to takenotes or listen.It’s sure not that way any more! For one thing,there were well over 250 people at this launch, mostof them TSO subscribers, seduced by an occasionoffering genuinely witty and off-the-cuff stuff fromthe music director, interspersed with four or fivewell-produced little video greetings from the comingseason’s luminaries, and an opportunity right afterthe launch to sit in on a TSO rehearsal in the hall. Infact there were so many people there enjoying theevent that you could hardly see that the number ofmedia types in attendance these days is far-and-awayless healthy than, say, the number of pigeons on theplatform at Bathurst subway station.As for the details of the season announced lastWednesday, stay tuned over the next month or so.There’s a lovely lot to talk about, and Peter Oundjian,the TSO music director, has promised us a visit,probably at the beginning of March, during theirNew Creations Festival, to talk about it all. “Hardto believe it’s already ten years since he came onthe scene” you hear some say. “Hard to believe it’sonly ten years” you hear from others; testament, Isuppose to the fact that he wears the role with allthe comfort of an old pair of slippers and all theenjoyment of a kid with a brand new toy.And what of the endangered few?That’s what I found myself wondering leavingRTH that particular frosty morning. And by “thefew” I don’t mean the pigeons or the loiterers,but us. The arts media. When in all the time I havebeen doing this, I found myself wondering, have Iever felt more mainstream leaving a TSO launch?In other words, when has the main stream ofarts coverage in the city’s media been so dried upand shrunken that The WholeNote’s presence orabsence at an event like this would even be noticedor commented upon?Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong withhaving one’s contribution to the cause noted. Butit’s unnerving to realize that one is standing out ina crowd because the crowd is dwindling.Among the biggest talking points at the TSOlaunch that day was that one of the city’s best andtruest voices on the musical arts scene might bethinking of winding up his blog, leaving us all witha far less musical Toronto.Nah, I say, if Grieg and the hawks can keep thepigeons and loiterers hanging around to listen atBathurst Station, there’s hope for reinvention yet.publisher@thewholenote.comINDEX OF ADVERTISERSAcademy Concert Series 38Andrea Warren 49Annex Singers 35Art of Time Ensemble 18Associates of the TSO 16, 32,40ATMA 5Aurora Cultural Centre 15Beaches Presbyterian Church34Canadian Opera Company 21Canadian Sinfonietta 31, 38Capella Intima / TorontoContinuo Collective 36, 41Chamber Music Society ofMississauga 36Christ Church Deer Park JazzVespers 25Civic Light Opera Co 32Cosmo Music 27Etobicoke PhilharmonicOrchestra 35Gallery 345 29Hannaford Street Silver Band31Heliconian Hall 46Jeffrey Concerts 42Jubilate Singers 35Kindred Spirits Orchestra 33Ladom Ensemble 33Liz Parker 48Long & McQuade 26Markham Concert Band 39Mississauga Symphony 30Moeller Organs 48Mooredale Concerts 36Music at Metropolitan - Noonat Met 30Music Toronto 9, 32, 37Musicians in Ordinary 33Nagata Shachu 25Nancy Sicsic 48Nathaniel Dett Chorale 12, 34Neapolitan Connection 47New Music Concerts 17, 40Norm Pulker 48NYCO 16Opera York 37Orpheus Choir 39Pasquale Bros 46Peter Mahon 14Reaching Out Through Music31Roy Thomson Hall 3Royal Conservatory 4, 22, 47Sheila McCoy 48Silverthorn Symphonic Winds36Sine Nomine 35Sinfonia Toronto 39St. Philip’s Anglican Church26Steinway Piano Gallery 7Steve Jackson Pianos 24Syrinx 15, 39Tafelmusik 2, 35, 41Tafelmusik Baroque SummerInstitute 46Tallis Choir 38The Sound Post 23Timothy Eaton MemorialChurch 33Toronto Chamber Choir 40Toronto City Opera 32Toronto Classical Singers 40Toronto Consort 19, 38Toronto Mendelssohn Choir13Toronto Symphony 29, 63, 64TorontoSinfonietta 36U of T Faculty of Music 11Victoria Scholars 40Visual and Performing ArtsNewmarket 39VOICEBOX - Opera in Concert23Windermere String Quartet34Women’s Musical Club ofToronto 37Wychwood Clarinet Choir 40thewholenote.com February 1, 2014 - March 7, 2014 | 7
