Vol 21 No 2 is now available for your viewing pleasure, and it's a bumper crop, right at the harvest moon. First ever Canadian opera on the Four Seasons Centre main stage gets double coverage with Wende Bartley interviewing Pyramus and Thisbe composer Barbara Monk Feldman and Chris Hoile connecting with director Christopher Alden; Paul Ennis digs into the musical mind of pianist Benjamin Grosvenor, and pianist Eve Egoyan is "On the Record" in conversation with publisher David Perlman ahead of the Oct release concert for her tenth recording. And at the heart of it all the 16th edition of our annual BLUE PAGES directory of presenters profile the season now well and truly under way.
intimate voice make this
intimate voice make this recording’s premise very persuasive. While capable of the softest pianissimos and mellowest hammer strikes, Schiff’s fortepiano still delivers some powerful full-throated chords and he uses this capability masterfully throughout his program. The familiar Moments musicaux D780 and Impromptus D935 take some getting used to but hearing them this way eventually suggests that a smaller performance conception is actually credible and perhaps this is closer to what Schubert had intended. The Sonata in B Major D906, however, is perhaps the most difficult to accept in this sonically smaller way. Too many years of hearing it from large concert grands have left a mark not easily erased. If this project and its argument were in the hands of someone less a pianist and musician than Schiff it would be far less persuasive. But it seems the 1820 Brodmann has become Schiff’s new muse and that he has found a new voice. We are bound to pay attention. Michael Lewin has recorded Debussy’s Préludes Book 1 and Book 2. As separate CDs, Starry Night (Sono Luminus SL 92190) and Beau Soir (Sono Luminus DSL 92175) both add other Debussy works to fill the discs. The set also includes the first recording of a Beau Soir transcribed for piano by Koji Attwood. Anyone undertaking a recording project on this scale has to understand the composer at the most profound level. Brilliant technique is not enough to play through all the Préludes and explore Debussy’s 24 character constructions using his unique keyboard vocabulary. Lewin’s approach seems to be one that allows the music to take all the time it needs to unfold. He never rushes a phrase or resolution but prefers to let it hang until it completes itself as in Des pas sur la neige. By contrast, he drives the Steinway through the impossibly rapid repetitions that Debussy demands in La danse de Puck, Jardins sous la pluie and other similar tracks. Lewin also draws key motifs effortlessly out of Debussy’s familiar pools of swirling harmonies. His performance avoids the pitfall of self-indulgence, so tempting with this repertoire. He never loses himself in the hypnotic but stays in complete control. This gives him the advantage when delivering the rhythmic angularity of La sérénade interrompue and Golliwog’s Cake Walk. Recorded a year apart, the set should be owned together. Each recording also includes a Blu-ray Pure Audio Disc. Italian organist Stefano Molardi has undertaken an ambitious project with Kuhnau Complete Organ Music (Brilliant Classics 95089). The 3-CD set contains all the Sonatas, Preludes, Fugues and a single Toccata. Kuhnau was Bach’s immediate predecessor at the Leipzig Tomaskirche and made a significant impact on the music of his time. The entire project was recorded in the summer of 2014 on two different instruments that might well have been known to Kuhnau. Both built by Gottfried Silbermann, the 1714 cathedral organ in Freiburg and the smaller 1722 organ of the St. Marienkirche in Rötha both show the typically bright mixtures and overtone-rich reeds of the German Baroque. Molardi approaches the Six Biblical Sonatas in a way that exploits their highly programmatic content. Using all the colours and effects available on the Freiburg organ, he retells the numerous Old Testament stories that Kuhnau portrays. As late baroque style goes, there is an amazing freedom of expression in the writing that includes great fantasia-like sweeps as well as rigid fugal architecture. Kuhnau must have had a ball writing these. Even more impressive are the individual Preludes, especially the Prelude in E Minor and the Prelude alla breve in G Major. Both are regal in presentation and use the full scale of their instrument to fill the Freiburg cathedral. Both organs are, of course, trackers and so give us some audible mechanical action noise during soft passages. This a wonderful document for serious organ buffs. TERRY ROBBINS Duo Concertante, the Newfoundland-based duo of violinist Nancy Dahn and pianist Timothy Steeves, have followed up their outstanding set of the complete Beethoven Sonatas with an equally satisfying CD of Double Concertos for Violin, Piano and Orchestra by Felix Mendelssohn and Andrew Paul MacDonald (Marquis Classics MAR 81463). Marc David conducts the Newfoundland Symphony Orchestra, apparently in their recording debut. The Mendelssohn D Minor Concerto is a remarkably assured work written – quite astonishingly – when the composer was only 14 years old. It is performed here in the version with winds and timpani that Mendelssohn added to the original string scoring shortly after the first private performance of the work in 1823. There are clear stylistic links with Mozart and Beethoven, but the grace and lyricism of the mature composer are already in evidence. Dahn and Steeves both display the perfectly judged tone and style that made their Beethoven set such an outstanding success, as well as shining in the virtuosic passages. The MacDonald Double Concerto Op.51 was commissioned by Duo Concertante some 15 years ago after they heard the composer’s Violin Concerto and was premiered with the NSO in 2000. It really is a very attractive and convincing work, essentially in traditional concerto form but cast in a single movement with the three sections separated by cadenzas. The Duo has performed both concertos numerous times since then, and the two works are perfect companions on a really attractive CD. The NSO apparently includes student and community members as well as professionals, but you’d never know it – the playing here is never less than top-notch. The Russian violinist Lydia Mordkovitch, who died last December at the age of 70, lived the second half of her life in Britain and was a founding artist for Chandos Records, for whom she made over 60 recordings. The 2-CD set of British Violin Concertos is one of four re-issues of her recordings that the label released in July as a Lydia Mordkovitch Tribute, and it’s simply stunning (CHAN 241-53). The four concertos are by: Sir Arnold Bax, recorded in 1991 with the London Philharmonic Orchestra; Sir George Dyson, recorded in 1994 with the City of London Sinfonia; Sir Arthur Bliss, recorded in 2006 with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales; and John Veale, recorded in 2000 with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Bryden Thomson conducts the Bax; Richard Hickox the other three works. The concertos by Bax (1938) and Bliss (1955) are exactly what you would expect from two main-stream mid-20th-century English composers in their prime: wonderfully strong, richly melodic works with outstanding idiomatic solo parts and brilliant orchestration. The music of John Veale was completely new to me, which was somewhat puzzling given that I was still living in England when he would have been in his prime; his romantic tonal music, however, had been swept aside by the avant-garde movement in England in the mid-1960s, when the likes of Stockhausen, Boulez and Henze ruled the roost, and there were virtually no performances or broadcasts of his work. As a result Veale wrote nothing for 12 years, and the striking Violin Concerto from 1981-84 marked his return to composition. Certainly his style hadn’t changed: you can hear echoes of his work in the British film industry in the 1940s and 1950s, and also more than a hint of two of his favourite composers, William Walton and – in particular – Samuel Barber. The slow movement is absolutely beautiful. The real gem here, though, is the Dyson, again someone whose orchestral music will be new to most people. It’s a simply glorious four-movement work from 1941: large (44 minutes), expansive, sweeping, lushly orchestrated, and quite symphonic in feel. 62 | Oct 1 - Nov 7, 2015 thewholenote.com
Mordkovitch’s playing is simply sublime, as it is throughout the entire set. If this issue is in any way indicative of Mordkovitch’s contribution to the British music scene then it magnifies the loss – but what a marvellous way to be remembered. It’s a wonderful set, and an absolute must-buy for anyone even remotely interested in 20th-century violin concertos. The new CD by the English violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen and the Welsh pianist Huw Watkins of Works for Violin & Piano by Hahn & Szymanowski (Signum Classics SIGCD432) was a real revelation in two ways: I don’t recall having heard the performers or the works on the disc before. My not knowing Waley-Cohen is the more difficult to explain; she has issued five previous CDs, enjoys a wide-ranging career and has garnered a great deal of critical acclaim. When Ruggiero Ricci calls you “the most exceptionally gifted young violinist I have ever encountered,” you’re clearly headed in the right direction. It’s easy to hear why: her dazzling technical assurance and interpretative subtlety are clear from the outset. You may know the two violin concertos by Karol Szymanowski, but possibly not the Violin Sonata in D Minor, Op.9. It’s a lovely melodic early work in the Romantic vein, written when the composer was 21. I’m not sure what the connection between Szymanowski and Reynaldo Hahn is supposed to be – the booklet notes call it “a somewhat tenuous one,” which is putting it mildly – but it really doesn’t matter when it means that works like the Romance in A Major, the Violin Sonata in C Major and the Nocturne in E-Flat Major are given wider exposure, especially in performances like these. The Sonata in particular is a beautiful work full of French refinement and harmonic subtlety and some particularly lovely piano writing. A terrific performance of Szymanowski’s Nocturne and Tarantella, Op.28 provides a passionate and brilliant end to a CD that features outstanding playing from both performers. Since 2007, incidentally, Waley-Cohen has played the Stradivarius violin previously owned by Lorand Fenyves, so long a fixture at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Music. Concert note: Szymanowski’s Sonata in D Minor Op.9 will be performed by Annette-Barbara Vogel and Durval Cesetti at the Don Wright Faculty of Music at Western University on October 16 and at the Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Music Society on November 4. Romantic Metamorphoses is the second of three CDs the 23-yearold Netherlands-based violist Dana Zemtsov will be recording for the Channel Classics label and features the Dutch pianist Cathelijne Noorland as accompanist (CCS SA 37215). The Sonata in B-Flat Major Op.36 is one of four works that the violinist/composer Henri Vieuxtemps wrote for the viola. It’s a lovely work that clearly shows what Zemtsov calls his lyrical romanticism, and one that eschews virtuosity for its own sake: Vieuxtemps’ pupil Eugène Ysaÿe quoted the composer as saying “Not runs for the sake of runs – sing, sing!” Zemtsov’s big, warm tone and effortless technique certainly enable her playing to sing here. Evgeni Zemtsov’s Melodie im alten Stil for viola and piano has a very special meaning for the soloist: it was written by her grandfather for the young viola player who would become his fiancée, and who would give birth to Dana Zemtsov’s father a year later. It’s a short piece, but simply lovely. The Swiss-American composer Ernest Bloch, who was a pupil of Ysaÿe, has rarely received the attention his compositions merit. His Suite ‘1919’ for viola and piano was written a few years after his first move to the USA in 1916, and won him a Coolidge Prize in 1919. It’s an expansive and fascinating piece with some exotic subtitles for the four movements: In the Jungle: Life in the Primitive World and Grotesques: Simian Stage, for instance. Zemtsov describes it as a “romantically fantasized adventure through savage nature and tribes under the sun in the jungle.” It gives both players ample opportunity to shine. Mention a Carmen Fantasy for violin and orchestra and Sarasate’s composition based on Bizet’s melodies usually comes to mind, but a different one by Franz Waxman has long been a cult favourite with violinists. It’s played here in a Mikhail Kugel arrangement for viola and piano, and provides a spirited end to the CD. While he was on the faculty at Cleveland’s Mannes School of Music from 1917 to 1920 Ernest Bloch taught a number of young American composers, among whom was Quincy Porter. Porter’s String Quartets Nos.5-8 feature on a new CD from Naxos (8.559781), which continues to issue terrific recordings of music that, if not exactly off the beaten track, thrives along the sides of the main musical highways. Quartets Nos.1-4 were issued on Naxos 8.559305 in 2007, to glowing reviews. Porter was a professional string player in the 1920s, and the four works here, written between 1935 and 1950, show just how well he understood the medium: they are idiomatic and immediately accessible, very appealing, strongly tonal and highly expressive. Recorded between 2008 and 2012, the performances by the Ives Quartet are of the highest quality. There’s another beautiful set of Beethoven string quartets available, this time from the Jerusalem Quartet, which is currently celebrating its 20th anniversary. Their main focus for the 2015/16 season is the six quartets of Béla Bartók, which they will be presenting in three different concert formats; one of these will be a four-concert cycle combining the Bartók with the six Beethoven String Quartets Op.18. The new 2-CD set of the Op.18 works on Harmonia Mundi (HMC 902207.08) is the first of two album releases which will mark the ensemble’s anniversary; Bartók’s Quartets Nos.2, 4 and 6 will be released in early 2017. Beethoven came relatively late (he was 30) to the string quartet genre, but you would never know it from the quality of these works – hardly surprising, perhaps, given that he carefully studied the late quartets of both Mozart and Haydn before setting to work. These performances by the Jerusalem Quartet are everything you could wish for and everything you would expect from an ensemble that has been playing together for 20 years. It’s a terrific set. Illuminations is another fascinating CD from Cedille Records, featuring the Avalon String Quartet in works by Debussy, Britten, Osvaldo Golijov and Stacy Garrop (CDR 90000 156). There’s a lovely reading of Debussy’s String Quartet in G Minor Op.10 to start things off, followed by four quite fascinating short pieces by the young Benjamin Britten. The Three Divertimenti (a March, Waltz and Burlesque) were written in 1933 by the 19-year-old composer as part of a projected five-movement suite and are startlingly modern – the March sounds like Dag Wirén meets Bartók. Revised in 1936 under the present title, they remained unplayed during the composer’s lifetime after the initial unsuccessful performance. Alla marcia is in the same vein and from the same period and was originally planned as the opening movement for the suite. Golijov’s evocative and effective Tenebrae from 2000 ends the CD, but the focal point is the String Quartet No.4: Illuminations, the 2011 work by the Chicago-based Garrop that gives the disc its title. It’s a charming piece that is essentially a meditation on five stunning illustrations from the 15th-century Book of Hours known as The Hours of Catherine of Cleves, now in the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York. Eleven short pieces depict the opening of the book, the five illuminations with two interludes, and finally the closing of the book at the end of prayer. The Avalon Quartet has been together for 20 years now, but this is their first recording for the Cedille label. They’re in top form throughout a lovely disc. thewholenote.com Oct 1 - Nov 7, 2015 | 63
Choral Scene: Uncharted territory: three choirs finding paths forward; Music Theatre: Loose Tea on the boil with Alaina Viau’s Dead Reckoning; In with the New: what happens to soundart when climate change meets COVID-19; Call to action: diversity, accountability, and reform in post-secondary jazz studies; 9th Annual TIFF Tips: a filmfest like no other; Remembering: Leon Fleisher; DISCoveries: a NY state of mind; 25th anniversary stroll-through; and more.
Online in flip through here, and on stands commencing Tues SEP 1.
Following the Goldberg trail from Gould to Lang Lang; Measha Brueggergosman and Edwin Huizinga on face to face collaboration in strange times; diggings into dance as FFDN keeps live alive; "Classical unicorn?" - Luke Welch reflects on life as a Black classical pianist; Debashis Sinha's adventures in sound art; choral lessons from Skagit Valley; and the 21st annual WholeNote Blue Pages (part 1 of 3) in print and online. Here now. And, yes, still in print, with distribution starting Thursday October 1.
Alanis Obomsawin's art of life; fifteen Exquisite Departures; UnCovered re(dis)covered; jazz in the kitchen; three takes on managing record releases in times of plague; baroque for babies; presenter directory (blue pages) part two; and, here at the WholeNote, work in progress on four brick walls (or is it five?). All this and more available in flipthrough HERE, and in print Tuesday Nov 3.
In this issue: Beautiful Exceptions, Sing-Alone Messiahs, Livingston’s Vocal Pleasures, Chamber Beethoven, Online Opera (Plexiglass & All), Playlist for the Winter of our Discontent, The Oud & the Fuzz, Who is Alex Trebek? All this and more available in flipthrough HERE, and in print Friday December 4.
July/August issue is now available in flipthrough HERE, bringing to a close 25 seasons of doing what we do (and plan to continue doing), and on stands early in the week of July 5. Not the usual bucolic parade of music in the summer sun, but lots, we hope, to pass the time: links to online and virtual music; a full slate of record reviews; plenty new in the Listening Room; and a full slate of stories – the future of opera, the plight of small venues, the challenge facing orchestras, the barriers to resumption of choral life, the challenges of isolation for real-time music; the steps some festivals are taking to keep the spirit and substance of what they do alive. And intersecting with all of it, responses to the urgent call for anti-racist action and systemic change.
"COVID's Metamorphoses"? "There's Always Time (Until Suddenly There Isn't)"? "The Writing on the Wall"? It's hard to know WHAT to call this latest chapter in the extraordinary story we are all of a sudden characters in. By whatever name we call it, the MAY/JUNE combined issue of The WholeNote is now available, HERE in flip through format, in print commencing Wednesday May 6, and, in fully interactive form, online at thewholenote.com. Our 18th Annual Choral Canary Pages, scheduled for publication in print and flip through in September is already well underway with the first 50 choirs home to roost and more being added every week online. Community Voices, our cover story, brings to you the thoughts of 30 musical community members, all going through what we are going through (and with many more to come as the feature gets amplified online over the course of the coming months). And our regular writers bring their personal thoughts to the mix. Finally, a full-fledged DISCoveries review section offers cues and clues to recorded music for your solitary solace!
After some doubt that we would be allowed to go to press, in respect to wide-ranging Ontario business closures relating to COVID-19, The WholeNote magazine for April 2020 is now on press, and print distribution – modified to respect community-wide closures and the need for appropriate distancing – starts Monday March 30. Meanwhile the full magazine is right here, digitally, so if you value us PLEASE SHARE THIS LINK AS WIDELY AS YOU CAN. It's the safest way for us to reach the widest possible audience at this time!
FEATURED: Music & Health writer Vivien Fellegi explores music, blindness & the plasticity of perception; David Jaeger digs into Gustavo Gimeno's plans for new music in his upcoming first season as music director at TSO; pianist James Rhodes, here for an early March recital, speaks his mind in a Q&A with Paul Ennis; and Lydia Perovic talks music and more with rising Turkish-Canadian mezzo Beste Kalender. Also, among our columns, Peggy Baker Dance Projects headlines Wende Bartley's In with the New; Steve Wallace's Jazz Notes rushes in definitionally where many fear to tread; ... and more.
Visions of 2020! Sampling from back to front for a change: in Rearview Mirror, Robert Harris on the Beethoven he loves (and loves to hate!); Errol Gay, a most musical life remembered; Luna Pearl Woolf in focus in recordings editor David Olds' "Editor's Corner" and in Jenny Parr's preview of "Jacqueline"; Speranza Scappucci explains how not to reinvent Rossini; The Indigo Project, where "each piece of cloth tells a story"; and, leading it all off, Jully Black makes a giant leap in "Caroline, or Change." And as always, much more. Now online in flip-through format here and on stands starting Thurs Jan 30.
Welcome to our December/January issue as we turn the annual calendar page, halfway through our season for the 25th time, juggling as always, secular stuff, the spirit of the season, new year resolve and winter journeys! Why is Mozart's Handel's Messiah's trumpet a trombone? Why when Laurie Anderson offers to fly you to the moon you should take her up on the invitation. Why messing with Winterreisse can (sometimes) be a very good thing! And a bumper crop of record reviews for your reading (and sometimes listening) pleasure. Available in flipthrough here right now, and on stands commencing Thursday Nov 28. See you on the other side!
On the slim chance you might not have already heard the news, Estonian Canadian composing giant Udo Kasemets was born the same year that Leo Thermin invented the theremin --1919. Which means this is the centenary year for both of them, and both are being celebrated in style, as Andrew Timar and MJ Buell respectively explain. And that's just a taste of a bustling November, with enough coverage of music of both the delectably substantial and delightfully silly on hand to satisfy one and all.
Long promised, Vivian Fellegi takes a look at Relaxed Performance practice and how it is bringing concert-going barriers down across the spectrum; Andrew Timar looks at curatorial changes afoot at the Music Gallery; David Jaeger investigates the trumpets of October; the 30th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution (and the 20th Anniversary of our October Blue Pages Presenter profiles) in our Editor's Opener; the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir at 125; Tapestry at 40 and Against the Grain at 10; ringing in the changing season across our features and columns; all this and more, now available in Flip Through format here, and on the stands commencing this coming Friday September 27, 2019. Enjoy.
Vol 1 of our 25th season is now here! And speaking of 25, that's how many films in the upcoming Toronto International Film Festival editor Paul Ennis, in our Eighth Annual TIFF TIPS, has chosen to highlight for their particular musical interest.
Also inside: Rob Harris looks through the Rear View Mirror at past and present prognostications about the imminent death of classical music; Mysterious Barricades and Systemic Barriers are Lydia Perović's preoccupations in Art of Song; Andrew Timar reflects on the evolving priorities of the Polaris Prize; and elsewhere, it's chocks away as yet another season creaks or roars (depending on the beat) into motion. Welcome back.
What a range of stuff! A profile of Liz Upchurch, the COC ensemble studio's vocal mentor extraordinaire; a backgrounder on win-win faith/arts centre partnerships and ways of exploring the possibilities; an interview with St. Petersburg-based Eifman Ballet's Boris Eifman; Ana Sokolovic's violin concert Evta finally coming to town; a Love Letter to YouTube, and much more. Plus our 17th annual Canary Pages Choral directory if all you want to do is sing! sing! sing!
Arraymusic, the Music Gallery and Native Women in the Arts join for a mini-festival celebrating the work of composer, performer and installation artist Raven Chacon; Music and Health looks at the role of Healing Arts Ontario in supporting concerts in care facilities; Kingston-based composer Marjan Mozetich's life and work are celebrated in film; "Forest Bathing" recontextualizes Schumann, Shostakovich and Hindemith; in Judy Loman's hands, the harp can sing; Mahler's Resurrection bursts the bounds of symphonic form; Ed Bickert, guitar master remembered. All this and more in our April issue, now online in flip-through here, and on stands commencing Friday March 29.
Something Old, Something New! The Ide(a)s of March are Upon Us! Rob Harris's Rear View Mirror looks forward to a tonal revival; Tafelmusik expands their chronological envelope in two directions, Esprit makes wave after wave; Pax Christi's new oratorio by Barbara Croall catches the attention of our choral and new music columnists; and summer music education is our special focus, right when warm days are once again possible to imagine. All this and more in our March 2019 edition, available in flipthrough here, and on the stands starting Thursday Feb 28.
In this issue: A prize that brings lustre to its laureates (and a laureate who brings lustre to the prize); Edwin Huizinga on the journey of Opera Atelier's "The Angel Speaks" from Versailles to the ROM; Danny Driver on playing piano in the moment; Remembering Neil Crory (a different kind of genius)' Year of the Boar, Indigeneity and Opera; all this and more in Volume 24 #5. Online in flip through, HERE and on the stands commencing Thursday Jan 31.
When is a trumpet like a motorcycle in a dressage event? How many Brunhilde's does it take to change an Elektra? Just two of the many questions you've been dying to ask, to which you will find answers in a 24th annual combined December/January issue – in which our 11 beat columnists sift through what's on offer in the upcoming holiday month, and what they're already circling in their calendars for 2019. Oh, and features too: a klezmer violinist breathing new life into a very old film; two New Music festivals in January, 200 metres apart; a Music & Health story on the restorative powers of a grassroots exercise in collective music-making; even a good reason to go to Winnipeg in the dead of winter. All this and more in Vol 24 No 4, now available in flipthrough format here.
Reluctant arranger! National Ballet Orchestra percussionist Kris Maddigan on creating the JUNO and BAFTA award-winning smash hit Cuphead video game soundtrack; Evergreen by name and by nature, quintessentially Canadian gamelan (Andrew Timar explains); violinist Angèle Dubeau on 20 years and 60 million streams; two children’s choirs where this month remembrance and living history must intersect. And much more, online in our kiosk now, and on the street commencing Thursday November 1.
Presenters, start your engines! With TIFF and "back-to-work" out of the way, the regular concert season rumbles to life, and, if our Editor's Opener can be trusted, "Seeking Synergies" seems to be the name of the game. Denise Williams' constantly evolving "Walk Together Children" touching down at the Toronto Centre for the Arts; the second annual Festival of Arabic Music and Arts expanding its range; a lesson in Jazz Survival with Steve Wallace; the 150 presenter and performer profiles in our 19th annual Blue Pages directory... this is an issue that is definitely more than the sum of its parts.
In this issue: The WholeNote's 7th Annual TIFF TIPS guide to festival films with musical clout; soprano Erin Wall in conversation with Art of Song columnist Lydia Perovic, about more than the art of song; a summer's worth of recordings reviewed; Toronto Chamber Choir at 50 (is a few close friends all it takes?); and much more, as the 2018/19 season gets under way.
PLANTING NOT PAVING! In this JUNE / JULY /AUGUST combined issue: Farewell interviews with TSO's Peter Oundjian and Stratford Summer Music's John Miller, along with "going places" chats with Luminato's Josephine Ridge, TD Jazz's Josh Grossman and Charm of Finches' Terry Lim. ) Plus a summer's worth of fruitful festival inquiry, in the city and on the road, in a feast of stories and our annual GREEN PAGES summer Directory.
In this issue: our sixteenth annual Choral Canary Pages; coverage of 21C, Estonian Music Week and the 3rd Toronto Bach Festival (three festivals that aren’t waiting for summer!); and features galore: “Final Finales” for Larry Beckwith’s Toronto Masque Theatre and for David Fallis as artistic director of Toronto Consort; four conductors on the challenges of choral conducting; operatic Hockey Noir; violinist Stephen Sitarski’s perspective on addressing depression; remembering bandleader, composer and saxophonist Paul Cram. These and other stories, in our May 2018 edition of the magazine.
In this issue: we talk with jazz pianist Thompson Egbo-Egbo about growing up in Toronto, building a musical career, and being adaptive to change; pianist Eve Egoyan prepares for her upcoming Luminato project and for the next stage in her long-term collaborative relationship with Spanish-German composer Maria de Alvear; jazz violinist Aline Homzy, halfway through preparing for a concert featuring standout women bandleaders, talks about social equity in the world of improvised music; and the local choral community celebrates the life and work of choral conductor Elmer Iseler, 20 years after his passing.
In this issue: Canadian Stage, Tapestry Opera and Vancouver Opera collaborate to take Gogol’s short story The Overcoat to the operatic stage; Montreal-based Sam Shalabi brings his ensemble Land of Kush, and his newest composition, to Toronto; Five Canadian composers, each with a different CBC connection, are nominated for JUNOs; and The WholeNote team presents its annual Summer Music Education Directory, a directory of summer music camps, programs and courses across the province and beyond.
In this issue: composer Nicole Lizée talks about her love for analogue equipment, and the music that “glitching” evokes; Richard Rose, artistic director at the Tarragon Theatre, gives us insights into their a rock-and-roll Hamlet, now entering production; Toronto prepares for a mini-revival of Schoenberg’s music, with three upcoming shows at New Music Concerts; and the local music theatre community remembers and celebrates the life and work of Mi’kmaq playwright and performer Cathy Elliott . These and other stories, in our double-issue December/January edition of the magazine.
In this issue: conversations (of one kind or another) galore! Daniela Nardi on taking the reins at "best-kept secret" venue, 918 Bathurst; composer Jeff Ryan on his "Afghanistan" Requiem for a Generation" partnership with war poet, Susan Steele; lutenist Ben Stein on seventeenth century jazz; collaborative pianist Philip Chiu on going solo; Barbara Hannigan on her upcoming Viennese "Second School" recital at Koerner; Tina Pearson on Pauline Oliveros; and as always a whole lot more!
In this issue: several local artists reflect on the memory of composer Claude Vivier, as they prepare to perform his music; Vancouver gets ready to host international festival ISCM World New Music Days, which is coming to Canada for the second time since its inception in 1923; one of the founders of Artword Artbar, one of Hamilton’s staple music venues, on the eve of the 5th annual Steel City Jazz Festival, muses on keeping urban music venues alive; and a conversation with pianist Benjamin Grosvenor, as he prepares for an ambitious recital in Toronto. These and other stories, in our October 2017 issue of the magazine.
In this issue: a look at why musicians experience stage fright, and how to combat it; an inside look at the second Kensington Market Jazz Festival, which zeros in on one of Toronto’s true ‘music villages’; an in-depth interview with Elisa Citterio, new music director of Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra; and The WholeNote’s guide to TIFF, with suggestions for the 20 most musical films at this year’s festival. These and other stories, in our September 2017 issue of the magazine!
CBC Radio's Lost Horizon; Pinocchio as Po-Mo Operatic Poster Boy; Meet the Curators (Crow, Bernstein, Ridge); a Global Music Orchestra is born; and festivals, festivals, festivals in our 13th annual summer music Green Pages. All this and more in our three-month June-through August summer special issue, now available in flipthrough HERE and on the stands commencing Thursday June 1.
From science fact in "Integral Man: Music and the Movies," to science fiction in the editor's opener; from World Fiddle Day at the Aga Khan Museum to three Canadians at the Cliburn; from wanting to sashay across the 401 to Chamberfest in Montreal to exploring the Continuum of Jumblies Theatre's 20-year commitment to the Community Play (there's a pun in there somewhere!).
In this issue: Our podcast ramps up with interviews in March with fight director Jenny Parr, countertenor Daniel Taylor, and baritone Russell Braun; two views of composer John Beckwith at 90; how music’s connection to memory can assist with the care of patients with Alzheimer’s; musical celebrations in film and jazz, at National Canadian Film Day and Jazz Day; and a preview of Louis Riel, which opens this month at the COC. These and other stories, in our April 2017 issue of the magazine!
On our cover: Owen Pallett's musical palette on display at New Creations. Spring brings thoughts of summer music education! (It's never too late.). For Marc-Andre Hamelin the score is king. Ella at 100 has the tributes happening. All; this and more.
In this issue: an interview with composer/vocalist Jeremy Dutcher, on his upcoming debut album and unique compositional voice; a conversation with Boston Symphony hornist James Sommerville, as as the BSO gets ready to come to his hometown; Stuart Hamilton, fondly remembered; and an inside look at Hugh’s Room, as it enters a complicated chapter in the story of its life in the complex fabric of our musical city. These and other stories, as we celebrate the past and look forward to the rest of 2016/17, the first glimpses of 2017/18, and beyond!
In this issue: a conversation with pianist Stewart Goodyear, in advance of his upcoming show at Koerner Hall; a preview of the annual New Year’s phenomenon that is Bravissimo!/Salute to Vienna; an inside look at music performance in Toronto’s health-care centres; and a reflection on the incredible life and lasting influence of the late Pauline Oliveros. These and more, in a special December/January combined issue!
In this issue: David Jaeger and Alex Pauk’s most memorable R. Murray Schafer collabs, in this month’s installment of Jaeger’s CBC Radio Two: The Living Legacy; an interview with flutist Claire Chase, who brings new music and mindset to Toronto this month; an investigation into the strange coincidence of three simultaneous Mendelssohn Elijahs this Nov 5; and of course, our annual Blue Pages, a who’s who of southern Ontario’s live music scene- a community as prolific and multifaceted as ever. These and more, as we move full-force into the 2016/17 concert season- all aboard!
Music lover's TIFF (our fifth annual guide to the Toronto International Film Festival); Aix Marks the Spot (how Brexit could impact on operatic co-production); The Unstoppable Howard Cable (an affectionate memoir of a late chapter in the life of of a great Canadian arranger; Kensington Jazz Story (the newest kid on the festival block flexes its muscles). These stories and much more as we say a lingering goodbye to summer and turn to the task, for the 22nd season, of covering the live and recorded music that make Southern Ontario tick.
It's combined June/July/August summer issue time with, we hope, enough between the covers to keep you dipping into it all through the coming lazy, hazy days. From Jazz Vans racing round "The Island" delivering pop-up brass breakouts at the roadside, to Bach flute ambushes strolling "The Grove, " to dozens of reasons to stay in the city. May yours be a summer where you find undiscovered musical treasures, and, better still, when, unexpectedly, the music finds you.
INSIDE: The Canaries Are Here! 116 choirs to choose from, so take the plunge! The Nylons hit the road after one last SING! Fling. Jazz writer Steve Wallace wonders "Watts Goode" rather than "what's new?" Paul Ennis has the musical picks of the HotDocs crop. David Jaeger's CBC Radio continues golden for a little while yet. Douglas McNabney is Music's Child. Leipzig meets Damascus in Alison Mackay's fertile imagination. And "C" is for KRONOS in Wende Bartley's koverage of the third annual 21C Festival. All this and as usual much much more. Enjoy.
From 30 camp profiles to spark thoughts of being your summer musical best, to testing LUDWIG as you while away the rest of so-called winter; from Scottish Opera and the Danish Midtvest, to a first Toronto recital appearance by violin superstar Maxim Vengerov; from musings on New Creations and new creation, to the boy who made a habit of crying Beowulf; it's a month of merry meetings and rousing recordings reviewed, all here to discover in The WholeNote.
2016 is off to a flying start! We chronicle the Artful Times of Andrew Burashko, the violistic versatility of Teng Li, the ageless ebullience of jazz pianist Gene DiNovi and the ninetieth birthday of trumpeter Johnny Cowell. Jaeger remembers Boulez; Waxman recalls Bley's influence, and Olds finds Bowie haunting Editor's Corner. Oh, and did we mention there's all that music? Hello (and goodbye) to the February blues, and here's to swinging through the musical vines of the Year of the Monkey.
What's a vinyl renaissance? What happens when Handel's Messiah runs afoul of the rumba rhythm setting on a (gasp!) Hammond organ? What work does Marc-Andre Hamelin say he would be content to have on every recital program he plays? What are Steve Wallace's favourite fifty Christmas recordings? Why is violinist Daniel Hope celebrating Yehudi Menuhin's 100th birthday at Koerner Hall January 28? Answers to all these questions (and a whole lot more) in the Dec/Jan issue of The WholeNote.
"Come" seems to be the verb that knits this month's issue together. Sondra Radvanovsky comes to Koerner, William Norris comes to Tafel as their new GM, opera comes to Canadian Stage; and (a long time coming!) Jane Bunnett's musicianship and mentorship are honoured with the Premier's award for excellence; plus David Jaeger's ongoing series on the golden years of CBC Radio Two, Andrew Timar on hybridity, a bumper crop of record reviews and much much more. Come on in!
Vol 21 No 2 is now available for your viewing pleasure, and it's a bumper crop, right at the harvest moon. First ever Canadian opera on the Four Seasons Centre main stage gets double coverage with Wende Bartley interviewing Pyramus and Thisbe composer Barbara Monk Feldman and Chris Hoile connecting with director Christopher Alden; Paul Ennis digs into the musical mind of pianist Benjamin Grosvenor, and pianist Eve Egoyan is "On the Record" in conversation with publisher David Perlman ahead of the Oct release concert for her tenth recording. And at the heart of it all the 16th edition of our annual BLUE PAGES directory of presenters profile the season now well and truly under way.
Paul Ennis's annual TIFF TIPS (27 festival films of potential particular musical interest); Wu Man, Yo-Yo Ma and Jeffrey Beecher on the Silk Road; David Jaeger on CBC Radio Music in the days it was committed to commissioning; the LISTENING ROOM continues to grow on line; DISCoveries is back, bigger than ever; and Mary Lou Fallis says Trinity-St. Paul's is Just the Spot (especially this coming Sept 25!).
