Volume 29 Issue 6 | June, July & August 2024

CLASSICAL AND BEYOND

CLASSICAL AND BEYOND EARLY MUSIC FELLOWSHIP AND MENTORING: Further Reflections New Brunswick violinist Katya Poplyansky first participated as a fellow in the TSM emerging artist program in the summer of 2018 and returned the following summer. Q. Looking back to the second time you participated in the EAP, what do you appreciate the most about what the program contributed to your artistic growth? A. I loved the challenge and variety of repertoire, as well as the opportunity to work and perform alongside the amazing faculty. As an example, in a few short weeks I was intimately acquainted with the music of Golijov, Brahms, Copland and Shostakovich to name a few. I was so grateful to learn and perform this wonderful repertoire …and understand the importance of balance and hard work. BO HUANG FACEBOOK Q. What would be your advice to incoming fellows on making the most of the opportunity? A. Try to find moments of peace and solace when you can, whether that means taking a walk, reading a book, watching a video, having a tea, anything that brings you calm. These few weeks are so exciting and busy that they can fly by before you know it. Taking a few moments for yourself can help you appreciate the beauty of the music and your colleagues even more. TSM chamber music EAP mentor, cellist Rachel Mercer, is Principal Cello of NACO in Ottawa and Co-Artistic Director of the “5 at the First” Chamber Music Series in Hamilton. Q. One of the unique features of the EAP as a whole is the wide age range of the fellows (from 18-35) — which necessitates a diverse range of musicians at different stages of their expertise. How does that challenge you as a teacher to be able to meet different needs of your students? A. As a life-long learner, I experience the program more like a diverse mix of musicians across the board, and we are united in our shared exploration of the music we are to perform at the end of each session. While I’m the “older” colleague, I feel that every player contributes in their own unique way. You never know where a moment of insight, inspiration or clarity will come from, even in works that some of us may have played many many times! Q. With students coming from different backgrounds of learning and stages of their musicianship, how do you go about setting a somewhat uniform goal/benchmark for these students upon completion of the program? A. The opportunity for the performance at the end of each week is definitely the immediate goal and the fact that these groups can perform some of the most complex and significant works in the chamber music repertoire in such a short time is a testament to the artistic level of the program and its director, Jonathan Crow. But every group and piece is different, and with each I endeavour to create a positive atmosphere and cultivate good will. Compiled and edited by Michael Zarathus-Cook Michael Zarathus-Cook is Editor-in-Chief of CANNOPY a visual and performing arts magazine. The interviews quoted here are from coverage of TSM in the Hubs & Huddles series presented by CANNOPY. Access the full story by visiting substack.com/@cannopy and subscribing to Hubs & Huddles. Purcell was “modern” and so is this production Les Arts Florissants’ Fairy Queen BY STEPHANIE CONN William Christie and Les Arts Florissants are synonymous with skillful, sumptuous playing. On July 11, in the opening performance of this year’s Toronto Summer Music festival, audiences here will have a rare chance to hear them as they present one of Henry Purcell’s delightful semioperas, The Fairy Queen. It’s part of an international tour that began last summer, and which takes this 17th-century work to a new level. This production marks a creative revisiting of this music by Christie and his ensemble some 35 years after they first recorded it (1989). That album was instrumental in cementing Christie’s place as a leader in historically-informed performance. But Christie has said that in his half-century of interpreting The Fairy Queen this production is the most unique: the orchestra of Les Arts Florissants is joined by dancers 28 | June, July & August, 2024 thewholenote.com

A MIRACLE The Fairy Queen, coming to Toronto Summer Music, pictured here in the Chaconne: “They shall be as happy as they are Fair.” At Festival Dans les Jardins de William Christie. J GAZEAU from Companie Käfig, directed by French-Algerian hip-hop choreographer Mourad Merzouki, and the singers are graduates of Les Jardins des Voix, a training program run by Les Arts Florissants and its co-directors, Christie and singer/conductor Paul Agnew. The chorus singers are also called on to move and dance along with Merzouki’s dancers… and to prove that hip-hop works well with 17th-century art music. As Agnew has mentioned, Purcell was very modern in his own time, so why should current interpretations not push boundaries, too? Purcell’s best-known work is probably the opera Dido and Aeneas. The Fairy Queen, however, is a semi-opera loosely related to Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and designed to be performed alongside it as a series of tableaux or “masques.” These provided entertainment in between acts of the play, and featured a similarly magical cast of characters and situations in the woods on a midsummer nIght. Although Purcell is one of England’s great and beloved composers, the music of The Fairy Queen is very French in style at times. There are a few reasons for this: one of the main ones being King Charles II’s love of French music, by Lully and his contemporaries. Charles II even went as far as to establish his own “24 Violins of the King”— not to be outdone by his cousin Louis XIV’s Vingt-quatre violons du Roi. Purcell however earns his honorary title of Orpheus Britannicus because of his deft and playful setting of English texts – in this work such memorable pieces as One Charming Night, the Drunken Poet scene with its broad humour, and beautiful instrumental movements including the joyous Chaconne which draws it to a close. The Fairy Queen deserves to be more popular and more performed. The maturity and beauty of this music makes all the more tragic the fact that Purcell died at age 35, just three years after it was first performed. As Paul Agnew has said about the challenges of directing this work, “It’s charming, beautiful, funny, touching, magnificent music – and if you can communicate a little bit of the love for Purcell’s music then people should be very touched.” Stephanie Conn is an ethnomusicologist, editor, and former producer for CBC Radio Music. With the ensemble Puirt a Baroque she sang on the 1999 Juno-nominated recording Return of the Wanderer, and has sung with Tafelmusik, La Chapelle de Québec, Aradia, and Sine Nomine. In Cape Breton she is active as a traditional Gaelic singer and piano accompanist. You can find her podcast at meezstephanie.substack.com/ (also on Spotify or YouTube). ACIS AND GALATEA G.F. HANDEL Oct 24–27, 2024 | Elgin Theatre Full of sensuality, vivacity and humour, Handel’s Acis and Galatea is one of the composer’s most beloved operas. DAVID AND JONATHAN M.A. CHARPENTIER Apr 9–13, 2025 | Koerner Hall THE OPERA EVENT OF THE YEAR! Charpentier’s greatest masterpiece, never before staged in Canada. SUBSCRIPTIONS ON SALE NOW! operaatelier.com thewholenote.com June, July & August, 2024 | 29