Thoughts on a STAY-HOME
Thoughts on a STAY-HOME musical summer DAVID PERLMAN When we talk about a “stay-home” musical summer, we’re not recommending you hunker down in your domestic cocoon (home or cottage, air-conditioned or otherwise) and wait for music to come to you already digitized. Quite the opposite is what we’re proposing. This year in particular, maybe we should all apply the same criteria for how we choose our live music as we do when buying our groceries. So for our current “buy local” purposes, “home” means Ontario. The next few pages that follow offer a healthy sample of choices that we hope will stimulate your appetite. Summer music in Ontario offers new music in the familiar places, and familiar music in new places. Either way these are fresh opportunities to hear and see, and to support our local cultural community and economy while doing so. Bon appetit! GREEN PAGES Aqua Nibii Waawaaskone 1. Fruitful juxtapositions: Aqua’s Red Rhythm and Blues at Guild Park and Gardens Oddly juxtaposed symbols influence audiences to have new perspectives by challenging their habits of thinking. —Kenneth Burke A perfect example of what literary theorist Kenneth Burke called “perspectives by incongruity” was a recent announcement by Guild Festival Theatre that their 14th summer will commence July 3 with a special concert: Aqua’s Red Rhythm & Blues - “an innovative musical ensemble that fuses traditional Indigenous sounds with contemporary blues, creating a unique genre known as IndigiBlues - bringing stories of Indigenous hope and resilience to the Greek Theatre through music and dance.” Aqua’s Red Rhythm & Blues is led by Aqua Nibii Waawaaskone, a Métis artist of mixed Anishinaabe, Irish, and French ancestry, GILLIAN MAPP WELCOME TO THE WHOLENOTE’S 21ST ANNUAL GREEN PAGES GUIDE TO SUMMER MUSIC! Nineteen music festivals and summer concert series are here to let you know what they’re up to, in their own words. There’s music for everyone: from classical to jazz; opera and music theatre; and increasingly -- music that combines or disregards entirely “genrefication.” The profiles here in print are only what we had received by the time we went to press: a dynamic snapshot in miniature of Ontario’s rich, diverse, and much much larger summer music scene. Visit our Green Pages online at thewholenote.com for new profiles which we’ll post as they come in. NOT TOO LATE! For information on how to submit a festival profile please contact members@thewholenote.com 2025 Green Pages Team PROJECT MANAGER: Kevin Harris PROJECT EDITOR: Danial Jazieri LAYOUT & DESIGN: Susan Sinclair DIGITAL EDITOR / WEBSITE: Kevin King BEACHES JAZZ FESTIVAL JULY 4 TO 27, 2025 Beaches & Leslieville neighbourhoods, Toronto, ON Celebrating its 37th year, the Beaches International Jazz Festival is a month-long music festival held each year in the lakeside Beaches community of Toronto, with stage concerts held in several different parks and also along a two kilometre stretch of the Beach mainstreet - Queen Street East. It’s now one of Canada’s largest free jazz festivals with nearly 1,000,000 attendees, throughout its month-long span. lidojazz@hotmail.com www.beachesjazz.com www.facebook.com/beachesjazz www.instagram.com/beachesjazzfestival 14 | July & August 2025 thewholenote.com
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