Today’s concert at the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre as part of the Canadian Opera Company’s noon-hour series was a special program titled “Remembering Kristallnacht”,  presented in partnership with the German Consulate of Toronto and the Neuberger’s 2018 Holocaust Education Week.

It’s the season for remembrances. November 11th happens to be the centennial of the Armistice ending the First World War. And it’s Holocaust Education Week. Today is also the 80th anniversary of Kristallnacht, a collective explosion of violence often understood as the beginning of the Holocaust in Germany.

Violinist Atis Bankas

I remember meeting Atis Bankas in the early 1980s (no way he’d remember me), a new arrival proudly introduced to me at the Lithuanian House by my father-in-law Walter Dresher as a brilliant young violinist.

Today I had a reminder of that brilliance in his collaboration with pianist Constanze Beckmann.

Bankas introduced six segments to us, explaining connections:

• Connections to Lithuania
• Connections to the Holocaust
• Connections making the program especially personal

Pianist Constanze Beckmann 

Some of those links were relatively obvious ones, such as Ravel’s “Kaddish” to open. But one of the keys to the event were these explanations from Bankas, who brings not just his virtuosity but the history, the sense of the ways in which all these composers were inter-connected. In his gentle explanations we were party to a kind of act of remembrance as moving as anything we’d see or hear on November 11th. Culture is so much more than just the famous texts or the performances, but the web of relationships alluded to in Bankas’ explanations, and the fond hopes of these artists seeking to escape a murderous time.

Edwin Geist had tried to escape Germany, and his choice to go to Lithuania seemed like a good choice: but no, it was not far enough, as it turned out.

Polish born Szymon Laks lived for a time in Auschwitz but was somehow able to survive, passing away in the 1980s at a ripe age.

Leo Smit finished his sonata for flute & piano in February 1943, but by April had been deported & murdered. Bankas arranged this intriguing work for violin instead.

Yes we heard stories, but also marvelous music-making. In the latter part of the concert, particularly Joseph Yulyevich Achron’s “Hebrew Melody”, Bankas unleashed the most impressive display of lightning fast passage- work, but always soulful and idiomatic, and sometimes super-soft even while going so quickly. Beckmann was every bit his equal, supportive and strong but always balanced with the violin. The regular eye contact between the players was a big part of the event, and a pleasure to watch.

It was great to see a big enthusiastic crowd at the event including our host COC artistic director Alexander Neef.

I am grateful for the gift of a new voice, a new composer introduced to me by Tafelmusik, Ivars Taurins, and Krisztina Szabo. It’s truly a magical thing.

I was pondering the experience of classical music, how so much of what we’re doing is really listening to familiar melodies, whether they’re Beethoven or Puccini or Handel. We live in a kind of golden age, when music is so ubiquitous, so available through various media, that you can find just about anything: and usually for free. So much of what we’re doing when we attend a classical concert is a bit like listening to oldies, melodies we know backwards, rather than anything strange or unfamiliar.

It’s a remarkable thing to encounter something new.

That’s the miracle of this week’s programme at Tafelmusik, titled “Steffani: Drama & Devotion”. There’s so much to this composer,  Agostino Steffani, (1654-1728) that they gave two radically different halves that correspond to the parts of the title. In the first half we heard two Christian texts in Steffani’s settings, namely Beatus vir from relatively early in his career followed by his Stabat Mater, a mature masterpiece. That was the “devotion” part, for which soloist Krisztina Szabo wore a beautiful but relatively sombre gown. Tafelmusik Orchestra & chorus were superb throughout.

In the second half, containing a series of operatic pieces, Szabo was in a stunning fuchsia gown, certainly portending drama.

Mezzo-soprano Krisztina Szabo (photo: Bo Huang)

While she will sing the Messiah later this year for Tafelmusik, Szabo is someone who is known for taking on the new and the adventurous. She sang alongside Barbara Hannigan in the world premiere production of Lessons in Love and Violence by George Benjamin (I think it was earlier this year). We have seen her in such edgy pieces as Pyramus & Thisbe, Erwartung and Harawi here in Toronto. In a real sense, the Steffani too is new, repertoire that’s not known to the audience or artists. And she brought a wonderful sense of adventure to the performances.

And yet I am frustrated. I need to explain and offer context.

The first half took two pieces, and saw us applaud at the end of each. In the second half, we went from aria to interlude to chorus: and in the process, stifled the drama. Each of those numbers was part of a story: but was presented without preamble and severed from any connection to anything else. I was leaning forward in my seat prepared to holler for the first aria I had heard, even though it was offered without much in the way of context. But there was a polite silence instead. Perhaps it will be different tomorrow.

Forgive me if I offer as my context, the concert I saw this afternoon: where Atis Bankas introduced each piece. We not only had loads of applause, we had clapping between the movements of a sonata. No that’s not considered good form, but it’s a sign of enthusiasm in an audience who weren’t asking anyone’s leave to show their love and affection for the artists & their work.

I  was disappointed to see these opera excerpts presented as though they were parts of a single unit, with no applause nor any encouragement of applause after each one. Call me weird if you will, but I love to applaud. I think it’s one of the components of number-opera, and also a lot of fun. In presenting these arias this way among other operatic excerpts tightly organized without any encouragement of applause: it was as though Szabo were a butterfly, so tightly crowded that she couldn’t spread her wings. Now of course she’d never agree with this assessment because she’s a trouper, indeed a total warrior in showing up, memorizing these new pieces and tossing them off perfectly.

Please note that normally at an opera aria recital we get no explanations. I can surrender to a performance without knowing what’s going on. But please don’t whisk the diva off the stage so quickly. Let us scream our approval first?

Some of these orchestral pieces were amazing, a marvelous smorgasbord of delights. I suppose from a musicological perspective it was wonderful, getting all those performances without any of that irritating applause: except that music is only one part of opera, not its sum total.  Opera is theatre, and when you only have music, you’ve removed part of its essence, a necessary part of opera. Doing it this way felt a bit repressed, bottled up, and unnatural. It was pretty, yes. But it was not operatic.

I yelled my head off at the end of course. They deserved it, because they were all wonderful.  The concert will be repeated Friday & Saturday at 8 pm, and Sunday afternoon at 3:30 at Jeanne Lamon Hall.

Walter Pater famously said “all art constantly aspires to the condition of music”.  But did anyone bother to ask “what then does music aspire to”?  Does music seek to be something more, or should it perhaps be content to be itself, the sine qua non, the most ideal of the arts, at least according to Pater.

Such questions were rattling around in my empty skull as I watched and listened to Opera 5’s “Open Chambers: Hindemith & Shostakovich”. Tonight was the second of three presentations that are more than just concerts, as the music was given additional opportunities to signify with the creative use of the principals:

• Vadim Serebryany—piano
• Melissa Scott—oboe
• Wolfram Koessel—cello
• Yosuke Kawasaki – violin
• Jacqueline Woodley – soprano 1
• Rachel Krehm—soprano 2

Sometimes the musicians were resembling actors, taking positions, posing and moving about on an interesting looking stage.

From a musical standpoint the evening was overpowering, wonderfully successful, especially with those two big soprano voices that easily filled the space at Factory Theatre’s studio space. The Shostakovich Romances were especially effective, although I wonder if dramatizing added anything. The musicianship, the commitment, the passion in these songs was tremendous.

In the earlier Hindemith pieces, overflowing with wit & ironic gestures, the results were if anything, more ambiguous, more playful, raising more questions.

(Left to Right): Wolfram Koessel, Cello, Jacqueline Woodley, Soprano 1 (photo: Dahlia Katz)

What if the cellist brings his bow up to lovingly address a woman between his knees as though she were a cello? Or is the idea too fraught, sexist, problematic, and must be ended immediately?  Jacqueline Woodley pushed Wolfram Koessel aside after his momentary approach to her with his bow, intriguing as the moment was.

What if the suggestion of chase music in a duet between two instruments inspires the sopranos to begin chasing one another around the stage? For a good ten seconds they went with it: then stopped.  I wonder, couldn’t the idea have been sustained longer?

There were a few such moments, playing with the strict & polite conventions of the concert. Yet I wondered whether Stage Director & Designer Patrick Hansen at times was fighting against the conventions and habits of his musicians? or did he simply lose his nerve, afraid of upstaging the musicians. He gave his silent onstage personnel so many moments of stillness rather than action. While there were several moments when images were overlaid on the music, I don’t believe anything was gained by the exercise. The music was fabulous, wonderfully well played. The dramatic shenanigans were at times stealing focus without adding much of anything: sitting on the fence between respectful and deconstructive. I would have welcomed it if they had gone much further, and tried something genuinely subversive, as this barely scraped the surface.  Why do it at all if in the end, you’re just going to surrender to the polite rules of the concert, and have your onstage personnel sit there as though they were Toronto concert-goers?

And I repeat, the playing and singing were fabulous. Rachel Krehm’s voice does me in, it’s so beautiful especially when she’s singing in a tight space like this one. She was joined by Jacqueline Woodley, who was sometimes singing forte, sometimes much more softly, but we were immersed in wonderful musicianship.

But the stage action struck me as pretentious, weighing the music down with additional incomprehensible layers.

We’re told that this is the first of a series. I applaud the effort, always delighted with ambitious efforts. I look forward to what may come in future Open Chambers creations.

When the phrase popped into my head (spoken), I was thinking of Tchaikovsky. But immediately I heard Ronnie Hawkins’ song in my head.

When I heard this near the start of The Last Waltz, and come to think of it, closer to the beginning of my life, I didn’t properly respect Hawkins, nor did I understand his wisdom. For instance, the way he says “big time” at the beginning of the song? His eyes are open.

But I digress.

The phrase came up thinking of Tchaikovsky and Eugene Onegin.  The main character is hard to like. In the Byronic original by Pushkin, he’s warmer than what Tchaikovky gives us.

I was thinking: the composer wrote the opera but dislikes or even hates the hero. Maybe that’s simplistic thinking? but I wondered.

He writes amazing music for the two people left in his wake

• Tatiana (although she does get the grim satisfaction of seeing him pursue her later.  She is enough of a mensch that while she’s still in love with Onegin, she’s devoted to her husband)
• Lenski (the poet Onegin kills in the duel)

I can’t help seeing Lenski as a kind of stand-in for Tchaikovsky himself, considering the music he wrote for the poet’s last scene, reflecting on the meaning of life, and fully expecting to die in the duel.

I was thinking about it again because of an upcoming adventure from Tongue in Cheek Productions at the Lula Lounge, where they’re offering something called “Verbotenlieder“.  

Forbidden songs?  I think it’s because we’ll hear women singing the music men usually sing.

One of them will be a woman singing Lenski’s sad meditation on life.

I saw this picture plus text on Facebook earlier today.

Meet the Women of Verbotenlieder:

“For years now I’ve been a coach
And helped the tenors shine. 
But there’s a piece that speaks my name,
I want it to be mine.
Onegin: I have done it all,
I’ve subbed for baritone;
I sang the mezzos’ parts so low,
It sounded like trombone.
But Lensky… seems not meant to be,
It just keeps falling through!
In Soviet Russia, as they say,
Tchaikovskiy will sing you.”

Catch Natalya perform “Kuda, kuda” from Eugene Onegin on Wednesday, Dec 19 at Lula Lounge!

Yes she is a coach: of Russian.  If I wanted to sing “Kuda kuda”, I’d have a much bigger problem with the text than the music, and wouldn’t know anyone better to approach for help than Natalya: whom you may recall from OksanaG Tapestry’s opera about human trafficking not so long ago, for which she was nominated for a Dora. 

I totally get that frustration, wishing I could sing something I’m not supposed to sing.

I’m going.

Aaron Durand + Michael Nyby = Tongue in Cheek Productions.

No that’s not a formula but come to think of it there is a curious creative chemistry, a tendency to energize. I find it exciting to talk to them, and frankly have been totally fascinated by their initial projects.

First came Winterreise, a song cycle they handed to 24 singers. My my but there was a lot of testosterone, to say nothing of the talent in Lula Lounge that night back in September.

The final ovation for Winterreise, when suddenly all those singers came out at the same time.

And now they’re handing the stage over to women for Verbotenlieder on December 19th. If you want to find out more about Michael Nyby or Aaron Durand, click the name to go to their respective pages.

But first? I need to ask them some questions.

BB: Are you more like your father or your mother?

AD: I think I’m a hearty blend of both, because Mom and Dad shared a lot of qualities. Both of them are the kind of people who “just get it done”. If work needs doing, do it now and don’t wait for perfect timing. This has tempered my tendency to be constantly living inside my head, and given me something to cultivate. Yay, adulting.

My dad has an innate sense of comedic timing, a love of zany things (we all watched Animaniacs together), and no sense of shame. Great things for a performer to grow up with! My mom always pushes us to work hard and aim high (arguably more important!). Most special to me is the idea of unconditionally supporting the people you love. I was–am–incredibly lucky to have a family that supports what I do without reservation or pause. They do so simply because that’s what you do. I try hardest of all to emulate that.

MN: I don’t think I’m more like either one of them. I suppose I try to emulate both of their best traits, with varying degrees of success. My path has been extremely different from either of theirs, but they have never questioned a single decision I have ever made in my adult life. But if pressed, I suppose I’d have to say my Dad. We share the same hairline and propensity to make silly faces at cameras.

BB: What is the best or worst thing about what you do?

AD: Best: the people in this industry are beautiful. Inside and out. They crack open their ribs daily in order to feed their own heart to this art, so they become these incredibly complex people with incredible stories and personalities.

MN: I completely agree with Aaron on this one. I’ve made a lot of good friends over the last decade or so as I’ve been working as a singer, and Tongue In Cheek Productions has given me the opportunity to interact with those friends in a new light. We’re quite early in our tenure, and aren’t really sure what Tongue In Cheek will eventually grow into, but so far we’ve made both our productions collaborative efforts between our performing artists the two of us wearing the production hats. We’ve incorporated the artistic input from a number of our artists, and I’d like to think that everyone involved in our productions can have some feeling of ownership in the company. That spirit of artistic community is definitely the best part for me.

Aaron Durand

AD: Worst: there’s, like, no money. All these amazing artists who could be doing all these amazing things and enriching the life of the whole country, and they’re having to work multiple jobs just for the chance of being considered for something. Ugh. I understand that times are tough everywhere, but if we as a culture don’t fund our artists effectively, it’s like removing herbs and spices from all your recipes. Imagine a world without rosemary, cayenne, or even salt. That’s a world without good art.

Michael Nyby

MN: There’s a lot of worst parts about being a singer, the psychological stress, the financial issues, the difficulty of maintaining a healthy family life. It’s hard to choose one. On the production end of things, I’m not sure I’m yet experienced enough to know what the worst part is. We’re both juggling a lot of balls at the moment, and I’m still at a point where everything is still fresh and interesting.

BB: Who do you like to listen to or watch?

MN: Like most singers, I usually only listen to the music I am working on for my next performance. But when given a chance to indulge, I will generally opt for Bruce Springsteen.

AD: Oh oh another thing inherited from my Dad: eclecticism. Dad taught me to enjoy all sorts of music, and we grew up with everything from Steely Dan to Khachaturian. Currently, I’m really enjoying the Swedish folk rock band Garmarna as well as an incredible reimagining of Fauré songs by Olivier Mellano, Baum, and a plethora of lovely performers.

On the screen, I’m currently on my third rewatch of Bojack Horseman. For a show full of talking animals I’ve never seen something so accurately human. It serves as a perfect example to me of how an art form can push it’s own boundaries and become something so much more. It also reminds me that we need humour if we want any serious themes in our own artistic work to hit home.

MN: I am also a big fan of BoJack. I think anyone who works in an artistic field can relate to that show. It’s a bit of an oxymoron. It’s almost poetic in its absurdity yet feels more real than anything else being produced right now. Also, I can watch the original Star Wars trilogy on repeat for the rest of my life and probably never get bored of it.

BB: What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

AD: We talking realistic or superpower? I’ll answer both
Superpower: the power to write a perfect grant proposal every time. Or telekinesis.
Realistic: an intimate knowledge of woodworking, from carving to joinery. I got a set of carving knives for Christmas last year but haven’t found the time to really practice!

BB: Was it Isaac Asimov who said that for a primitive society technology is indistinguishable from magic. For me, looking at virtuosity or skills that I will never have? It could be magic. What Stewart Goodyear’s hands can do may as well be a superpower.

MN: I would cut off my left arm to be able to competently play the piano. Although that bargain would likely limit my prospects as a pianist.

BB: (shiver) So when you’re just relaxing and not working, what is your favourite thing to do?

AD: If I were to pick just one, I deeply enjoy going out for ramen with a friend or two. Something about the warmth of the food and the buzz of the restaurant coupled with reconnecting with important people in your life. It’s just so…wholesome!

MN: I have a deep and abiding love for off-road cycling. Whether it’s downhill, cross-country, gravel, cyclocross, or bikepacking, as long as I have two wheels off-pavement I’m a happy man.

*******

More questions for Aaron & Michael, the producers of Verbotenlieder, coming up at Lula Lounge December 19th.

BB: Verbotenlieder is the second production from Tongue in Cheek Productions. You began with your Winterreise, 24 songs sung by 24 baritones back on Sept 5th. What was your motivation on that occasion?

AD: Truth be told, our motivation was mostly focused around, “We have a lot of awesome friends and there’s not nearly enough performance opportunity for all of us” mixed in with, “This industry needs more crazy shit”. We were lamenting these issues over beers one night (at Betty’s I think), and then we asked ourselves, “why not”?

MN: In order to get our newly-founded company off the ground, we knew we had to debut with something that would raise some eyebrows and generate buzz about who we are and what we do. We wanted to involve as many performers as possible, and put on a show that would really get people talking.

Back in undergrad, I performed one third of Winterreise in a joint recital with two other baritones in my voice studio. So what if we got twenty-four baritones together for a Winterreise? How often do you ever get twenty-four low voices in the same room? Now that would be some crazy shit.

BB: So who and/or what is Tongue In Cheek Productions?

MN: We were out for a drink one night–I think Aaron is right, it was Betty’s– and we just started coming up with dumb ideas for themed concerts that we found funny in our inebriated state. I honestly don’t recall most of the ideas we came up with (we were drunk) but we had a few good laughs. Some time later after we had both sobered up I texted Aaron to say “Hey, how about we actually do some of those concerts?”

AD: We had the idea for Winterreise first, and decided that if it were successful, it’d be proof that Toronto needed more of that.

MN: Winterreise may have been the only idea we came up with on that fateful night of drinking that still sounded good the next day.

AD: Another thing important to us both is humour. As Twain said, it’s the test of a good religion whether or not you can joke about it. Since classical music is often portrayed (and presented) with religious levels of stodginess, we felt it right to poke a bit of fun. Because if you can’t sometimes have fun with what you’re doing, why are you doing it at all?

MN: Absolutely. That’s something that’s always bothered me about the classical music industry. None of us in the business take ourselves seriously. We sing for a living. It’s ridiculous. So why is it that the industry feels it must take itself so deadly serious? Where’s the fun in that?

As far as the company goes, Tongue In Cheek Productions has so far been a two-man operation, but we’ve relied on our artists to help a lot with publicity. The arrangement worked great with Winterreise, and the interest and engagement for Verbotenlieder has been even better. Our poster for this show was designed by Madison Angus, a fine singer who will be performing a new soprano version of “Hai già vinta la causa” for us on December 19.

BB: Verbotenlieder on Dec 19th is women singing things they usually are not supposed to sing. Is this a soprano’s idea for a follow-up to your Winterreise, or did one of you conceive of this?

AD: As I recall, the idea came from a desire to “swing the pendulum”. We did 24 men singing, and that was grand, but there are also many incredible female performers in our city! It made perfect, obvious sense to have an all-women show.

MN: We had to somehow recapture the magic that led to the formation of the company and Winterreise, so once again we sat down and assiduously downed a few beers. We came up with a lot of bad ideas until eventually my wife showed up, had a drink herself, and eloquently described an idea that would develop into Verbotenlieder.

BB: Please tell me what’s on the program.

AD: We’ve programmed around a main theme of songs women aren’t “supposed” to sing and songs that some of the artists have been literally told not to sing.

There’s quite a few pieces, and I don’t want to spill the entire bag of cats, but here’s a few tidbits!

First up is the oh-so-classic Au fond du temple saint, performed by Jennifer Taverner and Beste Kalender.

What better way to open an all-women show than with one of the most bro duets of all time?

Soprano Allison Walmsley offered Strauss’ Als mir dein lied erklang, and we took her up on it because of the story behind it. There’s plenty of women who have performed this piece, but she was told in university not to sing it, because it “sounded better in a man’s voice”. Oy.

Mezzo Gena van Oosten will be performing Vaughan Williams’ Whither Must I Wander. Here we have someone taking a song about a lifestyle (the vagabond) quite traditionally male. This gives me a whole new perspective on the cycle itself, and is reminiscent (to me, at least) of Cheryl Strayed’s Wild.

Soprano Natalya Gennadi’s performance of Kuda, kuda, is exciting to me because, in a sense, she now has the opportunity to showcase the skills that led her to coaching this aria as well as receive recognition for them in a different light, a different frame. I love that. To me, a woman singing a man’s aria is more than sideshow frolics, and even more than pop-culture feminism’s “anything you can do I can do better” message. I’d like our whole show to say, “We are here, and we are equal. We are as complex, as nuanced, as important, as compelling, and as skilled. We love this as much as you, we have seen and heard you. See and hear us. Come celebrate!”

Our finale is the Lehar’s Weibermarsch from The Merry Widow. It seemed…right…to take this septet, full of whinging about the mysteries and annoyances of women, and flip it upside down. I’ve rewritten the opening and the chorus, and we’ve asked the performers to write their own couplets expressing their own issues with this business. That’s TiC in a nutshell, a collaborative effort to change the game.

BB: Talk about the process for developing Verbotenlieder, and how you got to where you are now.

AD: Programming the rep for Verbotenlieder has been a fascinating journey. Rep choices have largely been offered by our artists, and this is exactly what we wanted. On the 19th and forever after, this is also their music.

MN: To be fair, there were a couple of chestnuts we had already decided to program, and we knew we needed to include a few ensembles in order to keep things interested. For instance, I really wanted the Pearl Fishers duet on the program, but I didn’t mention that to Jen Taverner when I asked her if she wanted to do a duet. Her response was “The Pearl Fishers duet is on my bucket list.” So that worked out fortuitously for us. For the most part though, we explained the concept to each of the singers and asked them for suggestions. We did encourage our singers to dig into the realms of art song and musical theatre, otherwise we’d be presenting a whole program of women singing Puccini tenor arias.

AD: As for getting a lineup of singers, the classical music industry in Canada is like one giant family, so there was little difficulty drawing upon our contact lists and messaging people whom we thought would be interested. We also had a number of artists contact us after Winterreise–some mere days after–expressing interest in future shows.

BB: Does Tongue in Cheek expect to be doing another program like this one?

MN: It’s hard to say. We are trying not to repeat ourselves, so each time we come up with an idea we have to think of it within the context of what we’ve already presented. We hope to involve a good number of singers in each concert, but thematically we are hoping to stay as varied as possible.

AD: There are a great many ideas in the pipeline, and some of them aren’t even shows! Some of them are absolutely ridiculous (e.g. a battle royale show where two or more pianists and two or more singers sing at once to create live, unscripted mashups). Mike and I have made a point to maintain a commitment to art song, so producing an entire opera is plausible but unlikely. Then again, if it fits our raison d’être, who knows? The world is our oyster, and TiC is the…shucker thingy.

Although…Confession: I’ve always wanted to produce Company by Sondheim, and perhaps rework/restage it to represent the Toronto arts scene. If anyone wants to fund that Kickstarter text me

MN: Personally, I have no desire to produce full operas. There are plenty of independent opera companies bucking trends and presenting operas in innovative ways. I don’t think we’d be doing anyone any favours by crowding that field.

BB: Is opera dead or dying? Excuse me, I think that question is often subtext for anything new in this town, attempts to revive a corpse. (no you didn’t say that… I did)

But one of the subtexts that I can’t help noticing in both of your first two projects concerns the amount of work that’s available to singers, which is to say: not enough for all the talented voices & instrumentalists we’ve developed in this country. Forget my morbid preamble. Please talk about the talent that you’re drawing upon, and the work that’s available.

AD: I’m reminded of Will McAvoy’s speech at the beginning of Sorkin’s incredible show, The Newsroom.

Oh my. Opinions incoming. Let me say that everything following this sentence comes from a very deep love of opera.

Opera is not the greatest art form in the world, and whenever we place it on that pedestal we risk losing it. Whenever we treat it like a church or a museum, we rob it of power so that we can reanimate some bygone era. Whenever we run around proclaiming it to be something “above” musical theatre or pop music or Gilbert and Sullivan, we alienate people who might otherwise be really into what opera can say. Worst of all, when we can’t have fun with it, we lose morale and our original fascination with it, and that is reflected in performances that lack real passion.

I can’t pretend to know how to solve declining audiences, declining budgets, lack of available jobs for singers, and all the other concerns that I have about this industry. But I know it has to change, it can change, and I can change. If the ecosystem is evolving, so too must the organism, for there’s no tangible separation of the two.

Like, remember when you were a kid, and there was magic in the wisp of condensation in your breath during the winter? You were a dragon that rose with the first frost, and the way the vapour curled in the air was nothing short of miraculous. It is that simplicity of love, that direct pointing at the endlessly fun, joyful nature of existence that we must uncover and run with. It’s so incredibly hard to find in grand opera, underneath the endless layers of overpriced champagne, donor solicitations, ostentatious corporate sponsorship, and all the other shiny things we think are necessary. Yes, we will always have tuxedo fancy pants opera, and a lot of it will be absolutely delightful, and for contrast’s sake we’ll need it. But I think that, akin to finding God in a manger, we’ll find opera’s true salvation in bars, parks, and greasy-spoon diners.

MN: There sure is a lot of navel-gazing on that question in our business, and I don’t think I can really add anything to Aaron’s eloquent diatribe. I will say that I firmly believe opera is alive and well. It’s just evolving. Major houses with traditional venues are struggling, but dozens of new companies have sprung up all over the country and are doing very well, just on a smaller scale. Maybe today’s audiences don’t need the pomp and circumstance of opera on a grand scale. Maybe a low-budget Aida in the park is just the ticket. A few years ago, I saw Opera 5’s open-bar production of Die Fledermaus, sponsored by Steam Whistle. Personally I can’t stand Fledermaus but that show was a hit and I thought the production was brilliant. That’s the kind of ingenuity we have to strive for in tomorrow’s opera world. I hope Tongue In Cheek Productions can bring that joie-de-vivre to the concert stage.

BB: So what is your favourite opera?

AD: There’s a constant battle between the operas in my brain for title of favourite. The one that wins most often is Nozze. I feel in that music the very magic referenced in the last question. Pure humanity made music.

MN : Falstaff, of course. Need you ask?

BB: A pair of comedies! How refreshing (said the guy who loves Pelléas et Parsifal).
So, would there be a teacher or an influence you’d care to name that you especially admire?

Peter Barcza

AD: There have been so many over the years, and this might sound extra cheesy to you, but Peter Barcza’s influence echoes in my head again and again, and I’m incredibly thankful for that. Of all the things he taught me, the most helpful has been caution and wisdom in picking rep, and to not be ashamed of backing away from something if you know it to be unsafe vocally.

BB: Aw cheesy is good. Unless you’re vegan. But no wonder we seem to be on the same wavelength. He was certainly the best voice teacher I ever worked with, a curious mix of mentor & older brother.

AD: For general life stuff, I’ve been heavily influenced as of late by the work of Alan Watts. His book, The Wisdom of Insecurity, did more for my mental health in this business than any masterclass.

MN: I am also a product of Peter Barcza and he was an invaluable influence on me, as well. My stylistic values as a singer and aesthetic musical preferences are a direct result of his studio. He’s a great teacher and I do make an effort to get a lesson or two with him anytime I’m back in Vancouver. I also have to give a lot of credit to my teacher from Ithaca College, Randie Blooding. I could have never become a working artist if it weren’t for him, and I love him like family.

BB: Thank you!

And so Verbotenlieder happens December 19th, 8 pm at the Lula Lounge.  For tickets click here.

Toronto is Messiah town, as I’ve joked before. Handel’s most popular Biblical oratorio is everywhere at this time of year.

Tonight I took in the second of six offered this week by the Toronto Symphony, the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir and soloists under the baton of Johannes Debus, the Music Director of the Canadian Opera Company. We’ve heard him lead operas at Four Seasons Centre, I wondered what he’d be like leading an oratorio down the street with the TSO & TMC.

And in fact it was the cleanest clearest Messiah I’ve heard at Roy Thomson Hall.

Part of the credit must go to the deployment of this small orchestral ensemble on the stage. As you can see from my photo, there are all sorts of bare surfaces to reflect the sound, both floor and walls.

The Toronto Symphony & Toronto Mendelssohn Choir just before Messiah began tonight.

That’s a big deal when you compare this performance in a space seating 2600 to what we might get at Koerner Hall, and its 1300 seat capacity. To put it bluntly, as I sat there with my friend Russ, I asked him to imagine the same energy that he and I must share in the big hall, vs the same energy given to just one person instead, as it would be in the smaller space. I’ve been to other Messiahs in this hall where the best moments were the bombastic attempts to raise the roof, but where anything subtle seemed to be asking too much.

Ah but Debus and his team at the TMC (David Fallis & Ezra Burke) accomplished a miracle.  Attacks and enunciation were crisp, but the big difference was in dynamics. We often heard choruses sung mostly at moderate dynamics rather than loudly, including that one we always listen to standing up, namely The Hallelujah Chorus. And Praise the Lord, it was a moment of great beauty as it gradually built to the final big chords.

Most of the choruses offered a similar display of intelligence & artistry, whether it was Debus  or the TMC preparation by Fallis and/or Burke. My favourite chorus is “Lift Up Your Heads”, a wonderful bit of dramatic dialogue between sections, that builds inexorably to the end. I was thrilled to hear such a lucid exchange of phrases between sections.

Debus carefully reined back the orchestra who rarely ventured past mezzo-forte all night.  Our ears were given a rest, able to hear the gentlest phrasing of a soloist. Everyone had their moments.

Allyson McHardy opened Part II with “He was despised”, Debus carefully following her delicately eloquent phrases.

Claire de Sévigné was lovely in the Christmas Eve segment of the angels’ appearance; her smile was the cherry on top.

Tyler Duncan uttered the words “Behold I tell you a mystery”, and as he went up for the word that ends the sentence, his voice was unexpectedly delicate, a wonderful enactment of what he was describing.

Andrew Haji alas was competing in my section with someone who took “comfort ye” literally and thought it meant “tear open your packages of food”. Why Lord why? But Haji was a marvel in a brisk reading of “thou shalt break them”, the orchestra seeming to laugh sardonically in accompaniment.

The TSO and TMC under Johannes Debus continue their brilliant take on Handel’s Messiah at Roy Thomson Hall Wednesday, (Thursday off) Friday, Saturday & concluding with a Sunday matinee.

This is not a review.

I had the exquisite pleasure of going to Lula Lounge tonight for Verbotenlieder, Tongue in Cheek Productions’s latest extravaganza.

The premise as I understood it from my recent interview with TiC co-founders Aaron Durand & Michael Nyby is an extension from what they did in their 24-man Winterreise. On that occasion earlier this autumn, TiC did something transgressive; instead of a song-cycle interpreted by one man in a concert setting, they assigned each song to a different person, and in a bar with food being served.

Michael Nyby and Aaron Durand, co-artistic directors of Tongue in Cheek Productions

They took it further this time. Instead of 24 baritones, you had a group of women, and the transgressions were of the gendered sort, women singing rep that is usually sung by men.  Oh and they said something I haven’t heard previously, encouraging us to use our phones throughout, to share it through social media.  For me that’s a first although I chose to leave my phone aside while singers were singing.

And I think (as I continue to wrestle with a question my wife posed earlier tonight) I know the answer. Why is this event called “Verbotenlieder”?

…which I translate as “forbidden songs”.

Was anything really forbidden? Or is it perhaps a tendency in classical music for people to get up in arms about, pardon me, nothing at all? I think the name was a tease and a provocation, another German compound word like Winterreise telling you that this is meant for a special nerdy audience, a silly thing to have fun while we all get drunk listening to one another.

What would usually be a kind of box-office suicide worked like a charm.  The place was jammed, the audience louder by far than last time: possibly because a big chunk was comprised of Winterreise veterans.

No you don’t mention Fight Club: but perhaps something similar is at work.

This was not for your usual audience. The whole thing was a series of in-jokes.

• We watch two women singing “au fond de temple saint”
• We listen to the daughter of the most famous Canadian interpreter of a famous Italian aria singing it impeccably
• We watch a pair of singers undertake the Grand Inquisitor scene, arguably the greatest pissing contest in operatic history, but without any actual testosterone.

Now of course I know some people who probably wouldn’t have approached such an evening the way I did. Pardon me if I decided to have fun. I was at the Messiah last night (fun), and watched a grand-child’s school pageant this afternoon (also fun). Does one show up with stipulations, insisting that this person’s fach is wrong for what they’re trying to sing, or that a woman shouldn’t sing a particular aria or song?

Perhaps: but if you worry that the fach is wrong for the singer
YOU MISSED THE POINT

If you quibble or have stipulations
YOU MISSED THE POINT

if you didn’t let yourself eat drink and be merry?
(okay I understand some mustn’t drink… I never do when I have to drive).

The show I saw tonight was therapy. There isn’t enough work for all the talented singers in this town, or indeed in any town out there. What we saw tonight was a colossal finger jabbed in the direction of those who make the rules, of those who are uncomfortable with experimentation.

They’re called “Tongue in Cheek” for a reason. That being said, there were plenty of serious moments. I did actually shed a tear watching “kuda kuda” sung by Natalya Gennadi, beautifully sung and acted. I laughed loudest at Beste Kalender’s brilliant re-imagining of “Erlkönig” (a drinking game! Divide the audience in three, based on the three characters in the song, and take a sip whenever you hear yours –Vater, Kind oder Erlkönig—mentioned). Did I say I was sober? Tonight fortunately Erika was along so I didn’t need to drive.

Although come to think of it, Brittany Cann gave Kalender a run for her money (as funniest), in her brilliantly inebriated finale to the Ravel cycle “Don Quichotte à Dulcinée”.

It was a team effort, including Elina Kelebeev and Natasha Fransblow, pianists, stage direction by Anna Theodosakis, and several creative (hilarious) departures from the original text.   Here’s a link to the page where you can see it all listed, all the names of repertoire and the singers & musicians.

It was a funny night, to be upside down inside the rep. I’ve played so much of this music (for instance, I recall my brother singing the aforementioned Ravel cycle), sung some of it too: often knowing full well that internal sense of the forbidden, picturing the scolding fingers, the wrinkled noses. No I shouldn’t sing Wagner or Verdi. Do I embrace transgression? I sang the Four Last Songs at a recital and just to be really nerdy and weird, I played the accompaniment too, knowing full well that I was not supposed to do it (celebrating the 50th anniversary of the composer’s death: but it was fun).

And what I couldn’t miss was the sight of the supportive artists screaming for one another, eating it up and standing in solidarity, for everyone’s right to break the rules.

Everyone on stage for a final bow.

There may also have been some practical purpose too, when I saw some of those in attendance, enjoying the great singing but also nodding, making a note for future shows: where they might engage one of these brilliant women.  It was a showcase of vocal & dramatic talent.

To have singers boldly go where they weren’t supposed to go, a bit like Captain Kirk..?  Like I said, it felt like therapy.  While this one may be hard to top, I think Aaron & Michael may be on to something. I’ll be intrigued to see what TiC do next.

You can change the location but the song remains the same. Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra & Chamber Choir led by Herr Handel himself gave us their annual sing-along Messiah.

The previous 31 have been at Massey Hall, but this time renovation forced us into Roy Thomson Hall instead.

Playful old George Frideric had some fun with the name of the venue. Last year he called it “Roy Rogers Hall.” This year he got a little closer, calling it “Tom Thomson Hall” before finally explaining who Roy Thomson was, admittedly with help from above.

Herr Handel stares off into space, disconcerted to receive a special message telling him that no it’s not Tom Thomson Hall.

Above? The telegram is ostensibly from the creator, and helped set Herr Handel straight. He also told us that when God is displeased he addresses him as “George”. Because as we all know, God is an Englishman.

I had a bit of an epiphany, and not because the creator sent me any special messengers. No, I was just taking it all in,  in the lobby, in the bathroom, in my seat, wherever I went, I couldn’t help noticing the nerdy energy.

I had observed the special audience this past Wednesday at Tongue in Cheek’s Verbotenlieder: everyone at Lula Lounge knew the music being presented. But that small gathering of aficionados was nothing compared to what we saw today at Roy Rogers Hall.
If people can sing Bohemian Rhapsody (and they did so long before the film about Freddie Mercury) or Rocky Horror Show or Mamma Mia: why shouldn’t we do it for Messiah? This crowd of 2000 + armed with scores and seated by section are riding the same kind of high, except we get a bit of extra juice from the Christmas Season.

I feel like a bit of a fraud, I must say. I’ve stopped being a paid church-choir soloist because my singing isn’t what it used to be. While I still can honk out a few high B-flats if necessary (and church solos never get anywhere near that high) I used to have a D-flat, a C, a B…but gulp no longer. At one time I could sing through all of the Messiah choruses without getting very tired, but that was then. Now I am a spent force by the time of the tenor high ‘A’ on the last page of the “Amen” (that echoes the soprano ‘A’ a bar earlier). This year, just like last year, I sat in a mixed section rather than among tenors because I wasn’t sure what I’d be able to hit. At times I had to falsetto my high notes because I was just too pooped.

Yet the people sitting nearby were so gracious it’s amazing. It was a very Toronto kind of moment, to feel such warmth from total strangers, even as I was grateful to be there at all. People are nice here and you really see it at events such as this.

Aiding and abetting the warmth were the four soloists.

Tenor Charles Daniels gave us the first solos. I wonder if someone has ever done a dissertation on the ways in which one sings “Comfort Ye”, as today’s examples from Daniels were exemplary. In his improvisatory passages, themselves a brief sermon on taking comfort from the good news he brings, I heard the most remarkable bold explorations of comfort and peace, as enacted in his few calming notes. And in the cadenza to finish his opening aria “Ev’ry Valley” I believe I heard the highest note I’ve ever heard interpolated, namely a brief high B. It’s a bit of a mind—boggler that the baroque virtuoso impulse that might direct our gaze to the soloist as a showoff is so perfectly compatible with the message in the text: when carried out by someone as scrupulous as Daniels.

Krisztina Szabó might be the most versatile singer I know in Toronto. One of the go-to performers when it comes to new music, having made her mark at Covent Garden recently in George Benjamin’s new opera, that doesn’t preclude regular appearances in works such as Messiah. Hers is a voice and a mind of great accuracy. To this day I’m certain I’ve never heard her sing off pitch. As with Daniels, there’s a textual integrity alongside the musicianship. I was not surprised to find myself tearing up as she sang “Behold your God”, barely able to sing because my voice is all coming apart and emotional as we (the chorus, on the very next page) answer about good tidings. It’s such an insane thrill to be singing in the same show –admittedly from the 2500 or so in the audience—and not like anything else I know of.  It’s a good thing there are so many other voices to cover up my mistakes.

Similar pleasures lie in wait when we meet our soprano, Sherezade Panthaki. The recitatives of the soprano telling of the shepherds & angels on Christmas Eve are some of the most remarkable writing of anything from Handel. No it’s not Wagner, but wow, the music has such suspense and excitement, the pace & the accompaniment raising one’s heart-rate even before she sings “And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heav’nly hosts, praising God and saying…“ Much as I enjoyed watching this performed a few days ago by the TSO, there’s no comparison between watching, as opposed to following this in your score, and then getting to answer as part of a huge multitude singing “Glory to God, glory to God, glory to God in the highest!… and peace on Earth”. It’s also very cool that the tenors are (I think) the only section who get to be BOTH in the higher voiced group saying “glory to God” as well as the calm answering lower voices saying “And peace on Earth”. Yes I know it’s a vicarious thing, just like what I spoke of on Wednesday, the envy of one who wishes to be in the show. The singalong impulse is the most natural thing. Of course Panthaki sounded marvelous, although it’s hard to be objective about such things when you’re singing such exciting music.

Likewise baritone Drew Santini: who sang the solo number that received the highest applause, as with last year’s singalong. “Behold I tell you a mystery” followed by “The trumpet shall sound” is one of the climactic numbers in a work that goes far beyond telling  a mere story. I remember the first times I encountered this number played on historically authentic instruments, as you find in an ensemble such as Tafelmusik: when there were fluffs aplenty. In those days the trumpet did indeed sound: but not necessarily in tune. The Toronto Symphony could always be secure in the knowledge that their sound—from modern valved brass instruments—were at least more accurate in intonation. That was the trade-off in the old days: that while modern isn’t what Handel had, at least they’d play it right, and sounding better than the authentic instrument. But I don’t think that logic applies anymore, not when Tafelmusik have someone who can play the old style trumpets brilliantly.

Excuse me if so much of this review seems self-centred, as though I’m reviewing myself and the way I sang the choruses of Messiah. My head was mostly down in my Novello score, at least during our choruses. When we were singing of course that means we couldn’t hear the Tafelmusik chorus as well as we would had this been a regular Messiah. They’re a magnificent ensemble, who we could hear and rely upon to help us when we got lost (as I did a couple of times when I didn’t turn the page fast enough). They’re accurate & have a beautiful sound. I should also mention that other Tafelmusik namely the orchestra. Of course I think they sounded great, and again I wasn’t paying them much attention, even in the solo numbers.

Next year I want to do this again, but I will look the music over, making sure I actually know my part. If you’re a church chorister or soloist who knows some of this music, you should consider taking in the Sing-along.

Soloists (l-r) Sherezade Panthaki, Krisztina Szabo, Charles Daniels & Drew Santini, taking in one of Herr Handel’s tirades. AND the program reminds us: “Any resemblance of Mr Handel to any persons living and/or dead, in particular Tafelmusik Chamber Choir director Ivars Taurins, is unintentional, bot not entirely coincidental.”

In past years my annual review was out in December, but this time it’s later than usual: because I’ve had a real holiday this year, more sleep and more silence than usual, dodging the viruses & germs pursuing other members of my clan.

Does it matter? The question has been a recurrent one this year. We’re living in a world that bounces back and forth between films, operas, plays, performances & art containing edgy political commentary and silly escapes from reality. Forgive me if my usual mantra (“I’m a lucky guy”, meant to focus me on gratitude) has been displaced by a phrase I heard from Jessica Chastain on Saturday Night Live early in 2018. (using this url because youtube or NBC have not yet chosen to make the video available to Canadian viewers)

https://www.metatube.com/en/videos/382532/SNL-What-Even-Matters-Anymore/

And so it’s been back and forth, between the attempts to be meaningful and the moments of pure silliness. 2018 was book-ended by the two best things I saw all year. At the beginning of the year it was the mad shenanigans in the Talk is Free / Crow’s Theatre co-production of The Wedding Party. 

Playwright Kristen Thomson, Tom Rooney, Jason Cadieux (Photo: Guntar Kravis)

The year ended with the thumpity thump thump of Eldritch Theatre’s Space Opera Zero.

Princess Jenora, Hjalmar Pomeranki + Emily Trueheart (Mairi Babb, Eric Woolfe + Lisa Norton), photo: Adrianna Prosser

Thank you to both for so much blissful escapism.

And a bit less silly, but more in the spirit of Chastain’s mantra, there’s The Overcoat, A Musical Tailoring, the remarkable co-production between Vancouver Opera & Tapestry as part of Canadian Stage’s 30th Anniversary Season, James Rolfe & Morris Panych adapting Gogol’s story “The Overcoat”.

Geoffrey Sirett as Akakiy in The Overcoat A Musical Tailoring (Photo: Dahlia Katz); his performance was a highlight of 2018.

I am reminded of another mantra I used to live by, namely “less is more” (pun intended of course). Where others seem to be exploding out of the box of opera in their attempts to be meaningful (thinking especially of Rufus Wainwright’s attempts to show that yes he can write an operatic score, even if the libretto is a travesty), Rolfe and Panych let some of the air out of that fraught balloon: and as a result it mysteriously floats up into the sky. Nonsense sometimes makes sense.

Perhaps it’s the fact that so far I have not learned the lessons of the contestants on that show on the SNL video (above). Has the bar been raised? Good performances (singing –acting- playing an instrument) aren’t enough. I feel hungry for something more, because I’m desperate to see evidence that yes things still do matter.

The films that moved me the most this year all had a political edge. There must surely be films like Isle of Dogs, The Post, The Death of Stalin and BlackkKlansman every year, right? Was it only my appetite that changed this year? Or perhaps the changing times are changing the artists.

Wajdi Mouawad (photo: Jean-Louis Fernandez)

And it’s the same for live theatre. Nothing got under my skin and into my head like the powerful works of Wajdi Mouawad last winter, from his Abduction from the Seraglio at the Canadian Opera Company, his film Incendies (several years old, but found in the library) and his play Scorched, presented in March at the University of Toronto.

The conversation and quest for reconciliation with indigenous peoples seems to be ongoing when I look back at shows such as Victor Davies’ Ecstasy of Rita Joe presented by Opera in Concert / Voicebox, Jeremy Dutcher’s concert at RBA (launching his brilliant CD Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa ); I Call Myself Princess, Jani Lauzon’s new play with opera (a collaboration between A Paper Canoe Projects, Cahoots Theatre and Native Earth Performing Arts) and the workshop of Shanawdithit, a new opera being developed by Tapestry Opera and Opera on the Avalon in partnership with Native Earth Performing Arts, music by Dean Burry & libretto Yvette Nolan.

Brilliant native artist Kent Monkman put in an appearance in the summer, another wonderful show full of irony, wit and pain.

There were other moments with a political edge, such as Yom Shoah, a concert of remembrance for the Holocaust from Sara Schabas featuring Jake Heggie’s Another Sunrise; Safe Haven an intriguing multi-media performance exploring the ideas of exile & welcome from Tafelmusik curated with love & intelligence by Alison Mackay; a semi-staged performance of Stephanie Martin’s new opera Llandovery Castle, the concert presentation of Yiddish Glory , and the CD that I reviewed a few weeks later, BOUND v 2 from Against the Grain Theatre alongside their new recording of Ayre (capturing a wonderful performance from late 2016), Atis Bankas giving us a remembrance of Kristallnacht in concert; and finally Helen’s Necklace in a new translation, presented by Canadian Rep Theatre.

Forgive me, I mean no disparagement in foregrounding my hunger for something political, and thereby excluding some excellent work.

I’ll have more to say in a moment about the many other outstanding performances of 2018, but first wanted to call attention to those who were missing. First after an intense summertime farewell to Peter Oundjian, I was surprised at how keenly I felt his absence this autumn from the Toronto Symphony. And second, Jennifer Nichols had some misfortune last spring  and perhaps as a result, hasn’t been quite the ubiquitous presence onstage that she had been in previous years.

Other highlights of the year?
• H̶a̶m̶l̶e̶t̶ from Tarragon: a successful telling of the story
• Anna Bolena from the COC, the best singing of the year, and thank you Sondra.
• Orphée+, another celebrated production from AtG.
• Of the three wildly divergent productions of Candide I saw in the first half of 2018 aka Leonard Bernstein’s centennial, the Toronto Symphony’s semi-staged production was the most effective & the strongest argument in defense of the score.
• The Return of Ulysses from Opera Atelier, thinking especially of Mireille Lebel as Penelope, the MVP performance of the year raising that production to another level.
• Mass in B Minor from Tafelmusik especially Charles Daniels
• Hockey Noir was a great idea at least.
• Orfeo from Toronto Consort, especially Charles Daniels again

Tenor Charles Daniels (photo: Annelies van der Vegt)

• Another new company has taken its place in Toronto, namely Tongue in Cheek productions. They gave us two fascinating events, namely Winterreise, with 24 singers instead of one, and Verbotenlieder from a female group of performers.
• Actéon & Pygmalion from Opera Atelier were wonderful in so many ways. It’s a curious irony that after so many years when OA have been (rightly or wrongly) associated with a homoerotic aesthetic, that these 2 erotically charged operas should arrive at exactly the moment when the COC were presenting a pair of operas by gay composers.

I’d like to think that we’re sufficiently mature now that sexual orientation isn’t such a big deal. But oh wait…. next paragraph.

It’s 2019. Will this be a year vacillating between silly and serious, meaningless or meaningful? Forgive me if I oversimplify, I miss a lot. We’ve had the Ontario election and the rapid-fire actions of the new government, and guess what!? there’s another election coming in the fall that might be every bit as overwhelming, as frustration with a liberal government leads to a mindless stampede off a cliff.  Are we better off without Kathleen Wynne? And why was she and her party annihilated. I fear it was at least partially motivated by an over-reaction to her sexual orientation, as I thought she was doing a good job.

I miss you Kathleen Wynne

You won’t persuade me that things are better now under the Conservatives.  Arts funding & support for the CBC are not part of the conservative agenda, and so I’m very nervous about what’s ahead if Scheer takes power federally.

Have I scared you yet?

And when I can’t take it anymore, I hide out in beautiful performances such as Tafelmusik’s Beethoven concert in the spring or various takes on Messiah, each wonderful in their own way.

At least they haven’t taken away our hiding places.

Not yet.

I came out of the matinee of Kiviuq Returns: An Inuit Epic in an altered state of reality. It’s new but it’s old, it soothes you even as it challenges you. They set the bar very high for what’s to come in 2019.

See it if at all possible.

Created by The Qaggiq Collective, directed by Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory, produced by Qaggiavuut! and presented in the main space of Tarragon Theatre, I experienced the story as an epic in every sense.

Kiviuq Returns is based on legends shared by elder storytellers.

Inuit elders (l to r): Miriam Aglukkaq (from Kugaarjuk), Qaunaq Mikigak (from Kinngait), Madeline Ivalu (from Igloolik), Susan Avingaq (from Igloolik)

The performance is partially enacted by six actors (Keenan Carpenter, Vinnie Karetak, Avery Keenainak, Charlotte Qamaniq, Christine Tootoo and Natar Ungalaq), and partially re-told by the elders speaking to us on video. When we see them all gathered for a group shot near the end as the live performers kneel in homage, I was reminded of that beautifully sentimental moment near the end of Return of the Jedi (speaking of epics): also a gathering of wise elders. At times Kiviuq reminds me of clever Odysseus of the Odyssey or Aeneas of the Aeneid, a hero seeking to get home. We see storms at sea killing everyone but the hero. We encounter monsters and lovers.

The entire show is in Inuktitut. I am reminded of opera in the days before surtitles. One would read the synopsis and one listened carefully . While it’s much easier in Italian or German, where one often has phrase & sentences one recognizes, this wasn’t difficult really. The structure of the presentation was such that we regularly came back to a reading by one of the elders, when the lights would come up somewhat, allowing us to check our programs and in effect to know what was coming.

Director Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory

The director’s note recapitulates a theme I’ve heard before (for instance in Jeremy Dutcher’s album Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa ) about the need to reclaim one’s linguistic heritage as a response to cultural genocide:

Inuktitut is the language of Kiviuq Returns. Let it wash over you. Look for the intent, listen for the emotion, hear the cracks of smiles, the lines of sorrow. Feel the corners and curves of our holophrastic way of speaking. Close your glottiss around the sounds “qi-qu-qa” and hiss without using your teeth for “lli-u-lla” Inuktitut is a river; it flows from a lake that is our histories and dreams, it bends around the land that is our daily lives, hardships and joys and it pours into the ocean that is the working of our minds, our creativity. With this performance we immerse you in our language..Inuktitut.

By being together in this theatre, we have all engaged in an agreement: you agree that it is vitally important to hear and see Inuit theatre professionals working in their own language and we agree to work hard on expanding our use of the language, reclaiming the space it has always taken in this place called Canada. As a group of Indigenous people who have faced the theft of our lands, culture spirituality, music, stories, histories and language and who rage against the colonized pull of suicide and loss, we wrap ourselves in the practice of Inuktitut theatre. Our repeated actions on stage are healing. Our connection between our elders and young people is deepened. Humour balances our sadnesses. This play creates safety like the blocks of sod that insulated the houses of our ancestors.
—Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory

I love that the director’s note proposes a kind of contract with us, that our attention at least would suggest that we agree that their language is important to hear, as a project to reclaim what has been lost.

I would solemnly agree.

There is much beauty in this performance. Several images are engraved in my memory, unforgettably powerful. The six performers will hold your attention.

There are at least two things to mention from my classical – opera background.

1-The voices are doing amazing things that we don’t usually hear in the classical realm. More than once, I found myself asking “how do they do that?” Some of it is inevitably related to the way they phonate and speak, but even so, wow. When I recall performances by Tanya Tagaq I am hungry for more, wondering what else these voices can do.

2-The genre of the performance feels something like opera, at least in the broad sense that Robert Lepage used, when he called opera “the mother of the arts” (or some phrase like that), although I don’t think it matters what we call it. Dance, music, singing, masks & theatre all work together in Kiviuq Returns.

And it’s clear when I google Qaggiavuut that they merge tradition with new theatre in exciting ways.

As part of today’s Toronto audience eating it up I know that there’s a genuine appetite here, a hunger to see and hear more.

Tonight the Toronto Symphony joined forces with members of the Glen Gould School to launch the 21C Festival at Koerner Hall.

We heard six works including two world premieres to conclude:

• Terry Riley: “Half-Wolf Dances Mad in Moonlight” (string orchestra)
• Dorothy Chang: “Northern Star” from True North: Symphonic Ballet
• Dinuk Wijeratne: “First Winter” from True North: Symphonic Ballet
  -intermission-
• Jocelyn Morlock: Nostalgia (string orchestra, I think..?)
• Emilie LeBel: They do not shimmer like the dry grasses on the hills, or the leaves on the trees (world premiere)
• Stewart Goodyear: “Ur-” (world premiere)

There were reasons to be enthusiastic at every moment of the program. I enjoyed everything although there was a great deal of variety.

I cannot deny that the main reason I attended was to hear the final piece on the program, not just composed by, but also played by Stewart Goodyear, a pianist I think of as one of the pre-eminent players in the world. He burst on the local scene with his awe-inspiring Beethoven Marathon. I am thinking too of Neil Crory who passed away earlier this week, who helped launch Stewart, as the producer of the phenomenal set of Beethoven sonatas.

Here’s an example.

So now that Stewart has shown us his ability with Beethoven (and writing some brilliant liner notes as well), with Rachmaninoff and his original piano transcription of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker, perhaps he needed to show us something else. He is also a composer, with several commissions already to his credit.

Pianist & composer Stewart Goodyear

Goodyear’s new piano concerto might be a bit of a reminder.  The word “virtuoso” has lost much of its lustre, as the world doesn’t always remember that virtuosity in a player could be linked to great compositional ideas, from Liszt to Stravinsky to Messaien & Ligeti. One of the great questions has always been to ask: what are the expressive possibilities of an instrument? What are the limits? Watching –yes watching because one wants to see how he does it—the hands move over his Steinway, I wonder how difficult this concerto might be. We begin with some clusters up and down the keyboard, as I wondered about the tonality of what we were to hear. There was a lot of hand over hand movement with fast repeated notes, such as one sees in the closing section of Rhapsody in Blue (not the same sort of music, but a similar effect). At times I was reminded of 20th century piano music, for instance Khatchaturian or Stravinsky.  The energy of the piece and the pianist raised the roof. No wonder I want to hear it again. I believe it deserves to be programmed.

Goodyear’s work was a total contrast to the piece immediately before it, from Emilie LeBel. The piece felt so much like anticipation, a rhetorical framework leading onwards, restrained and beautifully coherent from beginning to end.

The second half began with a fascinating piece from Jocelyn Morlock, “Nostalgia”. I was struck by how much she put into this short piece, so energetic in its first minutes, gradually slowing and becoming reflective and even a bit passive, as the title might suggest, putting me in mind of tone poems that become introspective towards the end, such as the Siegfried Idyll.   We were at times self-referential, sometimes with suggestions of something old, perhaps a neo-baroque using the rhetorical devices such as phrasing and ornament to suggest an older sort of music-making.  And at the end we were in a very abstract place indeed.

Tania Miller conducted all but one of the pieces heard tonight.  Simon Rivard, newly appointed as Resident Conductor at the TSO,  stepped forward for the penultimate work on the program.

Conductor Tania Miller

To begin we heard Terry Riley’s ”Half-Wolf Dances Mad in Moonlight”, lovely string playing to begin the evening, from an older composer who has likely influenced everyone else on the program. Dorothy Chang’s “Northern Star” might have been a contemporary bit of impressionism – if you believe there is such a thing (there’s a controversy… I’ll write about it one of these days). We heard lucid solos emerging from extended harmonies that wouldn’t be out of place in the work of Debussy or the young Stravinsky.  Dinuk Wijeratne’s “First Winter” employed ostinati (although I think everyone in this concert used some sort of ostinato, some more than others). These were tight little cells, sometimes to create a kind of sonic wash as though background. And then suddenly Wijeratne offered powerful bold statements from the full orchestra. I loved how sudden they felt, how he had sloughed off the template of the usual or the predictable, to make something crystal clear & as audacious as his subject.

Goodyear return tomorrow (Thursday) for more of his compositions, while Terry Riley will be back on Friday. Meanwhile the TSO are playing Mozart for the rest of the week at Roy Thomson Hall.

While tonight’s Toronto Symphony all-Mozart concert, conducted by violinist Pinchas Zukerman was 180 degrees in the opposite direction from what they were up to yesterday at Koerner Hall, launching the 21C Festival of new music, there were some interesting points of contact.

I had mused about the notion of the virtuoso & the functions of virtuosity last night, contemplating the brilliant work of Stewart Goodyear as composer & piano soloist. Sometimes a new piece tests what’s possible on an instrument, what a player can do. That can be a very serious endeavor.

I was thinking last night that maybe at times it’s too serious. The difference between high art and something commercial? If you come up with something brilliant that might become an ear worm, and you repeat it insistently? That’s what a popular composer does, what a Richard Strauss, a Giacomo Puccini, a Camille Saint-Saens, a Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky or a Sergei Rachmaninoff might do. Perhaps more serious composers think of that as “selling out”..?

But the ear wants what it wants.

I couldn’t help noticing the joy in Zukerman’s playing tonight, music from 1775, and it was infectious.

Pinchas Zukerman plays Mozart (photo: Jag Gundu)

Who could blame him? I’m thinking particularly of the second half of the program, when he seemed to push himself to a higher level, inspired by what he was playing. There was no mistaking the enjoyment in his reading of the Violin Concerto #3, one where all three movements have memorable melodies, remarkable drama between the soloist & orchestra.

I didn’t want that third movement to end, it was so magnificently played. Zukerman was playing with us in more ways than one. In the back and forth dialogue between his solo lines and the accompanying ensemble he played up the comedy. For instance he might play the line straight (as written) the first time, then add a portamento (slide) the second time, and a touch of real schmaltz the next time, thoroughly enjoying the chemistry with the orchestra and an audience who were eating it up, not knowing what exactly to expect but enjoying the game.

Virtuosity is not just chops, the skill in one’s fingers & hands & arms. Zukerman took the stage with all the charisma of a vaudevillian playing his favourite routine for his fans. The swagger was contagious. Now please understand, this is a different kind of music and a different century from last night’s music. What was intriguing to notice was that Zukerman –a mature artist, in total contrast to the athletic young pianist from last night—really knows himself so well, so relaxed up there it was quite astonishing. During the first of two concertos he played (#5 was first, #3 second), he actually came out onto the stage with his violin, walking through the applause into the space amidst the strings to begin the first movement orchestral introduction, making the downbeat while still walking, the applause not quite dead in the hall. Was he seeking to surprise or startle the orchestra? I think so. That concerto before the interval was not as inspired as the one after intermission.

Did Mozart write with any other players in mind, or just himself? I can’t help wondering. But oh my that concerto –#3 I mean—is so enjoyable for everyone. If you were ever to ask “why compose music” there can be at least a couple of answers:

• You’re trying to make money as a composer ( not a good answer in my opinion)
• It’s what you do for a living (again, not a good answer)
• You love the sounds you’re creating and want to hear them (that’s more like it)
• It’s fun and you want to hear people play what you write (surely that’s the dream…)
• You want to give singers & musicians & dancers something to sing / play / dance

When a child hears music like this concerto, one can imagine them deciding they want to learn the violin, to play this someday. I know that there are pieces that when you hear them, you want to play them because they are beautiful, you want to hear them again because you can’t get the melody out of your head. That’s what I came for tonight and (wow) that’s exactly what I got.  Lucky me.

They warmed up to it, as parts of the first half of the concert were not quite as superb, perhaps a little too mellow for my taste. Maybe I am spoiled by the historically informed super fast approach of Tafelmusik and ensembles like them. That these were a little slower, more in the tradition of the Mozart I grew up with as a child, such as Karl Bohm’s Mozart (I had his Magic Flute and his symphonies #40 & 41) doesn’t mean they couldn’t be great fun. But they were romantic readings, the sound big and muscular, a pompous sort of fun. This Mozart makes you love the symphony.

Zukerman and the TSO are back Friday & Saturday with the same program at Roy Thomson Hall.

How do people meet, and what’s involved in making connections? I keep asking this question about the arts because in case you haven’t noticed, you can’t do it alone. Yes there are people like Beethoven who work in solitude, people like Richard Wagner who write the music and the words. But Beethoven was deaf, Wagner was a political exile, so there were reasons why they didn’t work with others. And even then yes they did work with others.  Theatre is collaborative.

So the undercurrent to my questions to Julie Tepperman & Chris Thornborrow –creators of Hook Up, a new musical theatre piece about relationships in the modern era that’s opening January 30th (previewing Jan 29th)– is to ask about connections and collaborative relationships.

I probably should know both of these people better by now.

I missed Julie Tepperman’s Bandits in the Valley in the summer of 2017, done with Tapestry Opera (an important connection too). She’s playwright in residence with Theatre Passe Muraille, who are teaming up with Tapestry on Hook Up.

Librettist Julie Tepperman

And she came up in my interview with Sara Schabas roughly a year ago, when Sara said this:

Aaron Willis, our director, was introduced to me through his wife, Julie Tepperman – librettist for Bandits in the Valley. Aaron and Julie are the co-artistic directors of Convergence Theatre, and Aaron has directed for numerous esteemed companies around Toronto including Soulpepper and Theatre Passe Muraille. He’s also involved in the Toronto Jewish community, and he and Julie wrote and starred in a comedy called Yichudabout an Orthodox Jewish couple a few years ago, which received wide-ranging praise.

Hm… more connections…people working together on projects they care about deeply.

Composer Chris Thornborrow

I don’t feel that I know Chris Thornborrow well either. I recall getting very excited at a Toy Piano Composers concert, the record launch that included a piece by Chris back in the summer of 2017. I’d previously encountered his work through the Bicycle Opera Project’s 2014 tour, a short work about relationships called A Little Rain Must Fall, and one that I’d seen previously at (you guessed it) another Tapestry LibLab.

And so now in anticipation of the encounter between Julie & Chris in Hook Up that opens January 30th at Theatre Passe Muraille, I had to ask them to talk about their work & coming together on the project.

BB: What is the best or worst thing about what you do?

CHRIS: My favourite thing about my work is collaborating. It is so fulfilling to collaborate with other artists to bring a work to life — particularly in film, opera, and theatre. I love working on projects artists of different disciplines whose work comes together to be greater than the sum of its parts.

JULIE: I agree! So much of my work as a playwright happens in isolation until the draft is in a place to start inviting a director, actors, and designers into the process. But in order to create an opera, the composer and librettist are in it together from day one…which is thrilling.

BB:Who do you like to listen to or watch?

CHRIS: I have pretty eclectic tastes in music. I listen to quite a bit of contemporary classical music, generally leaning towards minimalist and post-minimalist aesthetics (John Adams, John Luther Adams, Nico Muhly, Caroline Shaw). I also listen to a broad range of folk music, indie pop, some electronic stuff. I have a soft spot for Sibelius, which coincidentally is also my notation software of choice.

JULIE: I rely on people way cooler than me (Chris!) to introduce me to new music. In terms of theatre, I love shows that immerse me in a world. In the case of Hook Up, our director and design team is making really cool use of screens, projections, social media, and the entire mainspace of Theatre Passe Muraille, so that scenes pop up in unexpected places.

BB: What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

CHRIS: Time travel.

JULIE: I can kinduv sing, but I wish I could really sing…like the cast of Hook Up! And tap dance.

BB: When you’re just relaxing and not working, what is your favourite thing to do?

CHRIS: I love exploring the city (via bicycle), and when possible, traveling. I am also a pretty avid reader, movie watcher, and video game player. Although I love it, my enthusiasm for basketball far outweighs my skill in actually playing the sport.

JULIE: A year ago I would’ve said, “I’m never NOT working on something!”…but now I have a 15-month-old daughter who is pretty fun to hang out with…she’s the perfect antidote for a workaholic like me.

BB: How did you meet & come to collaborate on Hook Up?

CHRIS & JULIE: We met in August 2013 where we were one of four playwrights and four composers across Canada selected to participate in Tapestry Opera’s 10-day “LibLab” program. LibLab is designed like “speed-dating” — pairs of librettists and composers are matched for two-and-a-half-days of creation, with the task of creating 5-minute operas. When it was our turn, we instantly hit it off.

Chris had recently composed a children’s opera about two girls facing off against zombie pirates, was interested in continuing to explore women’s stories and also issues important to youth – a demographic Julie felt is often ignored in the operatic and classical music world. Meanwhile, Julie had spent the last three years building a theatrical piece that explores rape culture, and working with middle and high school students on various acting and playwriting projects as a guest artist in their classrooms, where this topic always seemed to come up. We were both intrigued by the others’ passion for working with youth

And so, a 7-minute piece they called “Cindy + Mindy = BFs 4EVR” was created and selected to be performed as part of Tapestry’s “Opera Briefs” in September 2013. It focused on a live Facebook chat that 17-year-old best friends Cindy and Mindy were having in their separate bedrooms, “slut-shaming” a girl at school they’d named “Ho-bag Heather”. At the time, we were motivated by the then-recent suicides of Canadian teenagers Rehtaeh Parsons (April 2013) and Amanda Todd (October 2012) after both of them endured endless in-person and online sexual harassment and bullying. This was the springboard for what would become Selfie, a roughly 75-minute piece that was written and composed over two-and-a-half years which explored teen cyberbullying.

After a rigorous process of development and workshops, including some sharing with invited audiences (which included teachers and teenagers), we got very stuck, and ultimately decided not to continue developing Selfie. In the fall of 2016, director and dramaturge Richard Greenblatt was brought onboard to help us refocus and reinvigorate.

Richard Greenblatt, Director & Dramaturge

We eventually landed on a theme that we had kept passionately returning to in conversations and in the sharing of research, even while working on Selfie – rape culture and consent, at large, but more specifically on university campuses. And so, facilitated by Richard over a period of several months, we created a new outline for a new story that involved three 17-year-olds navigating their first semester at a (fictional) Canadian university.

BB: Tell us a bit more about Hook Up as a piece of music-theatre.

CHRIS: Hook Up straddles the world of opera and musical theatre. Structurally, it is through-composed. Thematic material is used to augment the emotional and psychological states of the characters and the plot. There are no traditional musical theatre numbers (e.g. verse chorus structure). Aesthetically, the piece leans towards musical theatre. The singers, for example, will be miked. The story moves forward faster than most traditional opera. There, orchestration includes sounds and musical aesthetics you might hear on a university campus or college party today.
JULIE: With regard to the story, it focuses on young people navigating their first semester at university and being thrust into adulthood.

Chris and I have a shared desire to tell a story that puts complicated and complex young women at its centre, and pushes the boundaries of traditional operatic forms in an effort to tell a story of our time. The setting of our opera may be a college campus, but we believe that rape culture and consent are incredibly pervasive issues throughout society, as evidenced by the groundswell of the #MeToo Movement, and the rigorous conversations taking place around the globe thanks to the strength of women like Christine Blasey Ford. Sexual assault remains a brutal reality of modern campus life; we hope that our opera is the beginning of yet another vital conversation that we need to be having in our homes, schools, communities, and in society at large.

BB: The genre question becomes more and more tricky with every passing decade, as the difference between “opera” and “the musical” narrows or overlaps. Please talk about how you understand Hook Up, in terms of its origins, its development (when it may have changed in your hands), your objectives and the possible expectations of audiences.

CHRIS: It’s interesting that this question about the difference between opera and the musical as genres keeps coming up, even as those aesthetics have become increasingly interwoven (not to mention the cross pollination that is ubiquitous in virtually all musical genres, which doesn’t seem to get the same kind of scrutiny. Jeremy Dutcher, whose Polaris Prize winning album Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa combines opera, pop, and Wolastoq folk-song. Does it ever enter into the discussion that this kind of musical blending and exploration of “genres” as tricky?) It wasn’t helpful for me to think in terms of, “Is this a musical or is this an opera?” It was more useful for me to think of the work as a piece of theatre. In developing what Hook Up sounds like, I asked what would be the most authentic, compelling way to tell this particular story through music. Furthermore, this project is of special interest to me as an artist because I am eager to fill a void in opera: I want to create an opera that connects to a young adult audience by addressing contemporary issues that are important to them, while at the same time refuting traditional operatic narrative tropes. All too often, the harm done to women who are subjugated by men in the stories of historical operas is portrayed uncritically. This is problematic. Creating a story that places the experience of women at the centre of the narrative is my way of addressing this issue.

JULIE: This is a high-stakes issue and opera lends itself to high-stakes scenarios, and big emotions. It is certainly experimental, and lives in a unique place compositionally; hard core opera aficionados will likely accuse us of creating musical theatre, but because there are no traditional musical numbers, musical theatre fans will likely relate to it as contemporary opera! Chris’ music is certainly pushing the boundaries of traditional operatic forms, and in doing so he’s created a musical world that is accessible, authentic, surprising, and fully supports and reflects the emotional stakes and states of being of the characters and situations. Opera also requires the librettist to be economical with language; if this were a play, it would be written very differently. Rather, it’s been written with the intention of it being sung, and so intentionally leaves room for the music to enhance the emotional journeys. This kind of brevity is also very true of on-line communication – 140 characters! – and in that sense opera lends itself perfectly to the style and form of this piece. Ultimately, music has the power to deeply connect both artist and audience with their emotions in a visceral way, and in doing so music can elevate the piece, and enrich the audiences’ overall experience.

BB: The Canadian Opera Company Atom Egoyan production of Mozart’s cosi fan tutte explores the idea of a “school for lovers”; does Hook Up function as a modern version, even if it’s a cautionary tale?

CHRIS: I’m not sure how to answer this question, because we didn’t really set out to position ourselves in the context of traditional operas. We were definitely interested in telling a compelling story about what young people experience on college and university campuses today. We want to create an opera that connects to a young adult audience by addressing contemporary issues that are important to them, while at the same time veering away from some traditional operatic narrative tropes.

BB: In bringing Hook Up to life, especially as far as the relationship between the two of you, please talk for a moment about the role of your dramaturg (mediator or midwife?).
[please be as elaborate or as brief as you wish.]

CHRIS & JULIE: Our dramaturge, Richard facilitated what we as the writer/composer team wanted to say. This includes clarifying, asking questions, and helping us dig deeper into our material. We have a tremendous respect for each other, and so mediation was never really a part of it.

BB: Are there any influences you would care to mention, that might be relevant to someone coming to Hook Up that might be useful for them to recognize what they’ll be seeing & hearing?

CHRIS & JULIE: We’re going to be annoying and avoid this question in terms of musical influences, but we will say that a tremendous amount of research went into the writing of this piece. News articles, journals, books of non-fiction and fiction have been poured over, and of course talking with young people. The result: Hook Up is an unflinching examination of issues around consent, shame, and power, specifically on North American university and college campuses. We imagine it as a catalyst for discussion about difficult topics. We have included a content warning that the show contains explicit language, discussion of sexual violence, and sexual consent. In light of some of the difficult subject matter, we have planned several post-show talks facilitated by CANVAS Arts Action Programs, an organization that uses arts-inspired programs to educate on gender equity, consent, and LGBQT2S+ inclusion. Further written support material is available by request at the theatre’s box office.

*****

Hook Up, a Tapestry Opera Production in partnership with Theatre Passe Muraille opens January 30th, previewing Jan 29th at 16 Ryerson, running until February 9th. For tickets & further information click here.

In a week juxtaposing new (21C festival) and old (the Toronto Symphony playing Mozart with Pinchas Zukerman), I came finally to see The Harlequin Salon by Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, including a great deal of theatricality to complement their music. While I seemed to be moving back in time with the progression of the week, the show tonight might be the newest and freshest of all.

Conceived and performed by Marco Cera in the main role, The Harlequin Salon is that rare creature, a multi-media presentation where all the media are essential and perfectly linked together.

We were watching

• Harlequin as portrayed by actor Dino Gonçalves,
• his master Pier Leone Ghezzi, a caricaturist and amateur musician as portrayed by oboist Marco Cera who sketches guests in his home (the salon); we see the sketches take shape through miracle of digital images, projected above the stage thanks to Patrick Lavender & Ramon Cespedes. The guests we meet?
  • Vivaldi as portrayed by Tafelmusik violinist Elisa Citterio
  • the great singer Faustina Bordoni, portrayed by guest artist soprano Roberta Invernizzi
  • composer & cello virtuoso Giovanni Bononcini as portrayed by Tafelmusik cellist Felix Deak
  • Bordoni –playing a trick on the amorous Harlequin—disguises herself as the famous castrato Farinelli, again portrayed by Invernizzi
• the staging is directed by Guillaume Bernardi, while the music-making directed by Tafelmusik artistic director Elisa Citterio

Here’s some idea of the flamboyance of the Harlequin Salon from Tafelmusik. We watch Michael Cera (left) as Ghezzi sketching guests while sitting at the table. The sketches (sometimes unflattering) appear on the screen above, while Harlequin (Dino Goncalves, right) adds a layer.

It was never dull, and at times, exquisite, simultaneously a complex piece of theatre & musical performance plus video art. At times there was so much going on –caricatures taking shape, acting & comedy, all in context with some magnificent music-making—that one didn’t always know where to focus one’s attention. The last part of the concert, as Invernizzi sang a Pergolesi aria accompanied by Cera’s stunning oboe obbligato is one of the most beautiful things I’ve heard in a long time.  Not only have I discovered new music, but a new singer as well (both worthy of further exploration).

It’s a bit of a trip down memory lane, vivid reminders of what I learned about Commedia dell’Arte in graduate school. Near the beginning Gonçalves gave us the classic lazzo of the fly. A lazzo is a comic routine, and this one is such a chestnut that it’s been around for hundreds of years. Even so Gonçalves got laughs as he mimed chasing the fly, and eventually eating it.

Harlequin is always hungry.

Okay, some of the lazzi (the plural of lazzo) are old, such as the one with the mimed fly, or another one opening & re-sealing the master’s mail. But they did an original lazzo with a music-stand, a clever use of the available prop for a quick laugh.

Speaking of memories & grad school, their Commedia dell’Arte consultant was Domenico Pietropaolo who taught the CdA course I took during my MA, and who is now Principal of St Michael’s College at the University of Toronto.

I repeat what I hinted at earlier. While it appears superficially that I was going back in time as the week progressed (21C being 21st century music, Mozart composing in the latter part of the 18th century, and this program coming from the first half of that same century): yet this was actually the newest, the most theatrical, most daring programming of all.

We seem to be in the home of a man, watching a few musicians (only 9 of Tafelmusik’s players, and some in costumes for roles), while the sketches being created apparently in the present by Ghezzi were drawn anew on the big screen above. It was wonderfully intimate, very informal & playful, and at the same time, full of wonderful music. Tafelmusik continually challenge themselves with their inventive programs like this one.

You can visit The Harlequin Salon Saturday January 19th at 8pm or Sunday January 20th at 3:30pm Jeanne Lamon Hall, Trinity-St. Paul’s Centre.

If you’re a fan of the music of Richard Wagner chances are you’re fully aware that the Toronto Symphony are showcasing some of his best known music this week, in a concert tonight that repeats Saturday Feb 2nd. After three consecutive years of Ring Cycle thrills 2015-16-17 from the Canadian Opera Company we hit a two year drought since Götterdämmerung.

So you must get a ticket to the Saturday concert for your fix of  big powerful voices, passionate tunes & hair-raising climaxes. You won’t hear better singing anytime soon (sorry COC). There are several reasons to go, as I shall elaborate.

Yes the three nights of the Ring operas are over four hours each plus the one-act prologue that’s two and a half hours. Our 90 minute concert tonight was a delicious hors d’oeuvre, an appetizer. But then again, considering how exhausting some of those operas can be, this felt complete:

• a concert performance of the first act of Die Walküre perhaps Wagner’s most popular opera
• his best known melody, that five minute bon bon from later in the same opera aka “The Ride of the Valkyries.”
• In between the Wagner performances came Berg’s Three Pieces for Orchestra.

And yet there were lots of empty seats. Perhaps they didn’t know about the concert? I only spotted it a few days ago but of course I go to things compulsively and scour schedules to make sure I don’t miss things. When I saw this my heart skipped a beat.

In the spirit of Wagner, who denies you cadences and harmonic resolutions to keep you tied up in knots & hanging on, and all hot & bothered: let me first address the first half of the concert, and keep you waiting concerning the main event.

We began with the tune everyone knows. No this is not what we heard in Apocalypse Now. That sequence with the helicopters was the proper beginning to Act III with the soprano voices. In case you’ve ever wondered why Coppola put that music in the film, (preposterous and unlikely as it is), this is music that celebrates war. The first time I saw that film –as someone who grew up listening to Die Walküre –I felt like I was being ripped apart, torn in two by the contrary emotions of this orgiastic celebration of war (helicopters dropping napalm to those ecstatic soprano voices) while watching innocent villagers get shot and incinerated. Now if you take out the voices, you’re listening to a really cool melody in the trombones plus lots of swirling strings, all meant to accompany a vocal line: that’s missing. After about two minutes it gets very repetitive, but come to think of it, so are most of these orchestral gems (The Sabre Dance? Flight of the Bumblebee?), pieces of music for a different sort of audience.  Oh well, the audience ate it up.

This is not the same Andrew Davis I knew when he first led the Toronto Symphony decades ago. He’s gone away and matured. When he conducted Ariadne auf Naxos a few years ago with the COC we already saw a new larger than life persona, who’s been back for such adventures as his brassy Messiah that the TSO recorded. He is a magisterial presence, a steady hand on the tiller with a mischievous smile.

Sir Andrew Davis (Photo: Jaime Hogge)

Davis seemed very comfortable with Wagner & the riderless horses that this piece implies (given that the sopranos / Valkyries riding the horses are missing from this version). And then he came out to do the Peter Oundjian thing at the microphone, introducing the second item on the program. After a pregnant pause he took the stage, going much deeper than any talk I can recall from Peter, bless his heart. I’m guessing that Peter was mindful of his audience & his mission, aimed to educate and to be inclusive, and so was studious in the KISS principle: keep it simple, Scarberian, (or whatever else S might stand for). Berg is like the bastard child of the Ring; no I don’t mean in the way Siegfried is the outcome of a wild night on the forest floor for the fleeing Wälsung twins, so much as the musical outcome of what Wagner started, namely modernism. I loved Davis’s off the cuff style, explaining how we got to Berg and in the process making sense out of this curious program. While it was a wild & woolly Ride, complete with a trombone coming in a whole bar early (well the piece does seem to vamp until ready… except trombones are supposed to count, not make the whole orchestra adjust & make the conductor blush): all was forgiven. The Berg was a remarkably delicate affair for the first part, gradually building to big climaxes. The great thing about this piece is that I wouldn’t have a clue if someone played a wrong note or an entire wrong page. It sounded great.

And then after intermission we came to the reason most of us were there.

Let me begin by saying a heart-felt “it’s about time”. Every rinky dink opera outfit in the GTA gives us projected titles with a translation. Thank you Roy Thomson Hall for catching up to something the COC first did in 1983. So that was a mighty step forward. We shouldn’t have to juggle programs when something is being sung in a foreign language, opera or oratorio or whatever else it might be.  Hopefully this will be the new normal.

This concert performance of the Act I showcased many talents:

• Soprano Lise Davidsen as Sieglinde
• Tenor Simon O’Neill as Siegmund
• Bass Brindley Sherratt as Hunding
• The conducting of Davis: not at all who he used to be
• And assorted solos in the TSO…. Joseph Johnson was particularly affecting in two brilliant solos, especially the first one, as Siegmund begins to fall for Sieglinde. O’Neill stared at JJ as though dumbstruck by the beauty coming out of that cello. No wonder he falls in love.

It’s not fair to compare this to a fully staged performance. O’Neill doesn’t have to struggle with a real sword, Davidsen doesn’t have to actually get a drink for Siegmund or drug her hubby. No costumes or sets might be an advantage, though, in the era of Regietheater, productions that sometimes overwrite the opera with new meanings. And it’s a whole different animal to sing Sieglinde for three acts, or Siegmund for two (he doesn’t live to see Act III), as opposed to what we got tonight: which is still lots to sing.

While I won’t deny that I’ve got some Dalwhinnie in a glass as I gather my thoughts before sleeping, I’m sober in my assessments. I’ve heard a great many Sieglindes in my time, both on record and some live. This performance from Davidsen is the most accurately sung sensuous singing I’ve yet heard in the role. The lower part of the range is like butterscotch ice cream, so rich as to seem decadent and so good I kept wanting more (and she will be the reason I come back Saturday if I can manage it: as should you). It might be the most beautiful voice I’ve ever heard. I want to say it can’t last, because she’s young and singing rep that 30 year olds don’t normally undertake (and btw I don’t know her age, but she looks even younger). The approach seems natural, unaffected.  The sound emerges without struggle possibly because of her size, as she stands 1.88 meters tall, towering over the others onstage with her. With each successively higher note (it’s written so that she hits a G, then a G-sharp and finally an A) she showed more power, perhaps a tiny bit sharp on the A, which was preferable to flat. I mention that only because except for that she was perfect, the voice powerful, emerging without apparent  effort.  I think it’s fair to say that she has a brilliant future ahead of her.

O’Neill is in some respects the exact opposite even as he portrays her twin. You can hear recordings of his intelligent singing from years ago, and that’s basically what we got tonight. He has excellent technique, a committed portrayal dramatically with crystal clear diction & impeccable pitch on every single note. Maybe that’s what people expect in a concert performance: but Siegmund is challenging. The colour is lighter than what some singers give us, more of a McCracken than a Vickers or a Kaufmann, which is another way of saying that he is a tenor without darkening into a baritonal sound. This man is reliable, and will give you the high notes that make the climactic moments work so well.

Here’s an example of him singing part of what we heard tonight. Notice the commitment, the perfect technique & accurate pitch

I don’t know Brindley Sherratt, but maybe I should..? He reminded me instantly of Gottlob Frick, a bass with a wonderfully dark direct delivery. Again, he was note-perfect. This was a classic reading without anything quirky or unexpected, very musical.

Davis gave us some magic. In the earlier part of Hunding’s role, when so many orchestras think their job is to make the brass loud as if they were all MAGA hat wearers playing their music ALL IN UPPER CASE (in other words, without subtlety or guile), this was a revelation. Aha, what if Hunding is observing Wehwalt (as they initially call Siegmund), seeing the resemblance between his wife & the newcomer, singing sotto voce while the brass were crisp but shooting brief little bursts..?  As a result we could hear everything perfectly, without necessitating exhaustion for Sherratt: or any other singer come to think of it. Davis let it all build gradually. The big climaxes were never overly loud, under control, and musical. The emphasis on beauty rather than pure volume was noticeable.

And I need to mention something from today on Facebook. As I walked to visit a customer today in the extreme cold of Toronto’s morning, and I recalled a piece of music that makes me shiver, I asked friends what music makes them shiver: given that we’re already shivering, right? The culmination of that thought was in the moment during the concert when the (virtual) sword comes out of the (virtual) tree, a sound very much like an orchestral orgasm: and no Wagner was not blind to the implications of all this talk about a sword. The moment in question Davis and the TSO gave me colossal shivers as the whole orchestra simulated the convulsions in the viscera of the twins, glimpsing the sword pulled out of its sheath.

The three singers were entirely believable in their portrayals, delightful to hear. You won’t hear Wagner again in Toronto for a long time, and certainly won’t hear singing like this, perhaps ever. This is what Roy Thomson Hall is really good for, namely big loud performances from a big large orchestra.  The program repeats Saturday Feb 2nd at 8:00 pm.

Voicebox /Opera in Concert offered a highlight in a splendid week of music theatre in Toronto, reminding us of why they are such a crucial part of the mix in this city with their concert performance of Schubert’s Fierabras today.  Hook Up from Tapestry at Passe Muraille  was a brand-new musical, and then the Wagner done by the Toronto Symphony  gave us some amazing voices with the playing from the TSO. But this was a chance to hear a genuine rarity, done with wonderful care & some tremendous singing.

Like Beethoven, Franz Schubert was a transitional composer from the classical to the romantic, known for several different types of music. While Schubert wrote many more operas (the number could be as high as 20) than Beethoven (who composed but one), none of Schubert’s are ever staged, unlike Fidelio, Beethoven’s single operatic masterpiece. I’m very grateful to Guillermo Silva-Marin, OiC’s Artistic Director for programming this gem, full of beautiful music that we’ll probably never hear again.

Conductor Kevin Mallon

Kevin Mallon conducted the ten players of Aradia in his arrangement of the work, adding a movement from the Schubert Octet as overture. I’m clear as to why Schubert’s operas aren’t performed: at least if they’re like this one, thanks to what we heard today. I don’t think I can possibly calibrate the importance of Mallon’s input except to say that he made the entire thing possible.

It’s very challenging music, especially for the men. If we hadn’t been in the welcoming acoustic of the Jane Mallett Theatre (which seats fewer than 500), and if Mallon hadn’t orchestrated for such a small ensemble, it would have been brutal in a bigger theatre with a big orchestra. And it gets worse…(!) Even as it was, I had the distinct impression that Schubert’s idea of opera if very different from that of any other composer. The men are often above the passagio (the transition zone of the vocal registers), or in other words at times it’s very tough. There is a huge amount of choral writing in this opera, so in addition to a number of extraordinarily difficult roles for the men –already the likely deal-breaker for a company considering the work—the men’s choral writing is relentlessly difficult. The women’s chorus have a fair bit to do as well, but not as murderous. Robert Cooper, the OiC Chorus’s Director did a masterful job preparing them. Did I mention that the plot is very complex? I heard more than a few in attendance joking about the challenges of following the story. So in other words, there are several good reasons why one never hears this Schubert opera even though the music is stunningly beautiful.

I’m not sure who had the toughest role, only that I was staring in disbelief more than once. Lance Wiliford –the co-artistic director of Canadian-Art Song Project and therefore a singer we’d expect to be comfortable with Schubert’s song rep—gave a textbook demonstration of perfect technique, handling a considerable number of high notes with apparent ease. Matthew Dalen with a heavier sound than Wiliford’s also soared impressively in the title role.

Tenor Lawrence (Lance) Wiliford

In this story conflating tales of romantic love and wars of conquest, the testosterone on the stage was unmistakeable.  Much of the baritone writing resembled what Beethoven created for the tyrant Pizarro, which is to say quick macho declamation that wasn’t terribly pretty to hear nor very believable dramatically. Evan Korbut, Alex Dobson & Justin Welsh all had their masculine moments, although by the end some lines were so melodramatic as to give the audience the giggles. The two contrasting female leads were both wonderfully well-sung. Where Amy Moodie’s sound had the lightness and deft accuracy of a coloratura role –but without the coloratura—Jocelyn Fralick had a more dramatic sound, as well as one of the few staged moments in the opera, when she’s required to pass out on the stage (done quite believably).

The funny thing that occurred to me watching all these people in formal attire was how much more believable that made it than had it been costumed. Silly and tangled as the plot was, imagining it sung with knights in armour made me wonder how it would have looked in the time (although the opera never made it to the stage during the composer’s short life). The tuxedoes served to reconcile the extremes of plot –warfare & romance—in a curiously believable middle ground. At times I thought we were watching a director’s theatre approach to the opera, presented with the musical numbers sung in German but with English dialogue. I’m very grateful for their spectacular efforts today.

Voicebox / Opera in Concert are back for Kurt Weill’s The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny March 30th & 31st.

Happy Valentine’s Day.

Tonight I’ll be listening to the Toronto Symphony celebrate the day under the leadership of Barbara Hannigan, who will also be singing.

Soprano Barbara Hannigan, singing & conducting the Toronto Symphony. (photo: Jag Gundu)

Here’s the program:

When I posted that photo at lunch earlier today from last night’s Toronto Symphony concert, I joked that Barbara Hannigan is a precedent setter. Even so I understated what we saw & heard tonight.

Soprano Barbara Hannigan, singing & conducting the Toronto Symphony. (photo: Jag Gundu)

With one exception, the five works we heard hang together as a carefully curated study touching in various ways upon the Ewig-weibliche, (or the “eternal feminine”), via Debussy, Sibelius, Berg, and Gershwin. In the middle the TSO presented a Haydn symphony that might have been that proverbial piece of bread to cleanse the palate, although my gosh it might have been the clearest cleanest Haydn I’d ever heard.

I hope the question of Barbara Hannigan’s ability as a conductor has by now been laid to rest. We ran the gamut of styles tonight, including several places where she didn’t just conduct ferociously difficult scores, but at times sang while conducting. Does anyone else do this? I can’t recall unless we’re talking about someone from a popular realm such as Cab Calloway (the first one who comes to mind). Alas classical criticism often is nothing more than a measurement of competence, how fast or how high they went as though singers & instrumentalists were in the Olympics. She must surely pass in that kind of mechanical critique, but please don’t expect me to make that kind of assessment.

I was too busy having fun, and that’s likely true of the orchestra as well.

And so there we were out on our Valentine’s Day date, watching and hearing works that in various ways seem relevant to the day. Debussy’s brief Syrinx began our evening, played by TSO principal flautist Kelly Zimba from a darkened auditorium seated among us in the mezzanine. The program note is longer than the piece, which is perhaps an indication that there was something more ambitious in mind than just a curtain raiser, pointing to the deeper meanings for the work. While Zimba played Debussy’s sinuous line Hannigan quietly entered in the dark through the orchestra. As the piece finished there was a brief pause before the downbeat to begin Sibelius’ Luonnotar, a work for soprano & orchestra.

As with the Debussy, we’re in the realm of a romantic music. This one tells a creation myth in a song that’s a kind of ur-folk music. This was the second of five pieces tonight that were 100% in Hannigan’s head, memorized not only for her role as conductor but also singing.  At times her voice soared, sometimes sighing softly through the gentle accompaniments. She seemed to emerge organically out of the middle of the orchestra, a wonderful symbiosis. You’d never persuade me that the orchestra didn’t love playing with her, from the way they responded to her at the podium throughout the evening.

After the interval came two pieces from roughly the same historical period, that took our study of the female in new directions. Again, I’m mindful of Hannigan the curator, bringing two unexpected voices together. Berg & Gershwin? It’s nowhere near as odd as that might sound when you think about it.   Hannigan’s is the prettiest sounding Berg (Suite from Lulu) I think I’ve ever heard. No really. The internal voices came through with great delicacy, the powerful brass statements dramatic for their contrast, emerging out of soft textures.  While the ensemble is enormous, she resisted the temptation to be loud by default. And this Gershwin is of course an arrangement that plays up similarities, while pushing the most modern of his impulses. After hearing Hannigan singing Lulu & a little bit of Geschwitz, she sang three songs from Girl Crazy in a recent arrangement by Bill Elliott, designed to be heard alongside the Lulu Suite. For the Gershwin the voice was amplified, but the conducting was still very challenging, as Elliott sometimes threw in some odd time-signatures and dissonances. That’s the edgiest Gershwin I’ve ever heard: and it was thrilling.  Hannigan’s conclusion brought the audience to a stirring ovation at the end.

Barbara Hannigan leading the TSO (photo: Jag Gundu)

And now I hope she makes a recording of this repertoire. I need to hear it again.

Tomorrow the TSO switch gears, as Casablanca moves into Roy Thomson Hall. The ongoing film with live orchestra series appears to be a huge success.

Tonight I was present at the North American Premiere of The Angel Speaks, a program of several works in several styles from Opera Atelier in a single performance for a small audience at the Royal Ontario Museum.

Would we call it opera?  The word takes many forms and shapes.  I think tonight I wanted to call them “Ballet Atelier”, this company who foreground dance, and whose identity is more rooted in movement vocabularies & physical appearance than in anything you’d find in a score or a libretto.

As Opera Atelier co-artistic director Marshall Pynkoski explained it in his introduction The Angel Speaks, the work we saw tonight, is part of a longer development process. It was a pleasant unveiling, entirely in the right place.

We were watching the performance in the Samuel Hall Currelly Gallery of the Royal Ontario Museum, in a space with the same foot print as the chapel space in Versailles (where I think the work was premiered, if I understood what Pynkoski was telling us).

Speaking of footprint…!

Dinos in the dark…. exchanging glances

…we were in the presence of old and new, the building a post-modern juxtaposition of styles, the dinosaurs as the most ancient witnesses.  The dance was both the baroque we’ve seen before from Opera Atelier and something new, as Tyler Gledhill spent a great deal of time on the floor. The scores were from Henry Purcell but also new ones from baroque violinist Edwin Huizinga, tuneful pieces that are not out of place in such a program or in the midst of a baroque program. It’s the ultimate challenge to a composer to put their new work alongside brilliant compositions that have endured for centuries: a test Huizinga passed. His music is mostly melodic, at times reminding me of Vivaldi in the frenetic solo passages for his violin –that he played himself—while in others, channeling a minimalist mix of Erik Satie & Philip Glass, gentle pattern music that easily held the stage and the audience.

While there was singing, I felt we were more in the realm of dance than opera, as the singing was often self-conscious rather than dramatized, a very theatrical presentation that did not call forth much in the way of a dramatic illusion. Baritone Jesse Blumberg started us off with Purcell’s beautiful “Music for Awhile”. I looked across the space at the audience, not sure if they were getting the text, especially when we come to the magical phrase “Till the snakes drop…..drop…. drop…. from her head, And the whip from out her hands.” Purcell’s composition really sounds like something is dropping when we hear those words.  Blumberg delicately began the opening phrase on the threshold of our hearing.

Huizinga’s setting of Rilke’s “Annunciation” seems to be the heart of the piece. Here’s a bit from the program note:

In the process of turning this poem into a dramatic cantata, we have developed a loose, expressionistic plot line that focuses on the angel Gabriel, rather than the Virgin. Gabriel’s confusion, disorientation and gradual recognition of his mission provides exceptional fodder for accompanied recitative. It also allows for the opportunity of writing for two voices—soprano and baritone—from distinct worlds. The angel Gabriel is able to see the Virgin; he circles her,, touches her and explores the sensation of awe she inspires. She, in turn is unable to see the angel-but mesmerically repeats selections of his words and key phrases, as though speaking in a dream. At the conclusion, Gabriel is drawn back into his true element and the Virgin is left standing alone. She is like an icon or jewel—exquisite but unaware of its own brilliance.

While the objective may be operatic, so far the dance & the music are the most advanced in this project, and clearly in the foreground of what we saw, as so far the dramatization is in the movement + music less than in some treatment of the text via the singing.   Most of what we heard and saw was very beautiful all the same.

I will sound like a bit of a school-marm when I say that I had one objection. But the closing piece, sung exquisitely by Mireille Assselin (who was perfection throughout) was mis-used if not abused. I’m speaking of Purcell’s “An Evening Hymn”, a favourite of mine and one of the most genuine & sincere addresses to the creator that I’ve ever encountered, since I stumbled upon it on Michael Slattery’s The People’s Purcell CD last summer, a phenomenal piece of writing. It’s such a simple thing, as though the singer were talking to God. And so it began wonderfully in a solo, that turned into background music while the entire company danced to it. Sorry, but the choreography cheapens and arguably perverts the spirituality in this music. Okay it’s an experiment, and hopefully they will notice this glaring shift of tone, hopefully noting that what does or does not work. No one is asking me, but I’d suggest that they either permit Asselin to sing the hymn to its conclusion, perhaps at the beginning rather than the end (when the prayerful quality of the piece takes us deep into the heart of everything Rilke would want to invoke), and if the full ballet must take the stage to end, then finish with a secular piece such as the excerpt from Come Ye Sons of Art.

But the baroque music—a bit of Boyce and a whole lot more Purcell—was stunning throughout from a few members of Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, Asselin & Blumberg.

I’ll be intrigued to see what comes of this experiment. So far so good.

I’m sharing some lovely photos by Bruce Zinger of last night’s North American premiere of  The Angel Speaks at the ROM, featuring Opera Atelier and select artists of Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra.

Baritone Jesse Blumberg sings alongside dancer Tyler Gledhill. To the left you can see violinist & composer Edwin Huizinga towards the back with the orchestra. Felix Deak, viola da gamba, is visible just behind Gledhill. (photo: Bruce Zinger)

Is Opera Atelier perhaps pushing the envelope of what artists do? while they’re thought of as historically informed purveyors of music from centuries gone by, The Angel Speaks required a lot of Jesse Blumberg & Mireille Asselin, the two singers employed in the midst of and as part of a great deal of choreography.  I was thinking about the way music-theatre now looks for the “triple threat” of actor-singer-dancer.  Whether or not other opera companies look for a new mix of talents, Opera Atelier have different expectations.

Jeannette Lajeunesse Zingg, (dancer, choreographer and co-artistic director of Opera Atelier) Juri Hiraoka, Mireille Asselin and Tyler Gledhill (photo: Bruce Zinger)

I don’t think it matters what we call it –between such names as “opera” or “ballet”– so long as it works.

Violinist & composer Edwin Huizinga beside dancer and choreographer Tyler Gledhill (photo: Bruce Zinger)

The space’s post-modern design that’s a mix of new & old felt ideal for a performance that itself was just such a synthesis of old & new.

Artists of Atelier Ballet, Mireille Asselin, Jesse Blumberg (Photo: Bruce Zinger)

The space worked rather well for the musical performance. I was surprised at the excellent acoustics, without undue reverb but still quite live, likely due to the beautiful wood floor.

Perhaps we’ll be seeing more concerts, operas, ballets and theatre in this space: the Currelly Galllery at the Royal Ontario Museum.

Edward Tracz, Juri Hiraoka and Dominic Who (photo: Bruce Zinger)