Toronto Summer Music has announced the line up for 2025; the last festival with Jonathan Crow in the driving seat.  As ever there’s lots to like.  There are two operas in concert.  The big opening night gig is a concert performance in Koerner Hall of one of the very best early operas which, inexplicably, is not performed as often as the boring repertory staples.  It’s Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea in a touring production conducted by Leonardo García-Alarcón at the helm of Cappella Mediterranea.  Poppea will be sung by Sophie Junker and Nerone by Nicolò Balducci.  That’s at Koerner Hall on July 10th.

The other opera is a long awaited performance of Marie Clements and Brian Current’s Missing.  This piece about missing and murdered Indigenous women has been seen quite widely in Western Canada but not, so far, in Ontario and it needs to be. The story follows two women, one Indigenous and one non-Indigenous, whose lives become intertwined through tragedy. The cast includes Caitlin Wood, Melody Courage, Andrea Ludwig, Asitha Tennekoon, Marion Newman, Evan Korbut and Michelle Lafferty  That one’s at Koerner Hall on July 24th.

This year’s art song attraction is Mary Bevan who will be accompanied by Roger Vignoles in a programme of French chansons at Walter Hall on July 14th.  There’s also a concert by counter-tenor Franco Fagioli called The Last Castrato featuring music written for Giovanni Battista Velluti.  That’s at Koerner Hall on July 19th.

On July 16th Schmaltz and Pepper are back at Walter Hall with klezmer inspired by jazz, Roma, classical, and European folk music.  Their concert was one of the highlights of the 2024 festival so don’t miss it!  Also in a lighter vein there’s some cheesy Viennese; An Evening in Vienna featuring arias, waltzes, bon-bons, and violin favourites by J. Strauss, R. Strauss, Lehar, Kreisler, Mozart, and more.  Featured soloists include Yura Lee (violin) and Simone McIntosh (mezzo-soprano).  That’s at Koerner Hall on July 31st.

There’s lots more of course with plenty of chamber music, piano, ReGen concerts, Shuffle concerts plus all the community stuff and a wrap up concert at Koerner on August 2nd.  The full details of the festival plus ticketing info etc is here.