Last Friday’s lunchtime concert in the RBA was given by the France-Canada Academy of Vocal Arts at the University of Toronto. That mouthful is the moniker of a collaboration between the Faculty of Music and the Académie Francis Poulenc. So this last week members of the AFP had been in Toronto working with students and faculty here on French chansons and canadian art song. Fridays concert showcased six singer/pianist teams singing French song rep from both sides of the Canadian Channel.
Tuesday evening in the RBA members of the COC Ensemble Studio competed for the biannual Christina and Louis Quilico Awards. These days every time I attend a singing competition, which I have been doing much less of, I ask myself why. There are really three reasons:
Thursday lunchtime in the RBA saw Teiya Kasahara, Chihiro Yasufuku and Simone Luti perform 歌曲 Kakyoku: Journey in Japanese Song. It was an interesting contrast with Sam Chan’s exploration of Western representation of Asia and Asian in Western classical music the day before. This time all the music was by Japanese composers setting Japanese texts but (in some sense at least) in the Western classical style/tradition. In its way it forms part of the broader “modernisation” of Japan that took place after the Meiji Restoration.
Wednesday’s lunchtime concert in the RBA was given by Ensemble Studio graduates Samuel Chan and Rachael Kerr, reuniting for the first time since ES days. Nowadays Sam is Fest at Theater Kiel and the recital was built around his attempt to probe his identity as a Chinese-Canadian performing Western opera for (mostly) Germans. Sam is a pretty deep, thoughtful kind of guy so it wasn’t surprising that this was an unusual and carefully curated recital. It was also quite wonderfully performed.
Wednesday’s lunchtime recital in the RBA was given by Wirth Vocal Prize winner Sara Schabas and pianist Alexey Shafirov. It was a varied and virtuosic programme. Five composers and five languages were involved and the works performed ranged in date from the 1815 to 2000.
Tuesday’s RBA concert with members of the Ensemble Studio was themed around composer rivalries though not the really toxic ones. No Mozart/Salieri or Wagner/Meyerbeer here! The most convincing as a rivalry was the first; Berlioz vs Rossini. So Queen Hezumuryango sang “Le spectre de la rose” with some sensitive handling of the text and a pretty fiery “Cruda sorte” from L’Italiana in Algeri with plenty of emotion. I definitely like her voice more when she’s going for drama as she’s got plenty of power and expressiveness.
Next up was Duncan Stenhouse with four pieces that illustrated the complex relationship between Brahms, Wagner and Dvořák. “Der Tod, das ist die kühle Nacht” from the Vier Lieder Op. 96 and “Při řekách babylonských” from the Biblické písně were sung with excellent control and expressiveness but if there’s a connection it’s not obvious to me. The two operatic pieces though; “Běda!, Běda!” from Rusalka and “Abendlich strahlt der Sonne Auge” from Das Rheingold have, I think, more obvious affinities; both dramatically and musically. Both were very well sung. It’s so good to have a genuine bass in the Ensemble again! Continue reading
On Wednesday it was UoT Opera’s turn in the RBA. Pretty much the whole graduate programme appeared in a series of duets, trios and larger ensemble numbers staged by Mabel Wonnacott. The theme was “love” (well it had to be that or “death”.. this is opera). It was a French and German programme so there was fairly mainstream stuff like the Antonia/Hoffmann duet from Les contes d’Hoffmann and “Hab mir’s gelobt” from Der Rosenkavalier but also rarer material like “Doute de la lumière” from Thomas’ Hamlet.
Luxury! Two operatic concerts on consecutive lunchtimes in the RBA. On Thursday it was the turn of the Glenn Gould School’s Rebanks fellows with mentor Paul Groves to present a series of staged opera excerpts directed by Anna Theodosakis. Stéphane Mayer provided the excellent piano accompaniment throughout.
Wednesday lunchtime saw the members of the COC’s Ensemble Studio kick of the free concert series season in the RBA. It was good. Pianists Brian Cho and Mattia Senesi started off in fine style with a four hands version of the overture to The Barber of Seville and then it was on to the singing.
Alex Hetherington and Ariane Cossette’s last recital as members of the Ensemble studio happened on thursday lunchtime in the RBA. It was charming. We got a varied selection of art songs bookended by a couple of opera duets. They opened with “Miro O Norma… Si, fino all’ora estreme”. They blended well with Ariane, as Norma, displaying considerable power and richness of tone without overwhelming her Adalgisa.
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