Category Archives: Toronto opera news and views

Back to work

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zelenkaThings are starting to pick up after the Christmas lull.  Here’s my pick of the week in Toronto for w/c 10th January.

Today at 3.30pm The Talisker Players have a concert at Trinity St. Paul’s called High Standards.  It’s classic Broadway (Sondheim, Gershwin, Kern etc) and features soloists Virginia Hatfield and James Levesque.  (Also Tuesday at 8pm).

Wednesday is the COC Season Launch at the Four Season’s Centre at 6.30pm.  I think it’s subscribers and invitees only.  Speculation on what we might hear is here (me) and here (Dylan Hayden).

Then on Saturday from 1pm to 6pm Tafelmusik have a singing competition to select soloists for a future performance of Zelenka’s Missa omnium sanctorum.  Two gals and seven guys compete.  It’s free and , of course, it’s at Trinity St. Paul’s.

Over the holidays

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Heidelberg billboardUnsurprisingly there’s not a lot going on operatically in Toronto over the next couple of weeks.  This is not Berlin where you have a choice of operas to attend, even on Christmas Day!  About the only thing coming up over the next couple of weeks is Toronto Operetta Theatre’s production of Romberg’s The Student Prince.  Ernesto Ramirez and Jennifer Taverner head up the cast.  There are five performances; matinees on December 27th plus January 2nd and 3rd, an evening show on the 28th and a gala performance on New Year’s Eve.  It plays at the St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts and tickets can be bought here.

Getting Messianic

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AtG-Messiah-slideSo this week is the big Messiah week.  I’ll be seeing two; the TSO’s “big, fat” Messiah on Tuesday and Against the Grain’s choreographed version the following night.  The TSO version uses Andrew Davis’ “large scale” orchestration and has a great quartet of soloists.  It’s playing at Roy Thomson Hall Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday through Sunday.  The AtG version also has great soloists, it’s on a smaller scale and features Jenn Nicholls’ choreography.  It plays at Harbourfront Wednesday through Saturday.  There’s also Tafelmusik’s baroque take at Trinity St. Paul’s, also Wednesday through Saturday.

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Moving into the holiday season

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messiah2-570x540This week sees holiday season events beginning.  The main one on my calendar is Electric Messiah; tonight and tomorrow night at the Drake.  It’s a Soundstreams presentation described as “a stripped down, surround sound electro-improv Messiah for today’s Toronto”.  Other than that the Calmus Ensemble have a Christmas concert at Walter Hall on Sunday afternoon.

A few announcements

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danikaSo there’s another new approach to art song in Toronto.  Collectìf is a new group “dedicated to exploring and expanding the world of art song performance and presenting innovative, song-based theatre”.  The people behind this one, Danikà Loren, Whitney O’Hearne and Jennifer Krabbe, are young and very talented.  They have a show on December 14th and 15th at Loft404’s B-Lounge.  It’s called Le Rossignol et la Rose.  We are promised Oscar Wilde and the underground nightlife of 1930s Paris.  I shall go with a seriously depressed student and try not to pin my hand to a table with a knife.

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First week of December

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There’s not a lot in the calendar this week but what there is is high quality.  Adam Scime’s L’Homme et le Ciel premiers at The Music Gallery on Thursday with a second performance on Friday.  It’s a FAWN Chamber Creative production with Amanda Smith directing.  It has already been extensively written about with contributions from Lydia Perovic, Jenna Douglas and myself so there shouldn’t be too many surprises, though with a new work there are bound to be some!

 

Then on Friday there’s a rare chance to see Sondra Radvanovsky in recital at Koerner Hall.  The program is here.  She has an unusual voice with a timbre unlike any other soprano I know and, of course, incredible technique rooted in the demands of the bel canto repertoire.  Definitely worth checking out.

ETA:  This just in.  Pax Christi Chorale are doing Berlioz’ L’Enfance du Christ at Grace Church on the Hill on Saturday at 7.30pm and Sunday at 3pm.  It’s an impressive line up of soloists; Olivier Laquerre, Nathalie Paulin, Alain Coulombe, Sean Clark and Matthew Zadow.  It also appears to be choreographed.  Curious about that.  Anyway full details, ticket info and so on is here.

Lull before the storm?

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This week’s listings post is exceedingly dull.  Though the season of mince pies and Messiahs will soon be upon us, next week is really quiet.  The only event I’m aware off at this point is a concert next Sunday afternoon by the Canadian Children’s Opera Company.  It’s at 2pm at Grace Church on the Hill.  It will be their first public performance since Dean Burry took over a musical director.

A busy week

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Next week is a bit crazy.  Tomorrow is the Elizabeth Krehm memorial concert in aid of St. Mike’s ICU.  They are playing Mahler 2 and it’s PWYC with a tax receipt.  8pm at Metropolitan United Church.  Tueday sees the opening of Philippe Boesmann’s Julie at 8pm at the Bluma Appel.  It’s an important, if bleak, contemporary piece and for the first time here, in a Soundstreams/CanStage presentation, it will be sung in English.  It runs until the 29th so plenty of chance to catch it.

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Second week of November

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stimpyA bit of a lull this week with the COC fall season over and Yaksmas festivities still, mercifully, some time away.  Still there are a couple of events of note.  Simone Osborne is singing with the TSO at Roy Thomson Hall on Thursday and Saturday in a program of Mahler, Dvoràk, Charpentier and Strauss.  There’s also the fall production from the Glenn Gould School.  It’s a double bill of Xavier Montsalvatge’s Puss in Boots and Luciano Berio’s Folk Songs.  Friday and Saturday at 7.30pm in Mazzoleni Hall.

Radvanovsky at Koerner

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sondraI don’t think the program for Sondra’s Koerner Hall recital program was available when I posted about it last month so here it is:

  • Antonio Vivaldi: Sposa son disprezzata, from Bajazet
  • Vincenzo Bellini: Three songs (Per pieta, bell’idol moi; La Ricordanza; Ma rendi pur contento)
  • Richard Strauss: Four songs (Allerseelen, Befreit, Morgen, Heimliche Aufforderung)
  • Antonin Dvořák: Song to the Moon, from Rusalka
  • Franz Liszt: Three songs (S’il est un charmant gazon; Enfant, si j’étais roi; Oh! Quand je dors)
  • Samuel Barber: Selections from Hermit Songs (At Saint Patrick’s Purgatory, St. Ita’s Vision, The Crucifixion, The Monk and His Cat, The Desire for Hermitage)
  • Umberto Giordano: La Mamma Morta, from Andrea Chénier

Quite a mix!  I don’t think I’ve ever heard her sing in German and there is virtually no overlap with her Zoomerplex recital last year.