Abe Koogler’s The Fulfillment Centre opened last night in a production directed by Ted Dykstra. It’s the story of four people in a small town dependent on some sort of giant fulfillment centre; an all too common fate for small town America. In a post-industrial USA it’s that or a prison.
Counter-tenor Philippe Jaroussky and Artaserse present a recording of Italian baroque cantatas on the theme of “Jealousy”. My review of the CD is available at La Scena Musicale.
Catalogue information: Erato 5419799976
Calamus is a work for soprano and cello by Andrew Staniland based on poems from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass. My review of the recent CD release is now available at La Scena Musicale.
Catalogue information: Leaf Music VR2025
Invented Folksongs is a set of four pieces by Anna Pidgorna inspired, rather than based on, traditional Ukrainian folk songs collected by her in the field and recorded by her with the Ludivico Ensemble. My review is now available at La Scena Musicale.
Catalogue information: Redshift Records TK557
A few months ago I reviewed a recording of Morton Feldman’s Three Voices which I had never heard “live”. On Sunday evening I got the chance to hear Lindsay McIntyre perform it at Arrayspace. It’s a roughly one hour long piece in which the soprano performs with two tracks that she has recorded in advance. It was really interesting to hear the nuances of two recorded voices versus live which, of course, doesn’t really come across the same way on a recording, however good. It’s the subtlest of textural difference but it’s definitely there.
Soprano
Two pre-recorded tracks
Opera in Concert opened their season at Trinity St. Paul’s on Saturday with the Canadian premiere of André Grétry’s 1784 opéra comique Richard Coeur-de-Lion. This is very loosely based on the story of Richard’s imprisonment by Leopold of Austria while returning from the Third Crusade. Richard’s man Blondel; disguised as a blind minstrel, discovers Richard’s place of imprisonment by playing a tune that Richard wrote. He then enlists the help of the Countess of Flanders, in love with Richard, (which would have come as a surprise to Berengaria of Navarre) and a Welsh knight; improbably styled Sir Williams, who his now (also improbably) running an inn in Austria and his daughter, Laurette. The governor of the castle where Richard is imprisoned, Florestan, in turn in love with Laurette, is tricked and Richard is freed to great rejoicing. (As opposed to a whopping ransom being paid!)
I don’t usually take much notice of awards like the Grammys but this year there is an odd coincidence. As usual, CanCon is in very short supply across the 95 categories of awards but the three that I could find were all familiar to me.
In Category 89 “Best Opera Recording” there are two nominees with Canadians in the leading role. Mary Kouyoumdjian’s Adoration has Mirian Khalil as its leading lady and Royce Vavrek as librettist and it’s based on an Atom Egoyan film. It’s pretty good. Continue reading
Viva la Mamma (also known as Le convenienze ed inconvenienze teatrali) may be Donizetti’s most intentionally silly opera (though some of the “serious” operas rival it for silliness). It’s a farce and should be treated as such which is exactly what Maria Lamont’s production for UoT Opera, currently playing at the Elgin Theatre, does.
Kanika Ambrose’s The Christmas Market opened on Wednesday in the Studio at Crow’s Theatre in a production directed by Philip Akin. At one level it’s a much needed critique/exposé of Canada’s Temporary Foreign Worker Program and at another it’s basically a very funny comedy of manners. The two are extremely well integrated so that the horror of the TFWP is a bit of a slow reveal.
The line up for 21C for 2026 has been announced. This is always one of the city’s best programmes of contemporary and related music. Details… Continue reading
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