Come Closer – Preview

Posted on April 22, 2025 by operaramblings

Come Closer is a new opera with music by Ryan Trew and text by Rachel Krehm. It’s scheduled to premiere at Factory Theatre on June 13th but last Wednesday in the RBA we got a preview of some extracts. Come Closer deals with Rachel Krehm’s relationship with her younger sister Elizabeth who died in 2012. It started out as a song cycle setting seven of Elizabeth’s poems and now has narrative added to create a stage work. Yesterday we heard four extracts with Rachel playing herself and Jacqueline Woodley (who I hadn’t seen for far too long) as Elizabeth. Accompaniment was piano trio with Evan Mitchell conducting.

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The Girl in My Alphabet

Posted on April 21, 2025 by operaramblings

The Girl in My Alphabet is a 2002 CD of music by Errollyn Wallen; the Belize born composer recently appointed Master of the King’s Music. It contains six works for various instruments and small ensembles; some with vocals, and it’s very varied.

It starts with Dervish, a 2001 piece for piano and cello, played by Dominic Harlan and Matthew Sharp. It starts slowly with doom laden piano and scoopy cello but, like a Sufi dance, speeds up and becomes very fast and busy. An impressive beginning.

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Another nostalgic re-release

Posted on April 20, 2025 by operaramblings

Following on from the du Pré cello concerto recordings I was also fortunate enough to get my hands on another Warner Classics remaster of old EMI recordings. This one consists of the Barenboim/Klemperer recordings of the five Beethoven piano concertos and the Choral Fantasia recorded with the New Philharmonia Orchestra and the John Allis Choir back in 1967. I used to own these on vinyl decades ago. Now they are available as a three SACD set.

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Schmaltz and Pepper on CD

Posted on April 19, 2025 by operaramblings

Schmaltz and Pepper have a CD due for release on May 18th imaginatively called Schmaltz and Pepper. If you have heard them live you will likely have heard most of the eleven tracks on the CD. They include songs like I’m Sorry Mama (personal favourite) and Evil Eye, tunes drawn from Jewish folklore like Hershel and the Goblins and Ride to Zaslav and cunning musical jokes like Mozart the Mensch. It’s all composed by combinations of Eric Abramovitz, Rebekah Wolkstein and Drew Jurecka with a bit of help from Mozart. Continue reading →

Confluencias

Posted on April 18, 2025 by operaramblings

Flamenco is an interesting genre. It’s journey from India to Southern Spain via the Middle East and North Africa means it has influenced everything from Hindustani classical music through just about the whole Islamic world to its influence on Western classical (imagine Carmen without flamenco) and across the pond to Argentina and tango. Confluencias; a new Juno nominated album by Lara Wong and Melón Jimenez pays tribute to that global influence with a series of flamenco-jazz numbers inspired by that geographic spread.

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The complete du Pré

Posted on April 17, 2025 by operaramblings

I first started to think seriously about the late Jacqueline du Pré when I saw the Woolf/Vavrek opera Jacqueline in 2020 at Tapestry. Subsequently I listened to the CD release and attended the remount at Tapestry in February this year. Then I saw that all of her concerto recordings for HMV (back catalogue now owned by Warner Classics) made between 1965 and 1970 had got a major facelift along the lines of the Solti Ring. The original analogue tapes have been digitized at 192kHz/24 bit using the latest technology and then remastered for SACD. The result is a four hybrid SACD box set called The Great Cello Concertos. Continue reading →

Klezmerized!

Posted on April 16, 2025 by operaramblings

Tuesday’s concert in the RBA was at the unusual time of 5.30pm and it was rammed. Whether that was a function of the time slot or the following that Schmaltz and Pepper have built up in the short time they have been around I don’t know but it was impressive. And so was the concert. Schmaltz and Pepper consists of some amazingly versatile and virtuosic musicians; Rebekah Wolkstein on violin and vocals, Eric Abramovitz on clarinet, Drew Jurecka on lots of stuff, Jeremy Ledbetter onb piano and Michael Herring on bass.

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Greyscale Macbeth

Posted on April 15, 2025 by operaramblings

Christof Loy’s production of Verdi’s Macbeth filmed at the Liceu in Barcelona in 2016 is grey, very grey. Costumes and lighting are such that one might think one is watching a black and white film. The first, brief, touch of colour; some lights and bunches of flowers appears at the beginning of Act 4. Beyond the greyness the vibe is essentially late 19th century and it’s pretty sparse. It’s also very dark; at times almost unwatchably so on video (even Blu-ray).

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Back to Castro’s… again

Posted on April 14, 2025 by operaramblings

It’s been a while since I’ve been to a regular Opera Revue show and they were playing my favourite of their regular venues; Castro’s yesterday. Also, besides the usual gang of Alex Hajek, Dani Friesen and Claire Harris there was Alex Hetherington, so I went. I had a great time. It was classic Operas Revue; some arias, some music theatre, Kurt Weill and a couple of parodies. And Alex H. Boy does she sound loud in a small space like Castro’s! Plus this was a once in a lifetime opportunity to hear her sing the Countess from Marriage of Figaro (which will surely lead to expulsion from the Mezzos Guild).

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Quest

Posted on April 13, 2025 by operaramblings

Saturday night at the new performance space at 877 Yonge Street saw a concert inaugurating Cultureland’s residency at Tapestry Opera. The performance consisted mainly of excerpts from Cultureland’s recent and “in progress” operas accompanied on piano by Carolyn Maule and directed by Renée Salewski.

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