Tag Archives: confluence concerts

Confluence Concerts 2026/27

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The Confluence Concert series for next season was announced last night.  There are eight concerts:

  • August 20th – Side by Side.  The Confluence team will spend a week in workshops with a group of young artists.  The public concert resulting from that is on August 20th at Heliconian Hall (which is the venue for all their concerts unless otherwise specified).
  • September 25th and 27th – Global Voices.  Suba Sankaran curates a concert of a cappella works from different musical traditions.  The 27th show is at some place at Queen and Shaw that I didn’t catch!  (the Shaw & Queen location is Youngspace (formerly an Artscape location) at 180 Shaw).

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Confluence’s Centuries of Souls II

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On Friday evening at Heliconian Hall Confluence Concerts presented a concert entitled Centuries of Souls II.  It was built around two longish works; Tomás Luis de Victoria’s Missa Gaudeamus and Eugène Ysaÿe’s Sonata for solo violin op.27 no.2.  The individual movements/sections of these two pieces were interleaved along with a couple of Indian mantras, some plainchant, some lute pieces and the Stravinsky Pater noster to make a pretty coherent programme with its roots in various traditions of chant. Continue reading →

Looking ahead to June

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Things slow down just a little bit in June but with both Luminato and Opera 5’s Opera festival it’s not that quiet.  Here’s what’s coming down:

  • June 5th to 7th at Daniels Spectrum there’s Nigamon/Tunai; an exploration of Indigenous perspectives from North and South America (part of Luminato)
  • June 6th at Metropolitan United Krisztina Szabó leads in Queen of the Night Communion, another Luminato show.

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May 2025

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Here are my top picks for May.

  • The Cunning Linguist opens at Factory Theatre on May 1st.  Previews are April 26th, 27th and 30th and it runs to May 11th.  A young queer Mexican woman, with her sidekick God, decides to move to Toronto…
  • Eugene Onegin in the Robert Carsen production opens May 2nd at the COC.  Runs until May 24th.
  • On May 3rd Confluence has a Teiya Kasahara curated show called Project T: Home Video (this is a change from the originally scheduled May 2nd/3rd show).

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March 2025

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So what looks fun in March?

  • March 1st (Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Sant) Apocryphonia have a “classical meets punk” concert called Brews, Beauties and Brawlers at St. Olave’s Anglican Church at 7.30pm.  PWYC.
  • March 5th Canadian Art Song Project have their annual gig at noon in the RBA.
  • Crow’s Theatre have a new adaptation of Measure for Measure in the Studio Theatre.  Previews on the 6th and 7th, opening on the 8th and running to March 16th.

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Sighs Too Deep For Words

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Friday evening at Heliconian Hall saw the second of two performances of Confluence Concerts’ Sighs Too Deep For Words: A Canadian Valentine.  It was an all Canadian concert featuring songs and spoken word including two world premieres and a performance of Omar Daniel’s 2005 piece Neruda Canzones.

The spoken word pieces, read beautifully by Alison Beckwith, ranged from Lucy Maud Montgomery to Margaret Atwood.  Some pieces straightforwardly celebrated romantic love and others came at it a bit sideways!  Songs by Canadian composers were well represented With Derek Holman, Jeffrey Ryan and John Beckwith all represented.  Anaïs Kelsey-Verdecchia performed (with Christopher Bagan) her own setting of “The Lark in the Clear Air” and Patricia O’Callaghan gave us her setting of “Some by Fire” with Chris again at the pianio, Andrew Downing on bass and a backing group.  So many styles!  No-one could say that Canadian music is samey or boring. Continue reading →

February 2025

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Before looking forward to next month I want to mention a couple of things this weekend that I haven’t previously noticed.  Saturday (Jan 25th) at 12.30pm there is a Met HD broadcast of new production of Aida with a pretty interesting looking cast.  Later, at 6pm there’s a rather special concert at the Arts and letters Club to celebrate the 100th birthday of Morry Kernerman (former assistant concertmaster of both the TSO and OSM).  The concert is presented by Canzona Chamber Players and wiull feature Trio Uchida-Crozman-Chiu. Continue reading →

For a’ that

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There can be few poets whose work resonates as widely as that of the Ayrshire ploughboy and philanderer Robert Burns.  His influence has been felt from Bengal to Massachusetts and beyond.  Celebrating that influence was the the point of Confluence Concerts’ Robert Burns – A Passion for Freedom curated by Alison Mackay which played at Heliconian Hall on Friday and Saturday evenings.

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September 2024

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sept2024Well late August has been a bit thin in terms of live performances but September. sees things back with a bang.

    • Opera Revue has a Verdi and Weill show at the Redwood Theatre.
    • Coal Mine Theatre is opening with Annie Baker’s Infinite Life which played to rave reviews in London and New York.  Previews are on the 6th to 8th with opening on the 10th.  The play runs until the 29th.
    • Crow’s opens their season with Ibsen’s Rosmersholm.  Previews run from the 3rd to the 10th with opening night on the 11th.  The run continues to October 6th.

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