Tag Archives: hart

Dreams of Home

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04_CC_Dreams_of_HomeTuesday night at Heliconian Hall was the time and place for a concert curated by, and largely performed by, Confluence Concerts’ young associate artists; the KöNG duo.  KöNG consists of two Toronto-Hong Kong percussionists; Bevis Ng and Hoi Tong Keung, pursuing doctoral studies in Toronto.  They were supported on some numbers by Ryan Davis (viola) and Ben Finley (double bass).

The concert was very much in two parts.  The first half was a series of fairly short pieces on the theme of “dreams”.  Perhaps designed to be impressionistic and to leave far from clear memories.  First up was the slightly jazzy, very complex My Missing Harbour by Fish Yu.  It blended tuned percussion and both string instruments in a largely tonal, slightly shimmery sound world.

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Dido danced

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Last night saw the first of two performances of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas at Trinity-St. Paul’s. It was a collaboration between the UoT Schola Cantorum and the Theatre of Early Music though where one starts and the other ends I’m none too sure! Before the Purcell we got a fine performance of an early solo violin piece; Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber’s Passacaglia in G Minor played by Adrian Butterfield.

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Blitzkrieg Cabaret

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What better way to celebrate Kurt Weill’s birthday than listening to his songs, cabaret style, with a beer or three.  Well that’s what we did on Saturday as Blitzkrieg Cabaret opened a new run of Saturday afternoon shows at the Dakota Tavern.

We got three singers; Danie Friesen, Hilary June Hart, Jackson Welchner supported by Nick Donovan (drums), Colin Frotten (piano), and Andrew Downing (bass) with Hilary also chipping in on the accordion on occasion.  While Danie is a classically trained singer, Hilary and Jackson sound more comfortable in a jazzier idiom.  That, plus the make up of the band meant that the show tended to the “Sinatraesque” version of Weill rather than, say, the grittiness of Pabst’s Dreigroschenoper movie.  This was reflected in both choice of translation and performing style.  I think this works for some of Weill’s stuff but it doesn’t work for me so well with the Brecht lyrics.  I’ll go for Marx over McCarthy anytime!  Other people may feel differently.

blitzkrieg

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Morphology of Desire

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To Mazzoleni Hall yesterday to hear Christina Campsall’s graduating recital.  I think over the course of the year she has become my “top tip” for this year’s graduating class at the Conservatory and nothing that happened yesterday did anything to shake that judgement. It was a pretty intense program that was definitely more shade than light but that, I think, rather suits her voice.  The opening set, Mahler’s Rückert Lieder, was a case in point.  Dark, brooding texts, dark, brooding music and a dark, brooding voice with plenty of power.  We have a mezzo here not a second soprano!  That said, her high notes are all there and there seems to be plenty of power all through the registers, though to be fait I’ve only seen her once in a large hall and that was in operetta.  Very good German too with a distinct northern inflection.  All the consonants!

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