Back to the Royal Conservatory; Koerner Hall this time, for more Kronos Quartet last night. It was a bit of a mixed bag. I’m starting to understand that I really enjoy this group when they are doing music; however weird, but not so much when they are preaching.
Kronos photographed in San Francisco, CA March 26, 2013©Jay Blakesberg
The Kronos Quartet played Mazzoleni Hall last night along with the three young string quartets they have been working with this week. First up was the Dior Quartet (Noa Sarid, Tobias Elser, Caleb Georges and Joanne Yesoi Choi); the Glenn Gould School’s Quartet in Residence, with Soon Yeon Lyuh’s Yessori. They were followed by the Taylor Academy Quartet (Nicholas Vasdilakoupolos-Kostopoulos, Ophit Strumpf, Angelina Sievers and Ethan Jeon) with Yotam Haber’s rather meditative From the Book. The Glenn Gould School Quartet (Tiffasny Tsai, Tiffany Yeung, Tristan Macaggi and Shun-Nin Yand) closed out the student part of the evening with Aleksandra Vrebalov’s semi-improvisatory My Desert, My Rose. The standard of playing by all three groups was really high.
Kronos Quartet perform at the Roskilde Festival.
So what’s on as we move into the holiday season?
Closing out November there’s Opera Revue at Castro’s this afternoon at 3pm and a couple of concerts on Wednesday. At lunchtime Wirth Prize winner Elisabeth Saint-Gelais and collaborative pianist Louise Pelletier present an intriguing looking programme in the RBA then at 7.30pm at Mazzoleni Hall the RCM’s Rebanks fellows are performing. Both are free but the Mazzoleni concert is ticketed and may be sold out.
The line up for this year’s (and a bit of next’s) 21C at the Royal Conservatory has been announced. The full line up is here.
I’m particularly interested in the Kronos Quartet concerts on December 8th and 9th; especially the latter which features “Music for Change” including a world premiere of a piece by Tanya Tagaq.
I’ll also want to see three of the concerts in the new year. On January 21st at 5pm there’s a Cinq à Sept concert in Temerty Hall which, among other things, features a new song cycle by Lembit Beecher and Lisa Balkan. The following day at 3pm in Koerner Hall there’s a concert of new works by Ian Cusson and Stewart Goodyear. Finally, on January 28th at 10pm in Temerty Hall Brian Current and the GGS New Music Ensemble have a candlelit concert of night related works including music by Bekkah Simms and R. Murray Schafer.
Lots of good stuff!
The line up for this year’s 21C is out. It’s a bit difficult for a genre based blog like this to know what to say about a genre busting event like 21C so I will point out the things that look even remotely relevant. I think the vocal highlight is the concert at Koerner Hall on May 25 featuring the Kronos Quartet and the amazing Tanya Tagaq in a fascinating looking program. There’s also the after hours concert at 10.30pm on May 27 which will feature new works by John Oswald for piano, instruments and choir in total darkness. full details on the festival can be found here.
operaramblings 