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:
There have been a lot of announcements in the last few days. Tapestry announced that they had two companies “in residence” for next season at their new home at 877 Yonge Street. They are Opera Q ;led by Ryan Macdonald and Camille Rogers, who produced the pandemic video Medusa’s Children and Cultureland which is led by Afarin Mansouri and was responsible for Echoes of Bi-Sotoon. Continue reading
Two Canadian projects scooped first prizes at Opera America’s Digital Excellence in Opera awards earlier this week. Sweat from Jenn Nichols, Larissa Koniuk and the Bicycle Opera gang won the big one; “Artistic Creation”. What can I say? I loved the stage show and I loved the film. Well deserved.
The other winner was the very cute kids’ series Threepenny Submarine from Rachel Krehm and Opera5. This was joint winner in the “Noteworthy Projects” category.
So two out of four of the top prizes went to Canadian projects. Not bad eh?
The second performance of Opera 5’s production of Britten’s The Turn of the Screw on Thursday night was sung by the “apprentice” cast drawn from Opera McGill. Curiously, it was an all female cast with women singing both Miles and Peter Quint.
Here’s an events listing for June as it currently stands:
Coming up later this month is Angel’s Bone; an opera with music by Du Yun and a libretto by the amazing Royce Vavrek. It’s a chamber opera for amplified voices and small ensemble. The plot concerns two angels who fall to earth and are ruthlessly exploited by otherwise unremarkable people. It’s a commentary on human trafficking and the exploitation of youth. There’s a really good looking cast and it will play at Harbourfront Centre March 22nd to 24th. It’s already attracted largely positive reviews in New York and Vancouver. More details including casting and ticketing here. Continue reading
Those who know me are probably fed up of hearing me lament how slow the indie opera scene in Toronto has been to recover post plague. Well here’s some good news on that front. Opera 5 will be mounting a fully staged version of Britten’s The Turn of the Screw with the proper thirteen piece chamber orchestra at Theatre Passe Muraille in June next year. Yea!
Threepenny Submarine is a nine episode puppet animation series of videos on Youtube inspired by the idea that most of us got at least some of our exposure to classical music as kids from Looney Tunes and other cartoons. It’s produced by Opera 5 and Gazelle Automations and concerns an underwater journey by the submarine Threepenny Submarine investigating a mysterious sound coming from the equally mysterious Salieri Sector. The sub is commanded by a cockatiel called Iona (voiced by Lindsay Lee and sung by Caitlin Wood) assisted by a fox called Lydian (voiced and sung by Rachel Krehm). They befriend a “sea monster” called Flute, represented, appropriately enough, by Amelia Lyon on flute. Various adventures take place punctuated by well known arias using new text by Rachel Krehm. For example, the first episode features “Una voce poca fa” and “Dich, teure Halle” in arrangements for string quartet. There are also classical instrumentals used as incidental music. It’s all arranged by Trevor Wager and directed by Evan Mitchell.
Some organisations hold off on their season announcements later than others! Two came in today.
Tapestry Opera announced a season that includes:
Rachel Krehm and co’s latest project Threepenny Submarine is now live on the Opera 5 Youtube channel. It’s a collaboration between Opera 5 and Gazelle Automations and features two (puppet) singers on a quest in a submarine. It stars Caitlin Wood as a Rossini singing cockatiel with a tidiness fetish, which doesn’t seem terribly like Cait (at least the tidiness thing. Of course she can sing Rossini), and Rachel Krehm as a messy Wagnerian vixen, which sounds about right. It’s designed for kids but it’s quite funny and very cute and should work for kids of all ages.
Also on the tubes, The Crossing have produced an animated watercolour video of one of the tracks from their recent recording of Gavin Bryars’ A Native Hill.
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