Diasporic Bridges

Diasporic Bridges, at Trinity St. Paul’s on Sunday afternoon, was the Amici Chamber Ensemble’s final concert of the season.  It celebrated the way that music binds emigrant communities together and provides a link to “home”.  Most, though not all, of the pieces performed were by composers of diverse styles and backgrounds living and working in Canada and the live music was preceded by an excerpt from Amici’s upcoming film on the same topic.  I’ll save writing about that until I’ve seen the whole thing.

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From Strauss to the Orient

Last night’s concert at Trinity Saint Paul’s by the Amici Ensemble and friends. was titled From Strauss to the Orient.  Unsurprisingly, the first half of the concert was Strauss.  The first piece was the Duett Concertino for clarinet, bassoon, strings and harp; arranged by Serouj Kradjian with piano replacing harp.  Besides the Amicis (Serouj – piano, Joaquin Valdepeñas – clarinet and David Hetherington – cello) were guests Kathleen Kajioka and Timothy Ying – violins, Barry Shiffman – viola, David Lalonde – bass and Michael Sweeney – bassoon.  It’s an interesting piece.  The clarinet and bassoon basically carry on a conversation across three movements with the strings and piano as a sort of “backing band”.  The overlapping ranges but very different colours of the two woodwind instruments are both pleasing and intriguing.  It was nicely done.  It’s always a delight to watch a chamber ensemble that is obviously communicating and having fun!

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OPUS II: Kaleidoscope

brannonchoI found out quite late about OPUS Chamber Music and their current short concert series so I was only able to attend the last show on Sunday evening at Grace Church on-the-Hill.  Pianist Kevin Ahfat is the driving force behind these concerts and he was able to marshal an impressive line up including recent Indianopolis Violin Competition gold medallist Serena Huang.

The first half of the programme was essentially French.  Brannon Cho joined Kevin for Poulenc’s Sonata for Cello and Piano.  It has a lively first movement with jazzy dance rhythms and lots of interaction between the players which showed excellent mutual understanding.  The second movement is more limpid and languorous and drew some rather elegantly beautiful sounds from both cello and piano.  The third movement is marked “Ballabile” which was new to me.  Apparently it refers to a dance by the corps de ballet.  I can see that.  It’s fast and intricate with lots of pizzicato from the cello.  The finale is almost like back to the beginning with more playful interaction between the instruments.  Lovely playing in both the livelier and the more lyrical passages with an appropriate sense of Frenchness. Continue reading

Ema Nikolovska and Steven Philcox

Yesterday was the one vocal element in this year’s virtual Toronto Summer Music; a recital streamed from the Burlington Arts Centre by mezzo Ema Nikolovska and pianist Steven Philcox.  I think this was quite the best on-line event I have seen/heard since this schmozzle started.  It started off with a master class in German Lieder singing.  There were three Beethoven and three Schubert songs and they were just lovely.  Ema’s voice is a lovely rich mezzo and she showed great expression and attention to the text backed up by perfect diction.  Steven, as ever, was an exemplary accompanist.

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Across the Channel

Having been tipped off that yesterday’s RBA noon concert was to be a vocal recital rather than, as previously billed, a chamber concert I made the trip through the snow to catch it.  Three of the Royal Conservatory’s Rebanks fellows were singing with Helen Becqué at the piano and assorted staff and alumni added for the final number.  Attendance was a bit sparse perhaps unsurprisingly given the weather and the evident confusion.  That was a shame because it was an interesting, varied and well presented concert combining well known works with some much less well known fare.

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