This year’s Soundstreams concert season was supposed to feature a performance by the Nelson Mandela University Choir. The current student and other social unrest in South Africa led to that tour being cancelled and left Soundstreams with the problem of organising a replacement line up in just four and a half weeks. I think they should be congratulated for sticking with the South African theme and producing the line up we saw last night subtitled A Tribute to Nelson Mandela’s Dream.
Today at 2.30pm Voicebox:Opera in Concert are performing Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi. It’s Bellini’s take on Bandello rather than Shakespeare, not a lot happens and the orchestral music is ho hum so a semistaged version with piano isn’t a bad bet if the singing is good. Juliet is the up and coming Caitlin Wood. Romeo, on whom much depends, is Anita Krause. It’s at the St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts.
Here are details on some forthcoming new and/or amended shows. November 17th – 19th Toronto Masque Theatre are performing a double bill of Handel’s Apollo and Daphne featuring Jacqueline Woodley & Geoffrey Sirett performing alongside Montreal dancer Stéphaie Brochard. Larry Beckwith will lead a period instrument orchestra. It’s coupled with Richard Strauss’ Enoch Arden for spoken voice and piano. It will be performed by actor Frank Cox-O’Connell & pianist Angela Park. That one is at the Enoch Turner Schoolhouse at 8pm. Tickets and details here.
Last night’s Soundstreams Koerner Hall presentation; Magic Flutes was an interesting experience. Aside from interesting (mostly) contemporary flute pieces it was very much an experiment in different ways of staging a concert. I’m all for breaking down the conventions of Mahlerian solemnity and I think experimentation is great. It’s in the nature of taking risks though that some things don’t quite work.
Considering we begin with a holiday weekend it’s a busy week. Tuesday sees Dimitry Ivashchenko and Rachel Andrist in recital in the RBA at lunchtime with a program of Russian song that, inevitably, includes Mussorgsky’s Songs and Dances of Death and works by Rachmaninov, Borodin, and Tchaikovsky. At 7.30pm that evening Christina Haldane is giving a DMA recital in Walter Hall. This isn’t your usual student gig. Christina has covered at Salzburg and the Royal Opera and made main stage appearances in several European countries. Both recitals are free.
On Wednesday Soundstreams have a concert called Magic Flutes with a series of contemporary pieces featuring five flute virtuosi, harp, viola, a bunch of percussion and Carla Huhtanen. It’s at 8pm at Koerner Hall. Further details.
Soundstreams have just announced their 2016/17 season. There’s quite a lot there for those with an experimental taste in vocal music as well as a bunch of instrumental stuff. Probably the biggest deal is a staging of “musical curiosities” from R. Murray Schafer’s Patria cycle. Odditorium will feature selections from The Greatest Show, Ra, and others, immersing audiences in a circus-like atmosphere, complete with host carnival barker. This one is directed by Chris Abramson and runs March 2nd to 5th, 2017 at Crow’s Theatre, a new 215 seat venue on Carlaw. Time for my annual fix of Shafer nuttiness!
A concert of contemporary works for accordion? Why not! Well it was more of a concert of contemporary works for fixed reed instruments with, ironically, Trinity St. Paul’s most impressive fixed reed instrument forming an unused but imposing backdrop to the proceedings. Things started off conventionally enough with Soundstreams’ Artistic Director Lawrence Cherney on stage with three players of different instruments describing their histories and properties and then mild Hell broke loose as a curiously clad Joseph Macerollo burst into the auditorium, ejected Lawrence and friends and launched into R. Murray Schafer’s performance piece La Testa d’Adriane; the tale of a head mystically preserved between life and death. At this point the purpose of the rather bizarre contraption on stage was unclear but soon enough the cloth was pulled back to reveal Carla Huhtanen, or her head at least. More accordion and speech from Macerollo and a bizarre collection of grunts, squeaks, shrieks and gurning from Carla followed. Madness or genius? It’s Schafer. The question is unanswerable.
Soundstreams’ high concept show Electric Messiah opened at the Drake Underground last night. So what is Electric Messiah? It’s a potent mix of Handel/Jennens, four exceptional singers from varied backgrounds, electronics, turntable artists and electric guitars. It’s “staged” in the round in a dive bar with the audience and artists mixed up all over the place. Curator Kyle Brenders, dramaturg Ashlie Corcoran and lighting designer Patrick Lavender have created something that’s weird and dynamic and exciting and, just occasionally, a bit self indulgent and I really enjoyed it. Probably my biggest complaint would be that it’s too short at around an hour.
This week sees holiday season events beginning. The main one on my calendar is Electric Messiah; tonight and tomorrow night at the Drake. It’s a Soundstreams presentation described as “a stripped down, surround sound electro-improv Messiah for today’s Toronto”. Other than that the Calmus Ensemble have a Christmas concert at Walter Hall on Sunday afternoon.
We are remarkably lucky in Toronto to get as much contemporary opera as we do. Courtesy of groups like Tapestry and Soundstreams , it seems that two or three new pieces get performed every year. They tend to be home grown, which is fine but does mean we don’t often get a glimpse into what’s happening with new work in Europe. In fact, in the last few years, I think the only European contemporary piece I’ve seen in Toronto was Saariaho’s L’Amour de Loin. So, I was really pleased, courtesy of Soundstreams and CanStage to be able to see Philippe Boesmans’ Julie which opened last night at the Bluma Appel theatre.
