Tag Archives: szabo

TSO Messiah

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This year’s Messiah at the TSO is a fairly small scale affair by TSO standards.  There’s still the 100+ strong Toronto Mendelssohn Choir but the orchestra is quite small; 12 violins, 6 violas, 4 cellos, 2 basses, 2 oboes and bassoon, plus Christopher Bagan on a sort of monster harpsichord/organ combo. There were two trumpets in the gallery for “Glory to God” and they were back (on stage) with timpani for the Hallelujah chorus and part 3.  With Jane Glover conducting it felt like it was almost in Tafelmusik territory.

TSO Messiah 5 - Photo by Allan Cabral

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Opera 5 are turning the screw

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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!

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The Highwayman – the CD

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The HighwaymanDean Burry’s setting of Alfred Noyes’ The Highwayman has now been released on CD.  I think it’s the same performance that was previously released on Youtube by Queen’s University.  If it’s not the same performance then it’s certainly the same performers and I really don’t have more than a few incidental thoughts to add to my review of that concert.

Listening to it again though I was struck by the links to Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire and also by the way Burry subverts popular tunes along the way.  There’s a particularly weird version for flute and struck cello of The British Grenadiers for example.

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Tapestry’s new digs

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You may have been following this saga.  Basically, Artscape had a twenty year lease on a lot of space in the Distillery District which they leased out various arts organisations and studio artists, including Tapestry Opera and Nightwood Theatre; who jointly occupied the Ernest Balmer Studio and adjacent space wherein I attended many, many performances, rehearsals, workshops and so on.  It’s what made the Distillery District more than a bunch of tourist tat and over-priced restaurants. But the lease ran out and the landlord declined to renew.  Tourist tat is more lucrative than art and the Distillery District’s owners have always struggled with the idea of any purpose other than maximising profits.

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The Highwayman rides again

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Way back in 2016 I attended a concert of Dean Burry’s music in Victoria College Chapel.  The highlight of that evening was a performance by Krisztina Szabó and the Talisker Players with Bill Rowson conducting, of Dean’s setting of Alfred Noyes’ poem The Highwayman. It was performed more recently at Queen’s University, again with Krisztina, backed this time by an ensemble of Queens faculty members (flutist, Sarah Moon, clarinettist, Kornel Wolak, violinist, Gisèle Dalbec-Szczesniak, cellist, Wolf Tormann, pianist, Younggun Kim and conductor, Darrell Christi).  This time it was also accompanied by some cool shadow puppetry.  It was recorded for video and audio and will eventually be released on Centrediscs.  This time it was preceded by chamber music by Debussy, Berg and Beethoven.  The whole thing is available now on Youtube for free.

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Songs From the House of Death

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Songs From the House of Death is a new song cycle for mezzo-soprano and orchestra by Ian Cusson.  It was premiered in April by Krisztina Szabó and the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.  It’s a setting of three texts from Joy Harjo‘s How We Became Human.  Ian has a knack of finding really strong texts by Indigenous poets and these are no exception.  The longest (13 minutes of the 23 minute work) is “Songs From the House of Death; Or How to Make it Through the End of a Relationship”. This is an evocation of death and impermanence and memory.  The setting is very varied.  The opening pizzicato strings are barely audible but it rapidly builds to blend densely orchestrated (it’s a big orchestra) and very high energy music with much gentler and more lyrical passages; sometimes using the concert master as a soloist.  This fits the changing moods of the text and, as I’ve come to expect with Ian, the music is always rooted in the text.

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Found Frozen

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CMCCD 30222_Found Frozen_Album CoverFound Frozen is a new CD from Centrediscs featuring songs by Jeffrey Ryan.  The centrepiece of the disc is his Miss Carr in Seven Scenes.  It’s a setting of extracts from Emily Carr’s notebooks for mezzo-soprano and piano performed here by Krisztina Szabó and Steven Philcox.  I’ve heard them do the piece twice live, including the premier, and I really don’t have much to add to what I wrote then.  It’s a terrific piece.

The first set on the disc though is Found Frozen.  It’s a setting of three poems by Helen Hunt Jackson about Death and Remembrance.  It’s scored for soprano and piano and sits quite high much of the time.  The piano part is busy and somewhat minimalistic.  It’s sung by Danika Lorèn with Steven Philcox again at the piano.  It’s very good singing indeed.  There are long sustained notes that are navigated with aplomb and her diction is excellent, even in the very high passages.

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Lots of Beckwith

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John Beckwith turned 95 a little while ago and there’s some good celebratory material up on Youtube.  Confluence Concerts are rereleasing their three concerts from last year.  The first one is here.  Plus, Canadian Art Song project have a really lovely film of Krisztinaa Szabó and Steven Philcox performing The Four Short Songs to texts by Kandinsky.  The location filming is the work of Jenn Nicholls and Patrick Hagerty and it’s gorgeous.  The performance is rather good too.

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SOS Sketch Opera Singers 3

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The third SOS – Sketch Opera Singers from Tapestry Opera is now up on Youtube.  It’s quite similar to the previous episodes with inspired lunacy from KrossØver (Teiya Kasahara, Keith Klassen, Krisztina Szabó, Korin Thomas-Smith and a snail but definitely not Simone McIntosh).  I think it’s a bit darker and a bit weirder than earlier episodes, even a bit surreal in places.  The sketch where people are helped through break-ups by soft toys singing well known arias comes to mind.  Still, it’s half an hour of (mostly) harmless fun.  Definitely worth a watch.

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SOS: Sketch Opera Singers 2

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SOS2 was at least as good as the first instalment.  Krisztina Szabó came in as replacement for Simone McIntosh who is back on the west coast and showed that she’s at least as crazy as anyone else involved in this show (even Keith Klassen and that’s saying something).  Highlights include Korin Thomas-Smith auditioning for Papageno and being asked to sing everything from Sarastro to the Queen of the Night, Krisztina as a manic photographer, the previously mentioned ABBA-nera, Teiya Kasahara breathing COVID on Keith Klassen and lots more rather dark virus humour.  All sorts of people chipped in with cameos and/or music, Michael Mori and Keith Klassen directed with Jennifer Tung and Juliane Gallant providing music direction.  Technical quality is excellent and it’s free.  It’s only 30 minutes long so there’s no excuse for not watching.  It’s available here.

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