Schmaltz and Pepper were back at Walter Hall on Wednesday night as part of Toronto Summer Music. It was a generous two hour programme featuring some of the music on their recently released CD; like “Mozart the Mensch” and “I’m Sorry Mama” plus plenty of new stuff.
British soprano Mary Bevan and pianist Roger Vignoles gave a recital of French chansons in Walter Hall on Monday night. The concept was that the songs were paired; one being a setting of Baudelaire by a male composer and the other song by a female composer of the the same period. With two exceptions all the composers were French and with one exception from roughly the fin de siècle. So Duparc, Déodat de Séverac, Fauré Debussy and de Bréville were paired variously with the predictable; les sœurs Boulanger and Pauline Viardot, and less predictable; Mel Bonis, Marguerite Canal, Amy Beach (American) and Jeanne Landry (Canadian and much later).
My review of the performance of Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea that opened Toronto Summer Music is now up at La Scena Musicale.
Photo:Lucky Tang
July in Toronto is really all about two festivals; the Toronto Fringe Festival and Toronto Summer Music.
The Fringe runs July 2nd to July 13th and there are more than 100 shows on 20+ stages. There’s a huge range of performance styles; drama, comedy, clowning, musicals, stand up etc. Most shows run an hour or less and the standard ticket price is $18.75 though there are plenty of discounts plus multi show passes as well as free events at the Fringe Hub which this year is at Soulpepper with events also across the street at Old Flame brewery. Quality varies a lot. Some shows are excellent; Monks last year would be a case in point, but others a re a bit meh. But that’s the point really. You can see what looks interesting to you. All the details are here.
I’ve been following the development of MISSING; an opera with text by Marie Clements and music by Brian Current since early 2017. There’s an article principally about the project in the Summer 2017 edition of Opera Canada. But I’ve yet to see the opera on stage. It’s had multiple productions in Western Canada but this July will see it’s first performance east of the Lakehead when Toronto Summer Music present it in concert format. That’s at Koerner Hall on July 24th.
Marion Newman in MISSING at Pacific Opera Victoria – Photo: Dean Kalyan
Last Tuesday lunchtime in the RBA we got a sneak preview of some of the music that will feature at this year’s 20th anniversary Toronto Summer Music.
There was soprano Caitlin Wood with Philip Chiu performing three French chansons; at least one of which will feature in Mary Bevan and Roger Vignoles’ Walter Hall recital. Cait herself will be performing as part of the cast of Brian Current’s opera Missing during the festival.
Here are my top picks for May.
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
Toronto Summer Music has announced the line up for 2025; the last festival with Jonathan Crow in the driving seat. As ever there’s lots to like. There are two operas in concert. The big opening night gig is a concert performance in Koerner Hall of one of the very best early operas which, inexplicably, is not performed as often as the boring repertory staples. It’s Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea in a touring production conducted by Leonardo García-Alarcón at the helm of Cappella Mediterranea. Poppea will be sung by Sophie Junker and Nerone by Nicolò Balducci. That’s at Koerner Hall on July 10th. Continue reading
Saturday night Toronto Summer Music closed out with a final concert in Walter Hall showcasing the many and various aspects of the festival. It’s a pretty good solution to the problem of how to wrap up such a diverse set of programmes.
So, we got a few numbers from the Community Choir. There was some nicely sung Vivaldi and Brahms and an arrangement by Kathleen Allan of “Come and I Will Sing You” that was firmly in the more fun to sing than to listen to genre.
operaramblings 