I wrote “2015” on a cheque today. Scary. Anyway, what’s on in Toronto as the new year dawns? Quite a lot as it happens. Here are my picks.
December 9th sees Anne-Sofie von Otter in recital at Koerner hall. She’s not doing opera anymore and who knows how many more chances there will be to see her in Toronto?
‘Tis the season to Hallelujah in Toronto and Handel’s Messiah is everywhere. Last night was the first performance of the biggest of them all, the Toronto Symphony and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir at Roy Thomson Hall. Traditionally this is Toronto’s equivalent of John Barbirolli and the Huddersfield Choral Society so I was surprised to see a set up for a rather small orchestra. In fact about thirty instrumentalists were used, playing modern instruments of course, with about 150 choristers. It was something of a sign of things to come as conductor Grant Llewellyn took us through the piece quite briskly and rhythmically with even some ornamentation in the da capo repeats. It’s becoming more common I think for conductors to get something approaching an HIP sound out of a modern orchestra as we’ve seen with Harry Bicket in various opera houses. The orchestra and chorus responded pretty well to the less staid approach with the sopranos sounding particularly spritely and incisive.
This Sunday sees the first of the season for Recitals at Rosedale. Entitled A Walk on the Dark Side: Myths, Legends and Fairy Tales, it will feature soprano Leslie Ann Bradley, mezzo soprano Allyson McHardy and baritone Geoff Sirett with pianists Robert Kortgaard and Rachel Andrist. The programme features works by Mahler, Debussy, Symanowski, Weil, Gershwin and more. It’s on November 9th at 2.30 pm at Rosedale Presbyterian Church and tickets are available here.
Every time I go to Roy Thomson Hall, as I did last night to see the TSO perform Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius, I have to recalibrate for the acoustic. It’s just much quieter than the Four Season’s Centre and, indeed, many other venues. This has the advantage that coughing is largely inaudible but also that even a large orchestra playing full bore doesn’t exactly blow one’s socks off. So, perhaps it wasn’t a surprise that I was more struck by the meditative aspects of this score than its moments of high drama such as the chorus of demons. I’m pretty sure this was just the acoustic because conductor Peter Oundjian was certainly going for maximum effect in those sections. Continue reading
This evening at 7.30pm at Trinity St. Paul’s The Talisker Players have their first concert of the season entitled Songs of Travel. Virginia Hatfield will be performing the French baroque work Le Sommeil d’Ulisse by Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre and the rarely performed Algoma Central by Louis Applebaum. Also featured is baritone Geoffrey Sirett in Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Songs of Travel and Vally Weigl’s Songs of Love and Leaving. Also on tomorrow.
There a few things coming up in Toronto over the next week or two that might be worth a look.
Tomorrow at noon in the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre Lauren Segal and Robert Gleadow accompanied by Sandra Horst are giving a free concert featuring Dvořák’s Gypsy Songs, de Falla’s Siete canciones populares Españolas, Ibert’s Chansons de Don Quichotte and Vaughan Williams’ Songs of Travel.
So along with the late night (10pm start) June 14th Roy Thomson Hall concert of Mason Bates’ Garages of the Valley (a Canadian première/TSO Co-Comission) and Shostakovich’s Symphony No.5 there’s a tailgate party at 7.30pm in the car park and an after party in the lobby. The former features all you can eat food from Kaplansky’s and Smokes Poutinerie with the after party featuring food from Big Daddy’s.Those of us over 40 are not encouraged to attend; a line will probably be endorsed by local cardiologists. Full details here.
Once in a while it’s fun to go to something almost entirely undemanding (for the audience at least!). So, yesterday afternoon I attended a concert of classical “lollipops” given by the TSO under the baton of young Portugese conductor Joana Carneiro. The chief attraction for me was that recent Ensemble Studio graduates Simone Osborne and Wallis Giunta were also performing. Things got going with the overture from Il Nozze di Figaro. It was a brisk and stylish performance with Ms. Carneiros displaying a very physical conducting style.
Saturday (7.30pm) and Sunday (3pm), at Roy Thomson Hall, the TSO has a programme that includes operatic lollipops from Simone Osborne and Wallis Giunta. Joana Carneiro conducts. I had to go all the way to Sudbury to find a picture with wallis and Simone. Anyway, here’s the programme for the concert:
| Mozart: Overture to The Marriage of Figaro | |||
| Mozart: “Letter Duet” from The Marriage of Figaro | |||
| Offenbach: Intermezzo and Barcarolle from The Tales of Hoffmann | |||
| Delibes: “Flower Duet” from Lakmé | |||
| Beethoven: Symphony No. 6 “Pastoral” – Mvt. I | |||
| Glinka: Overture to Ruslan and Lyudmila | |||
| Villa-Lobos: Bachianas brasileiras No. 5 | |||
| Tchaikovsky: Romeo and Juliet Fantasy-Overture |
So three lovely ladies (plus the TSO) at one low (not especially actually) price.
operaramblings 