Yesterday’s VOICEBOX presentation was Handel’s Rodelinda. It was given in their usual style. No sets (bar the odd projection), minimal props, concert wear and the singers mostly in front of an onstage orchestra. The main attraction was the “all star” cast. To have Christina Haldane, David Trudgen, Charles Sy and Alex Dobson in the principal roles is something of a luxury. The two young mezzos rounding out the cast; Gena van Oosten and Meagan Larios weren’t half bad either.
This week we have VOICEBOX’s presentation of Handel’s Rodelinda. It’s a great cast with Christina Haldane, Charles Sy and Alex Dobson among others. Also it’s chamber orchestra not piano. That’s on Sunday at 2.30pm at the Jane Mallett Theatre. On Thursday the noon concert in the RBA is McGill’s Schulich Singers. They will present works by Henk Badings, Eric Whitacre, John Corigliano, Dan Forrest, and others. Not sure that’s my thing but each to his/her own. That evening at 8pm in the Dancemakers’ Studio at the Distillery it’s Tapestry Briefs: Winter Shorts. This is a show of excerpts from concepts and works in progress. It’s always interesting and often very funny. I think the opening show is probably sold out but there are further performances on Friday and Saturday at 8pm and Saturday and Sunday at 4pm (for those brave enough to face the Christmas Market hordes).
Wow! There’s a stack of season and other announcements in my inbox. Apologies for any redundancy from earlier posts but here’s stuff you might want to know. In no particular order…
On November 6th at 7.30pm in the Conservatory’s Temerty Theatre Happenstance, made up of clarinettist Brad Cherwin, pianist Alice Hwang and singers Adam Harris and Whitney Mather, are giving a free concert. Adam will be singing a set by Jean Francaix, promised to be “hysterical”, with bass clarinet, and Whitney will be singing Messiaen’s Resurrection with Alice and a duo for soprano and clarinet, Pascal Dusapin’s To God. I would be all over this but I’m tied up that night.
Thursday 23rd at 8pm, Karina Gauvin is performing with Tafelmusik at Koerner Hall in a concert called The Baroque Diva. Details are here. This will be repeated on Friday and Saturday evenings and on Sunday at 3.30pm. Sunday at 3.30pm Voicebox are presenting Mussorgsky’s Khovanshchina. I’m not sure where it will fall on the semi-staged to concert spectrum but it’s definitely piano accompaniment (Narmina Afandiyeva) and the cast is headed up by Andrey Andreychik. This is a piece that played in full runs over three hours so it will be interesting to see what they choose to include, or not.
Tomorrow (Sunday) is a busy day. There’s a matinée of Götterdämmerung at the COC with a few tickets still available. UoT Opera is doing their annual student composer piece. This year it’s called Prima Zombie and it’s based on the premise that a cabal of disgruntled music critics, disenchanted with the current state of opera, unearth and electrify the corpse of the celebrated 19th century diva Nellie Melba. Mayhem ensues. This one is in the MacMillan Theatre at 2.30 pm and it’s free.
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.
VOICEBOX:Opera in Concert has announced details of their upcoming season. There are four shows:
All performances are at 2.30pm in the St. Lawrence Centre’s Jane Mallett Theatre.
For those of you who were wondering “whatever happened to Opera 5?” they are back, and with some pizzazz (and possibly some pizza). Their upcoming show is an “immersive” version of the Johann Strauss classic Die Fledermaus. In act 2 patrons will be encouraged to interact; to dance with the cast, gamble at the tables, snort coke with Prince Orlofsky (ok I made that up) etc. The cast includes Michael Barrett, Rachel Krehm, Julie Ludwig and Erin Lawson with drag queen Pearle Harbour as Ivan and emceeing. Aria Umezawa and Jessica Derventzis direct with Patrick Hansen conducting. It plays at 8pm on June 8th to 11th at 918 Bathurst Street. Tickets at www.opera5.ca.
I caught the second and final performance of Isis and Osiris – Gods of Egypt presented by Voicebox:Opera in Concert yesterday. It’s a new piece with a libretto by Sharon Singer and music by Peter-Anthony Togni. It tells the story of mythical ancient Egypt under the rule of sibling consorts Isis and Osiris and there struggle with their brother Seth who embodies violence and chaos. In the process Seth disposes of Osiris in fourteen pieces but Isis manages to gather up all save the phallus. A golden replacement is made, Osiris is revived and the cosmic order restored. It’s quite a promising premise but it never really comes off.
As we approach All Fools Day the calendar starts to get busier. On Tuesday 29th March there’s a concert at lunchtime in the RBA called The Four Tenors. In this case it’s Andrew Haji (lucky St. Louis folks can see him as Rodolfo next season), Jean-Philippe Fortier-Lazure, Charles Sy, and Aaron Sheppard. The program is a bit predictable and, yes, there are Neapolitan songs, though not, at least according to the on-line version O sole mio. Also no Nessun dorma so I think we have a handle on the possible encores.
Then it’s on to April 1st itself and here the gods are laughing. At 5pm, at the McMillan Theatre, UoT Opera are doing the The Art of the Prima Donna; a selection of staged and costumed scenes from classic operas. Parts of this were performed in the RBA in October last year. Then at 8pm at the Arts and Letters Club, Bicycle Opera Project and the Toy Piano Composers’ Collective have a show called Travelogue featuring short operas about travel. This one is repeated on the 2nd. Finally, Voicebox:Opera in Concert are premiering Isis and Osiris by Peter Anthony Togni and Sharon Singer. This one is at 8pm at the Jane Mallett Theatre and it’s sponsored by the Egyptian Tourist Authority who can probably use all the help they can get right now (and no jokes about pyramid marketing schemes please). This one is repeated at 2.30pm on Sunday 3rd April.
operaramblings 