There was a time when site specific productions were very much part of the Toronto opera scene but, like much else, they seemed to disappear with the pandemic. So it was especially pleasing to see Tapestry Opera, Luminato and Metropolitan United Church combining for just such an event.
Today’s noon hour concert at Metropolitan United Church featured soprano McKenzie Warriner and pianist Christine Bae. Ellita Gagner was also scheduled to sing but, unfortunately, she was not able to do so due to illness. So we got a hastily reorganised programme.
Luxury! Two operatic concerts on consecutive lunchtimes in the RBA. On Thursday it was the turn of the Glenn Gould School’s Rebanks fellows with mentor Paul Groves to present a series of staged opera excerpts directed by Anna Theodosakis. Stéphane Mayer provided the excellent piano accompaniment throughout.
Unfinished Business is a CD of music by Toronto based composer Tristan Zaba. It’s mostly songs for soprano (McKenzie Warriner) and piano (Paul Williamson) but the second and longest track; Matryoski and Blue Vase is a solo piano piece that plays with different textures and densities; sometimes very spare, sometimes very busy, for twelve minutes. There’s also a shorter, ceaselessly busy piece Swan Dive.
Slow Rise Music (Tristan Zaba and McKenzie Warriner) presented a concert called here be sirens on Saturday night at the Tranzac. Apparently it’s their third concert but they are new to me and I’m really happy to find a new collaboration of young musicians putting on quite experimental shows of the kind I saw last night. It’s something that was common enough before the plague but has been slow making a comeback.
operaramblings 