Beat Columns (Live Music)

June is an important time of transition. This is true not only for the seasons (the 21st marks the summer solstice and a promise of consistently better weather) but also for the live music scene, where the closing concert season makes way for a flourishing of summer music festivals.

It is also true for me: I am making a transition away from the music field to take up new challenges in the arena of arts and learning. This means that I will also be stepping away from writing this column, which has given me endless opportunity to explore how Toronto’s new music community has made its own remarkable transitions over time. The most noticeable of these is in the sheer range of appropriations, influences, inspirations and collaborations new music makers employ to create and showcase exciting new work.

We can look to a handful of this month’s concerts to see this notion at play.

One group that has been constantly pushing at the boundaries of what it means to be “new music” is CONTACT Contem-porary Music. Their multidisciplinary approach crosses between live and electronic, traditional and site specific, popular and avant-garde, audiovisual and interactive, in ways that many other ensembles would be too timid to try. If that weren’t enough, the content of each CONTACT show treads into touchy territory – from transexualism to transcendentalism, popular music to electro-eroticism, and just about everything in between. Ultimately, CONTACT seeks to unlock the power of artists, leveraged through music-based collaborations, to create situations that eliminate barriers, open new dialogues, find new perspectives and advance new understandings of current, contemporary challenges. It would be absentminded not to mention their “Electronica Unplugged” lunchtime concert on June 8 at the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre, which features original electronic works by David Bowie, Brian Eno, Robert Fripp, Gavin Bryars and Philip Glass arranged for the unique forces of the CONTACT ensemble. You can learn more at www.contactcontemproarymusic.ca

Another case in point is the deliriously eclectic Adventures of the Smoid, a creative concoction from the ever-adventurous percussionist/composer/artistic director Rick Sacks for the Evergreen Club Contemporary Gamelan. Drawing on the growing popularity of visual story telling through comic books and graphic novels, Sacks inventively connects a diverse series of dots to link this world to the tradition of gamelan and Indonesian shadow puppetry. Sacks asks the Club to do double duty as musicians and puppeteers to tell a humorous tale about an astronaut’s adventures in space. Adventures of the Smoid is prefaced by a song cycle from iNSiDEaMiND, the wildly experimental turntable duo. New music crossover eclecticism doesn’t get much better than this. The boundaries are definitely pushed once again for these June 13 and 14 events at the Music Gallery.

Tapestry New Opera Works has long been exploring new paths to collaboration between composers, writers and musicians in the creation of the highest of musical forms: opera. Over the last quarter century and beyond, this hallmark company has expanded beyond its Canadian roots to provide a haven for an increasingly international network of creators to develop some of the most promising new work in the field. Tapestry’s season-closing New Opera Showcase will no doubt be another exhilarating adventure through a collection of shorter pieces in development, ranging from those by veteran creative partners to new collaborations. The inspirations range just as far, from Ancient Greek tragedies to modern-day Irish pub love stories, from Icelandic mythology to Canadian immigrant stories filtered through Old Testament morality tales. Be sure to visit www.tapestrynewopera.com to get full details for the June 14 and 15 performances at the Ernest Balmer Studio in the Distillery District.

These three events are just the tip of an iceberg of musical innovation at work in our local music community; I hope to find such radical minds and creative connections in my future work. Don’t miss your chance to catch such new sounds while they are still summer fresh! Be sure to get in with the new via The WholeNote concert listings here and online at www.thewholenote.com.

Jason van Eyk, The WholeNote’s longtime New Music beat writer is stepping down from this column and from his position as Ontario Regional Director of the Canadian Music Centre.

Opera in Toronto no longer ends with the close of the Canadian Opera Company’s season. This month sees the world premiere of Svadba – Wedding, a new a cappella opera by Montreal composer Ana Sokolovic commissioned by Queen of Puddings Music Theatre.

Any opera by Queen of Puddings is an event, especially when it is on a large scale, this time involving six singers. According to the QoP press release, Svadba – Wedding “takes place the night before a fiancée, Milica, leaves for her wedding. Her girlfriends keep her company all night long and engage in raucous girltalk, invoking pagan rituals as they prepare her for the impending wedding. What elevates this ‘girltalk’ to a supernaturally exhilarating experience is Ana Sokolovic’s style of composition. Using existing Slavic/Balkan peasant folk tales, myths and traditions as her text source, she draws on her native Balkan folk music as a source of inspiration for all her music. She transforms the music and text into her own unique onomatopoeic language and transports listeners to a world of magic realism. The singers have to use every single possible vocal technique – combining opera singing with Balkan folk singing, overtones, extreme chest voice, heightened nasal voice, whispering, creating a wildly inventive intense palette of colours.”

This is Sokolovic’s fourth collaboration with QoP after Love Songs (2008), The Midnight Court (2005) and Six Voices for Sirens (2000). Born in Belgrade, Serbia, in 1968, she studied composition with Dusan Radic and Zoran Eric. She completed a master’s degree at the Université de Montréal under the direction of José Evangelista. Her catalogue includes orchestral and piano works and several chamber music compositions, and she has written numerous scores for the theatre. This year she has been unanimously chosen by the SMCQ (Société de musique contemporaine du Québec) for its 2011-2012 season Homage Series. This season the entire Québec cultural community will recognize and celebrate the work of Ana Sokolovic by programming her music.

Via e-mail, Dáirine Ní Mheadhra, co-founder with John Hess of QoP, writes of Sokolovic and her inspiration for this new work: “The genesis of Svadba was Sirens, that ten minute work for six female voices we commissioned from Ana in 2000. We adored that work and anyone who heard it has never forgotten it and we’ve performed it many times since. She used Balkan vocal techniques in Sirens, something akin to what you hear in that famous Bulgarian women’s choir, Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares. While we’ve commissioned other works from Ana since 2000, we’ve always wanted to revisit a full-length scenario for six female voices in which Ana would again be drawn towards Balkan vocal techniques, as she always is when writing vocal music.”

“Balkan folkloric music has always been the inspiration for all of her music. Love Songs included three Serbian poems, and now in Svadba she has come full circle as it’s completely in Serbian. She had the idea of really exploring Balkan literature and folk texts for Svadba and the wedding rituals and texts were the ones that caught her attention. She spent time in Belgrade poring over hundreds of texts. While Ana lives in Montreal, married to a Québécois with two Canadian children, she is never far from her Serbian background in her art. Igor Stravinsky’s Les Noces (a choral ballet from 1923 based on Russian wedding lyrics) may not have been Svadba’s immediate inspiration but it was probably there subliminally.”

In answer to questions about the nature of Svadba as opera, Ní Mheadhra says, “Svadba is more about ritual than narrative, although it does unfold in seven consecutive scenes where the bride and her girlfriends stay up all night long before the impending wedding as they prepare her for the ceremony. It includes scenes like colouring her hair, bathing her in the hammam, dressing her, etc., leading to the farewell, and the music is completely onomatopoeic. The catharsis is a purging through emotion, most definitely, as the forcefield of sound set up by those female voices singing nasally pushes into the far reaches of your cranium and makes your head buzz and your body vibrate so much that you feel totally exhilarated! It’s primal stuff and communicates so viscerally that you want more and more and more … which is after all how those Sirens could lure those sailors onto the rocks with their sound that was so seductive!”

Svadba will be sung in Serbian with English surtitles. The cast is comprised of singers Jacqueline Woodley, Shannon Mercer, Laura Albino, Carla Huhtanen, Andrea Ludwig and Krisztina Szabó, under the music direction of Dáirine Ní Mheadhra. The creative team consists of stage director Michael Cavanagh, set and costume designer Michael Gianfrancesco and lighting designer Kimberly Purtell. Performances take place in Toronto June 24, 25, 28, 29, 30 and July 2 at the Berkeley Street Theatre Downstairs. For tickets phone 416-368-3110 or visit www.canadianstage.com/alsoatberkeley. For more about Ana Sokolovic, see www.anasokolovic.com and for more about Queen of Puddings see www.queenofpuddingsmusictheatre.com.

Christopher Hoile is a Toronto-based writer on opera and theatre. He can be contacted at opera@thewholenote.com.

TAFELMUSIK BAROQUE SUMMER INSTITUTE

What makes a musician a “baroque” musician? The answer to this question has evolved dramatically over the years, as consideration of how baroque music should be played moves from presenting it from a completely modern standpoint, to awareness of a sound more “informed” by the stylistic elements present in baroque times.

One of the world’s premiere baroque music training programmes is right in our midst: The Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute, which takes place every June in Toronto, is about to begin its tenth season. As TBSI music director, Jeanne Lamon, writes on the website, the Institute is dedicated to developing the period performers of the future. With an impressively comprehensive programme of study and first-rate teachers, it attracts student participants from all over the world.

There’s a component for instrumentalists, with in-depth study of their instrument in a variety of solo, chamber and orchestral settings, and for players new to period instruments, an introduction to baroque instruments, their technique and repertoire. There is even a number of baroque flutes, oboes, bassoons, stringed instruments and bows available for loan.

There’s a component for singers, offering study in solo, choral, ensemble and operatic repertoire; Opera Atelier’s Marshall Pynkoski leads workshops in scenes from baroque operas, focusing on gesture and deportment and their relation to music and text in the 17th and 18th centuries.

There’s a component for conductors and directors, too – a self-directed study for the most part – during which participants are encouraged to audit vocal and instrumental masterclasses, sit in on orchestra, choir and chamber ensemble rehearsals and attend opera workshops, lectures, demonstrations and concerts.

There are classes in baroque dance, led by Opera Atelier’s Jeannette Lajeunesse Zingg; continuo classes for keyboard players and lutenists/guitarists; classes for conductors and directors with Tafelmusik librarian, Charlotte Nediger, on sources and editions. There are private lessons, lectures and workshops on a range of topics. There is even an international exchange programme with Jeune Orchestre Atlantique, a European training orchestra specializing in classical and romantic repertoire on period instruments and directed by Philippe Herreweghe.

But wait! Why not let the voices of some who have studied at the Institute speak for themselves? Those I asked came back with a flood of enthusiastic stories, from which I’ve distilled just a little here:

Roseen Giles, baroque flutist, relates how TBSI teachers guided her in moving from the modern to the baroque flute, and says: “Eventually it became clear that the best way to learn how to play a period instrument is through immersion in baroque playing and style, which is exactly what TBSI provides. Two weeks of having nothing but well-played early music in my ears was exactly what I needed to help me understand that baroque music was not dry and academic like I’d previously been taught, but vibrant and alive. After TBSI, I traded my silver for wood, my keys for pure intervals, and never looked back since!”

Elizabeth Loewen Andrews, baroque violinist, tells of the journey that led her through TBSI and Jeune Orchestre Atlantique to professional work with Aradia Ensemble, the Windermere String Quartet and Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra as an extra, and concludes: “So, how has TBSI impacted my musical and professional life? Pretty much in every way! It started me on the road to a much more diverse performance career, opened my mind and ears to a different world of sound, and has helped open so many doors to me in the first five years of my career. My life today would certainly not be the same without that summer!”

From soprano Johane Ansell: “The major impact that TBSI has made on my musical life: not only did it assist my solo performance skills but it also encouraged and facilitated the development of my ensemble singing, which is a useful skill to have and is applicable in all facets of vocal singing, not limited to early music singing. It is also one of the few programs that emphasize the study of the different styles of early/renaissance music: French baroque, Italian, etc., as well as the styles of different composers such as Bach, Lully and Handel. There is a reason people return to TBSI to participate more than once: it is a unique program with a LOT to offer and you get to work with the best in the business.”

Baroque violinist Alice Culin-Ellison says: “This will be my third summer attending the Institute. The first summer (at) TBSI was the first time I ever played on gut strings and learned the period performance techniques of how to hold the instrument (chin off with no chin or shoulder rest). I have nothing but fantastic things to say about TBSI. It led me to be in the process of getting my masters in early music (violin) and I have recommended it to many, many people, at least three of whom are attending this summer due to my recommendation.”

Even if you aren’t planning to participate as a student in TBSI, you can participate as an auditor of individual classes, full days or the events of the entire institute. There are also four public concerts featuring faculty and/or student performers, on June 3, 8, 12 and 15 – find details in The WholeNote’s festival listings or at www.tafelmusik.org/tbsi.

OTHERS

Just north of Newmarket lies a building of exquisite proportions, a National Historic Site known as Sharon Temple. Its interior space, with beautiful acoustical ambiance, is a natural venue for music (and was intended so by the Children of Peace, who built it). For several years now it’s been the home of a summer concert series, and this year co-artistic directors Larry Beckwith and Rick Phillips planned five Sunday afternoon concerts. The first one took place on May 29 and the other four run throughout June. Early music is featured in two of these. On June 5, celebrated countertenor Daniel Taylor brings his Theatre of Early Music to perform arias and duets by Handel. On June 26, the Toronto Consort presents their programme “Shakespeare’s Songbook”, featuring songs and dances from the plays of the immortal bard. A lovely way to spend a Sunday afternoon, I’d say.

The Church of St. Mary Magdalene in Toronto is famous as the place where composer Healey Willan focused much of his musical life, directing and composing for the choir and adding his musical voice to the Anglican liturgy for over 45 years. A new Friday evening concert series entitled, “Concerts Spirituels,” is beginning at the church which, as artistic director Stephanie Martin says, hopes to keep Willan’s dream alive by continuing the tradition of singing and playing wonderful music. Three concerts are planned – June 3, 10 and 17 – each featuring an a cappella renaissance mass (Victoria, Guerrero and Palestrina), a baroque chamber ensemble and organ music played on the three manual Healey Willan Memorial Organ.

FOILED

Isn’t it just the luck! You write enthusiastically about the pending appearance of a special artist, then an injury prevents the concert – the whole North American tour! – from happening! The concert by Jordi Savall, Hespèrion XXI and La Capella Reial de Catalunya, that was discussed in last month’s column, and was supposed to have taken place at Koerner Hall, was cancelled, as you probably all know. But all being well, it will happen on March 1 of next year, and be enthusiastically heralded again in this column.

She can be contacted at earlymusic@thewholenote.com.

Last November in The WholeNote I interviewed Christina Petrowska Quilico about the many international piano competitions in the world today, and the abundance of pianists vying for the opportunity to compete. Almost as if to prove my point a message arrived in my inbox yesterday telling me that a twelve-year old Toronto pianist, Anastasia Rizikov had just been awarded the first prize in the adult pianists’ class of the Concurso International de Piano Rotary in Mallorca, Spain, the youngest pianist ever to win this award. Needless to say, this will be the first time many readers will have heard of Ms. Rizikov, who, I expect, has a brilliant career ahead. I doubt it will be the last. Hopefully we will have the opportunity soon to hear her play again in Toronto.

Another Toronto pianist, whose name is not yet well known outside the piano competition circuit, is Ilya Poletaev. He came to Toronto from Russia via Israel at the age of fourteen, continuing his piano studies at the Royal Conservatory of Music. Some years later he completed a Bachelor of Music degree at the Faculty of Music at U. of T., moving on to Yale University, where he did his Master’s and Doctorate.

Just last July he captured First Prize at the International Johann Sebastian Bach Competition in Leipzig and, as the winner, will appear in recital at the Leipzig Gewandhaus. He won first prize in the 2008 Concorso Sala Gallo Piano Competition in Monza, Italy, where he also received the Audience Prize, the Bach Prize, and the Orchestra Prize. He also won First Prize at the 2009 Grieg International Competition, is a laureate of the 2008 National Stepping Stone Competition in Canada and joined the Astral Artists roster as a winner of its 2009 National Auditions. But it was way back in 1997 that he got his start in Toronto when he won the TSO Volunteer Competition which gave him the opportunity to perform Brahms’ Concerto in D Minor with the TSO.

Unlike most pianists, Poletaev manages to find time in his day for harpsichord and fortepiano, intending to include them in his performing career along with the modern piano. “What is important to me is not so much playing various instruments as being able to speak each musical language fluently. I have done a lot of continuo playing on the harpsichord. Doing this you can’t help but see the connection between the continuo and the text, which informs the musical rhetoric. Interestingly, I have found it possible to transfer something of this to my mainstream piano playing to make it more rhetorically vivid.”

In addition to all this he also finds time to pursue his interest in music history with a focus on the less well-known works of well-known composers. He has recently completed a project unearthing largely unknown works of the twentieth-century Romanian composer George Enescu, and with violinist Jennifer Curtis has recorded Enescu’s complete works for violin and piano, scheduled for release soon by Naxos. Not surprisingly, with abilities as both a performer and as a scholar, he has recently been appointed an assistant professor at McGill University.

A little closer to home I asked harpsichord wrangler extraordinaire Dawn Lyons of Claviers Baroques about Ilya Poletaev: “… He is a really, really nice guy who can play the piano and the harpsichord very well … I mean very, VERY well … stupendously well, in fact. Den [Den Ciul, her partner in Claviers Baroques] says he is one of the ten best harpsichordists on the planet who can do ‘magic’.”

Where this is all leading is to the good news that we will have the opportunity to hear this accomplished Torontonian on June 4, when he will play the rarely-performed Piano Concerto No. 3 by Nikolai Medtner, with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Peter Oundjian.

The choice of this concerto would appear to reflect Poletaev’s musicological interests and perhaps his Russian background. Nikolai Medtner, who was Russian, lived from 1880 to 1951, and was trained at the Moscow Conservatory as both a concert pianist and as a composer (he studied composition under Taneyev). From a Canadian perspective it is interesting that in 1924 he toured the United States and Canada. A slightly younger contemporary of the much better known Russian composer and pianist, Sergei Rachmaninoff, he dedicated his second Piano Concerto in c minor, Op. 50 (1920–27) to Rachmaninoff, who dedicated his own Fourth Concerto to Medtner. The third Piano Concerto (in e minor “Ballade”, Op. 60, 1940–43) was written towards the end of his life when he was living in London. Medtner recorded his three piano concertos with the Philharmonia Orchestra in 1947.

“I first became acquainted with Medtner’s music when I was sixteen” Poletaev writes. “Something that makes him a very special composer is that he was able in a very original way to put together both his Russian and his German roots. What makes it Germanic is its coherence, the way unity is built into it in a very organic way. This was not an important feature of Russian music. What seems Russian to me is his thematic material, which while not overtly “Russian,” is somehow psychologically charged in that it contains a quality of remembering the essential. It is definitely not cliché, but when you hear it you feel as if you have heard it before but then forgot. Unlike Rachmaninoff, his music is hard to follow on first hearing. It is denser, more polyphonic and almost overloaded. While it unfolds very logically it requires an effort on the part of the listener. To me Rachmaninoff’s appeal is more immediate but Medtner’s is more lasting.”

MUSIC MONDAYS

In an editorial in the May issue of The WholeNote David Perlman observed that one of the biggest changes to occur in the Toronto music scene over the past fifteen years has been the emergence of a summer music season in Toronto. I remember more than once commenting in the June or July issues on the migration of musicians to small towns and rural areas, which came alive with the sound of music while the music almost stopped in the city.

I say “almost” because a series of weekly concerts beginning in late May and continuing until Labour Day was growing and flourishing all through that time. The series, still flourishing and which is now celebrating its twentieth anniversary season, is Music Mondays. The visionary behind the series was Margot Linken, the administrator (a position she still holds) at Holy Trinity Church, the series’ venue. For the first ten years the artistic director of the series was the organist and harpsichordist, Paul Jenkins, who moved on to other things and was replaced by the series’ current director, Sue Crowe Connolly.

The venue, the venerable Holy Trinity Church, an heirloom from a Toronto now long gone is almost as much a part of the performance as the roster of excellent performers that Ms. Crowe Connolly assembles for the series. Sheltered from Yonge and Dundas Streets by the Eaton Centre, it stands like an oasis of memories of things past. This impression becomes all the more intense when you go inside and are enveloped by the smell of the aging pine interior, the light mellowed by the stained glass windows and a silence that can remind you of an almost forgotten quiet place inside yourself. When the music begins it comes out of that silence, surrounds you and fills you at the same time, as if it had always been there and always will be there. We don’t know how lucky we are that this beautiful building, this beautiful idea, was saved from the wrecker’s ball – but that is another story.

Besides providing a weekly concert Music Mondays has provided opportunities for emerging artists such as Autorickshaw and violinist, Jasper Wood and many others. I was also surprised to find out that its fame has crossed the Atlantic and requests to perform come regularly from abroad. Among these have been the Polokwane Choral Society from South Africa, Italian early music singer and instrumentalist Viva Biffi Biancaluna, organists Reinhard Seeliger from Germany and Henri Ormieres from France, and German French horn player, Manfred Dippmann.

To mark the anniversary, Music Mondays has extended its season to the end of September and will also host a celebrative reception after its June 6 concert. I hope to see some of you there!

BROTT FESTIVAL IN JUNE

Another musical visionary in our midst is Boris Brott. In response to the lack of cultural activity in the Hamilton area way back in 1988 he put together the first Brott Summer Festival, which was eleven days long. This year the festival begins in June and ends in August. The very next year, with support from the Ministry of Labour Brott started National Academy Orchestra, as the official Orchestra of the Brott Music Festival. The orchestra gave the festival something most summer festivals don’t have, a resident symphony orchestra, and additionally provided what amounted to an apprenticeship programme for young orchestral musicians. What a stroke of brilliance!

The 2011 Brott Festival begins in Burlington with four performances by the National Academy Orchestra on June 11, 18, 25 and 30 with an impressive array of soloists and conductors.

MUSIC AT SHARON

Started in 2007, the current incarnation of the Music at Sharon concert series is a relative newcomer to the early summer music season. By the time you read my column the first concert in the series will probably already have taken place, but four others remain – June 5, 12, 19 and 26.

Needless to say, there are many other wonderful performances waiting to be discovered in our listings. I hope you get out to some of them.

Allan Pulker is a flutist, a founder of The WholeNote, and serves as Chairman of The WholeNote’s board of directors. He can be contacted at classicalbeyond@thewholenote.com.

Fewer jazz airlines, more jazz clubs! In Toronto, The Rex Hotel is the only music venue that books jazz 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and standing room only is not unusual. On May 30, the venue celebrates JUNO-winning John MacLeod and The Rex Hotel Orchestra. But before I elaborate on this triumphant story, let me draw your attention to a few other events which need your support in order to triumph.

Ben McConchie is one of John MacLeod’s pupils, a charismatic player who has been “busy trying to balance having newborn twins and getting through my first year of a Master’s Degree in Jazz Performance at U of T.”
McConchie’s group will perform a spirited night of jazz-country fusion at the intimate Emmet Ray (924 College St.) on May 15.

You will find in The WholeNote listings many concerts that take place beyond the GTA, but so far, not much jazz. Port Perry is an exception, where jazz vocalist and presenter Lynn McDonald books The Jester’s Court: May 8, “Mother’s Day with Alex Pangman”; May 15, Canadian Jazz Trio (Frank Wright, vibes; Gary Benson, guitar; Duncan Hopkins, bass); May 29, Jeff Taylor Trio (Jeff Taylor, violin; Chris Kettlewell, bass; Arch Rockefeller, guitar).

If you know of another music venue beyond the GTA that hires jazz musicians on a regular basis, we will happily include them in print and online. Ideally, The WholeNote jazz listings will ultimately include a separate section, “Jazz Beyond the GTA.” Please send listings to jazz@thewholenote.com by the 15th of the month prior to publication.

A good example of good music being presented for a good cause: on Thursday May 12 at Heliconian Hall, vocalist Peggy Mahon sings songs from a woman’s point of view as part of her fourth annual benefit concert for Canada’s first Women’s Shelter, Interval House, accompanied by three musically sensitive gentlemen: Danny McErlain on piano, Dave Field on bass and Don Vickery on drums.

Big news for jazz musicians and east-enders in particular: Ten Feet Tall (1381 Danforth), launches a new night of live music. Beginning Thursday May 5 and on every subsequent Thursday, the venue presents a new jazz jam session hosted by Brendan Davis Trio with special guest Chris Gale on saxophone. The house band is easy to love: Amanda Tosoff on keys, Brendan Davis on bass and Jeff Halischuck on drums. Music starts at 8pm and the jam is open to all musicians comfortable performing in the jazz tradition.

Now back to the top story: In 2003, after a decade of writing original big band music, trumpeter and arranger John MacLeod formed his dream band, The Rex Hotel Orchestra. Assembling the band was “a bit like casting a play and having the luxury of using anyone I wanted,” he muses. Last year the large ensemble released its debut recording, “Our First Set,” this year’s JUNO winner for Traditional Jazz Album of the Year. I asked the leader about the challenges of running a big band in Toronto, and what has kept him going at it all these years.

“There are many different kinds of big bands and different acceptance levels for each kind. When many people think of big bands, they automatically think of the Swing Era. Perhaps that is why modern groups have started using the term “jazz orchestra.” Swing era big bands played primarily for dancing, which is definitely not what we do. We are a large jazz ensemble. We do love to swing though, but in a more modern way. As for the problems of leading a big band of this sort in Toronto? Well there is no problem if you accept at the beginning that jazz is a rather marginalized form of music appealing to quite a small percentage of the population. You simply need to know why you are doing it and that your reasons have nothing to do with fame and fortune or anything else related to wide acceptance. I love composing and arranging and performing jazz music, and I have the luxury of playing with musicians who make my music sound better than I wrote it. And something else - they make it sound different every time. My challenge is to keep these musicians happy and coming back every month. They are all very important to me.”

Why did MacLeod choose The Rex, not only as a venue but as the name for his orchestra?

“When I was working out the logistics of making a project like this work, I realized that I needed some sort of regular gig. At that time, there were a couple of suitable choices and I spoke with a few owners and managers. Tom at the Rex was immediately open to the idea, even though I don’t think he realized at first what kind of world class group I was planning or that the band would attract the kind of large crowds we manage to get out on our Monday night time slot (we have to make our appearances on Monday nights because so many of us are involved in theatre productions and theaters are “dark” on Monday) … I named the band The Rex Hotel Orchestra at the beginning because I thought it sounded rather grand, which of course the Rex isn’t. What it is, though, is a wonderful unpretentious place that makes it a policy not to exclude people from hearing live music, drinking a pint or eating a decent meal at a reasonable price. I’m really glad that I named the band after them now because I am so grateful to them, not only for supporting my band but the whole jazz scene. Now that the band is starting to get booked for concerts outside of the club, perhaps we will become Toronto’s answer to the Village Vanguard Orchestra. Our Monday nights will always be the most important thing, though. There is nothing like hearing professional music performed live at close range. It’s thrilling.”

John MacLeod and The Rex Hotel Orchestra perform on the last Monday night of every month at 9:30; on Monday May 30, join the band for a celebratory JUNO reception at 6:30. Glasses raised!

Ori Dagan is a Toronto-based jazz vocalist, voice actor and entertainment journalist. He can be contacted at jazz@thewholenote.com.

Early in 1921 in Kitchener, Ontario, a local furrier named Joe Graf (and Mrs. Graf) welcomed into the world their third son and named him Edward. In the annals of Canadian music, the rest is history. Early last month I had the pleasure of attending, in the company of a host of luminaries of Canadian music, a party to celebrate Eddie Graf’s 90th birthday.

Since his father, known as Pop to his kids, played violin and his mother played piano, it was only natural that young Eddie Graf would be drawn to music. His father, a regular at fiddle festivals in the Kitchener area, started Eddie on both violin and clarinet at age five, and it wasn’t long, with some coaching from his mother, before Eddie had learned to play chords on the piano to accompany the fiddlers.

At age 13, Eddie joined the local boys’ band, where the featured boy trumpet soloist was a lad named Erich Traugott, who later was one of the stars of Rob McConnnel’s original Boss Brass. In his late teens Eddie worked in a grocery warehouse by day and played around town in the evenings. In those days in Ontario there were no bars or clubs where alcohol was served. Beer was available for men in beverage rooms. Ladies were permitted, if escorted, to drink in separate “Ladies and Escorts” rooms. It was in one such room where he was hired to play piano one night a week. Among other selections in his repertoire, a piano version of the famous Meditation from the opera Thaïs was a favourite. He was paid the princely sum of $1.25 per night plus free beer. Since he was under-age and a non-drinker, he gave the beer to friends. With money coming in from music, he set his sights on a saxophone. The price was $75. One dollar of each evening’s pay went to pay for his new instrument. (The night before this most recent birthday party, Eddie, as a regular member of the Encore Symphonic Concert Band, played a couple of sax solos in a concert. I have it on good authority that these solos were on a newer sax.)

It wasn’t until he joined the army at age 20 that he became a full-time musician. When he enlisted at Wolseley Barracks in London, Ontario, Eddie was assigned to play second clarinet in the band. While there, he also played in various big bands around town and continued to arrange. Meanwhile, over in England, Canadian Bob Farnon, formerly of the old CBC radio show The Happy Gang, had been given the job of assembling musical show groups to entertain service personnel. On a trip back to Canada to line up more talent for his “Army Shows,” Farnon visited Wolseley Barracks. Eddie auditioned and was soon sent off to England.

Shortly after his arrival in the camp near Greenwich he was assigned to Bob Farnon’s band. About a week after Eddie joined the band, Farnon’s brother left the band on compassionate leave and Eddie replaced him in the lead alto sax chair of that prestigious group. Concerts entertaining the troops were routinely interrupted by Luftwaffe aircraft attacks and the infamous “Buzz Bombs.” After the Normandy beaches were secured and the allied armies moved inland, Eddie’s band landed at Caen and subsequently followed the action as the armies advanced through France, Belgium, Holland and ultimately Germany.

In England there was often a number of bands, singers and dancers stationed in the same camp, who in their off hours mingled and made friendships. At some point, on a return from Holland to a camp near Guilford in England, Eddie struck up a friendship with a young dancer from Toronto named Bernice O’Donell, “Bunny,” as she was known to her friends. Some time before the war ended, Bunny’s show was sent off to Holland and Belgium. A bit later Eddie’s show, now a big band stage show, was off to the continent. Lo and behold their paths crossed again in Amsterdam.

After VE day in May 1945, the entertainment groups continued in Europe for many months. By the early fall, both Bunny and Eddie were sent back to England. By now Eddie had enough seniority that he was slated for repatriation home to Canada. Bunny, on the other hand, was further down on the list and was destined to remain in England for some time. The solution: get married and then Eddie could return to Canada with his bride. After a New Year’s Eve party, they were married in a small town church not far from Guilford on January 1, 1946.

Sixty-five years later they shared the good wishes of their many musical friends and family at their home in Scarborough.

Of their seven children, all play musical instruments. However, Lenny is the only child who has pursued music as a career. In a recent conversation, Lenny remarked that is was wonderful growing up in a home where music was so central. In his words, “Dad was not a teacher by trade, but still a fountain of knowledge, not only in the realm of music, but in matters of every day life.” He recalls a steady stream of professional musicians coming to the house for rehearsals. In addition, he met more than his share of radio and television personalities as guests at home. From Gordie Tapp, Bobby Gimby and Juliette to Rich Little and Bob Hope, they all respected Eddie’s talents.

During the course of his 90th birthday party, the steady stream of wellwishers included top Toronto musicians. Photos in my collection from that day include such notables in the trumpet world as Johnny Cowell, Rainer Schmidt and Stephen Chenette to name but three. All of us had the pleasure in sharing a bit of a most artistic birthday cake with a topping in the form of a giant yellow saxophone.

At the party, renowned trumpeter, conductor and educator Stephen Chenette conveyed a special message from Bill Harris, President of the Canadian Band Association (Ontario) proclaiming “Eddie Graf, well known Ontario musician, composer and arranger, ... an Honorary Life Member of CBA (ON) on the occasion of his 90th birthday.” The message went on to laud Eddie’s big band jazz charts and his concert band arrangements and compositions, and noted that Eddie had been recognized by the Canadian Band Association National organization in 2003 with the Canadian Composers Award, one of only two times it has been awarded.

Speaking of Stephen Chenette, there is quite a bit to say about some of the awards that he has received in recent years. However, that will have to wait until next month. Similarly, a full report on the Hannaford Band’s exceptional “A Festival of Brass” weekend will be deferred until then. I have run out of time and space.

In the meantime, check out the web site www.grafflemusic.ca (Graffle Music Publishing). Eddie’s scores and arrangements are available from them. We all look forward to playing his arrangements for years to come.

Definition Department

This month’s lesser known musical term is: gaul blatter: a French horn player.

We invite submissions from readers.

Coming Events

Welcome to two new groups with inaugural performances. Please see the listings section for full details.

• May 9 7:30: East York Concert Band. Memories of Love. Annual spring concert featuring favourites from film and television
classics, musicals and contemporary concert band arrangements.  Emily Summers, director. On the Park Centennial Ballroom.

• May 11 7:30: Earl Haig/Claude Watson Music Program. Symphony/Band Night: Classical, Romantic and Contemporary. Verdi, Tchaikovsky and others. Alan Torok and Gennandy Gefter, conductors. Glenn Gould Studio.

• May 14 8:00: Counterpoint Community Orchestra. Flutopia. Dvořák, Andersen, Gordeli. Terry Kowalczuk, conductor; guest: Robert Aitken, flute. St. Luke’s United Church.

• May 14 8:00: Greater Toronto Philharmonic Orchestra. Finale. Dvořák, Wienawski, Saint-Saëns, Beethoven. Jani Papadhimitri, violin; Vincent Cheng, conductor. Calvin Presbyterian Church.

• May 14 8:00, May 15 2:00: Oakville Symphony. Finalissimo. Works by Nino Rota. The Oakville Centre.

• May 14 8:00: Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra. Spaghetti Western: Music Inspired by Hollywood. Daugherty, Pool (premiere), Royer (premiere). Cary Ebli, English horn; Louise Di Tullio, flute; Ronald Royer, conductor. Birchmount Park Collegiate Institute.

• May 15 2:00: Mississauga Pops Concert Band. On Broadway. The golden age of musicals; featuring choral group Justus.                                 Meadowvale Theatre.

• May 15 3:30: Wychwood Clarinet Choir. Spring Concert. St. Michael and All Angels Church.

• May 19 7:30: Long & McQuade Bloor New Horizons Band. The Beat Goes On: Annual Spring Concert. Dan Kapp, music director.  Glenn Gould Studio.

• May 29 3:00: Orchestra Toronto. Masterworks on Canvas Live.  Mussorgsky, Debussy, Weber, Stravinsky. Danielle Lisboa, guest conductor; Noru Gogovita, clarinet. Toronto Centre for the Arts.

• May 29 7:00: North Toronto Community Band. Spring Rhythms Gala. Music from Mozart to musicals. Danny Wilks, conductor; guest: Graziano Brescacin, flute. Crescent School.

• Jun 01 7:30: Resa’s Pieces Strings. Debut Gala Performance. Ric Giorgi, music director. Richmond Hill Centre for the Performing Arts.

• Jun 03 8:00: Etobicoke Philharmonic Orchestra. 50th Anniversary Gala Concert. Raum, Rachmaninoff, Mahler. Arthur Ozolins, piano; Sabatino Vacca, conductor. Silverthorn Collegiate.

Jack MacQuarrie plays several brass instruments and has performed in many community ensembles. He can be contacted at bandstand@thewholenote.com.

“Musick has Charms to soothe a savage Breast,” was coined by William Congreve, in The Mourning Bride, 1697. Some music, yes. But the other day I was in a large store owned by a grocery chain. And there it was, seeping unbidden and unwanted into my sensitive ears – perhaps too sensitive for this day and age – disagreeable and intrusive “music” flooding the store through tinny, ceiling-mounted speakers, just loud enough to disturb and certainly loud enough to annoy me.

People listen to music for a variety of reasons. It can help you to relax. It can make you happy. It can give solace. It can trigger memories. But nowadays it is everywhere – all the time – and somehow it has lost value and too often is a form of noise pollution.

I will walk out of a restaurant or bar if there is a pounding, repetitive noise coming through the sound system, forcing everybody to raise their voices just to be heard across a small table. And, it seems to me, almost nobody is actually listening to it; the noise seems to act like some sort of security blanket. Heaven forbid that they would have to cope with silence. Familiarity and all that.

It all began with Muzak which, believe it or not, was created in 1922! It was the brainchild of General George Squier and initially was called Wired Radio. He devised a system to deliver music from phonograph records to subscribers – mainly workplaces – via electrical wires, in the belief that people would be more productive listening to certain types of music. He decided later to change the service’s name to “Muzak.” Influenced by the system, the BBC began to broadcast music in factories during World War II in order to encourage workers.

So who was this General Squier?

He was an officer in the U.S. Signal Corps and was Chief Signal Officer during World War I. He had a distinguished career, died in 1934 and in 1943 was honoured by having a U.S. troopship named after him.

Don’t get me wrong. The concept, and value, of music in the work place goes back a long way. The human voice was an instrument which everybody possessed. People could sing either individually or in groups. When in groups, singing was always a collective act. The rhythm of songs was key to work, coordinating workers’ muscles for the repetitive tasks of the day. Songs commented on the work process, everyday life or religious themes, thereby establishing a shared bond between co-workers even in the most difficult of situations. Songs sung together at the workplace, at home, and in worship established solid bonds – work songs and sea shanties come immediately to mind – by providing shared experiences. Music was both a communal activity and, in memorializing events, it was a form of history writing. And it was performed live.

Until recorded music, no two performances were exactly the same, just as today, for example, no two performances of a play are exactly the same.

With the coming of the Industrial Revolution, everything changed and machines became the prevailing producers of sound. General background noises were inescapable. Not only that, singing in the workplace was difficult and sometimes frowned upon by factory management. If you worked for Henry Ford, for example, you were expected to work in silence, although he did organize concerts for his workers several times a year.

Then along came General Squier and music was taken out of the hands, or rather the voices, of the general public. It was replaced by sounds which in too many instances today seem to me to be leading the charge in the dumbing-down process in evidence all around us, in a society which is afraid of having to deal with even a few minutes of silence.

Muzak’s claims were questioned in some quarters and among those expressing some doubts was Canadian composer R. Murray Schafer who feared that it would lead to a dulling of aesthetic sensitivity. I wonder what he thinks about today’s assaults on our ears.

Perhaps it is time to form the National Organization for the Prevention of Aural Pollution or NOPAP.

Of course, the only antidote to muzak is live music! WholeNote colleague Ori Dagan lists the jazz happening in the clubs; here is some other live jazz taken from our concert listings:

• May 5 at 7:30: Jazz.FM91. Jazz Lives 2011. Local and international artists including Al Jarreau, vocals; Karrin Allyson, vocals and piano; Randy Brecker, trumpet and flugelhorn; Joey DeFrancesco,  jazz organ, and others. Convocation Hall.

• May 14 at 8:00: Emilie-Claire Barlow. In Concert. Jazz vocalist covers songs from the 1960s. Queen Elizabeth Theatre.

• May 14 at 8:00: MCC Toronto. Leading Ladies: Jackie Richardson. Jazz, blues and R&B vocalist performs with David Warrack, piano.       Metropolitan Community Church.

• May 31 at 8:00: Gallery 345. Mark Kieswetter & Ross MacIntyre CD Release. Piano-bass duo release jazz recording “Green Edge Sky, Green Edge Sun.”

• June 5 at 8:00: Jazz Performance Education Centre. Seamus Blake Quartet. Featuring New York-based tenor saxophonist and                                composer Seamus Blake, joined by trio of Toronto-based musicians. Glenn Gould Studio.

Giving Me the Air

I hope you will forgive me for taking this opportunity for a little self-promotion, but starting June 5, for 13 Sundays, I will be on Jazz.FM at 91.1 from 4pm to 5pm with a programme called “Journeys In Jazz with Jim Galloway,” playing music from my own collection. Much of the music will be played by musicians I know or knew personally on and off the bandstand and I’ll have some little anecdotes about some of them.

Please give it a listen. It won’t be boring and you’ll hear some music that you might not have heard before, played by some of the great but sometimes under-appreciated talents who helped to shape jazz. Oh, and yes, it will be melodic and it will swing.

Happy listening to music that you choose to hear.

Jim Galloway is a saxophonist, band leader and former artistic director of Toronto Downtown Jazz. He can be contacted at jazznotes@thewholenote.com.

During the month of May, Toronto’s Latin music mecca, Lula Lounge on Dundas St. W., is the destination for world music aficionados. This year its ambitious festival LULAWORLD 2011: The New Canadian Songbook, runs from May 12 to May 22 and encompasses 15 concerts. While Lula’s focus does not abandon its Latin American musical roots, programmers make a case for showcasing the diversity all around us. Judging from the line-up, what they call “The New Canadian Songbook” is sung in Spanish, Portuguese, Yiddish, French as well as English. The festival highlights the contribution of Canada’s newcomer musicians, whose compositions, performances, and recordings constantly serve to refresh and redefine the Canadian musical landscape, enriching our cultural fabric by incorporating traditions from across the globe. And isn’t that what world music should be about?

The concert series kicks off May 12 with the celebrated Latin jazz vocalist Amanda Martinez, joined by her guest, the Colombian-born Grammy nominated guitarist/singer-songwriter Fernando Osorio. With her 2009 release Amor reaching #1 on iTunes, recent performances at the FIFA World Cup in South Africa and at New York’s prestigious Blue Note, Canada’s Martinez is riding high.

The festival continues later that evening with the Columbian group Bomba Estéreo, no doubt living up to their explosive moniker with an eminently danceable sound that often expands into trippy electronica territory. Bomba Estéreo was formed in 2005 by Simon Mejia, building on an already active underground electronic dance music scene in Bogotá, Colombia. The group expanded its sound and enhanced its live show by recruiting the fierce singer Liliana Saumet. Bomba Estéreo plays an explosive fusion of electronic dub and hip-hop styles which commentators have likened to M.I.A. and Santigold, but underscored with Colombian dance rhythms of cumbia and champeta. Afro-Colombian rhythms and the folk music of the coastal city Santa Marta, where the group leader Saumet grew up are especially important to Bomba Estéreo’s music.

Singer Patricia Cano was raised in Sudbury, Ontario, but is of Peruvian heritage. She headlines LULAWORLD on May 13. Moving early in life into the international spotlight, this young singer worked and studied in Paris and Brazil. In 2009, Cano recorded her debut album, showcasing traditional South American folk songs, including samba and Afro-Peruvian forms driven by jazz grooves and the soulful sound of the blues. Blessed with a mellifluous and oft intense voice, the album has a strong Brazilian lilt thanks to Brazilian guitarist Carlos Bernardo and percussionist/producer Luisito Orbegoso. Cano is emerging as one of Canada’s leading vocal talents.

In the second set on May 13, one of Canada’s leading salsa bands releases its third album Looking from the Top. Caché’s signature vibraphone-inflected sound that the group has been developing for nearly a decade features the irresistible vocals of frontman Juan Carlos Cardenas. Under the leadership of percussionist Wilson Acevedo and bassist Richard Morales, vibraphonist Randy Stirtzinger and conguero Daniel Stone contribute compositions that have become standards for Toronto salsa dancers. A favourite of CBC and campus radio stations, Caché may be the most in-demand salsa outfit in the country. I may be there trying out my floor moves too.

Speaking of dance, on May 14 at 1pm, Café Con Pan will be holding a free Mexican fandango workshop for families. Accompanied by the son jarocho music of Southern Veracruz, you too can learn the basics of zapateado dancing. At 3pm, the all-ages theme continues with Family French World Café hosted by Quebecois singer-songwriter Joanna Moon, with Donné Roberts. Both are LULAWORLD events.

Continuing with the LULAWORLD New Canadian Songbook theme, at 10pm on Saturday, May 14, an all-star band performs salsa works by noted Canadian composers including Luis Mario Ochoa, Hilario Durán, Jesus El Nino and Mario Allende. The musical direction is co-chaired by Luisito Orbegoso and Sean Bellaviti. The following day, join guitarist Luis Mario Ochoa, one of Canada’s best known Cuban voices, in “Lula’s Sunday Family Salsa Brunch,” hosted by CBC Radio’s Mary Ito; seatings at 11am and 1:30pm. The brunch includes a beginner salsa lesson and Ochoa’s Cuban Quartet. What better way to dance off your eggs benedict?

Sunday evening, May 15, LULAWORLD showcases David Buchbinder’s Odessa Havana featuring Hilario Durán and Maryem Tollar. Yes, you guessed it, this Jewish-Cuban mash-up was predated but not predicted by the Jewish-fuelled American mambo craze of the 1950s. This band is comprised of award-winning trumpeter and composer David Buchbinder, JUNO award-winning pianist/composer Hilario Durán and topped up with Canada’s top jazz and world musicians.

The young BC fiddler Jaron Freeman-Fox’s music dances the line between the soulful and the ridiculous. With his recent album Manic Almanac: Slow Möbius, and a new fiery band, The Opposite of Everything, he displays his own fusion of folk and experimental instrumental music on Tuesday, May 17, at LULAWORLD.

On May 19, singer-songwriter and 2010 Juno award winner, Dominic Mancuso, performs both originals and contemporary treatments of Italian songs and folk melodies joined by celebrated Toronto bassist Roberto Occhipinti. On the second set, Socalled (presented in association with Small World Music) performs his genre-bending collaborations melding funk, Klezmer, hip hop, lounge and classical music. Described as a “klezmer hip-hop maestro,” Socalled (aka Josh Dolgin) is a Montreal-based musician, producer, composer, arranger, magician, filmmaker and photographer.

Book-ending the LULAWORLD festival are several local acts. On May 20, Samba Squad makes a welcome appearance with guest vocalist Luanda Jones. Directed by Rick Lazar, Samba Squad gathers diverse global influences and produces raw, drum-heavy original compositions that are certain to rock the Lula! Lazar presents a night of new compositions and Samba Squad originals with a good measure of funked-up covers of traditional Brazilian favourites. Then on May 22, the Brazilian-born singer, percussionist and composer, Aline Morales, launches her solo CD Flores, Tambores e Amores. Accompanied by album producer David Arcus, percussionist Maninho Costa and the Heavyweights Brass Band, Morales provides a contemporary Canadian perspective on those quintessentially Brazilian genres, samba, tropicalia and maracatu.

Elsewhere in Toronto, the Toronto Tabla Ensemble performs on May 18 and 19 at the Harbourfront Centre’s Enwave Theatre. Featuring North Indian rhythms combined with original loops, samples and sequencing, Ritesh Das directs from the tabla. Guest musicians include Evan Ritchie on drums and percussion, and Ian de Souza on bass.

Further afield, in London, Ontario, the “Year of India in Canada 2011” touches down at the Delta London Armouries on May 1. This year-long, Canada-wide cultural and trade show features dancers and musicians from across India. Represented is Carnatic music from the south, Hindustani music from the north, Rabindra Sangeet (songs of Rabindranath Tagore, Bengali’s favorite son), as well as folk and Bollywood songs. Nor have Indian dance fans been neglected: Odissi and kathak dance traditions are well represented too.

Back in Toronto, Quebec’s renowned folk trio, Genticorum, plays on May 19 at Hugh’s Room. Featuring songs from their new album Nagez Rameurs, the Juno and Felix nominated Genticorum’s performances are marked by stirring three-part harmonies, a high-level of musicianship, an engaging sense of stage humour and a joie de vivre, all of which have earned the band a growing international fan base. They impressed me a few years ago at the Cambridge Millrace Folk Festival and then again at the Mariposa Festival in Orillia. Their current show has more interplay than before between traditional songs and original compositions. Original reels are fused to traditional songs and traditional songs are performed to original lyrics. In my humble opinion this is what living folk music should be like.

Andrew Timar is a Toronto musician and music writer. He can be contacted at worldmusic@thewholenote.com.

Contemporary music concerts are springing up in bunches this month, with a trio of themes each containing a quartet of events.

Quartet 1: Celebrations

April’s sense of celebration flows into May, with a greater emphasis on new musical voices.

On May 15, the Esprit Orchestra will reach the peak of its five-day New Wave Composers Festival, exploring a range of musical inspirations from Bach’s A Musical Offering to the cosmic “music of the spheres” and the mythological Phoenix. This Koerner Hall concert also offers three other reasons to celebrate: it features the world premiere of composer Chris Paul Harman’s Coyote Soul for orchestra; it recognizes the 60th anniversary of the venerable Canadian League of Composers; and it trumpets the return of the Toronto Emerging Composer Award by announcing its first winner in five years. For more details about Esprit and its New Wave Composers Festival, visit www.espritorchestra.com and follow the links.

Array will celebrate in its own way on May 29 with its Young Composers’ Workshop Concert. [See “The ETCeteras” section of listings.] This afternoon event is the culmination of a month’s intensive work completed by a carefully selected foursome of emerging music creators. The resulting pieces will receive their world premiere in the very urban Array Space at 60 Atlantic Avenue. For more info, visit www.arraymusic.com.

The Toronto music community will come together on June 1 at Walter Hall to celebrate the 80th birthday of musical polymath Derek Holman. The concert will feature a variety of Holman’s music for choir, strings, clarinet, voice and pianos, in performances by the Talisker Players, Choir 21, Canadian Children’s Opera Company, pianists Bruce Ubukata and Stephen Ralls, and clarinetist Peter Stoll. A special treat will be the world premiere of Holman’s latest work for tenor and harp, featuring Lawrence Wiliford as soloist. Stay on after the concert for a big, belated birthday party!

Pushing into June, we’ll find the Penderecki String Quartet celebrating its 25th anniversary. To mark the occasion, the PSQ has commissioned seven new works from a cross-section of Canadian composers. We’ll get to hear some of the early results with world premieres from Michael Matthews and Norbert Palej during the Penderecki’s annual QuartetFest (co-produced with the Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Music Society) – an intensive string quartet training and performance program that runs June 1-7 at several locations throughout Kitchener-Waterloo. For more info about Quartetfest and this year’s invited ensembles, visit www.quartetfest.ca. To buy tickets, call 519-886-1673.

Quartet 2: Intersections

The connection of new music to other genres and art forms has been sprouting up more often in Toronto, with this month offering four interesting examples.

On May 3 and 4, the Talisker Players continue their explorations into words and music with their season-closing concert “Façade.” Alongside the title-bearing work by William Walton, and others by Harry Freedman and Alex Eddington, is a world premiere from Toronto’s Alexander Rapoport based on the poem “Jabberwocky.” Soprano Xin Wang and tenor James McLennan join the Taliskers in this program that explores how we look for coherence in words that sometimes hold no meaning. Visit www.taliskerplayers.ca.

The Music Gallery’s Emergents Series will explore a totally different type of intersection, that of genres and styles which collide. The Dupuis/Clark Duo combines harpsichord and electric bass to bridge the distance between four centuries of musical creation. The stretch between these two worlds is not as far as we think, if we conceive of a rock rhythm section as the modern baroque continuo. Sharing the program is GREX, a vocal ensemble that claims to defy easy description. Their set of Meredith Monk, Ned Rorem, R. Murray Schafer and traditional Georgian folk songs makes the claim clear. Visit www.musicgallery.org.

The Canadian Opera Company’s Chamber Music Series unites music and dance in a short, free concert of Beethoven and Golijov, on May 17. Toronto’s celebrated Tokai Quartet will perform the String Quartet Op.131 alongside Golijov’s bittersweet Tenebrae in its original version for soprano and clarinet. Jacqueline Woodley and Kornel Wolak join the Tokai’s as guest performers. Toronto-based dance maverick, Matjash Mrozewski, offers new choreography for four dancers to illuminate the music’s intentions.

Near the end of the month, on May 28, the Music Gallery presents “From Eye to Ear,” an exploration of visual influences in contemporary music, tracing a re-emerging movement towards non-conventional notation and graphic representation. New “scores” by the mercurial John Oswald and the more minimalist Chiyoko Szlavnics are works of art whether sounded or not. Live video will allow the audience to view each piece as it is performed by pianist Eve Egoyan and Quartetto Graphica. More Szlavnics scores, part of the Intimate Music exhibition on loan from the Canadian Music Centre, will be on display.

Quartet 3: Globalization

From Finland to Malaysia, Toronto regularly welcomes the global flow of contemporary music creation. This quartet of concerts demonstrates the range of international ideas on our local stages.

Paris-based Finnish composer, Kaija Saariaho, seems to be popping up everywhere in Toronto classical concert calendars. On May 6, a set of her solo works will appear at the Music Gallery, including her From the Grammar of Dreams for two female voices set to texts of Sylvia Plath, NoaNoa for flute and electronics, Sept Papillons for solo cello and Six Japanese Gardens for percussion and electronics. Singers Carla Huhtanen and Marion Newman, percussionist Aiyun Huang, cellist Rachel Mercer and flautist Camille Watts bring a powerhouse of talent to these demanding and beautiful works.

On May 8, New Music Concerts continues its exploration of music from the Far East in a concert titled “Malaysian Voices.” The program has been curated by Kee-Yong Chong, currently Malaysia’s leading composer. He is credited with a rare musical talent, expressing a highly innovative yet deeply spiritual style. The programming hinges on several pieces by Chong, including a new flute concerto for NMC Artistic Director Robert Aitken. The remaining works by Chow Jun Yi, Yii Kah Hoe, Tazul Izan Tajuddin and Neo Nai Wen will bring a mix of Canadian and world premieres to a portrait of new music from an underrepresented community. Visit www.newmusicconcerts.com.

A little further afield, but also on May 8, the Elora Festival Singers will demonstrate the diversity of voices that makes up the Canadian multicultural mosaic. Simply titled “Oh! Canada,” this program of recent works by Mark Sirrett, Gary Kulesha, Derek Holman and Leonard Enns will bring us some of the best voices in Canadian choral writing as performed by one of our leading choirs. For more information about this afternoon event, and to buy tickets, visit www.elorafestival.com.

Our global tour will end at Roy Thomson Hall on May 26, when the Toronto Symphony Orchestra performs Chinese composer Tan Dun’s Water Concerto and Paper Concerto. Both works reflect the composer’s ideas of an organic music, which embodies sounds of nature and the mind. He claims, “The environment is related to our lives, and spiritually, everything germinates from one seed of creativity.” Tan Dun made a great splash in Toronto with his appearance during the 2009 New Creations Festival. He returns to conduct the TSO in his own imaginative works for unconventional solo instruments. For more info and tickets, visit www.tso.ca.

This is a larger list than I normally offer, but May is a month of many new sounds. But there’s still plenty more music to be discovered, so be sure to get in with the new via The WholeNote concert listings here and online at www.thewholenote.com.

Jason van Eyk is the Ontario Regional Director of the Canadian Music Centre. He can be contacted at newmusic@thewholenote.com.

Once singers have graduated from Opera School, how do they get a job? How do they know what repertoire to sing? How do they prepare for auditions? If you’ve ever wondered about these questions, a special event in May will show you the answers. The International Resource Centre For Performing Artists (IRCPA) presents Opera Week in Toronto from May 5 to 9. During this period, Vincenzo Scalera of the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, and Joan Dornemann of the Metropolitan Opera, New York, will be in Toronto to work intensively with Canadian opera singers with the goal of helping them learn what their possibilities might be in the international market and how to prepare for important auditions for employment. The information garnered at these sessions will also be of interest to coaches, pianists, conductors, stage directors, teachers and managers.

Best of all, the coaching sessions are open to observers for $20 a session. Morning and afternoon sessions will take place May 5 to 9 at the Gallery Theatre Space, Toronto Centre for the Arts. Opera Week will then culminate in a Toscanini Celebration Concert on Wednesday, May 11, at 8pm, at the George Weston Recital Hall, Toronto Centre for the Arts. Singers for the May 11 concert will be chosen during the week’s coaching sessions by Mr. Scalera and Ms. Dornemann, together with Canadian operatic divas Clarice Carson and Lois McDonall, both retired after illustrious international careers, and now active members of the IRCPA. May 11 is a significant date as it marks the 65th anniversary of the reopening of La Scala by Arturo Toscanini on May 11, 1946, after its restoration following the bombing of Milan in 1943. Tickets are $30, and $25 for seniors and students, and are available at 416-872-1111 or at www.ticketmaster.ca. More information is available at www.tocentre.com.

The IRCPA has designed programs since 1983 to make artists ready for employment. Its mandate is to help all performing artists in the classical music and ballet fields to move into professional careers, with special attention to singers and dancers because of their short career spans. After years of formal training, singers need guidance in auditioning for national or international markets, and the IRCPA gives them the opportunity to learn from artistic directors and high-level coaches who work with international casts and know what they need to be hired. The artists thus gain rare access to people currently at the pinnacle of their field while saving on the costs of travel and an accompanist.

These sessions (also called “encounters”) are often supplemented by panel discussions and information on the “business” of performing – including contracts, protocol and the expectations presenters and employers have of artists. The IRCPA program also includes “Encounters with Employers” and the “Business of Career Development.” The next such encounter is scheduled for November 2011.

Ann Summers Dossena, IRCPA founder and the producer/organizer of Opera Week, had been working with Joan Dornemann and other major people, including Joan Ingpen (who was head of the Metropolitan Opera’s young artists programme). When Ann returned to Canada in 1977, she realized that there wasn’t anything similar in Toronto. Artists were asking for management but they weren’t ready for it. Ann spoke to Joan Dornemann, who said, “You do it and I’ll come.” That was in 1983. Joan Dornemann began her Israel program two years later, and Ann went there twice to help her.

Ann continues: “We soon realized that the coaching wasn’t enough because languages were a problem, so we expanded to include Nico Castel for languages. Then it became apparent that stage protocol and interpretation were needed, so we expanded further and brought in Leon Major, a Canadian stage director working in the U.S. who created the Opera Centre at the University of Maryland.”

Artists the IRCPA has tracked include Adrianne Pieczonka, Isabelle Bayrakdarian, Measha Bruggergosman, Colin Ainsworth, Jean Stilwell, Kimberly Barber and also actor Adam Brazier. Summers says, “We’ve also helped accompanists and they are working in theatres outside Canada. We hope they will bring back their experiences to Canada.”

Famed Canadian voice teacher Mary Morrison has said, “Many years ago, I attended Joan Dornemann’s classes as an observer. Her fabulous ears and acute musicianship have inspired some of our budding professional singers, and have certainly influenced my own teaching. I always encourage students to participate in any of her courses. How fortunate for singers to have this experience.” Soprano Adrianne Pieczonka agrees, saying, “As a young student aspiring to become an opera singer, I had the good fortune to benefit from the IRCPA. I participated in a masterclass given by Joan Dornemann which was a revelation! Her expertise and energy inspired me very much and I can still recall the suggestions she made.”

Opera Week is an event that benefits not just the participants but the public curious about the complex process of becoming an opera singer. For more information about the IRCPA, visit
www.internationalresourcecentreforperformingartists.com.

Christopher Hoile is a Toronto-based writer on opera and theatre. He can be contacted at opera@thewholenote.com.