Features

A young girl, her face alight with wonder and recognition appears in an ever-changing  space defined by floating wooden fence posts … 

Suddenly exploding near her a thunderous music of movement and sound …. a magnificent young horse rearing and neighing so close and unexpected …  but this beautiful creature is being whipped by a fierce looking man with a boy by his side in a shocking juxtaposition of beauty and cruelty …

The other day, I had the wonderful chance for an early look, in rehearsal, at  She Holds Up the Stars, a new multidisciplinary work written and directed by multi-award winning artist Sandra Laronde for her company Red Sky Performance, to be performed with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra at Roy Thomson Hall Sunday April 19.

Sixty years ago, Vesnivka Choir stepped onto the Toronto music scene – young girls whose voices were uncertain but full of promise. Their conductor, Halyna Kvitka Kondracki, wasn’t much older but had clarity of vision and purpose – to share her passion for Ukrainian choral music and culture.

I didn’t want this to be the story, but it is the story. Jazz, segregation, the Musicians’ Union and why jazz and Black musicians at the Pilot (and other venues) are still a big deal.

This past summer, an early music band was asked for a promotional group photo and a name for a concert at Toronto Harbourfront’s Music Garden. They realized they had neither, so they searched for a Renaissance painting to capture their spirit. The image they chose, by a follower of imaginative painter Hieronymus Bosch, shows a group inside a giant egg gathered around a book of music, singing and playing – and so they dubbed themselves The Musicians of the Egg.

Afrokando, an ode to the Cuban big band, is a searing, scorching album with the deepest groove. With it, bandleader, composer, arranger and Cuban trumpet player Alexis Baro is continuing to build his discography, documenting and sharing important aspects of Afro-Cuban music. Baro travelled to Toronto from Cuba in 2001. The young player was quickly snapped up by Archie Alleyne and his group Kollage. Since then, Baro has written and recorded many of his own albums, all rooted in Afro-Cuban jazz.