Directories

London's The Telegraph describes Russian pianist Pavel Kolesnikov’s playing as having “brilliance, but also a caressing, almost sly intimacy.” Kolesnikov was named Prize Laureate of Canada’s Honens International Piano Competition in 2012.

1. What are we interrupting (i.e. what music-related activity are we taking you away from to write this)?

Being interrupted is a good thing, in fact, when one works with high concentration. Doing little bits of different things makes it possible to work more effectively for longer periods of time, and this is how I always try to build my practicing. I often jump from one piece to another and have many little breaks to do something completely different. Life may feel a little bit fragmented and disordered, but it suddenly gains harmony when you realize that many different things mature at the same time. This is how it is at the moment (Monday, May 27), because I am leaving for the Spoleto Festival tomorrow morning to enjoy ten days of intense chamber music making. Running through the scores to be presented to the unpredictable Gods of Chamber Music in a few days is a little bit like zipping your travel bag thinking: "What did I forget?"

2. What, if anything, are you most looking forward to as an audience member between now and September 7?

Pre-planning your impressions is the worst thing when attending a concert. Artists are mere people first of all, and the most anticipated concert may turn out to be a disappointment. "Expect nothing, be ready for a miracle" – would be a good motto for a listener. Also it is a good sign if many little coincidences come together to bring you to a concert. I like this feeling of great music calling for me.

3. How about as a music maker/player?

For the same reason the artist cannot predict which concert will be the most enjoyable for him, there are hundreds of different factors which enhance or destroy the concert and they all have different weights as well. Because of that the concert you were in doubt about may unexpectedly become your best concert in the season. Apart from that, nominally, I am very much looking forward to a very special experience, both with fear and excitement – the most extraordinary set of pieces by Tchaikovsky, The Seasons, is to be recorded along with Op.19 in August and released on the Hyperion label in 2014. These pieces bring to life with incredible power the reality of a different country, the great wonderland Russia, which doesn’t exist anymore and can’t be confused with the country as it is today. The three days of the recording will be a travel in a very fragile vessel, to the past so unknown and yet so dear.

4. What are you already preparing for musically beyond the summer? And (how) do your summer plans tie in with these longer term plans?

I am preparing for many things. Actually, most of the things for this summer are already prepared to the extent that I can influence the process. I am sure when working on a music piece that one has to remember the other companion is also working on it: Time!

You must let it do its work. The next season is intense and exciting. A refined combination of Rameau, Debussy and Chopin has been programmed for my Wigmore Hall recital in January, so I have to be careful.

WEBSITE

honens.com/Laureates/Pavel-Kolesnikov.aspx

VIDEO

HONENS PRIZE LAUREATE 2012: Pavel Kolesnikov from Honens on Vimeo.

Soprano Virginia Hatfield is known to audiences for her performances with companies across Canada, including Symphony Nova Scotia, Vancouver Bach Choir, Voicebox: Opera in Concert, Opera Hamilton, Ensemble Caprice, Pacific Opera Victoria, Festival of the Sound, Queen of Puddings, Saskatoon Opera, the Aldeburgh Connection and the Canadian Opera Company. Born in Belleville and raised on a dairy farm near Campbellford, she has lived in Toronto for 16 years and is pretty much a city girl now.

1. What are we interrupting (i.e. what music-related activity are we taking you away from to write this)?

Between sips of coffee and folding laundry (Thursday, May 23), I am running through words for “Tiny's Song” from Britten's Paul Bunyan, for the Aldeburgh Connection's final concert this week. I will try to hold it together during this concert but I make no promises. Stephen Ralls and Bruce Ubukata gave me and many, many young singers opportunities that otherwise were not available. I first sang with them while still in my undergrad at U of T, performing a recital with baritone Matthew Leigh. It is an extra-special treat to sing on their final concert.

2. What, if anything, are you most looking forward to as an audience member between now and September 7?

Cannot wait to hear Shannon Mercer and Karina Gauvin perform Handel's L'Allegro, il Moderato ed il Penseroso with Jane Glover at Luminato in June. Of course I know that it's being performed as a dance work – but it's a glorious score – in English – and should be heard in North America much more often than it is. I sang it several years ago in Aldeburgh, with a delightful group of young artists that included the fantastic countertenor Iestyn Davies. I hope Toronto audiences love it as much as I do. Yes, I am unabashedly a Handel soprano nerd.

3. How about as a music maker/player?

Looking forward to singing Burns’ songs (so straightforward - and yet utterly heartbreaking!) with the dashing Ben Covey on June 7, and am very excited to return to the Westben Festival in late July for a series of concerts with Brett Polegato, James Levesque and Brian Finley. Westben is in my hometown of Campbellford, so it's always a joy to sing there and to perform with artistic director Brian Finley. Brian was my piano teacher and coach and his co-director (and spouse) Donna Bennett was my first singing teacher. I owe a great deal to their guidance, mentorship and of course their talent – a huge inspiration to me.

4. What are you already preparing for musically beyond the summer? And (how) do your summer plans tie in with these longer term plans?

As the summer winds down, I'll be drumming Ana Sokolovic's Svadba back into my brain, for performances in Philadelphia in October and November, and will be preparing my first Naiad in Ariadne auf Naxos for Pacific Opera Victoria. And, of course, auditions auditions auditions. 'Twas ever thus!

TWITTER

@gingerhat

VIDEO

L'allegro:

Toronto-based trumpeter and composer Mike Field has the capacity for vision much like a phoenix scanning the landscape and collecting sensory information, creating with intense excitement and deathless inspiration. His latest collection of nine instrumental tracks, called ASHES, delivers a deep and penetrating array of textures and sounds.

Field can be frequently heard playing with various bands at local concert venues such as The Legendary Horseshoe Tavern, The El Mocambo and The Rex. He has toured Canada three times (with rock/funk band Jay Spectre), and has played the Beaches Jazz Festival in Toronto and in New Zealand (where his trumpet can be heard in the experimental bossa-nova collective The Inverts). He is also in the well-known reggae collective High Plains Drifter, playing numerous local Bob Marley and Peter Tosh tribute shows.

1. What are we interrupting (i.e. what music-related activity are we taking you away from to write this)?

Today (Friday, May 24), we’re preparing for our third Vietnamese jazz concert, which takes place tomorrow night. Last year we were invited to be “the young local jazz band” to join Don Thompson and some Vietnamese singers in a concert of Vietnamese jazz songs and original local jazz music. It went so well, we’re now on our third concert and are now the headlining band. The crowds have grown to about 200 people and it’s been really amazing learning so much about their culture through music. I’ve even been fortunate enough to have translated a famous song of theirs and arranged a couple more for jazz quintet. Also, sharing the stage with Don Thompson and Diana Panton has been really nice too.

2. What, if anything, are you most looking forward to as an audience member between now and September 7?

Can’t wait to see Dr. John this summer at the jazz festival.

3. How about as a music maker/player?

I’ll be performing at the Lighthouse Café in Los Angeles this July. It’s the second time I’ll be taking the stage there to perform my original music, and really amazing to play where Chet Baker and so many other famous musicians have performed. I hire a local band – all players who are crazy talented and pick up my tunes so quickly and play them so well.

4. What are you already preparing for musically beyond the summer? And (how) do your summer plans tie in with these longer term plans?

We’re releasing our second album of jazz originals this fall. It’s been 12 months in the making, we’ve gone a lot further since our first one and it’s been really exciting to add flamenco guitar and vocals to our traditional jazz quintet sound. This summer, I’ll be finishing up the mixing, mastering and printing, and beginning the promo campaign.

VIDEO

Irishman and Toronto resident Kevin Mallon directs orchestras in Toronto (Aradia), Ottawa (Thirteen Strings Chamber Orchestra) and New York (West Side Chamber Orchestra). With 50 Naxos CDs to his name, he guest conducts in Canada and internationally.

1. What are we interrupting (i.e. what music-related activity are we taking you away from to write this)?

At this moment (Friday, May 24), a very busy season is coming to an end and the last responsibility I have is a fundraising concert with the Thirteen Strings in Ottawa on June 8. The event is being sponsored by the Czech embassy – so there is a Czech theme with symphonies by Johann Stamitz and František Benda and waltzes by Dvořák.

2. What, if anything, are you most looking forward to as an audience member between now and September 7?

Since I am conducting in two opera festivals in the summer, my main experiences as an audience member will be to hear the other operas being produced (the ones I am not conducting) – Gianni Schicchi by Puccini in Italy and Poulenc's Les Dialogues des Carmélites and Sondheim’s A Little Night Music in Halifax.

3. How about as a music maker/player?

On June 11 I travel to Ireland to visit my family and then on June 17I fly to Italy to conduct Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito at the Centre for Opera Studies in Italy (COSI). This is my fourth year conducting at COSI. Aradia is the orchestra in residence, so it is a wonderful residency for the orchestra and I. The day following this festival, July 21, I have an epic travel day: Sulmona to Rome, Rome to Munich, Munich to Montreal, and Montreal to Halifax. All this to conduct Figaro at the Halifax Summer Opera Workshop! I love going to Nova Scotia and working with the orchestra there regularly. This is the first time the Halifax Summer Opera Festival will have an orchestra and the players are taken from the Symphony Nova Scotia – so, I am happy about that too. It will be a long time away from home – nine weeks – but that, alas, is the life of a conductor!

4. What are you already preparing for musically beyond the summer? And (how) do your summer plans tie in with these longer term plans?

My summer plans don’t have any direct bearing on the immediate work ahead. Aradia going to Italy is a fun and important experience for the players, and I appreciate the continued repertoire we are able to explore together. The long-term plan is to produce one of the operas we do in Italy in our Toronto season. We were able to do this once with Handel’s Giulio Cesare – and indeed last year we performed Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater six times in Italy and then performed it as the first concert in Aradia’s Toronto season (we are also performing Vivaldi’s Gloria six times in Italy this July, but have no immediate plans to perform this in Toronto). With the Halifax Opera, I continue to develop my relationship with Nova Scotia and the players there.

I am preparing for another busy season starting in September: I have full seasons with Aradia and the Thirteen Strings in Ottawa. I have concerts and a CD release with my orchestra in New York – the West Side Chamber Orchestra. There are three CD projects with Naxos next season: Purcell and Vivaldi with Aradia and Franz Beck’s Op. 2 symphonies with the Thirteen Strings. Aradia has its yearly collaboration with Opera in Concert – this time performing Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie. I have guest conducting jobs with two Canadian orchestras, Hamilton and Thunder Bay, two concerts with orchestras in the US in Seattle and Boston and concerts in the Northern Lights Festival in Mexico.