Volume 21 Issue 1 - September 2015

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Let’s Get Digital Starting this season, you will be able to use your phone to enhance your WholeNote experience. Download the Blippar app and skip to the back cover of this issue. Use the app to scan the image and bring the magazine to life! This month marks 20 years of musical celebration for The WholeNote and we invite you to share in the festivities. Share your Blip with us on Twitter @TheWholeNote or at facebook.com/ LikeTheWholeNote and reserve your space at our 20 th anniversary celebration on September 25! FOR OPENERS | DAVID PERLMAN From Under the Sky For me, this is the moment I never tire of in this process: sitting with the issue almost complete, gobsmacked as always by the sheer diversity of musical life teeming under the lens of the month’s microscope. September’s writers often spend a fair bit of time looking back at the summer past, as much as looking ahead at the month to come. In part, as I have noted in other Septembers, this is because the Toronto International Film Festival strides like a colossus across the middle of the month, so there are fewer live concerts in September than any other in the year. No major musical presenter in town hoping for undivided media attention goes head to head with TIFF. (For devotees of this magazine hungering for their customary musical fix, all is not lost, though. Once again managing editor Paul Ennis, in TIFF Tips, has seized the opportunity to combine his twin passions for film and music and has combed the TIFF catalogue for films with one or another musical slant. As always it’s a rich and eclectic mix and worth a look. There are those rare and serendipitous coincidences (too neat to be planned) where a film of significance comes to TIFF right at the same time as a concert by the subject of the film in question. It sort of happened three Septembers ago when the Brentano String Quartet came to town, for a concert at Music Toronto, at the same time as the film A Late Quartet for which they had done the actual playing. This year’s example is way more interesting - the Silk Road Ensemble is coming to Massey Hall two days after the world premiere of The Music of Strangers: Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble at TIFF. If the movie delves into the social aspects of the Silkroad Project touched on in Andrew Timar’s cover story, taking in both events will be a real treat for lovers of music and film alike. That being said, the propensity of our September writers to look back at the summer because of slim concert pickings is even more pronounced than usual this year because it has been, to say the least, an unusual summer. “The Summer to End All Summers” we called it on our June cover – a bit too apocalyptic, it should be said, for more than one reader. “Let’s hope not!” one WholeNoter muttered, darkly. (The reference – a bit too oblique in retrospect – was to the eagerly anticipated Luminato mounting of R. Murray Schafer’s magnum opus, Apocalypsis, at the Sony Centre.) Readers will notice that Apocalypsis features in the summer musings of more than one WholeNote writer; In with the New columnist, Wende Bartley, joined up with the Element Choir to experience The WholeNote VOLUME 21 NO 1| SEPTEMBER 1, 2015 – OCTOBER 7, 2015 Centre for Social Innovation 720 Bathurst St., Suite 503, Toronto ON M5S 2R4 PHONE 416-323-2232 | FAX 416-603-4791 Publisher/Editor In Chief | David Perlman publisher@thewholenote.com Chairman of the Board | Allan Pulker directors@thewholenote.com EDITORIAL Managing Editor | Paul Ennis editorial@thewholenote.com Recordings Editor | David Olds discoveries@thewholenote.com Social Media Editor | Sara Constant editorial@thewholenote.com Listings Editor | John Sharpe listings@thewholenote.com Club Listings Editor | Bob Ben jazz@thewholenote.com SALES, MARKETING & MEMBERSHIP Concerts & Events/Membership | Karen Ages members@thewholenote.com Record Industry Sales/Marketing | Thom McKercher thom@thewholenote.com Directory Sales and Services | Adrienne Surtees adrienne@thewholenote.com Advertising/Production Support/Operations Jack Buell | adart@thewholenote.com Classified Ads | classad@thewholenote.com Website/Systems | Bryson Winchester systems@thewholenote.com Website/Systems Support | Kevin King kevin@thewholenote.com Circulation/Subscriptions | Chris Malcolm circulation@thewholenote.com SUBSCRIPTIONS $35 per year + HST (9 issues) THANKS TO THIS MONTH’S CONTRIBUTORS Beat Columnists Hans de Groot, Jack MacQuarrie, Brian Chang, Paul Ennis, David Olds, David Podgorski, Ori Dagan, Wendalyn Bartley, Bob Ben mJ buell, Christopher Hoile Features Paul Ennis, David Jaeger, Andrew Timar, Mary Lou Fallis, Steve Wallace CD Reviewers Adam Scime, Cathy Riches, Christina Petrowska Quilico, Daisy Meng Li, Daniel Foley, Dianne Wells, Dr. Réa Beaumont, Hans de Groot, Ivana Popovic, James Harley, Janos Gardonyi, Ken Waxman, Larry Beckwith, Lesley Mitchell-Clarke, Max Christie, Pamela Margles, Richard Haskell, Robert Tomas, Roger Knox, Tiina Kiik, Wesley Shen Proofreading Vanessa Wells, Jennifer Liu, John Sharpe, Paul Ennis Listings David Perlman, Bob Ben, Tilly Kooyman, JennieLea McLeish, Ruth Atwood, Simone Desilets, Jennifer Liu Circulation Team Abram Bergen, Andrew Schaefer, Beth Bartley, Bob Jerome, Dagmar Sullivan, Dave Taylor, Garry Page, Gero Hajek, Jack Buell, Jeff Hogben, Joan Andrews, John Dodington, Lorna Nevison, Mark Clifford, Micah Herzog, Niamh Malcolm, Patrick Slimmon, Paul Ennis, Randy Weir, Robert Faulkner, Sharon Clark, Tiffany Johnson, Tom Sepp, Vicki Stainton, Wende Bartley Layout & Design Bryson Winchester an Ontario government agency un organisme du gouvernement de l’Ontario Upcoming Dates & Deadlines Free Event Listings Deadline 6pm Tuesday September 8 Display Ad Reservations Deadline 6pm Tuesday September 15 Classifieds Deadline 6pm Monday September 21 Advertising Materials Due 6pm Friday September 18 Publication Date Tuesday September 29 (Online) Thursday October 1 (Print) Volume 21 No 1 covers October 1, 2015 to November 7, 2015 WholeNote Media Inc. accepts no responsibility or liability for claims made for any product or service reported on or advertised in this issue. Printed in Canada Couto Printing & Publishing Services Circulation Statement September 2015: 30,000 printed & distributed Canadian Publication Product Sales Agreement 1263846 ISSN 14888-8785 WHOLENOTE Publications Mail Agreement #40026682 Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to: WholeNote Media Inc. Centre for Social Innovation 503–720 Bathurst Street Toronto ON M5S 2R4 COPYRIGHT © 2015 WHOLENOTE MEDIA INC thewholenote.com 6 | Sept 1 - Oct 7, 2015 thewholenote.com
the event from the inside out; Brian Chang, who steps into Ben Stein’s choral shoes this issue, was in the balcony with the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir in which he sings (tenor, I suspect from his first column!); and David Jaeger refers to the work’s genesis in his musings on the golden years of CBC Radio (The Future of Canadian Music, Back Then, page 57), this time on the topic of commissioning. Speaking of Jaeger’s piece I got a bit of a chuckle (that’s 20th century talk for LOL) in his description of another commission mentioned in the piece – a song cycle titled Private Collection by John Weinzweig. “[It was] written for the young, emerging soprano, Mary Lou Fallis. I remember John telling me, that she was ‘pretty hot stuff’ as a performer, besides being an excellent singer.” As for Mary Lou Fallis, she is a welcome guest in this issue, writing in Just the Spot (page 54) about her long association with Trinity-St. Paul’s Centre, where she, along with yours truly, will, on September 25, host what promises to be a splendid concert/celebration of this magazine’s 20 years of existence. For details (and to arrange your free ticket to the event) see the magazine’s back cover! But back to the topic of Luminato and Apocalypsis, one last time. Beyond the writers already mentioned in this opener, I counted at least ten other WholeNote staff and contributors, myself included, who went to see and hear Apocalypsis. And for every two who saw it, there were at least three different opinions as to its artistic merit and significance: it was an overblown insult to the perfection of Schafer’s vision; it was a tribute to director Lemi Ponifasio’s genius that he could massage Schafer’s bombast into something genuinely theatrical; it was an artistic triumph; it was an artistic failure; it was more than the sum of its parts; it never really came together…. As for me, to borrow a phrase from Bob Ben’s column Mainly Clubs, Mostly Jazz, page 45, “when petty concerns of quality and integrity eclipse art’s purpose (whatever it is), that, to me, is tragic.” Granted, Bob is talking about jazz jams, but there’s an idea worth delving into here. Apocalypsis for me had a purpose that was as much social as artistic. It brought together, under one tent, a thousand performers and twice as many witnesses, to experience something that as a totality existed only in the moment of enactment. Each of the performers, musicians, singers and soloists alike played their part. None had a chance to see the whole picture, only to be part of a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Whoever is charged with taking Luminato into the future should reflect on this: as a festival, as a fixture, its future depends on being more like this one show – a giant tent under which our city’s artists are invited to play. Bringing in the headliners, the stadium shows, the big names is part of that mix, for sure. But the real spectacle is the musical and artistic city we already are and can continue to be if topdown “bring in experts to fix it” cultural policies are set aside in favour of humane social policies that enable our artists, along with the other working poor, to afford to live and play here. We’ll be watching, and keeping score. publisher@thewholenote.com Aga Khan Museum 11 Amadeus Choir 31 ATMA 5 Bloor Street United Church 53 Bravo Niagara 43 Canadian Opera Company 23 Cathedral Bluffs Symphony Orchestra 17 Christ Church Deer Park Jazz Vespers 48 Continuum 38 Dr. Réa Beaumont 22, 38 Drew Henderson 59 Elmer Iseler Singers 33 Esprit Orchestra 3, 42 Friends of Gravity 39 Hannaford Street Silver Band 20 Horizon Tax 53 I FURIOSI Baroque Ensemble 26 Isabel Bader Centre for the Performing Arts 4, 44 Liz Parker 53 Long & McQuade 51 Louis Babin 63 MasterPerforming 53 Mississauga Symphony 17 Mooredale Concerts 40 Music at Metropolitan 19, 37 Music Toronto 9 Musicians in Ordinary 39 Naxos of Canada 59, 61, 62, 63 New Horizons Bands 35 New Music Concerts 21 NUMUS 20 INDEX OF ADVERTISERS Off Centre Music Salon 29, 40 Opera York 28 ORGANIX Concerts 19, 38 ORIANA Women’s Choir 31 Orpheus Choir 30, 52 Pasquale Bros 51 Peter Mahon 32 PEC 19 Remenyi House of Music 13 Roy Thomson & Massey Hall 25, 37 Royal Conservatory 15 Shen Yun Symphony Orchestra 14 Small World Music 10 Soundstreams 41, 79 St. Jude’s Celebration of the Arts 42 St. Olave’s Church 40 St. Philip’s Jazz Vespers 48 Steinway Piano Gallery 17 Sweetwater Music Festival 43 Tafelmusik 2, 37, 41 Talisker Players 18 That Choir 32 Toronto Consort 24 Toronto Mendelssohn Choir 33 Toronto Operetta Theatre 27 Toronto Symphony 39, 42, 77 U of T Faculty of Music 16, 39 Universal Music Canada 61, 63 VOICEBOX/Opera In Concert 28 Windermere String Quartet 26, 38 16 BLUE TH Annual PAGES DON’T EVER STOP MUSIC IS FOR LIFE THE BLUE PAGES A rich resource for musicians and all lovers of live music, with detailed profiles of Southern Ontario’s live music makers and their 2015/16 seasons. Printed in our upcoming October edition and up-to-date year-round at thewholenote.com. THE CANARY PAGES The WholeNote’s annual guide to the extraordinary choral diversity of Southern Ontario. Printed in May but searchable online year-round: find yourself the right choir anytime! THE GREEN PAGES GUIDE TO SUMMER MUSIC printed in June but includes September festivals! Enhanced coverage remains online for year-round browsing and dreaming of summer. Musical guides online, all the time thewholenote.com/ resources thewholenote.com Sept 1 - Oct 7, 2015 | 7
Page 1 and 2: PRICELESS! Vol 21 No 1 CONCERT LIST
Page 3 and 4: ESPRIT ORCHESTRA 2015-2016 Season A
Page 5: Volume 21 No 1 | September 2015 FEA
Page 9 and 10: GREAT CHAMBER MUSIC... DOWNTOWN SPE
Page 11 and 12: The Silk Road Ensemble with Yo-Yo M
Page 13 and 14: philosophical theories unspool in a
Page 15 and 16: KOERNER HALL IS: “ A beautiful sp
Page 17 and 18: seemed re-engaged if not re-energiz
Page 19 and 20: i ❤ Brahms stéphane lemelin arti
Page 21 and 22: and is a perfect concert Thierry Ti
Page 23 and 24: CANADIAN WORLD PREMIERE PYRAMUS AND
Page 26: and interesting concert repertoire
Page 29 and 30: Beat by Beat | Art of Song Pieczonk
Page 31 and 32: September is Building Time! BRIAN C
Page 33 and 34: Elmer Iseler Singers Lydia Adams, C
Page 35 and 36: from American publishing companies.
Page 37 and 38: 416-928-3553. Free. Weather permitt
Page 39 and 40: (transcr. by Rodolfo Richter). Tafe
Page 41 and 42: Black CMYK ●●Sep 28 4:30: Chris
Page 43 and 44: B. Concerts Beyond the GTA IN THIS
Page 45 and 46: Beat by Beat | Mainly Clubs, Mostly
Page 47 and 48: the same improvisational spirit as
Page 49 and 50: The biggest thing is to watch. It
Page 51 and 52: DAVID HOU. C. Music Theatre MUSIC T
Page 53 and 54: AUDITIONS & OPPORTUNITIES AUDITIONS
Page 55 and 56: very surprised parishioners who kne
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The Future of Canadian Music, Back
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I almost gave the next disc to Toro
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The Franck Sonata is the centrepiec
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the same age as Grieg when he wrote
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hanging in a basket suspended high
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Walton - Symphony No.2; Cello Conce
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else will likely quibble with that
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Bradford - an on-off member of Cole
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Something in the Air Many Musical I
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Old Wine, New Bottles Fine Old Reco
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TIFF TIPS continued from page 13 pr
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Celebrate 20 years of FREE! Trinity
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Volume 21 Issue 1 - September 2015

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