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Volume 24 Issue 4 - December 2018 / January 2019

When is a trumpet like a motorcycle in a dressage event? How many Brunhilde's does it take to change an Elektra? Just two of the many questions you've been dying to ask, to which you will find answers in a 24th annual combined December/January issue – in which our 11 beat columnists sift through what's on offer in the upcoming holiday month, and what they're already circling in their calendars for 2019. Oh, and features too: a klezmer violinist breathing new life into a very old film; two New Music festivals in January, 200 metres apart; a Music & Health story on the restorative powers of a grassroots exercise in collective music-making; even a good reason to go to Winnipeg in the dead of winter. All this and more in Vol 24 No 4, now available in flipthrough format here.

When is a trumpet like a motorcycle in a dressage event? How many Brunhilde's does it take to change an Elektra? Just two of the many questions you've been dying to ask, to which you will find answers in a 24th annual combined December/January issue – in which our 11 beat columnists sift through what's on offer in the upcoming holiday month, and what they're already circling in their calendars for 2019. Oh, and features too: a klezmer violinist breathing new life into a very old film; two New Music festivals in January, 200 metres apart; a Music & Health story on the restorative powers of a grassroots exercise in collective music-making; even a good reason to go to Winnipeg in the dead of winter. All this and more in Vol 24 No 4, now available in flipthrough format here.

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JAKE JACOBSON<br />

Beat by Beat | World View<br />

Tip of the<br />

Seasonal Iceberg<br />

ANDREW TIMAR<br />

At times in this column I have gone deep into a particular world<br />

music theme, presenter, musician, ensemble, audience or<br />

school. For example, last month in this column I explored in<br />

some detail, the 150-year lineage of Chinese music performance<br />

in Canada, then pulled a tighter focus on the world of Chinese<br />

Orchestras active in the GTA today. Concerts by two of those<br />

ensembles bookend the two-month-plus period I’m covering here.<br />

At other times I’ve painted our region’s worldly music pulse with a<br />

broad brush. For this <strong>December</strong>-<strong>January</strong>-early February column I’ve<br />

chosen the latter approach, surveying the seasonal tapestry of our<br />

region’s astonishingly diverse music scenes. So, consider this column<br />

the tip of the GTA winter season’s live music iceberg.<br />

Toronto Chinese Orchestra “Scenic Sojourn: A Night of<br />

Chinese Music”<br />

<strong>December</strong> 1: The Toronto Chinese Orchestra is the oldest such<br />

continually operating regional orchestra. It’s presenting a concert on<br />

<strong>December</strong> 1 at North York’s Yorkminster Citadel titled “Scenic Sojourn:<br />

A Night of Chinese Music” with Matthew Poon conducting. Angela Xu<br />

is the yangqin (Chinese hammered dulcimer) soloist, while Charlotte<br />

Liu is featured on the dizi (Chinese transverse flute).<br />

On the program is music by both Chinese and Canadian composers<br />

chosen to underscore the concert’s geographic and seasonal themes.<br />

They paint portraits of village life in Jiangsu, scenic views of mountain<br />

ranges in Taiwan and Kyrgyzstan, as well as evoking the prototypical<br />

Canadian winter chill.<br />

Works include Whiteout by Matthew van Driel and Reincarnation<br />

Suite by Marko Koumoulas, both early-career Toronto<br />

composers. IMHO the performance of these works signals<br />

a healthy active engagement with the broader non-Chinese<br />

Canadian music community. Composers Hua Wu (Taiwan<br />

Folk Song Rhapsody), Xianyu Jiang, arr. Chunmin Zhang<br />

(Touring Gusu), and He Huang (Tian Shan Poetry) present<br />

Chinese approaches to orchestral writing. Rounding out the<br />

evening, a performance by the TCO’s Toronto Youth Chinese<br />

Orchestra ensures essential interpretive orchestral skills are<br />

passed on to the younger generation.<br />

Payadora: “Tango and Argentine Folk Music”<br />

<strong>December</strong> 2: The warm and intimate Gallery 345 hosts the<br />

tango-centric Toronto quartet Payadora in concert. “Tango and<br />

Argentine Folk Music” is the aptly concise title of its committed<br />

tribute to the tango repertoire and ethos. Payadora regulars,<br />

violinist Rebekah Wolkstein, Drew Jurecka, bandoneon, pianist<br />

Robert Horvath and bassist Joseph Phillips are joined by guest<br />

vocalist Elbio Fernandez in a program drawn partly from the<br />

roots of the Buenos Aires’ early 20th-century tango heyday.<br />

The group typically plays scores which favour instrumental<br />

tangos designed for listening in a concert setting rather than<br />

those intended for couple dancing. The evening continues with<br />

Astor Piazzolla’s well-known, trend-setting nuevo tango compositions<br />

of the second half of the 20th century.<br />

In my May 1, 2017 review of a Payadora concert in The WholeNote, I<br />

wrote that in addition to tango they “also performed two Argentinian<br />

vernacular dance music genres. The zamba is set in a slow 3/4 meter –<br />

or is it in 6/8? – while yet another couples’ dance, the chacarera, also<br />

plays on similar hemiola syncopation.”<br />

Audiences at the <strong>December</strong> 2 concert can certainly expect similar<br />

rhythmically compelling folkloric renditions. Founded in 2013, with<br />

its playful and virtuoso approach to the musically accessible tango<br />

repertoire, we can see why Payadora has, in a few years, garnered a<br />

healthy regional fan base.<br />

Christmas musical themes<br />

Every year at this time I look at music traditions of those who celebrate<br />

Christmas in its many guises. For those who don’t, it may be<br />

time for Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Solstice or just simply “The Holidays.”<br />

This year is no exception.<br />

I’ve assembled a few picks from the many seasonal musical offerings<br />

that highlight diversities in our region.<br />

<strong>December</strong> 5: The Toronto Choral Society, Geoffrey Butler conductor,<br />

presents “Navidad Nuestra (Our Christmas)” at Koerner Hall. The<br />

concert features two of the best-known works of popular Argentine<br />

composer Ariel Ramírez (b. 1921). The 150-voice TCS choir is joined<br />

by the Latin ensemble (and past collaborator) Cassava, led by Rodrigo<br />

Chavez, with tenor soloist Ernesto Cárdenas.<br />

Ramírez’s Navidad Nuestra for choir and Andean instruments<br />

is a “folk drama of the Nativity” based on Hispanic-American traditions.<br />

His earlier Misa Criolla (1964), a Creole Catholic mass in a<br />

South American hybrid mixture of Iberian and Indigenous musical<br />

genres, swiftly became a big hit among international choirs and on<br />

LP. A pioneering mass written in a regional Indigenous dialect, Misa<br />

Criolla’s bright, optimistic sound exuded an unpretentious spirituality,<br />

in tune with the changing times in which it was produced.<br />

Founded in 1845, the TCS is the city’s oldest and largest community<br />

choir and it is impressive to see them tackle these Ramírez scores<br />

again. Feliz navidad!<br />

<strong>December</strong> 8: Celtic-themed music appears alive and well, particularly<br />

during the holiday season. Here’s just one concert example at<br />

the eastern end of our own “fertile crescent.”, the Isabel Bader Centre<br />

for the Performing Arts presents “The Kingston Connection: A Celtic<br />

Christmas with Kelli Trottier” at its beautiful Kingston Ontario hall.<br />

A member of the North America Fiddlers’ Hall of Fame, Kingston<br />

fiddler, step dancer and vocalist Trottier’s musical vocabulary is<br />

steeped in her deep Scottish and French roots, reflected in her ten<br />

albums. Trottier and her backup musicians present an album of<br />

Canadian and Celtic Christmas songs and fiddle music.<br />

Chris McKhool brings his Holidays of the Global Village with Chris McKhool<br />

and Friends to the Kingston Road United Church, <strong>December</strong> 9. Then he puts<br />

on his Sultans of String hat for a whirlwind six-city Beyond the GTA tour from<br />

<strong>December</strong> 12 to 18 with a stop in Markham on <strong>December</strong> 13 in between.<br />

<strong>December</strong> 9 at 2pm: “Holidays of the Global Village with Chris<br />

McKhool and Friends” plays at the Kingston Road United Church.<br />

Kid-friendly Canadian violinist, guitarist and singer-songwriter<br />

McKhool is bringing two armloads of world music friends to help him<br />

fete the “multicultural mosaic of our country.” Inclusive songs about<br />

“Bodhi Day (Buddhist), Carnival (Quebec), Chanukah, Chinese New<br />

Year, Christmas, Diwali, Halloween, Kwanzaa (Pan-African), Native<br />

Traditions, Ramadan and Winter Solstice” will ring out in the church.<br />

Assisting McKhool with his ecumenical vision are Toronto-based<br />

musicians Aviva Chernick, Shannon Thunderbird, Maryem and Ernie<br />

42 | <strong>December</strong> <strong>2018</strong> / <strong>January</strong> <strong>2019</strong> thewholenote.com

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