Volume 28 Issue 4 | February - March 2023

Collaborative life on the choral scene
Choirs were the first music sector to be choked off during the
pandemic, and for the same reasons have been the slowest to
re-emerge – but, from the things I see, they are doing so more energetically
and more collaboratively than ever before. Which is
good news when one considers that choral music is the bedrock
of community participation in music life – bridging audience and
performance in a way no other form of music can. Here’s a taste:
Toronto Mendelssohn Choir’s Exchange: Community Singing
Festival. On February 4, the TMChoir hosted three high school choirs,
plus their friends and families, for a one-day non-competitive singing
festival and showcase presentation at Yorkminster Park Baptist
Church, the TMChoir’s home base “to celebrate our ability to sing
together again, in a day of collaboration, learning, and community
connection.” The invited schools reflect the sweep of the outreach
they are doing: Agincourt Collegiate Institute (Scarborough); O’Neill
Collegiate and Vocational Institute (Oshawa); and Mayfield Secondary
School in Caledon East (one of two Arts Schools serving Peel Region).
Add to that the recent reinstatement of the Toronto Mendelssohn
Singers as the TMChoir’s 24-voice paid professional core, and the
organization’s capacity for tackling chamber choir repertoire takes
them far beyond the large-scale oratorios and Masses that were the
raison d’etre for its founding in 1894.
And speaking of non-competitive one
day singing festivals, this year’s Ontario
Senior Treble Festival, (the first since 2020!)
is titled “Sending You Light” and is hosted
by Young Voices Toronto, bringing together
choristers in the senior ensembles of the
Bach Children’s Chorus, Chorus Niagara, the
Hamilton Children’s Chorus, Mississauga
Children’s Choir, Oakville Choir for Children
& Youth, the Toronto Beaches Children’s
and Youth Chorus, the Toronto Children’s
Chorus and Young Voices Toronto. Guest
conductor this year is Kellie Walsh.
Kellie Walsh
Walk Together Children, at Christ Church
Deer Park on March 4, may sound familiar.
It is the second iteration of a concert curated
in 2018 by Antiguan-born soprano Denise
Williams, with the aim of bringing together
the music of Toronto’s African, Jewish and
Muslim diasporas. “Most of the artists –
representative of the three diasporas – and
the choir (the Jubilate Singers conducted
by Isabel Bernaus) are the same as in 2018,”
Williams told me. “We have incorporated
a lot of the repertoire from 2018. This one
will have more selections by the choir, more
Denise Williams
that integrate the soloists with the choir,
many more contemporary selections that are by Toronto composers,
and we are specially pleased to welcome multi-instrumentalist Waleed
Abdulhamid, who represents both African and Muslim heritage.”
Her sense of what constitutes “diaspora” has shifted, though, more
than the construct for the event: “I see things more and more as
involving cultural migration and integration as well. Toronto’s already
multicultural mosaic continues to diversify but also to blend cultural
identities as well. As I see it, two most recent historical globally
impactful events – George Floyd and the pandemic – have increased
understanding, unity, and cooperation among cultures, further
dissolving the walls of division.”
The related events that will take place are, from a community
arts perspective, as important as the concert: on February 19, a
community forum with the choir, Williams, and some of the other
featured soloists, at the Neighbourhood Unitarian Universalist
Congregation (NUUC); and, as part of Black History Month, a workshop-presentation
for students at Rosedale Heights School of the Arts
on February 10.
AMINA ABENA ALFRED
Tuesday, February 28 at 8 pm
Angela Cheng
Thursday, March 30 at 8 pm
Gryphon Trio
May 6, 20, June 3
Celebration of
Small Ensembles
Tickets: 416-366-7723
option 2
27 Front Street East, Toronto
| music-toronto.com
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