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It’s back! And it promises to be as big and bold as ever.
It’s Music and Beyond, Ottawa’s summer music and arts festival which—every July since its inception in 2010—has blossomed across the capital in a gloriously scatter-cast profusion of musical sounds, styles and intriguing interdisciplinary programming.
“The public is ready to return,” says Julian Armour, the festival’s plucky and indefatigable founder and artistic and executive director. “We’re doing a big festival! We’re going to do about 64 different major concerts.”
It’s a bracing and welcome assertion of renewal, after the scaled-back famine years of global pandemic.
Rock and a Hard Place
Interestingly, though, the challenges of having to grapple with artistic adversity also came with certain unexpected upsides—including the achievement of a new international artistic reach.
“I had always wanted to film,” Armour says, “and because of the pandemic there was a period when we could only film.” As those initial forays into virtual performance multiplied, Music and Beyond has now come to boast a library of more than 300 videos which it makes available globally.
“We’re getting emails from all around the world,” Armour says. “Someone from Nunavut sent a donation.”
Things to Come
Still, the centrepiece of Music and Beyond’s mission remains its yearly summer festival, and even a cursory glance at this year’s roster of events is cause for celebration.
The festival kicks off on July 4 with an Hommage à Piazzolla!—a concert celebration of music composed or inspired by the great Argentine progenitor of “tango nuevo,” Astor Piazzolla. Featured along with the festival orchestra, the Carleton Dominion-Chalmers Centre will host Piazzolla’s acknowledged artistic heir, pianist and composer Pablo Ziegler who, along with conducting full orchestral selections, will also perform several intricate two-piano arrangements in tandem with his wife, accomplished pianist Masae Shiwa.
MAB 2023 also marks the festival return of internationally beloved choral composer John Rutter, fresh on the heels of his tremendous accomplishment as principal arranger of the music for Charles III’s coronation. Rutter will conduct the festival orchestra on July 13 with his own arrangement of Gabriel Fauré’s great Requiem, followed by a performance of a second Requiem—one composed by Rutter himself.
And on July 15 Rutter will lead a highly anticipated audience-participation event, inviting attendees to “Come and Sing with John Rutter.”
Other 2023 highlights include: a tantalizing July 5 program entitled Einstein and Music; a July 6 tribute to great Renaissance composer William Byrd on the 400th anniversary of his death, plus an evening of stories and musical selections hosted by renowned indigenous Canadian playwright and novelist Tomson Highway; on July 7, a grand performance of Handel’s “Music for the Royal Fireworks,” synchronized witth an actual pyrotechnic display igniting the skies above the Ottawa River; and on July 9 a full day of family-oriented music and games at Ontario’s unique Cumberland Heritage Village Museum.
Playlist
The entire festival runs from July 4 through the 17th.
A full listing of events, plus ticket and attendance information, is available at www.musicandbeyond.ca.
This page is also available in / Cette page est également disponible en:
Francais (French)
