Category: Classical | my/maSCENA

Browsing: Classical

Les Violons du Roy: a great reunion

By Justin Bernard on 16 September 2021 Chamber Music, Classical, Opera

They have not been led by their conductor, Jonathan Cohen, since the start of the pandemic. Thus the spirit of a reunion will prevail on Sept. 22, when Les Violons du Roy present their first concert of the season at the Palais Montcalm. There will be a reunion also with the French soprano Sandrine Piau, who sang for the first time with this Quebec City chamber orchestra in 2003. “She was to give a gala concert with us in April 2020,” explains Les Violons artistic director Laurent Patenaude. “This will be our first guest from abroad since the…

Bourgie Hall: the beginnings

By Justin Bernard on 10 September 2021 Baroque and Early, Chamber Music, Classical

Well established today in the cultural landscape of Montreal, Bourgie Hall was not always a setting for concerts and music making. Since its inauguration in September 2011, recitals, chamber music, vocal music or world music concerts, jazz evenings and even crossover events – many in connection with the collections and exhibitions of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts – have taken place in the former Erskine and American United Church. Through its evolution and transformations, this place bears invaluable witness to the fate of the various anglophone Protestant communities that were established in downtown Montreal, in the district known as…

Photo: Antoine Saito

Classics prevail in Payare’s first OSM season

By Arthur Kaptainis on 24 August 2021 Classical, Classical Music, Interviews, Orchestral

Rafael Payare will be in masterpiece mode for his inaugural season at the helm of the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal. The Venezuelan conductor’s indoor opening act on Sept. 14 comprises Shostakovich’s Fifth, arguably the most popular of all post-Mahlerian symphonies; Ravel’s La Valse, a venerable OSM showpiece; and Pierre Mercure’s Kaléidoscope, a Canadian favourite since its premiere by the OSM in 1948. The closing concerts in May and June feature Beethoven’s Ninth. “I would not say anything against this,” the 41-year-old said Monday when it was put to him that a playlist including Brahms, Bruckner, Debussy and Sibelius reflects a…

Karina Gauvin in stellar form

By Arthur Kaptainis on 26 July 2021 Arts Industry, Classical, Concert Reviews, Opera

JOLIETTE – Negative in so many ways, the pandemic has given local presenters a good reason to hire Canadian talent. The Lanaudière Festival profited from the opportunity Sunday afternoon in the Fernand-Lindsay Amphitheatre by matching the soprano Karina Gauvin with Les Violons du Roy under Nicolas Ellis. Gauvin has been making music for years but seems no less special for her accessibility. Official biographies stress her strength in baroque repertoire. In fact she can do it all. This program focused on Gluck and Mozart, the composers most responsible for ushering opera from baroque formality into an era of relative realism.…

Nadia Labrie will perform on May 30th

CD review: Nadia Labrie – Flûte passion: Mozart

By Justin Bernard on 8 June 2021 CD and Book Reviews, Classical

Flûte passion: Mozart Nadia Labrie, flute; Antoine Bareil, violin; Isaac Chalk, viola; Benoit Loiselle, cello Analekta AN 2 8925 ★★★★✩ For the third instalment of her Flûte Passion series, Nadia Labrie has chosen Mozart. With her fellow musicians, the flutist offers chamber music by this composer she is so fond of: four quartets, including the famous Quartet in D major K. 285, as well as the Andante in C major K. 315. We find typically Mozartian melodic lines, full of charm and insouciance. The music flows without interruption and the sounds of the instruments fit together perfectly. Labrie nicely captures…

New Releases: June-July 2021

By Wah Keung Chan on 4 June 2021 Arts Industry, Baroque and Early, Classical, Contemporary

This section is an advertising supplement. To announce here, contact [email protected] Studio Piccolo Session Stick&Bow. Leaf Music LM242 Discover the new videos of the two young musicians of Stick&Bow as they revisit the Cuban masterpiece Che comandante by Carlos Puebla, rewrite the rock success of Sting’s She’s Too Good For Me and perform two commissions written especially for them, Romanza by Luis Naon and Folk Suite by Jason Noble. Recorded at the prestigious Studio Piccolo in the heart of Montreal, the Canadian duo Stick&Bow bring life and energy to “Studio Piccolo Sessions.” Eckhardt-Gramatté: 28 Alphabet & Character Pieces “From My…

Janina Fialkowska – Looking Forward at 70

By Arthur Kaptainis on 3 June 2021 Classical, Piano

It’s a time to try to keep looking forward,” Janina Fialkowska said from her home outside Augsburg, a German city some 80 kilometres west of Munich, where the Canadian pianist has lived since 2013. “I’m doing my best not to look back because I believe there are great things to come.” Among the near-future prospects are a return to concertizing in July, COVID willing, and the resumption in September of her International Piano Academy, an innovative mini-fest, also in Bavaria, featuring young pianists she admires who might not have been lucky enough to win one the many competitions she has served…

Bourgie Hall expands its online musical offering

By Newswire on 17 March 2021 Arts Industry, Baroque and Early, Classical, Classical Music, Scena Jazz

Montréal, Monday, March 16, 2021 – In addition to the concerts announced recently, few of which are still available online, Bourgie Hall at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts is expanding its online musical offering. From jewels of the Italian Baroque with Les Violons du Roy to contemporary jazz with Jean Deromeperforming songs by Steve Lacy, in addition to the musical traditions of Iran and Peru with the Duo Perse-Inca, an homage to Inuit throat singing with Oktoécho, and a concert-lecture of the history of the Romantic guitar presented by Pascal Valois, to offer you a diverse range of online…

Prix Opus 2021: CQM unveils the winners

By Justin Bernard on 7 February 2021 Arts Industry, Canadian Music, Classical, Contemporary, Indigenous, Scena Jazz

Owing to government restrictions to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, the Conseil québécois de la musique (CQM) was obliged to organize its 24th Gala des prix Opus online, a first for the ceremony. The webcast was made public on Feb. 7 on the Facebook page of the Fabrique culturelle de Télé-Québec. The setting was unchanged: Bourgie Hall in the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. A total of 26 laureates were recognized for their achievements during the 2019-2020 season, before and during the pandemic. Exceptional circumstances led to an exceptional tribute to Kent Nagano, former music director of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra,…

DID YOU KNOW THAT…

By Robert Markow on 28 January 2021 Classical, Classical Music

. . THE BELGIAN COMPOSER BOUDEWIJN BUCKINX (B. 1945) WROTE NINE UNFINISHED SYMPHONIES?All were composed in a single year, 1992. . . . PLUTO HADN’T BEEN DISCOVERED YET WHEN HOLST WROTE HIS PLANETS (1914-1917)? However, later composers helped him out with a Pluto movement. In 1997 the American composer Margaret Brouwer wrote Pluto: A Sequel to Holst’s ‘Planets,’ and three years later the British composer Colin Matthews finished Holst’s cycle with Pluto, the Renewer, composed at the request of Kent Nagano. . . . THE LONGEST SYMPHONY IN THE STANDARD REPERTORY IS GUSTAV MAHLER’S THIRD? This runs about an hour and…