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Preview | SMCQ présents : Amitiés et étrangeté

By Viktor Lazarov on 12 September 2023 Contemporary, La Scena Online, Montreal, This Week in Montreal

On September 24, 2023, the Société de musique contemporaine du Québec (SMCQ) will present the fourth concert in their Hommage 2023-2024 series, dedicated to composer Sandeep Bhagwati. Organized in collaboration with the Vietnamese Cultural Centre of Canada, the multimedia event will involve music, text and images, centered around such themes as proximity, distance, estrangement and familiarity. Titled Amitiés et étrangeté, the program focuses on a single work by Bhagwati, Exercices d’étrangeté 1, inspired by a verse by Vietnamese poet Nguyễn Duy, about Vietnamese diasporic communities. The idea of encountering the unknown is embodied by the musical collaboration that will bring…

Fall Hightlights: Contemporary Music

By Arnaud G. Veydarier on 1 September 2023 Contemporary, Montreal, Orchestral

SMCQ This fall, the Société de musique contemporaine du Québec, Canada’s oldest concert society dedicated to contemporary music, presents the eighth edition of its Tribute Series. After Katia Makdissi-Warren, José Evangelista, John Rea, Denis Gougeon, Ana Sokolović, Gilles Tremblay and Claude Vivier, it’s German-Indian composer Sandeep Bhagwati’s turn to have his vast repertoire celebrated. From orchestral compositions to chamber music, multimedia creation, musical theatre and opera, Bhagwati stands out for his great versatility and mastery of different instrumental idioms. The first concert is scheduled for Sept. 24 at Salle Pierre-Mercure, with Amitiés et étrangetés presented in partnership with the Vietnamese…

CD Review | O Sun O Moon (True North Records, 2023)

By Zenith Wolfe on 31 July 2023 CD and Book Reviews, Contemporary, Folk, Strings, Vocal

O Sun O Moon Bruce Cockburn, vocals and guitar True North Records, 2023 O Sun O Moon marks Bruce Cockburn’s 37th album, an incredible feat for any musician. While some of the songs on this new release serve as a reminder of why Cockburn is considered among Canadian folk-music greats, others suggest he is aiming for quantity over quality. The guitar in O Sun O Moon is naturally where his writing shines most. Cockburn turns even the simplest chord progressions and rhythms into wonderfully transfixing experiences, most noticeable in Haiku – Instrumental. He pairs his distinct lyricism with varied vocal…

CD Review | Weyn Allah (Self-published, 2023)

By Zenith Wolfe on 31 July 2023 CD and Book Reviews, Contemporary, Vocal, World Music

Weyn Allah Al Qahwa ensemble Self-published, 2023 Their first album explored the traditional songs of the Middle East; the second, Egypt, and the third, South Africa. Al Qahwa’s latest addition to their discography, Weyn Allah, is a much more ambitious venture: uniting humanity through original world music. No two songs are alike on this album. The titular Weyn Allah (Where is God) addresses social issues of inequity and racism to the tune of a qanun, saxophone and busy backing choral group singing in Arabic and English. Peace and Safety (Salma Ya Salama) incorporates French lyrics that promote acceptance, and Humanity…

CD Review | Montréal Musica (Centrediscs, 2023)

By Pietro Freiburger on 29 May 2023 Canadian Music, CD and Book Reviews, Contemporary, Piano, Scena Jazz

Montréal Musica Marc Bourdeau, piano Centrediscs, 2023 Marc Bourdeau’s new project features piano music by Montreal composers. The innovative project, conceived during the pandemic, includes a CD containing 22 tracks and eight short films and music videos. Among the composers, there are names of yesterday and today who’ve made Montreal famous in the music world: piano star Marc-André Hamelin; “Canadian Mozart” André Mathieu; jazz monument Oscar Peterson, composers and pedagogues François Morel, Claude Champagne, Jacques Hétu, John Rea and Denis Gougeon; and organist Rachel Laurin. The CD, whose repertoire spans a century (1918-2017), offers the image of a city with…

John Rutter (Photo provided)

Music and Beyond: The Big Comeback!

By Charles Geyer on 26 May 2023 Classical, Contemporary, Indigenous, Ottawa

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…

Isidore String Quartet

Festival Picks

By Eva Stone-Barney on 26 May 2023 Baroque and Early, Canadian Music, Chamber Music, Choral, Classical, Classical Music, Contemporary, Opera, Orchestral, Piano, Strings, Vocal

Author : (Eva Stone-Barney)

MONTREAL/QUEBEC Centre Culturel de Pointe-Claire In an effort to make cultural programming accessible to its residents, and breathe life into public park spaces, the Centre Culturel de Pointe-Claire will present a series of free concerts as part of their Summer Evenings in the Parks / Summer Beats in the Parks Festival. Running from June 28 to Aug. 16, the festival will consist of 10 concerts in parks across the city. Starting at Stewart Park on June 28, audiences are invited to a concert of world music titled Paul Kunigis: Yallah. Performances of blues, Latin jazz, world jazz, and Brazilian percussion…

Pablo Ziegler and Masae Shiwa (Credit: São Paulo State Symphony Orchestra)

Pablo Ziegler: Music and Beyond Welcomes Back the Piazzolla Pianist

By Zenith Wolfe on 26 May 2023 Contemporary, Ottawa, World Music

This summer, composer and Piazzolla quintet pianist Pablo Ziegler is bringing experimental Argentine tango to Ottawa. On July 4, Ziegler will host the Opening Gala: Homage to Piazzolla concert for his third Music and Beyond season. It’s his first time as the festival’s gala performer, and his first time back since the start of the pandemic. But he’s kept busy with international performances in the meantime. During lockdowns, Ziegler and his wife Masae Shiwa started experimenting as a piano duo before visiting Japan, Brazil, and Argentina for duet concerts, with New York lined up later this year. Their concert at…

CD Review | Valentin Silvestrov: Silent Songs (Deutsche Grammophon, 2023)

By Pietro Freiburger on 27 March 2023 Art Song, CD and Book Reviews, Contemporary, Piano

Valentin Silvestrov: Silent Songs Hélène Grimaud, piano; Konstantin Krimmel, baritone Deutsche Grammophon, 2023 This new CD from Deutsche Grammophon features the Five Songs and some of the Eleven Songs by Valentin Silvestrov, one of Ukraine’s leading composers. Initially an exponent of the so-called Kiev Avant-Garde, which developed around the 1960s, Silvestrov has known greater success in the style he himself refers to as “meta-music”—metaphorical music. In Silvestrov’s writing, a touching lyricism of Mahlerian inspiration and contemporary colours coexist: the language of this style is universal and precisely meant as an instrument from which the listener can give his own meaning…

Lebrecht Weekly | Beethoven/Ravel: Concertos (Avanticlassic)

By Norman Lebrecht on 24 March 2023 Contemporary, Lebrecht Weekly, Orchestral, Piano, Romantic

Did anyone know that Pablo Casals had a kid brother who wrote him a concerto? Enrique Casals, 16 years younger, was a violinist and conductor. His cello concerto came to light three years ago and the enterprising Jan Vogler has made a captivating world premiere recording of it on Sony. It was sitting on my deck destined to be named album of the week when, as so often happens, an unforeseen astonishment dropped through the letterbox and took pride of place. Let’s not get all wokey and egalitarian about this: the best is, always and forever, the enemy of even the…

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