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Browsing: Orchestral

Montreal Sees the Dawn of a New Orchestra with a Big Heart

By Viktor Lazarov on 4 December 2025 Classical Music, Education, Montreal, Orchestral

Arriving in Canada in 2019 with a graduate degree in orchestral conducting, Evgenii Sakmarov is making his mark among Montreal’s young conductors. After completing a second doctorate in orchestral conducting at the University of Montreal under the tutelage of Jean-François Rivest and Paolo Bellomia in 2022, Sakmarov is now embarking on an ambitious project: founding a new symphony orchestra. While striving to build his life and career in Canada—a challenge immigrant musicians know all too well—Evgenii is launching a new symphony orchestra in Montreal in 2025. Its mission: to popularize classical music by presenting concerts in hospitals and facilities for…

Toronto Symphony Orchestra (Photo by Allan Cabral/Courtesy of the TSO)

Newswire | Toronto Symphony Orchestra Heads to Europe in Its 2025/26 Season

By Newswire on 2 December 2025 Classical Music, Newswire, Orchestral, Toronto

Gustavo Gimeno’s first overseas tour with the TSO runs from January 27 to February 9, 2026, and marks the orchestra’s début in Spain and Luxembourg, and return to Europe. In the midst of an extraordinary 2025/26 season defined by international artistic explorations, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra (TSO) will proudly bring Canadian music, music-making, and spirit to Western Europe as part of a 14-day tour spanning eight cities in six countries. Running from January 27 to February 9, 2026, and continuing a rich legacy of touring, the TSO’s ninth European tour celebrates the power of music to transcend national boundaries, and…

André Leroux with Orchestre national de jazz de Montréal

Review | Orchestre national jazz de Montréal’s Extraordinary Charlie Parker with Strings

By Amanda Wong on 1 December 2025 Concert Reviews, Jazz, Montreal, Orchestral

Every once in a while, I’ll attend a performance that hits all the right spots and leaves me buzzing for more. Jazz evokes a sense of longing for an era I wasn’t even alive for. I’ve never been the best at differentiating between all the different jazz subgenres, but I am a sucker for orchestral jazz. Charlie Parker’s 1955 orchestral-bebop fusion album Charlie Parker with Strings gets the nostalgic orchestral jazz right just the way I like it. Superlative concerts can be the most difficult to write about. I hate to say “you just had to be there,” but some…

Cellist Nicolas Altstaedt with the OSM conducted by Anja Bihlmaier. Photo: Antoine Saito

Review | Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique with Anja Bihlmaier and the OSM

By Amanda Wong on 28 November 2025 Classical Music, Concert Reviews, Montreal, Orchestral

Despite Orchestre symphonique de Montréal Music Director Rafael Payare’s absence due to his busy schedule conducting elsewhere, there is no shortage of exciting programming at OSM this November. Witness German conductor Anja Bihlmaier, Principal Guest Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic, who made her OSM debut on Nov. 26. Dressed smartly in head-to-toe teal, she led the orchestra through a program of English music before diving into Tchaikovsky’s famous final masterpiece. First up was the Ballade in A minor by British composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s (not to be confused with poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge). Bihlmaier’s somewhat stiff and pushed approach, that thankfully…

Glass Marcano conducts Orchestre Métropolitan

Review | A New World with Glass Marcano and Orchestre Métropolitan

By Amanda Wong on 17 November 2025 Classical Music, Concert Reviews, Montreal, Orchestral, Piano

Last year, I had the pleasure of witnessing—and writing about—Glass Marcano’s Canadian debut with Orchestre Métropolitan (OM), here in Montreal. The Venezuelan conductor’s return to Maison Symphonique with OM—and a new collaboration with pianist Tony Siqi Yun—was just as rewarding, with a diverse program of Dvořák, Prokofiev and Ortiz. Marcano’s humble origins have foregrounded her hard work and determination. She is a multitalented powerhouse whose accomplishments extend to fields outside of music like law. This concert proved that her energy remains undiminished since her last Montreal appearance. Marcano and the OM kicked off the afternoon with Antonín Dvořák’s Symphony No.…

Upcoming Concerts | Montréal

By Emma Yee on 11 November 2025 Chamber Music, Classical Music, Montreal, Opera, Orchestral

Opera McGill Opera McGill’s season is off to a busy start. On Nov. 6, 8, and 9 at the Segal Centre, the school presents a double bill of Bernstein’s Trouble in Tahiti and Mozart’s The Impresario directed by Opera McGill Artistic Director Patrick Hansen in his own new English adaptation. On Nov. 23, at the Wirth Opera Studio, a double bill of student-led projects will be unveiled: Vaughan Williams’s Riders to the Sea directed by Emma Yee, and Weill’s Down in the Valley directed by Tristan Pritham. After a short break, Opera McGill returns Jan. 30 through Feb. 1 with…

Upcoming Concerts | Toronto & Ottawa

By Gianmarco Segato on 11 November 2025 Chamber Music, Classical Music, Opera, Orchestral, Ottawa, Toronto

Toronto Aga Khan Museum The 11th annual Duende International Flamenco Festival features international headliners from Spain as well as family and community dance workshops. Performances include Oscuro Brillante with renowned flamenco dancer Eva Yerbabuena (Nov. 20); Cruces which brings together the four voices of flamenco: dance, song, guitar, and percussion (Nov. 21); Flamenco: Made in Canada featuring flamenco artists from diverse cultures (Nov. 22); and Alter Ego, an acclaimed contemporary flamenco creation (Nov. 23). www.agakhanmuseum.org Koerner Hall Koerner’s piano recital series continues on Nov. 16 with superstar Canadian Jan Lisiecki in a program of preludes by Chopin, Bach, Szymanowski, Messiaen…

Jacob Caines: Creator of Canada’s “Living Archive” of Queer Musicians

By Hal Kowalewski on 10 November 2025 Arts Industry, Education, Orchestral

For musicologist, conductor and researcher Jacob Caines, queer musicians may be the key to revitalizing the modern classical music scene. “Performing arts is in a space where it is, unfortunately, getting squeezed from all sides,” says Caines. There is no need to spell out the numerous obstacles modern classical musicians face. As pianist Charles Rosen famously observed, “the death of classical music is perhaps its oldest continuing tradition.” “The opportunity for arts institutions to thrive,” says Caines, “is by looking through a queer lens.” A PhD candidate at Concordia University, and instructor at the Fountain School of Performing Arts at…

Hervé Niquet. Photo: Nicole Bergé

Les Idées heureuses: A Musical Feast at the Court of Versailles

By Benjamin Goron on 10 November 2025 Baroque and Early, Orchestral

At the end of November, Les Idées heureuses welcomes a distinguished guest to Montreal: conductor and baroque music historian Hervé Niquet. In a “two-in-one” format as refined as a haute-cuisine dish, audiences will be treated to two events centred on the theme of the table—a veritable feast for the ears in the era of the Grand Siècle. The project revolves around the tercentenary of Michel-Richard de Lalande and his famous Symphonies pour les soupers du Roy, instrumental works composed to accompany royal dinners at the court of Louis XIV. First a fundraising event, then a playful and theatrical concert that…

Esprit Orchestra: A New Season of Art Inspired by Artists

By Emma Yee on 10 November 2025 Contemporary, Orchestral, Toronto

Esprit Orchestra launches their second annual Edge Of Your Seat International Festival with two concerts that celebrate elation and musical legacy. The first, Tour de Force (Nov. 30), will feature “very strong, exuberant, vigorous pieces to show the dynamic that Esprit can attain in exciting people and putting them on the edge of their seat,” says Music Director and Conductor Alex Pauk. The concert opens with Thomas Adès’s Overture to The Tempest. Based on the Shakespeare play, Adès’s opera premiered in 2012 as a co-production between Metropolitan Opera, Festival d’opéra de Québec and Vienna State Opera—and it won a 2014…

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