+ Read Wah Keung Chan’s review of Rufus Wainwright’s Prima Donna at the Montreal international Jazz Festival this past weekend.
“While there is much to like about Prima Donna, the one-hour concert version presented at Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier also had much wanting. First, a lack of surtitles marred the understanding of the text, even though the libretto is in French, the predominant language of the home-town audience.”
+ Russian-born Canadian piano pedagogue Marina Geringas has passed away at the age of 77. Geringas taught at both the Royal Conservatory of Music and the University of Toronto.
+ Jana G. Pruden asks if this is the end of “O Canada” as we know it now that the lyrics are non-gender-specific.
+ Read an interview with US tenor Paul Appleby before he sings Béatrice et Bénédict at Glyndebourne.
“As I immerse myself in rehearsals for Béatrice et Bénédict at Glyndebourne, I wish I could have worked with Sir Colin Davis. He was just so musical. But also his body of works exhibits a unique perspective on the repertoire and his distinct tastes for certain composers. I admire artists who are so clearly animated by their passion for the music, and who advocate for it with such conviction.”
+ Watch the 2016 Rio Summer Olympics Theme Song, “Alma e Coração.”
+ The International Resource Centre for Performing Artists (IRCPA) launched a new website today.
+ A review of a rare recording of Charles Ives’s four Sonatas for Violin and Piano, written by La Scena Musicale‘s Kiersten van Vliet.
“French violinist Annabelle Berthomé-Reynolds approaches the difficult material with a keen sensitivity. Along with pianist Dirk Herten, this disc captures the composer’s reverent approach to composition, while maintaining a forthrightness and simplicity of expression.”
+ The Toronto Symphony Orchestra is negotiating with Gary Hanson, hoping that bringing him on as an interim CEO or senior consultant will help bring the orchestra from the brink of bankruptcy.
+ Read Arthur Kaptainis review of Orford Musique’s July 1st concert.
“Orford Musique, as the festival in the Eastern Townships now calls itself, got under way Friday night, almost a month after it started. The educational camp fires up well before the concert calendar. Thus the first non-student program, paradoxically, represented a farewell for at least a few of the teachers who had spent most of June in residence.
It also represented the kind of event that I would gladly cross several county borders to hear. Louis Spohr’s Duo for Two Violins in A minor Op. 67 No. 1? Just try to hum that one.
Or more to the point, just try not to after a performance by Jonathan Crow and Andrew Wan.”
