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La Scena Online is the digital magazine of La Scene Musicale.Contents: News, Concert reviews, CD reviews, Interviews, Obituaries, etc; Editor: Wah Keung Chan; Assistant Editor: Andreanne Venne
ISSN: 1206-9973

Scene from Teatro alla Scala's Così fan tutte Photo: Vito Lorusso

Review | Love as Spectacle: Robert Carsen’s Così fan tutte at La Scala

By Denise Wendel-Poray on 11 November 2025 Classical Music, Concert Reviews, Multimedia, Opera, Theatre

The evening begins inside a dazzling television studio. Cameras glide, applause signs flash, and a suave host greets a group of young couples assembled to test their love on live television. From among them he singles out two pairs whose fidelity will be put to the test before an audience and a bank of cameras. The million-euro prize glitters across giant screens. A revolving stage slides between pastel-pink dormitories and a shimmering poolside patio, while a pristine warship glides across an AI-generated sea. It all feels like a parody of Love Island or Big Brother—a world of total surveillance, where…

Nad Roop in Chaturang ki Chaupal

Review | Fall For Dance North Kathak & Ballet

By Gianmarco Segato on 10 November 2025 Concert Reviews, Dance, La Scena Online, Région, Scena Arts, Toronto

Kathak & Ballet was a featured signature program this year at Toronto’s Fall For Dance North Festival held Oct. 15-26. It was co-curated by the festival’s artistic director and co-CEO, Robert Binet with one of Canada’s premiere Kathak dancers and choreographers, Tanveer Alam. As mentioned in Alam’s pre-show speech on Oct. 25, the program’s aim was to assert kathak’s rightful place alongside the country’s most heavily funded art form, ballet. An international cast of dancers highlighted the rigorous technical requirements and profound artistry of both dance traditions in a program of contrasts, and remarkable intersections. Alam opened with his own…

The Year on Record

By Félix-Antoine Hamel on 10 November 2025 CD and Book Reviews, La Scena Online, Scena Jazz

Our picks for some of 2025’s best releases. The Birdsong Project Presents: Birdly Serenade David Murray Quartet: David Murray (tenor sax, bass clarinet), Marta Sanchez (piano), Luke Stewart (bass), Russell Carter (drums); Ekep Nkwelle (guest vocalist); Francesca Cinelli (spoken word). Impulse! 7591592 (LP); 00602475915911 (CD), April 25, 2025 At 70 years old, David Murray has slowed down his recording activities somewhat, but he remains true to his virile style, evoking swing-era tenors as well as some freer stylists of the “fire music” period. Following in the footsteps of Messiaen and Dolphy, Murray (with the help of his partner/manager Francesca Cinelli)…

Benjamin Deschamps. Photo: Bruno Guérin

Benjamin Deschamps: Taking Jazz Above and Beyond

By Félix-Antoine Hamel on 10 November 2025 Jazz, La Scena Online, Scena Jazz

At a relatively young age, saxophonist Benjamin Deschamps has already garnered some impressive credentials: Révélation Jazz for Radio Canada/CBC in 2017–18 and winner of the TD Grand Jazz Award at the Montreal Jazz Festival in 2019. Since 2014, he has released three albums under his name (with a quartet, a quintet and a sextet), and two more with the No Codes collective, where he is joined by his former mentor at McGill University, Frank Lozano. For the 2025–26 season, Deschamps is artist-in-residence for Jeunesses Musicales Canada (JMC). The saxophonist will present three different concert projects at JMC’s Joseph-Rouleau Hall in…

Remembering Dr. Ante L. Padjen (1942 – 2025)

By Newswire on 7 November 2025 Montreal, Obituaries

In Memoriam Dr. Ante L. Padjen Founder and Director, I Medici di McGill Orchestra Professor Emeritus of Pharmacology, McGill University (1942.02.04 – 2025.11.03) Tom Samek, Deputy Director of I Medici di McGill and good friend of Dr. Padjen: True to his favourite way of describing others, “illustrious” perfectly captures his own generous and devoted spirit. Through all the ups and downs, Ante’s heart was always focused on keeping our musical family together and in harmony. He cared deeply — not only for the orchestra, but for each of us personally. His warmth, humour, and belief in the healing power of…

Lebrecht Weekly | Vikingur Olafsson: Opus 109 (DG)

By Norman Lebrecht on 7 November 2025 Lebrecht Weekly

Some of us remember a time when November landed with a thump of label adverts, big wodges of glossy pages that promised nirvana in the form of symphonic cycles from eminent maestros and piano sets from timeless immortals. Yeah, so last century… All we have now is a flutter of ephemeral pianists in concept albums of music that does not necessarily feel fully conceived. Such is the case with the Icelander Vikingur Olafsson, a thoughtful man who tackles large themes – one year Debussy and Rameau, another Mozart’s contemporaries. Olafsson has spent the last two years touring Bach’s Goldberg’s Variation…

Shaakir Muhammad, Christopher Gerty & Matthieu Pagès with Artists of the Ballet in Procession. Photo: Karolina Kuras

Review | Procession: National Ballet’s Winner

By Gianmarco Segato on 5 November 2025 Concert Reviews, Dance, La Scena Online, Région, Scena Arts, Toronto

The National Ballet of Canada opened its 2025-26 season on Nov. 1 with the world premiere of Bobbi Jene Smith and Or Schraiber’s Procession. Former dancers with the renowned Batsheva Dance Company based in Tel Aviv, the choreographic pair—who are also a couple offstage—bring a practice steeped in collaboration to their first work for the company. The result is a jubilant, boldly-conceived and visually-striking piece that is perhaps the most successful new National Ballet commission in many a year. The ballet is inspired by questions prompted by the idea of procession: “It’s travelling where? It’s going away from what? It…

Review | Diverse Program, Homogenous Band: Women Jazz Composers with ONJ

By Amanda Wong on 5 November 2025 Concert Reviews, Jazz, Montreal

Women have long had fewer opportunities and have been overlooked in the male-dominated jazz industry. Jazz grew in popularity in the late 1800s, at a time when some men were still proclaiming that women were innately unable to produce music and art as creatively as men did. When women started to become more involved in the early 1900s jazz scene, it was mainly in the role of featured vocalist. Names like Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald are synonymous with ‘women in jazz,’ particularly in their capacity as singers, but how much does the average person know about the women who…

Renée Fleming with Royal Conservatory Orchestra. Photo: The Royal Conservatory/Koerner Hall; Lisa Sakulensky

Review | Renée Fleming Enchants at Toronto’s Koerner Hall

By Denise Lai on 4 November 2025 Art Song, Classical Music, Concert Reviews, Opera, Orchestral, Toronto, Vocal

On Nov. 1, a night when downtown Toronto was all abuzz about the final decisive game of the World Series, Koerner Hall was filled with equally excited fans for a glittering evening with Renée Fleming, one of the most-renowned sopranos of our times. The multi-award-winning superstar is known not only for her diva roles in opera, but also for her performances in Broadway, jazz and indie rock. She was the first woman in the 125-year history of the Metropolitan Opera to solo headline an opening night gala. She has performed not only in the world’s most famous opera houses, but…

Sir András Schiff at Koerner Hall (2023). Photo: Royal Conservatory/Koerner Hall; Lisa Sakulensky

Review | András Schiff Offers Wit and Profound Wisdom at Koerner Hall

By David Fanning on 4 November 2025 Classical Music, Concert Reviews, Piano, Toronto

Sir András Schiff doesn’t make things easy for his audiences. And yet his Toronto recital was sold out, even with well over 100 additional seats on the platform. For some years now he does not advertise his programs in advance. But three things are virtually guaranteed: that he will include a generous helping of Bach, the composer whose music first brought him fame in the mid-1970s; that he will not include anything by a living composer and most likely nothing composed during his own lifetime; and that he will offer pianism and musical understanding of the highest order. On Nov.…

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