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Welcome to La Scena Musicale’s weekly Highlights, a roundup of classical music news from Canada and beyond. We’ve been graced with a suite of impressive new releases by Canadian artists over the last few weeks, but now we’re setting our eyes (and ears) on upcoming albums that will blossom this spring. Festivals in Vancouver and Lanaudière are starting to announce their lineups, and the U.S. is introducing new legislation that will pay streaming royalties to musicians.
New Albums Blossom This Spring
The Obsession With Her Voice, the first solo album by Montreal-based Swedish singer and composer Erika Angell, has been released on the label Constellation! You can catch Angell live in Quebec City on May 25.
Mathieu Godet has captured the “enduring charm” of Schubert’s German Dances and Impromptus on Schubert: Melodist, published with Analekta on March 8.
JUNO-award winning composer Jordan Nobles ventures into the stars with his latest work: The Night Sky, an 88-track solo harp recreation of the constellations.
That same day, Western Canadian composer Nova Pon’s Symphonies of Mother and Child will become available. The album is a collaboration with over a dozen musicians, including Turning Point Ensemble and Denise Ball, former director of the CBC Radio Orchestra.
Montréal composer Patrick Giguère and Toronto pianist Cheryl Duvall are publishing a new joint album, Intimes Exubérances, on April 19. It’s part of Duvall’s greater project to collect hour-long works from various Canadian composers.
Recent and Upcoming Shows
The University of Toronto Opera “opened a sparkling new production of Massenet’s Cendrillon on March 15 at Toronto’s historic, neo-Baroque Elgin Theatre, the perfect setting for director Maria Lamont’s 1930s Busby Berkeley-inspired conception,” according to music critic Gianmarco Segato.
Fauré Quartett
Catch Fauré Quartett’s (Stir) March 26 concert featuring the “greatest hits” of the piano-quartet repertoire, from Mahler to Fauré to Brahms.
Christian Li, the 16-year-old Australian violinist who’s performed alongside Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, garnered millions of social media on his performances of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, and already signed onto Decca Records, will be making his Canadian debut (Stir) at the Vancouver Playhouse on March 24.
In April, Isabella d’Éloize Perron and the FILMharmonic Orchestra will perform Vivaldi and Piazzola’s Four Seasons in 11 cities across Canada and the US.
Festivals and Events
POP Montréal has announced that it will host its 20th international music festival from Sept. 25 to 29, alongside various individual POP Montréal performances over the next six months. The URSA Anti-Jazz Police Festival, featuring Erika Angell and Emilie Kahn, among others, is also taking place March 26 to 29.
Vancouver International Jazz Festival, hosted from June 21 to 30, will feature performances by guitarist Julian Lage, vocal jazz singer Veronica Swift, and post-metal supergroup SUMAC.
Outdoor concert at 2022 Lanaudière Festival (Photo provided)
Festival de Lanaudière has unveiled the programming for its 47th edition, with shows featuring Nicolas Ellis, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, William Christie, and Les Violons du Roy.
Orchestra and Ensemble News
With the recent releases of Maestro and Tár, Vanity Fair reporter Esther Zuckerman has asked actual conductors how accurate Oscar nominees Bradley Cooper and Cate Blanchett are at conducting on-screen. While many of the higher tension moments are on point, the conductors say the actors were lacking in stillness and slowness.
The American Youth Symphony closed permanently on March 15, due to “financial challenges and the inability to sustain operations, especially in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic,” according to The Violin Channel.
Opera and Choral News
The winners of the Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition are: tenor Daniel Espinal, sopranos Lydia Grindatto and Emily Richter, baritone Navasard Hakobyan, and mezzo-soprano Meridian Prall. Each winner will receive $20,000 USD (around $27,000 CAD) in addition to “several career-based opportunities and exposure,” according to Opera Wire.
Polish-Canadian soprano Karoline Podolak has been signed by Intermusica.
Karoline Podolak (Photo from Karoline Podolak’s website)
Instrument News
Windsor Festival International String Competition (The Violin Channel) has awarded first prize to 25-year-old Canadian-Korean cellist Andrew Byun. He will play with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, receive a £5,000 (around $8,600 CAD) prize, and will have a chance to record an album with Champs Hill Records.
The American Pianists Association has announced the finalists for its American Pianists Awards (The Violin Channel), distributed every four years. The finalists include: Michael Davidman, Avery Gagliano, Sasha Kasman Laude, Elliot Wuu, and Angie Zhang
Business and Politics in the Arts
The Living Wage for Musicians Act recently introduced in the U.S. will “introduce a new streaming royalty that will pay musicians a flat rate of a penny per stream — so that they are compensated more fairly for their work,” according to The Violin Channel.
Obituary
Solomon Mikowsky
American pianist Byron Janis (La Presse), who fought through psoriatic rheumatoid arthritis in his hands and wrists to continue performing, has died at 95.
Cuban-Polish pianist Solomon Mikowsky (The Violin Channel) has died at 88. He taught at the Manhattan School of Music for 55 years.
Aribert Reimann (The Violin Channel), a famous post-war composer, has also died at 88.
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