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Marc Hervieux, Robert Marien, Stéphanie Bédard, and Geneviève Charest

Review: Les Concerts Populaires (July 8 and 12)

By Kiersten van Vliet on 13 July 2016 Concert Reviews, Musical Theatre, Orchestral, Popular Music, Quebec Music, Strings, Vocal

Established from an initiative by Mayor Jean Drapeau 52 years ago, Les Concerts Populaires de Montreal strives to present high-quality classical music to Montreal citizens. Now a bulwark of arrondissement Hochelaga-Maisonneuve’s summer season, Les Concerts Populaires, in collaboration with the Comité Musique Maisonneuve, offers five star-studded selections in the shadow of the Olympic tower at the Centre Pierre-Charbonneau. This year, their normal Thursday night schedule is interrupted by the 2016 Jeux du Québec, so it is more important than ever to plan your musical evenings. The eclectic series embodies a true democratization of music. On both evenings the atmosphere was…

Nikki Chooi

Daily News Roundup: 8 July 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 8 July 2016 Classical Music, Daily News Roundup, Mainstream Jazz, Musical Theatre, Opera, Popular Music, Romantic, Scena Jazz

+ Canadian violinist and winner of the OSM’s Manulife Competition in 2004, Nikki Chooi has been named the new concertmaster of the Metropolitan Opera. + China’s Cultural Revolution made listening to Beethoven a political crime, but half a century later, the relationship between Chinese people and western classical music has evolved in unpredictable ways. “When it comes to ways of listening, the Chinese have long been open to other cultures and to change – not in a revolutionary way, but through a process that builds on its long musical tradition.” + Video of the Day: Lullabies with Alessio Bax on…

Daily News Roundup: 7 July 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 7 July 2016 Canadian Music, Circus, Daily News Roundup, Opera, Orchestral, Scena Jazz, Strings

+ The Music of Strangers: Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble is coming to Cinéma du Parc on July 29. The movie will be shown in its original English with French subtitles. (French) + Canada’s History Society and Library and Archives Canada team up to explore Canada’s musical legacy with “Sounds Like History” podcast. + Should we cut the classics? The New York Times’ Michael Cooper weighs in about shortening operas. “After several decades in which the trend has been toward longer, uncut operas — drawing on the work of scholars to restore rarely performed passages, and putting a…

Lila Downs. Photo credit: Frédérique Ménard-Aubin, 2016

Daily News Roundup: 6 July 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 6 July 2016 Choral, Contemporary, Mainstream Jazz, Piano, Romantic, Scena Jazz, World Music

+ Cleveland Classical talks with guitarist Denis Azabagić about winning prizes, his wife and duo partner flautist Eugenia Moliner, and practice philosophy. “I remember when I came to the U.S. more than a decade ago. I opened the yellow pages and found an ad that said, ‘Learn to play the piano without practice.’ I thought, who in the world could put out such an ad? I mean how can you lie like that — because that’s impossible. We would all like to get our things in life the easy way, but music is something that certainly doesn’t happen like that.…

Jacques Lacombe. Photo by Fred Stucker

Daily News Roundup: 5 July 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 5 July 2016 Arts Industry, Choral, Daily News Roundup, Orchestral, Piano, Popular Music, Scena Jazz

+ Read Jeanne Hourez’s review of Nicholas Angelich’s latest release of Liszt, Schumann, and Chopin. (French) + Jacques Lacombe was invited to the Tanglewood Music Festival for the third consecutive year. He will lead the Boston Symphony Orchestra with soloist Joshua Bell on July 8, and Orff’s Carmina Burana on July 9, followed the next day by a concert with the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra with a program of Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet and Schumann’s Third Symphony. (French) + 53 years ago today, the Beatles invaded America with “From Me to You.” + In light of the ongoing Montreal Jazz…

Daily News Roundup: 4 July 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 4 July 2016 Arts Industry, Classical Music, Daily News Roundup, Education, Opera, Scena Jazz

+ 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…

Daily News Roundup: 1 July 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 1 July 2016 Arts Industry, Classical Music, Contemporary, Daily News Roundup, Mainstream Jazz, Opera, Romantic, Scena Jazz, Violin

+ The marriage between text and music in contemporary opera is more important than ever, says William Littler, citing Fellow Travelers (Cincinnati Opera) and Les Feluettes (Opéra de Montréal) as recent examples. “Perhaps today, more than at any other time in the recent past, librettists are coming into their own as something approaching full partners with composers in the creation of successful opera. And tied to this development is the heightened importance in an age of film and television of casting singers who can give visual credibility to their roles. Tenor Aaron Blake and baritone Joseph Lattanzi both looked and…

Andris Nelsons Photo: Marco Borggreve

Daily News Roundup: 30 June 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 30 June 2016 Arts Industry, Classical Music, Daily News Roundup, Mainstream Jazz, Opera, Scena Jazz

+ Andris Nelsons has pulled out of a production of Parsifal that opens the Bayreuth Festival. “Owing to a differing approach in various matters, the atmosphere at this year’s Bayreuth Festival did not develop in a mutually comfortable way for all parties,” said a written statement that was issued on behalf of Mr. Nelsons and his management team, Konzertdirektion Schmid. + Long-time proponent of new new music, violinist Anahid Ajemian has passed away at the age of 92. + His Excellency the Right Honourable David Johnston, Governor General of Canada announced 113 new appointments to the Order of Canada. See…

Daily News Roundup: 29 June 2016

By Kiersten van Vliet on 29 June 2016 Classical, Contemporary, Daily News Roundup, Opera, Piano, Romantic, Scena Jazz

+ A CD review of English composer Granville Bantock’s epic late-Romantic oratorio Omar Khayyam, re-released from the 1979 Lyrita version with the BBC orchestra and chorus under Norman Del Mar. + The results of the Seventh Cliburn International Amateur Piano Competition, held in Fort Worth TX, are in. + David Lang talks with The Guardian’s Kate Molleson about writing music for memorials. A classic daunting Lang commission: construct exactly the right music for collective remembrance. “Right,” he nods, but he doesn’t look daunted. “How to write something that seems ancient, like a kind of music whose origins we don’t question.…

Mr. Patrick Corrigan appointed as General Director of the Opéra de Montréal

By Newswire on 29 June 2016 Arts Industry, Newswire, Opera

29 June 2016 – Mr. Bernard Stotland, Chairman of the Board of directors of the Opéra de Montréal is pleased to announce the appointment of Mr. Patrick Corrigan as General Director of the company. Mr. Corrigan, who currently is the CEO of Pacific Opera Victoria (POV), will take over the position next September. He will succeed Mr. Pierre Dufour, who has been with the Opéra de Montréal for 16 years. Originally from Montréal and bilingual, Patrick Corrigan has over 25 years of experience in the musical field, including 16 years as a member of the management team of POV, where…

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