JAMES STRECKER: Please tell us about a creation of yours featured at this year’s Toronto Summer Music Festival. Why exactly does it matter to you and why should it matter to your listeners?
ALICE HONG: “…for not all is lost” is a composition commissioned by Toronto Summer Music in 2021. This piece was a great opportunity for me to reflect on the pandemic lockdown in a musical way and to put a positive spin on some very uncertain times. I hope the message behind the piece remains applicable to listeners post-pandemic: to stay hopeful and to celebrate the good people in our lives during trying times. In 2021, the piece also offered a way to reconnect with Toronto Summer Music, Jonathan Crow and Philip Chiu during a time when traveling to Toronto was definitely not an option! It is especially special to me this year because through the generosity of TSM, I am able to attend a performance of the piece in person – and on my birthday!
JS: What are the most important parts of yourself that you put into your creations?
AH: I like sharing darker moods in my pieces than I like to share as a social person. I really appreciate that outlet and freedom.
JS: What causes you to compose or create as you do? Is it because you play a specific instrument, for instance?
AH: Being an instrumentalist definitely plays a large role in my composition process. Aside from approaching the creative process physically as a violinist, I often have the opportunity of writing new pieces for instrumentalists I know (sometimes that person being myself too). It makes the creative process that much more special to have that performer’s personality, experiences and sound in mind when deciding how a piece will unfold and what story it will tell.
JS: What are your biggest challenges as a creative person?
AH: Imposters syndrome is not very fun, but it’s definitely something that has pushed me to be stronger and braver about being committed to what I hope to put out in the world. Another challenge for me personally is work/life balance. It’s hard to resist the urge to work constantly or to constantly think about work – but I guess that’s the price of doing something fun for work!
JS: What are the hardest things for an outsider to understand about your life as a person working in the arts?
AH: In recent years, I’ve poked my head out from the classical music world a bit more and have gained some insight on what someone’s life looks like outside of classical music. I have to say, there are equally as many things I didn’t understand about that life as someone outside of classical music would understand about mine! There are two common concepts I often hear and love to challenge: that everyone in the arts is starving and that what we do is unrelatable. In Atlanta, I recently started a small business – Luxardo Entertainment Group – that puts on performances marrying classical and pop music, performed by classical musicians. It helps the musicians learn music and meet people outside of classical music, and it draws audiences into concerts that will introduce them to some classical music. Fun!
JS: Let’s talk about the state of the arts in today’s society, including the forms in which you create. What specifically gives you hope and what specifically do you find depressing?
AH: When I was a string fellow at TSM in 2017, Andrew Kwan did several public talks asking us musicians what we were going to do to keep classical music alive. That question stayed with me well beyond the month-long festival. With successful performers being active on social media and YouTube, as well as mainstream media depicting musicians in more shows and movies like Bridgerton, Tár, Chevalier, and Maestro, I think there are a lot of big moves being made to keep classical music alive and well. I don’t find this particularly depressing, but I do think it would be really cool to see Asian female composers programmed more often, especially in orchestral settings!
JS: What new works are you working on at present?
AH: I’m currently working on two orchestral pieces, commissioned by Dr. Chaowen Ting and the Georgia Tech Symphony Orchestra, to be premiered November 2023. That same November, I’ll have a solo vibraphone piece premiered in Kyoto, Japan, and I’m chipping away at that as well. I’m also writing a two-violin and piano piece, for my dear friend Atlanta Symphony Orchestra violinist Bob Anemone, another dear friend pianist Choo-Choo Hu, and myself for an upcoming ensemble vim concert in the 2023-2024 season.
JS: What do you yourself like about the music you create?
AH: I like that I stick to what I like. There’s often an emphasis on pushing boundaries in new music, and I am all for that. However, I really love cheesy music and sometimes my music can be cheesy – and I stand by it!
JAMES STRECKER: Please tell us about a creation of yours featured at this year’s Toronto Summer Music Festival. Why exactly does it matter to you and why should it matter to your listeners?
ALEXINA LOUIE: For me, writing music is always a new adventure. It is an act of self-expression as well as a special way to communicate with another human being. Each piece offers the opportunity to write a work that not only suits the request from the commissioner (in the case of Lotus III – Tai Chi String Quartet, Jonathan Krehm), but also offers me new possibilities for achieving my artistic goals. In this case, Jonathan approached me to write a new piece for string quartet plus tai chi performers. It is a unique chance to combine two different art forms – contemporary music for string quartet plus an ancient Chinese martial art.
JS: What are the most important parts of yourself that you put into your creations?
AL: It took me many years to find my own musical voice. It was not a linear journey. Part of the act of self-discovery came from my connection to Western musical literature because I was a piano student from the age of seven through my undergraduate studies at the University of British Columbia. In addition, I discovered the depth, beauty, and expressiveness of Asian music. This connection became a most important part of finding myself and became inexorably tied to my musical voice.
JS: What causes you to compose or create as you do? Is it because you play a specific instrument, for instance?
AL: Part of my creativity is tied to the fact that I was a serious piano student for so many years of my life. However, it is not advisable for a composer to write in a pianistic style for other instruments of the orchestra! I write the kind of music that I do partly because of what I respond to in music – that which captures my imagination and activates my mind. Resonance is a major component in my music. I often choose sounds that have a lingering quality.
JS: What are your biggest challenges as a creative person?
AL: The biggest challenge for me is finding what it is that I want to say in each piece – to give each piece its own life. Each work is different even though my sound world emanates from the same ‘space’, so to speak. It is also important for me to discover something new even within my own musical voice. It keeps the act of bringing life to a new piece fresh for me as the composer. It’s also important to take risks so you can stretch yourself as an artist. That can be a bit frightening because sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t – but you always have the option of revisions.
JS: What are the hardest things for an outsider to understand about your life as a person working in the arts?
AL: Composing is very hard work for me, but it shouldn’t sound like it is. I throw out many more pages than I eventually keep. I don’t clock my hours. Any piece of music that I write takes as much time as it takes for me to be satisfied with my creation. Even after a premiere or a performance, I don’t hesitate to correct, edit, revise, or rewrite if I feel that the composition needs it.
JS: Let’s talk about the state of the arts in today’s society, including the forms in which you create. What specifically gives you hope and what specifically do you find depressing?
AL: My hope is that more people will listen to the music being written today and find a connection between this music and life in today’s contemporary society. Of course, one doesn’t have to eliminate other genres of music or compositions written in the past. I’d love to see people keep an open ear, an open mind, and have a curiosity about music written in the same time period in which they are living. One’s listening choices don’t have to be exclusive (they certainly aren’t for me).
JS: What new works are you working on at present?
AL: I most recently completed Lotus III – Tai Chi String Quartet and have just begun my very first piece for solo flute. It’s a completely different kind of piece. At the same time, I am also in the beginning stages of a new work for orchestra.
JS: What do you yourself like about the music you create?
AL: The music I compose belongs to my sound world — it’s personal and expressive. I find inspiration from many sources and I explore various styles in order to create music that reveals the world around me and the times in which we live.
JAMES STRECKER: Please tell us about a creation of yours featured at this year’s Toronto Summer Music Festival. Why exactly does it matter to you and why should it matter to your listeners?
KEVIN WILKS LAU: My Fourth String Quartet will receive its world premiere at the Toronto Summer Music Festival. The work was commissioned by the Ironwood String Quartet, and by Jonathan Krehm, a wonderful and generous patron who happens to be a teaching disciple at Wu’s Tai Chi Chuan Academy in Toronto. The four movements of this quartet will accompany Tai Chi Chuan players (including Jonathan) demonstrating various weapon forms.
This piece documents my initiation into the concepts of Tai Chi, and into the philosophy of Taoism in general. Many of the principles found in Lao Tzu’s collection of ancient writings known as the Tao Te Ching—principles such as stillness, centredness, and flow—have resonated intuitively with me for many years, but in this quartet they are rendered musically explicit. These principles are conspicuously absent in much of modern culture, despite what I believe to be their immense importance to our well-being as individuals and as a species. This piece presents a small opportunity to bring some of these ideas to the forefront of the audience’s attention, intellectually and viscerally.
JS: What are the most important parts of yourself that you put into your creations?
KWL: Music is an expressive conduit that allows me to tap into the more extreme, intense aspects of myself; to transcend the boundaries of both language and ordinary experience. In real life I am a fairly reserved, even-tempered person; I suppose that my music expresses a hunger for life that I don’t find myself expressing as much in my speech and actions. I’m not sure I can articulate it better than that! But that is the nature of music, after all: to communicate something that resists the harsh clarity of words but is nevertheless full of meaning.
JS: What causes you to compose or create as you do? Is it because you play a specific instrument, for instance?
KWL: I have always been primarily inspired by other people’s music. I absorb influences like a sponge; my early compositions were all stylistic imitations of music I liked. Over time, I began to develop a certain way of processing these influences that I felt was unique to me. Composing has been (and continues to be) a journey of self-discovery, and I mean this literally—there are so many parts of myself I don’t fully understand, and the process of discovering and nurturing my own creative voice has been a highly illuminating and fulfilling one.
Learning piano at a young age undoubtedly served me well, especially when it comes to hearing and utilizing harmonic patterns, but I try not to rely on the actual physicality and sonic profile of the piano too much when composing—especially when it comes to orchestration, where the piano can place unwieldy limits on the imagination.
JS: What are your biggest challenges as a creative person?
KWL: Maintaining a state of flow as a creator. I don’t mean flow in the narrow sense of being joyfully engaged in every local moment of your life—that would be unrealistic, and I think not particularly desirable. But flow in the broadest sense: recognizing that creativity has a playful dimension, and preserving and integrating that playfulness into the business of daily life. Protecting the spirit of play is vital. That isn’t to say that composition shouldn’t be difficult or frustrating. But difficulty has a purpose. It’s a bit like parkour: there are obstacles everywhere, and sometimes those obstacles seem painful, even insurmountable, but with practice, patience, and with the right balance of focus and openness, the obstacles themselves become part of the landscape of play, the tapestry of living.
JS: What are the hardest things for an outsider to understand about your life as a person working in the arts?
KWL: The sheer unpredictability of everything. I can’t speak on behalf of all outsiders, but when I think of my immediate family members (none of whom are in the arts), I think they find the variation in every aspect of my life—from how much I made to what projects I’d be working on to what my daily schedule was like—bewildering and even anxiety-provoking. I would read their anxiety as a lack of trust in my ability to thrive in my chosen field, which then produces feelings of insecurity—something I really had to deal with over the past few years. But I have sympathy for their position, especially since stability is such valuable currency these days.
JS: Let’s talk about the state of the arts in today’s society, including the forms in which you create. What specifically gives you hope and what specifically do you find depressing?
KWL: I am neither hopeful nor depressed about the state of the arts. Maybe it’s more accurate to say that I have gratitude, and I have concerns. First off, my hats off to the arts councils: they have been doing a great job in supporting composers’ livelihoods, and I owe a big chunk of my career to the granting bodies (in particular the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, and the Toronto Arts Council) that have funded so many of my commissions. I entered my field fully expecting that it would be impossible to make a career as a concert composer (I grew up never having heard of such a profession!) And the fact that it is possible at all is a testament to the organizations that keep music alive, and the advocacy and generosity of countless individuals that make up our cultural support system.
A few weeks ago, I attended a speech given by the percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie, who was being awarded the Léonie Sonning Music Prize in Copenhagen. Glennie, who is profoundly deaf, made a case for listening as an ultimate value—one that lies at the core of our collective humanity. I think we are in danger of losing our ability to listen. One symptom of this is when we begin to mistake preaching (often under the guise of inclusive rhetoric) for the kind of genuine connection that actually produces lasting, healthy change. Listening is more than hearing; it’s a complex, multi-directional process, requiring openness and space and a suspension of our basic impulse toward categorization and judgment.
JS: What new works are you working on at present?
KWL: This summer I am creating an orchestral arrangement of The Nightingale (originally scored for clarinet, violin, piano, and narrator) for ROCO, a wonderful orchestra based in Houston that I have a close relationship with. I am also writing a new piece called The Infinite Reaches for the National Arts Centre Orchestra (which I can now call my ‘hometown’ orchestra since I just moved to Ottawa!), which will be paired, excitingly, with Strauss’s Death and Transfiguration. In the fall I will get to work on a new version of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, from the perspective of a composer writing 100 years from now (in a world dramatically transformed by climate change), a piece that will blur the lines between arranged and original music.
JS: What do you yourself like about the music you create?
KWL: Lately I have become more open about my love of film music, and the way this manifests itself in my concert music. There was a time when film music was looked down upon, and I would be very reluctant to cite John Williams as a source of inspiration (he is.) Now I take pride in the challenge of integrating my cinematic influences into structural contexts that are completely independent of visual language.
And then there is flow, which I mentioned before. I have always been attracted to musical flow as an ideal—the sense that one musical event leads inexorably to the next, not just on a superficial level but on some deeper plane. It’s something I strive for, both consciously and unconsciously, and I’m absurdly happy on the occasions I’m able to achieve it. Particularly when I’m ‘flowing’ between things that, on paper, seem like binary contradictions—old and new, high and low—or unlikely associations, like erhu and space travel (see Between the Earth and Forever). I think flow is a metaphor for so many things in life, including the possibility of connection between disparate entities that is both the hallmark and the challenge of true diversity.
JAMES STRECKER: Since you are the curator of Summer Music in the Garden, please tell us what we need to know about this upcoming series of 18 free concerts on most Thursdays and Sundays throughout the summer.
GREGORY OH: I always think of the Music Garden as a meeting place – you can travel there by boat, plane, streetcar, bike or on foot – and I want the programming to reflect this as well. I want the season to be accessible, not in the pejorative sense of “watered-down”, but more that everyone has access, everyone can listen, find things both familiar and new.
JS: What are your biggest challenges as a curator?
GO: I think that cultural programming has to reflect past, present and future. The danger is that if you only honour one of these streams, you risk doing a disservice to your audience, your community and the artists you rely on.
JS: In presenting the artists featured in this series, what do you in turn ask of your audience?
GO: Be open, but trust yourself. Be respectful, but enjoy yourself. Enjoy the familiar, explore the unknown.
JS: Let’s now find out more about you yourself. If you were asked for 50 words for an encyclopedia to summarize what you do, or have done, in the arts, what would you say about your purpose and creations?
GO: I have two very different artistic selves – one is curious, whimsical and prone to tantrums and impetuousness. The other is ultra-conservative, and secretly loves some tonal music, video games and standing in my garden staring into space.
JS: What are or have been your most meaningful achievements?
GO: Lots of little things. Everything else has either been a team effort, or a chance outcome.
JS: What important beliefs do you express in or through your creative work?
GO: Success and achievements are dangerous goals. When everyone agrees on something, be very suspicious. To paraphrase Ursula Leguin, the open and accumulative nature of the gatherer can be much more sustaining, albeit less sexy, than the hyper focus of the more celebrated hunter.
JS: How has living with the pandemic affected your creative life?
GO: It allowed me to raise a kid without losing my mind. Mostly.
JS: Please tell us about one or more projects that you have been working on, are preparing, or have recently completed.
GO: The past two years I have been teaching at Memorial University of Newfoundland, which is a beautiful School of Music. I have also been working on a solo show called Lessons in Failure, which is half piano recital, half storytelling, about the most compelling of my fantastic failures as a pianist.
JS: How have you changed over the years since you began to do creative work?
GO: Yes, a lot. And, also, not nearly enough.
JS: What do you yourself find to be the most intriguing and/or surprising things about you?
GO: I really love 22-minute procedurals. I almost always fall asleep in concerts.
JS: Of what value are critics?
GO: They are like courtroom sketch artists and/or guide dogs. They help me understand what I cannot yet see for myself. Like teachers, they can be lovely or meanies, and sometimes it just depends who is telling the story. Probably, we all need to be better critics.
JS: What specifically would you change about what goes on in the world of the arts?
GO: I am playing around with this idea of tenyear, as a replacement for tenure. As regards academia and also orchestra positions, I think contracts should be 10-year renewable contracts rather than forever contracts. We don’t do it for marriage, and we shouldn’t do it for the most lucrative positions either. Like many things, it is about finding a balance.
In his new recording, From Oblivion to Hope, composer Frank Horvat, with the voice of the Odin Quartet, remains quite assured throughout in exploring multiple possibilities of musical ins and outs.
He is much at ease with the intrinsic playful potential of his compositions, with the quietly but assertively challenging value of musical understatement, and with sounds doing a fresh take on intellect and meaning.
The music here is alluringly experiential, irresistible to ears seeking rich new turf of the sprit, complex and repeatedly with surprise but never sounding intentionally so. Call it a natural knack for expression, if you will.
A take on Vivaldi’s Four Seasons makes one rethink the classic as music meditating upon its existential self and realizing itself anew. The music seems deceptively straightforward on a spiritual plane, but one continues to feels engaged in inner search.
These are engaging compositions and performances of music that addresses both the intellect and the heart, sometimes with the impact of a subtle punch in the gut, or is it in the spirit?
One feels the intimacy of the composer’s presence, as if he is attempting to probe the often unresolvable with the listener’s -your -collaboration.
Horvat demonstrates to us that music, like existence, is a world unto itself and that our words cannot duplicate it at all, but merely react. Which is what I am doing, no? But music of such firm purpose does compel us to live it through our reactions to it.
Horvat provides his written take on what he has written in evocative passages contained in the CD package. He writes about String Quartet No. 2: “Inspired by hard rock and metal, this piece mimics musical characteristics most often found in these genres. From thick textured orchestration to crunchy riffs to melodic shrieks…”
The second longer composition, “The Four Seasons…in High Park” is written “in recognition of” both, with the composer’s expert handling of the listener’s familiarity, shock of recognition, and surprise.
Unity in Distress, composed in 2020, gives “all those who suffered a united voice to express their distress.”
I haven’t as yet united in my mind the compositions “Oblivion (2018)” and “Hope (2022)” to their titles, since Oblivion and Hope are decidedly personal experiences whose present meaning I must discover on my own each time I listen to the music.
Moreover, my work as a human development consultant always makes me wary of any bonding of human experience and the words applied to it.
But the music’s the thing, and one potent quality of Horvat’s skillfully-portioned works is that they compel the listener to experience indefinable, even indescribable, realms within.
And who can say what is happening, can happen, will happen, as a result of hearing From Oblivion to Hope?
JAMES STRECKER: Let’s talk about the two recordings that you have recently released, but let’s do them one at a time. First, with From Oblivion to Hope which is performed by Odin Quartet, why exactly does the composition matter to you as a composer?
FRANK HORVAT: From Oblivion to Hope was an important album for me to make as it is a varied collection of my compositions for string quartet crossing 4 decades of my career. It’s a cathartic experience to curate such a collection because it not only encapsulates my evolution as a composer but also my development as a human being.
JS: Why exactly does this composition matter to you, as a human being and why should it matter to us?
FH: From Oblivion to Hope features compositions that show both the dark side of humanity but it also morphs into something that is optimistic for the future. I wanted the pieces to reflect my hope that as human beings, we do have the ability to make the world a better place.
JS: What can you tell us about the Odin Quartet, especially as interpreters of your work?
FH: It was a such a pleasure to make this album with Odin. They are such a talented quartet. They are so creative and adaptable in playing in such varied styles. We were a good match in that way as I tend to explore a variety of styles through my compositional voice. I also appreciated their input on fine-tuning the compositions. The result is something that is intense, beautiful but also very idiomatic.
JS: How may one purchase this recording From Oblivion to Hope?
JS: The second recording is A Village of Landscapes, performed by Sébastien Malette on bassoon. As before, why exactly does this work matter to you as a composer?
FH: I have always enjoyed composing for the bassoon but never composed anything so in-depth to explore the many facets of the instrument, so this was a wonderful experience to do that.
JS: Was it difficult or relatively easy to write for bassoon as a somewhat isolated instrument in an extended piece?
FH: I actually found the process of composing all 13 pieces in the suite to be quite fluid and organic. I often make a game-plan of what I want each piece to achieve mood wise, so that preparation before starting to compose makes it quite straight-forward. Meanwhile, the bassoon is a VERY versatile instrument. It has a wide range of notes, timbre contrasts and dynamics. I think we tend to pigeon-hole or stereotype instruments like the bassoon, limiting what they’re capable of doing. That’s one of the reasons why I appreciated composing this suite – feeling like I could explore every nature and character of the instrument.
JS: As previously, please tell us why exactly this composition matters to you as a person and why it should matter to us.
FH: My hope is that listeners will have a new appreciation for the natural beauty that is found all across Canada. I also hope listeners appreciate how art can inspire art, in this case, my music being inspired by the breathtaking photography of Michelle Valberg.
JS: You note that A Village of Landscapes was inspired by photos of stirring natural landscapes that represent each of the 10 provinces and 3 territories in Canada. Please tell us about your love of the environment and how this love translates for you into creation of music.
FH: I have always been passionate about using my musical voice to bring to the forefront the natural world. Having my music reflect this has always felt very natural to me. I think artists have long made their work reflect the times they live in. Our present world is at a precipice when it comes to protecting our natural resources, so as an artist, I feel I have a duty to have my compositions reflect this.
A Village of Landscapes was a great project to work on as it pays homage to the wide array of landscapes that are prominent all across Canada. This was a wonderful creative challenge for me to use a finite source of instrumental and sound sources to achieve this.
JS: What kind of audience from the general public will these projects interest?
FH: That’s a tough question for me to answer as I rarely think about that as I compose the works. Now that the music is out there though, my hope is that the music will resonate with fans of classical chamber music as something a bit “different” yet engaging. Meanwhile since my musical influences tend to be quite eclectic, I do hope that music fans who don’t regularly listen to classical music will also find it interesting.
JS: Oscar Peterson once told me how worried he was about the shallow levels of musical knowledge and appreciation in our culture. Do you share his concerns and, if so, what kind of remedy do your creations offer?
FH: I love Oscar Peterson but I respectfully disagree. Because of technology these days, we have never had access to sample such a wide array of artistic expression in human history as we do today. These are exciting times with so many people of many varied backgrounds that are creating and communicating amazing and wondrous things. On a music front, we have composers and performers putting the most exciting mix of music out there…creating new sounds never heard before especially when including electronics in their practice. When people say the quality of art and culture is not as good as it used to be, they’re either not looking in the right places or they’re consuming work with a closed mind.
JS: I need to bring up the notion of genre in our culture. Is this notion a limitation to creators of music, or does it provide a means to deeply explore a specific genre’s possibilities, or should music be flexible enough to embrace most possibilities?
FH: I think the business of music has always needed to create labels in order to sell music. As a creator of music, I have always rebelled against this because of the fear that my creative latitude would be stifled. I would like to think that the art-consuming public is intelligent enough that they don’t need to have everything they consume labelled. They can sample something and if it resonates with them, then they should consume more, even if it is of a genre that they have traditionally not veered towards.
JS: Let’s talk about the state of the arts in today’s culture, including the forms in which you work. What specifically gives you hope and what specifically do you find depressing?
FH: I don’t get depressed about the state of arts and culture these days for the simple reason that it is something that I cannot control…specifically the direction in which it continues to evolve. I compose my music, produce my albums and collaborate with very talented and kind-hearted individuals to make it all happen. I then put it out there in the world and the world will have their unique relationship with it. I do what I do because it brings me joy and purpose. If the results of this life bring others joy and engagement, then that is a pleasant bonus to the whole process. As I said, the way in which we consume art is always evolving. I will follow along as a fan and get inspired, but otherwise I just love doing my own thing.
JS: What do you yourself like about the music you write?
FH: Great question! Basically, when I sit at my desk and I’m composing something, I always ask myself, have I ever heard anything like this before? If I answer, no, then I know I’m on the right track. For me to put my music out there, I have to be surprised, amazed and moved. If it passes this test in my mind, that I have pride in my creation. I never get sick of this feeling.
JS: What’s next for you in the coming few years of your very active life in the arts?
FH: I’m fortunate that I have a number of commissions that will be released either in album form or through live performance with a number of innovative artists including the SHHH!! Ensemble, Kathryn Ladano, Christina Petrowska Quilico, Sinfonia Toronto, Sharlene Wallace, and Meredith Hall. In June, I will be going on an artist Arctic Expedition, so I’m sure this will inspire a number of new projects. I can’t wait!
JAMES STRECKER: Please tell us what you want the public to know about your current exhibition at the You Me Gallery.
ROBERT CLARK YATES: Well, first of all, the gallery is located at 330 James Street North in Hamilton, and this exhibition, which I call “Distant Landscapes and other observations,” will be on display until April 23, 2023. Please understand I am not a landscape painter in the traditional sense of those words. This is a selection of improvised inventions based on after-the-fact memories of things seen and felt while travelling in landscapes beyond Hamilton and Dundas. Most were painted in my Dundas studio during the covid pandemic when being a tourist was not the thing to do. The “landscapes” represented here are from Italy, Lithuania, Algonquin Park and Ireland. I was inspired by the architectural and sculptural fragments of the ruins of the Forum in Rome; the overwhelming abundance of Renaissance and pre-Renaissance art in Florence; the hauntingly beautiful and spiritually-charged forests and sand dunes of the Curonian Spit (which runs into the Baltic Ocean parallel to the mainland of Lithuania in eastern Europe, ancestral homeland of my beautiful wife, Donna); the very down-home, familiar and always inspiring wilds of Algonquin Park. And the Irish landscape is inspired by all the splendid Irish writers and the extraordinary Long Room Library above the home of the Book of Kells in Trinity College, Dublin.
JS: How is making art a significant experience in your life?
RCY: I don’t understand why some people are called to be artists and others aren’t. I was. Maybe it is something like the arbitrary colour of your hair or skin, your chance height or flip-of-the-coin personality. We all seem to be significantly different. My mother told me I was an easy child to bring up because all she had to do was give me some paper and a pencil and I would occupy myself for hours on end. I am an artist. It is my calling. It is all I have known.
JS: What exactly do you like about the work you create?
RCY: It is what I am and what I do. I feel the astonishment that accompanies being aware of the breath-taking miracle of having come-to-be. I love life. My response to it is to do something I like which, as it has turned out, is making art.
JS: In what ways is your creative work fairly easy to do and in what ways is it difficult to realize? Why is it so?
RCY: I am, and have always been, a chronic artistic maker. At all times, even when on holidays, I have an artistic project in mind, something I want to work on. It is not limited to the visual arts and could involve poems, fiction or song-writing. I guess you could call it “easy” because that is what I am and what I do, almost without thinking about it, as if I had no choice. The difficulty comes with the idea of presentation to the public, of what I have to offer to others. I don’t want to waste their time. I want them to find what I do meaningful. So, the big problem is what to do. I can’t help it that I am going to make art anyway, but I sure hope it is meaningful to someone besides myself.
JS: What are the most important parts of yourself that you put into your work in the arts?
RCY: The answer to this question is best decided by the viewer of my art.
JS: What are your biggest challenges as a creative person in the arts?
RCY: How to make a living that is financially untroubling has been a bit of a problem for me. I have not been able to associate making art with making money. They have had nothing to do with each other. Therefore, working at other jobs determined by other people has been necessary to make money. I have done commercial work as a graphic artist. I have worked as a stage-hand, and as a scenic artist for professional theatre and museums. Best of all, I have worked as a farm-hand bringing in the fall harvest, cutting cabbage and digging potatoes. I do the best I can, but all the while I have my own art projects in mind.
JS: Please describe at least one major turning point in your life that brought you to this point as a creative person in the arts.
RCY: My discovery (and on-going re-discovery) of both Art and Nature is a constant turning point for me. I have always loved what we call Nature, and as long as I can remember I have spent a large part of my time in the woods. Nature (which is trees, creeks and wildlife unspoiled by human activity) and Art (which is Human Nature at its best) have held a constant and unfailing attraction for me. Art and Nature provide me with daily turning points.
JS: What are the hardest things for an outsider to understand about your life as a person in the arts?
RCY: To the best of my knowledge, most people if they were to win a big multi-million-dollar lottery would quit their jobs and do whatever they want to do. This suggests to me that they don’t consider their work an essential part of who they are and therefore they understandably want to be free of it. On the other hand, if any artist, including myself, were to win a lottery we would say, “At last, no financial worries, now I can get down to work.” (I don’t buy lottery tickets so this hypothetical situation is unlikely.) What artists do may appear to be non-functional because it adds no appreciable value to our abnormally business-oriented society, whose most vital concern is the growth of the economy. But in the long run, what our society will be remembered for is what is produced by our artists. I think it is hard for an outsider to understand that if the world was more focused on the arts than money, acquisition and commodities, the world would be a better place. Private ownership is not that important. Through the arts an individual can lead a full and fulfilling life without obsessive material possessions. All the arts — music, writing, the visual — can be shared by everyone and provide everyone with an all-embracing meaningfulness.
JS: Let’s talk about the state of the arts in today’s culture, including the forms in which you work. What specifically gives you hope and what specifically do you find depressing?
RCY: The world seems a long way from embracing art as a primary collective concern. That is somewhat depressing because if we are to have a better world, art is necessarily essential. After everyone is fed and sheltered, art should be our first concern. I find it hopeful that those who are deeply interested in the arts tend to be more tolerant of their fellow human beings. They tend to have a sense of fairness and equality that promotes peace and well-being. But still war, brutal exploitation and the rape of Mother Earth is the way of the world. Concerning art in this wide world, I am going to make-up some sad statistics based on an impression I have, which may or may not be true. I have the impression that only about 10% of the general public are interested in what we call the visual fine arts. One in ten. That may be a generous estimate. Art itself is widely varied and the interest of that 10% is spread over the full range of art, from the most avant-garde to the most conservative. So, I will go on to say that probably only !0% of the 10% interested in art — that is, one in a hundred — would be interested in the type of art I do. That’s a pretty good statistic — if everybody in the world could see my art. But the truth of the matter is that less than one in a skrillion get to see it, and — as already noted — only one in a hundred of them would find they had found something that engaged them. There is a long way to go, both for me as an artist and the society I live in.
JS: What exactly has the impact of the COVID pandemic been on you, your creative work and your life in the arts?
RCY: My art is not conducive to collaboration, which means even at the best of times I tend to work alone. So, the pandemic has not impacted my solitary working habits. However, it has made me more acutely aware of our communal life together, the way we treat each other and the precautions we must take to give the human experiment a future.
JS: What’s next in the coming few years of your life in the arts?
RCY: Like everyone else, my personal future is getting shorter and shorter. I am approaching the end of my 77th year. I continued painting during the pandemic years, and I also wrote a book about travels around my own brain. I call it a “fiction” though I have a feeling that classification is as approximately accurate as calling the paintings in my current exhibition “landscapes.” In the next few years, I hope to continue painting and writing while trying to figure out a way to publish my book. It is entitled Now and Never Again, the subject of another interview.
First things first: Do not, do not, do not miss Mahabharata, Parts 1 and 2, now at the Shaw Festival until March 26.
Of course, you might read Mahabharata: A Modern Retelling by Carole Satyamurti, in which this production is anchored, instead, and leave it at that, having explored a much-praised book. But you will then miss an experience that says aloud in a variety of voices, “This is your world, indeed your own life, with all its idiocies, vanities, cruelties, death, and pointlessness,” a production that finally asks, in endless summations of human madness, “And now what?”.
You will miss a dazzling and gripping production that takes you into its universe and works you over, security by security, truth by truth, and leaves you vulnerable, changed, thinking deeply.
Of course, the story is 4,000 years old, five hours of memorable theatre here in two parts, and complex with its endless characters and plot twists passed down to us through time. Storyteller tells the audience, warns the audience, at one point, “Don’t be confused by the plots…. within the river of stories flows infinite wisdom.”
Of course, while watching this Mahabharata, we think of Putin, Hitler, Stalin, and a never-ending line of butchers and murderers for whom our species is known. Of course, while watching, we think of Donald Trump, Doug Ford, Pierre Poilievre and the unyielding pointlessness of small men who talk big.
In this traditional tale from another world and its unfamiliar realities, we gradually find our own way, but that discovery doesn’t free us, nor does it compel the world to release its grip on our thinking and feeling. We exist and the world will destroy us somehow. We know that, we see that on this stage.
I found myself surprised by the potent effect of the intensely etched characters before us, each one a compelling individual, each one a life in a personal universe. I was held throughout by the direction of Ravi Jain, with associate Miriam Fernandes, that created the many peopled visual dimensions before us, all shaped with honed dramatic smarts and a subtle sense of effect.
Indeed, I connected with this production for many personal reasons.
Miriam Fernandes as Storyteller certainly held me transfixed with each word she spoke, with each meaning her intense eyes expressed, and I was transported into the mythical world she created. She also took me back to days far away when my maternal grandmother told me stories at bedtime in Ukrainian and when my father would satisfy my ceaseless requests for the Bremen Town Musician with an animated telling. Yes, we do love and indeed need – that overused word again – some “narrative” in our lives
I connected because Shekar from Mysore, who became the dearest of lifelong friends in university, once told my as-yet-to-be wife of now fifty-six years that she should marry me. Later he suggested the name Sumitra for one of our dear cats.
I connected because Dan, a university acquaintance, found himself in the back seat of our car one day reciting Savitri by Sri Aurobindo. Dan had met The Mother at an ashram in India and this day talked me into reading his gift of Savitri, which I tried, I did try….but such wasn’t my world.
I do have better luck connecting, however, with friend Brenda Bell, Brenda who once was a renowned belly dancer called Badia Star at a posh hotel in Cairo and who, needing more spiritual meaning, returned to Canada to become a sincerely informed yoga practitioner and teacher, a Reiki master, and the best Shiatsu practitioner in the world – just ask my back.
Brenda and I sometimes talk of her many teachers and esoteric books, but I guess I’m more into the existentialist “now” of my life than the workings of Karma in Brenda’s world, although in university I did read both Heidegger and the Baghavad Gita.
I guess I’m saying all this because the production of Mahabharata at Shaw has a place to go in my psyche, a world made by my past that is real to me and therefore makes the production real.
I once had the pleasure of interviewing Ravi Shankar, on a couch in North York of all places, and I liked the guy partly because he called me James Bond and partly because I always responded immediately to his playing of the sitar.
But the Indian who provides for me a reality in which to dwell as a genuine self is the master of the sarod, Ali Akbar Khan, whom I once interviewed as we sat on the side of a bed in Mississauga and smoked our cigarettes.
I listen to the music of Ali Akbar Khan and feel real in both a new and old way, feel alive ironically in this world of death and human insanity. My body moves instinctively with each alap and raga, and my life seems at home, for now, with itself.
Whatever the world is and however else I am in it, I am still alive in it, and, as one alive, I must dance with whatever the winds blow my way.
Perhaps that’s the power of this production. We are told in this Mahabharata not to struggle to get the characters “right” in our heads, but to sense an ineffable meaning of things taking shape perhaps within our grasp, however wondrous or horrible they might be.
We listen to the truly ethereal voice of Meher Pavri singing the Bhagavad Gita and are stunned by the beauty of such sound. We think of the words she sings, “The fight is not out there, Arjuna, it is inside you….fight the attachment inside you…..control the mind so you can see.”
And we feel fortunate that this production of Mahabharata gives us a dramatized visual expression to truths of the struggle of our existence, right on this Festival stage. These are truths we cannot conquer, nor even understand, but in our personal struggles, these are truths that we, who watch and listen, can hear and now share with those around us who also watch and listen.
We are not alone, but together we realize that we are fated to be human.
JAMES STRECKER: Your production of The Resurrection was already presented digitally in 2021, so what reasons have you for recommending the upcoming live performance?
MARSHALL PYNKOSKI: In the broadest sense, we believe there is no comparison between a film performance and a live performance. One is not superior to the other, but each provides an experience for the audience that is unique unto itself.
Our film production of The Resurrection took place in the ballroom of St. Lawrence Hall and major concessions had to be made in terms of the choreography and staging due to space restrictions.
The set that has been designed for Koerner Hall is enormous – far too large to fit into the ballroom of St. Lawrence Hall. In fact, much of it could not even fit onto the freight elevator. Consequently, those who saw the film version of The Resurrection saw only a very few select pieces of the set. The set was designed specifically to fit into Koerner and to blend seamlessly into the architecture and the surfaces of that concert hall. Consequently, our staged production will be visually far more cohesive.
Due to COVID restrictions, major changes were necessary in terms of choreography and staging when filming The Resurrection. No physical contact was allowed whatsoever – a huge challenge in an opera that is so emotionally fraught. What’s more, the rules of “social distancing” meant that the choreography and blocking had to be reimagined to allow the requisite two meters between all participants at all times.
The artists were not allowed to sing while filming The Resurrection and consequently were lip-syncing to a playback of their own voices, recorded in Koerner Hall at an earlier date with Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra. Working with a live orchestra allows for far greater spontaneity particularly in terms of delivery of recitative and even in the tempi of the arias and the ballet.
In the film, the singers and dancers followed the recorded music. On stage, the instrumentalists follow the singers and dancers.
Costumes for The Resurrection were only partially completed for the film version. The costumes will be realized in their entirety for the stage production.
JS: The Resurrection has been called “Handel’s first acknowledged masterpiece,” so two questions. What exactly makes a musical creation a “masterpiece”? What makes Handel’s Resurrection fit that designation?
MP: I think a masterpiece is a work that lasts beyond the period in which it was originally created. From a baroque perspective, a masterpiece must embody a particularly harmonious fusion of all of the elements that are part of its creation. In the case of The Resurrection, the libretto, the character development, and the music are wonderfully allied, and the dance music is integrated so successfully, it loses all sense of divertissement and becomes an integral part of the story.
For me, a masterpiece must feel new every time you approach it. It must be able to lend itself successfully to a variety of interpretations from artist to artist and period to period. This means that it never remains static. A masterpiece is a catalyst – a point of departure rather than an end in itself.
JS: Handel has been called “the consummate showman” and I wonder what evidence you find of this quality in the composer’s “The Resurrection.”
MP: Handel is always aware of his audience and even in his moments of greatest inspiration, he never loses sight of the fact that it is the audience who must be engaged. He is a master at ensuring that the audience is not reduced to being voyeurs, but rather, that they become participants emotionally in the action.
Handel is always aware that an audience must never be expected to sustain one emotional state for too extended a period of time. This is why a creation like The Resurrection includes moments of subtle, ironic humour. Handel understands the need for a dramatic and emotional palate cleanser.
I find it particularly fascinating that Handel was able to create a sense of dramatic tension even while dealing with a story that is familiar to the audience and in which the outcome is a foregone conclusion.
Handel never shies away from the opportunity to show off the technical prowess of his instrumentalists, his singers, and dancers. Because he was surrounded by the greatest theatre artists of his day, he brought his orchestration, ornamentation, and dance music to a pinnacle that has seldom if ever been surpassed.
JS: How do the visual and musical elements in your production support and enhance one another? Any favourite examples?
MP: Handel’s composition – his word painting – always reflects the emotional state of the artists on stage. Clearly, he had great respect for his librettists and consequently it is not a difficult process for us to visualize scenes that have already been so perfectly prepared from a musical and textual point of view.
I’m particularly fond of a scene in which Mary Magdalene and Cleophas enter an ecstatic state during which they begin to have visions, or hallucinate – believing they are seeing elements of Christ’s passion, i.e., the nails, the crown of thorns, his beautiful lacerated face. In this instance, the dancers (invisible to the human beings onstage) appear to Magdalene and Cleophas carrying these elements as though they are floating through space. The presence of these props as part of the choreography enhances the surreal nature of the women’s duet.
Jeannette and I were particularly inspired by the opening aria of The Archangel, and the extreme militant quality of the music writing. The orchestration sounds, to us, like wings (not unlike Mendelssohn’s depiction of the winged creates in AMidsummer Night’s Dream) and we consequently decided to include all of our dancers onstage as angelic beings – carrying swords and engaging in highly styled swordplay on the ritournelles between the sung portions of The Archangel’s aria.
Finally, Handel is a genius at creating running music, walking music, weeping music – music of sleep, and of rage. His cues are unmistakable and we do everything we can to follow them.
JS: We are promised “an inventive transformation of Koerner Hall by Gauci” for this production, so please fill us in with the details and tell us what you’ll be doing to one of my favourite halls.
MP: I don’t want to give too much away, but you can expect to see some spectacular architectural elements added to the Koerner Hall stage and balconies. We were very anxious, however, to do nothing that would impose on the space or make it seem that we wished we were in a proscenium arch theatre. Consequently, the enormous staircases and platforms have been given a painted treatment that make them indistinguishable from the architecture and woodwork of the hall itself. These new architectural elements do allow our singers and dancers to appear at a variety of levels that would never be possible otherwise.
JS: I need you to clarify and say more about this delicious sentence regarding your production: “Handel’s astonishingly sensual score and vivid word painting act as a catalyst for an exceptional play of emotions for all the protagonists.”
MP: Handel may have been a Protestant, but he seems to have absorbed all of the most sensual aspects of the counter-reformation Catholic church. The Catholic church of the 18th century never shied away from those emotions and responses that make us most human. In fact, the church took these qualities and translated them into a spiritual realm. The line between human sensuality and sexuality becomes blurred as characters enter states of spiritual ecstasy. Pain and pleasure become inextricably tied together. A perfect example being Bernini’s Ecstasy of Saint Teresa or countless Saint Sebastians and other ravishing martyrs depicted in the throes of ecstatic duress.
JS: Apparently, this will be the first time “both male and female Artists of Atelier Ballet will be armed with swords” and I wonder if anyone has recently requested an increase in pay, considering this new addition to their performance skills. Do the personalities of your dancers change when they carry arms?
MP: The Artists of Atelier Ballet are all superb fighters, having been in the capable hands of our resident Fight Director, Jennifer Parr, for many years. We seldom, however, have had the opportunity to put weapons in the hands of the women of the cast – other than the brandishing of a dagger or Cherubino’s adorable fencing match with Figaro. It was a great pleasure for all of the Artists of Atelier Ballet to handle weapons together for the opening of The Resurrection. The swordplay becomes an extension of the choreography, just as you would find in ballets such as Romeo & Juliet.
JS: Please tell me more about “renowned acoustics” of Koerner Hall that so many singers remark upon. How is sound experienced differently by singers and listeners in this venue in comparison with other venues.
MP: Our singers invariably comment on the fact that every part of the stage gives an equal response to their voice. They find there is no need to push and that their voices carry in a particularly natural way into the house. Our singers and dancers have also all commented on a heightened sense of colour in the music-making of the orchestra – a less amorphous sound, and more of a sense of individual instrumentalists working together to create a desired effect.
JS: Speaking of singers, you again, as usual, have a very impressive cast for your production. Could you say a few words about each singer and what unique qualities we can anticipate in each one’s singing?
MP: With pleasure.
Tenor Colin Ainsworth, interestingly enough, made his professional debut singing the role of St John for Opera Atelier’s semi-staged production of The Resurrection which took place in 1991 in the Jane Mallett Theatre. Even then, the extraordinary ease of his upper register and the sheer beauty of his voice promised great things and he has more than lived up to that promise. It would be difficult to find a more mellifluous or more sensitive singer. This combined with an extraordinary acting ability makes Colin, to my mind, one of the great singing actors of our time.
Soprano Carla Huhtanen: There are few coloratura sopranos who can handle the ornamentation that Handel wrote for The Archangel in The Resurrection. The ease with which Carla moves through ornamentation that was intended for castrati is astonishing. This coupled with her dramatic delivery and wonderful, ironic edge has made her an integral member of what is essentially a repertory company of singers and dancers.
Soprano Meghan Lindsay: We have known Meghan Lindsay ever since she graduated from the Glenn Gould School. It has been fascinating to witness the development of her voice as it has become bigger, richer, darker, and more dramatic over the years. Meghan is so at ease with the technical side of singing that at times you forget that she is singing at all. The line between singing and speaking becomes so blurred that she simply becomes an actor, capable of interpretations of great depth. Meghan will try anything you throw at her – a fearless performer in every aspect of her craft.
Mezzo-Soprano Allyson McHardy: Allyson’s beautiful voice is one in a million. She has all of the dark beauty and richness of a contralto, coupled with a top that any mezzo would envy. She is a particularly intelligent and thoughtful performer, who deeply internalizes her emotions without ever losing sight of her audience.
Bass-Baritone Douglas Williams: Douglas is one of the most fascinating performers you could hope to meet. His astonishing good looks and heroic physique would practically put him at a disadvantage were it not for the fact that they are coupled by a magnificent voice, extraordinary dramatic ability, and a completely un-self-conscious sense of humour which captures his audience and colleagues off guard. He would be as comfortable singing Papageno as Don Giovanni. He is capable of projecting a type of darkness and danger, which I personally find fascinating, and lends itself particularly well to roles such as Lucifer, whom he has depicted for us in OA’s film production of Angel, and now in The Resurrection.
JS: Please tell us something about your creative relationships with Kimberly Purtell, Michael Legouffe, David Fallis, Tafelmusik, Gerard Gauci, and of course Jeanette Lajeunesse Zingg. For one, how do they influence your thinking about a production or about opera itself?
MP: Opera Atelier has grown organically over the years and this is one of the company’s great strengths. By surrounding ourselves with a team of like-minded people, we have been able to pursue goals that we have in common, even while continuing to grow and develop in our own personal directions. OA’s creative team never ceases to take Jeannette and me by surprise. Their input is never predictable and the growth and changes we have all experienced within our artistic careers have in turn pushed Opera Atelier into new and unexpected directions, aesthetically and in terms of repertoire.
Production meetings, per se, are less important in our creative process than the daily interaction and exchange of ideas that takes place between all members of the creative team. Our work is collaborative in the extreme and we are well aware of each other’s strengths and weaknesses. Gerard Gauci and David Fallis have been part of Opera Atelier since the company’s inception, and Jeannette and I now enjoy a sort of creative shorthand with both of them that enables a smooth and efficient creative process. That process extends beyond what we create in the theatre and includes what books we read, what music we listen to, where we choose to travel, and the other art forms that influence us. Photographer Bruce Zinger should also be included in this roundup. We are all in agreement that an OA production begins with an image. The images Bruce creates for us and with us do not depict precisely what our audience will see on stage, rather, they alert our audience to what the production will feel like, and how we, as a creative team, feel about the repertoire in question.
New members of the core team are brought in on a regular basis. For example, this is only the second production we have created with Lighting Designer Kim Purtell. We were aware of Kim’s exceptional work and had wanted to collaborate with her for many years. It was only recently, however, that our schedules aligned and I feel that Kim has come to collaborate with us at exactly the right moment in our company’s history.
The same can be said for Costume Designer Michael Legouffe, our Fight Director Jennifer Parr, our team of painters and carpenters, and our entire administrative and production team.
JS: You’ve spoken of Toronto as “returning to live theatre with great enthusiasm,” so could you fill in for us why live theatre, and live concerts, are so important in our lives. What are we without them?
MP: As inhabitants of the 21st century, we spend a great deal of time interacting and being influenced, on a personal and professional level, by our virtual relationships. As we have become more and more cut off from each other socially, we have begun to lose an important sense of community. Live theatre provides us with a space in which we can reestablish that sense of community, while interacting with artists and audience members in ways that affirm our humanity and our dependence on each other.
There is something in our DNA that responds to live storytelling – an activity that belongs to the prehistoric and preliterate world. The sort of storytelling that a live theatre experience makes possible has a cleansing effect on all participants – a cathartic experience that cannot be replicated by interaction in the digital world.
Live theatre and live concerts literally make us more human and more humane. Without them, we are only partially conscious.
JS: What are your plans for next season?
MP: I can’t speak of these plans in detail, but you can expect a major piece of late 18th century French repertoire, and a program that includes French music from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, played on period instruments. A program of this sort would have been unthinkable 30 years ago, but this exemplifies the natural evolution and growth that takes place within a company like Opera Atelier.
1)FAIRUZ: ALMAHABA – A voice full of horizon and instinctive understanding. I wrote a poem about her decades ago that hardly even reached her a nuanced profundity. A few weeks ago, a young cashier, Serena, from Lebanon, and I chatted away about Fairuz while other shoppers waited patiently to pay for their groceries. They must have respected our adoration of the singer.
2) MELINA KANA: PORTRAIT – Another unique and haunting voice, accompanied with irresistible bouzouki and distinctively Greek rhythms and includes one almost overwhelming selection of Kana with the band Ashkabat from Turkmenistan. Maybe ten years ago, a Greek friend who had moved back to Greece wrote and said, “Send me your poem about Melina Kana, because she is now a neighbour of mine and I want to give it to her.”
3) JOHANN BAPTIST VANHAL & ANYTHING BY THE EYBLER QUARTET – Great joy was mine last week when Bud Roach’s Hammer Baroque offered a recital by one of my favorite chamber music groups, the Eybler Quartet. The Eyblers are special for many reasons: their vigorous technical mastery, their intriguing and sometimes not widely known (Eybler, Vanhal) repertoire, their compelling joie de vivre, their delightful introductions to the quartets they play in recital, their unity of purpose in musical magic.
4) RICHARD & LINDA THOMPSON: HARD LUCK STORIES – Once long ago when I interviewed Richard Thompson, I told him that should I ever have a funeral I’d want his guitar instrumental, Dargai, played. This box set collects all the recordings of the – at the time – married pair, and because Linda has one of most quietly gripping voices in folk and because Richard is always a guitarist, songwriter, singer of piercing and imaginative versatility, we have an abundance of often unforgettable gems here.
5) RICERCAR CONSORT: DIETRICH BUXTEHUDE KANTATEN – Like many, I used to spend hours in the classical music section of Sam the Record Man and A&A Records, and during one such pilgrimage the good folks were playing the Ricercar Consort’s recording Dietrich Buxtehude’s Kantaten. I found myself prolonging my browse until, finally, I said to the sales staff, “I want that recording!” And ever since I have enjoyed the recording’s lilting purity of heart and its unforced sense of spiritual dignity.
6) DICK GAUGHAN: A HANDFUL OF EARTH – Once at Dick Gaughan’s gig at Toronto’s Tranzac Club, singer Gartnet Rogers said to me, “I can’t believe he plays all those notes!” And, to be sure, Dick Gaughan of Glasgow is definitely a genius of imaginative flatpicking in Scottish repertoire. Moreover, his voice is full-bodied, assertive, and challenging in its connection to his native land, the working class, and depths of the human heart. Handful of Earth was voted Recording of the Decade in Britain about thirty years ago.
7) KATHLEEN FERRIER: BACH AND HANDEL- Contralto Maureen Forrester once told me that her career moved into a higher level when Bruno Walter needed a contralto to replace the recently deceased Kathleen Ferrier. I always find that I stop whatever I’m doing when Ferrier starts to sing, especially Bach and Handel, and feel transported to another level of being human. I’ve loved this recording a long time for that reason alone – and the profound beauty of her voice.
8) TIME IS ON MY SIDE: IRMA THOMAS, 24 CLASSIC RECORDINGS FROM THE SOUL QUEEN OF NEW ORLEANS 1962-66 – There are a number of widely adored and sometimes brilliant popular singers – like Aretha Franklin – I simply do not listen to any more. But I return to this collection whenever I want a soulful voice that sounds like a life lived, a life deeply felt, and a voice that makes intimate connection as it swings with the human heart. Ruler of My Heart makes me melt every time I hear it.
9) VILDE FRANG: BRITTEN KORNGOLD VIOLIN CONCERTOS – What is that musical instinct in us that, upon hearing a musician, says to us “Check out this one?” I know not, but there are several recordings on this list that appear owing to that instinct, and Frang’s is one. I once heard her first playing the Stravinsky concerto and, here again, so fused is the musician to her instrument that the violin seems to have its own presence, its own quality of being. Frang can be breathtaking, but so compelling is she as a performer that we never stand back and marvel but feel compelled instead to live the music with her.
10) CAPELLA INTIMA & THE GALLERY PLAYERS OF NIAGARA: WORSHIP IN A TIME OF PLAGUE – Not only is Bud Roach the founder of Hammer Baroque, but he has likewise designation as the founder of Capella Intima. Not only is Margaret Gay the cellist of the Eybler Quartet, she is also Artistic Director of the Gallery Players of this recording. The plague in question is not ours, but one from the time of Heinrich Schutz whose work is featured here as six of the thirteen works, the same Schutz who, on his return to Dresden from Venice, was soon to see that “one third of the Republic’s population succumbed” to the plague. This a quietly delicious recording, rich with vocally shaped passion, poise in manner, and idiomatic savoir faire.
11) SERGIO AND ODAIR ASSAD: ALMA BRASILEIRA – I discovered Sergio and Odair Assad, acoustic guitarists extraordinaire, through Scott Yoo’s programs on music on PBS television and, as quickly as I could, tracked down four of their now hard-to-find CDs which now give much regular pleasure. “These don’t sound like usual guitar recordings,” said Margaret, and, yes, through the playing of the Assads we delight in the guitar’s many tonal resources as we, through their imaginative mastery, flow invariably from atmosphere to atmosphere in something of a dream. If you love guitar, the riches and pleasures here are many.
12) INTRODUCING SHIYANI NGCOBO – As I write these words, I am listening to Shiyani Ngcobo’s recording and find I cannot still – I find my body parts each want to follow some calling from the music and the singer’s sometimes raspy voice. The disc’s notes say that this music, maskanda, is “born of the Zulu experience of labour migrancy” and is ” a musical dance style dominated by lush acoustic guitar picking and distinctive rhythms.” I also find it celebratory and life-affirming, stylistically intriguing and a joy to hear.
13)MOZART VIOLIN CONCERTOS, FRANCESCA DEGO WITH SIR ROGER NORRINGTON & THE ROYAL SCOTTISH NATIONAL ORCHESTRA – Sometimes following media hoopla pays aesthetic dividends, and with two discs of Mozart violin concerti now declared as Roger Norrington’s last recordings and having sampled violinist Francesca Dego on the internet, I am happily taking much pleasure in this Volume 1. Norrington, of course, has a history of controversy for his interpretations, say of Beethoven, but I find his partnership with Dego makes me pay attention to the music and enjoy the technical virtuosity, the interpretive choices, the implicit humour, and the obviously informed commitment of both conductor and violinist. I find I want to take time to appreciate these interpretations, which indeed I surely already do.
14) MICHAEL PRAETORIUS MESSE DE NOEL: GABRIELLI CONSORT AND PLAYERS, DIRECTION PAUL MCCREESH -We have here a case of (a) and (b) so let me explain, starting with (b) which is a CD released in 1994 and which I have treasured since that time. It’s a Lutheran Mass for Christmas Morning “as it might have been celebrated around 1620” and in this performance has the formal vocal grandeur and somewhat peppy tempo in the instrumental parts that would make it a compelling occasion in a large cathedral. And then half a year ago I acquired a DVD of the same mass with Paul McCreesh and his Gabrielli group, performed this time two years ago in the Chapelle Royale of Versailles which gives a more intimate space, and ergo a more intimate performance to which I had not been accustomed. So, to be brief, I love this performance which I have viewed several dozen times. I love the feeling of intimacy with the singers and players, I love feeling of smaller scale which draws one in to the space of these folks, and I love the photography with its frequent cuts which place us pore to pore beside the fine musicians.
15) JACQUES BREL: L’INTEGRALE DES ALBUMS ORIGINAUX – Again many years ago, we saw Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris one night in Toronto, then stopped off at Sam the Record Man to buy an LP of Brel himself singing, and rarely listened to any Broadway-ish take on his songs again. I have watched films of Brel’s many available performances and listened to most of his CDs, and find most English versions of his songs idiomatically off base, often whimpy and whiny or hurried in manner, and a very inaccurate reflection of the man’s unique presence ad style. I have also happily found a number of not-too-well-known gems in his creative box, songs like Sur la Place, Pourquoi Faut-il Que les Hommes S’Ennuient? and Il Neige sur Liege, and recently was frustrated with myself for forgetting some of the lyrics or chords in his songs. There is work to be done, n’est-ce pas?
16) OUM KALTHOUM: DIVA OF ARABIA – Twice in the past week I surprised Arabic speakers from the Middle East, including a doctor whom I was visiting for consultation, by saying that one of my favorite singers is Oum Kalthoum, here presented in a five CD set. My friend Brenda Bell, who as Badia Star used to dance in the more prestigious hotels of Cairo, once explained how, when she danced to songs of Oum Kalthoum, Arabic-speaking audiences would appreciate how she physically translated the words of this great singer’s songs, whereas Canadian audiences were of the immature “take it off” mentality. You’ll hear much audience response in these recordings and also much soul as it is experienced in the Middle East.
17) MARTIN CARTHY: WAITING FOR ANGELS -By some quirk of fate, I was once offered the opportunity of a performance by British folk legend Martin Carthy in my class of students at the Sheridan College School of Design. I’ve seen him perform many times in Canada and Britain since that fortunate day and you’ll now find many of the much-honoured Martin’s CDs on my shelf. His guitar playing, which he created through years of experimentation, is one-of a kind and highly respected and influential, his singing is evocative, and he is also a traditional song reviser with respect for the original a primary concern. He’s been called the most important British folk singer in Britain in the past fifty years.
18) NUSRAT FATEH ALI KHAN: SUFI SOUNDS FROM THE QAWWALI KING – The man was and is a legend, and as I found out during our interview, one devoted musically and spiritually to his music. He didn’t have reason to expect to be “the qawalli king” in his earlier years but here he was on tour with music and singing that are passionate, joy-inducing, and memorable. This Rough Guide sampler is a good introduction to this joyful, spirited music.
19) SATIE: PIANO WORKS – The piano music Erik Satie is perfect for so many nights or so many mornings, rich as they are with longing and wistfulness that easily echo one’s existence in times like these. I’m especially fond of these recordings by Anne Queffelec and have spent many hours with these well-known works massaging the atmosphere about me and within me. Mood-making and mood-changing music, this is.
20) PURE BACH: VIVIANE CHASSOT – A new discovery and recently highly-honoured recording of – who would have guessed? – Bach on the accordion of Viviane Chassot. Chassot has an instinct for the essence of this music, one feels, and it’s a quiet joy to surrender to her nuances and musical flavours, be they reflective or dance-worthy, in these five works of the great one – the Well-Tempered Clavier being one. An irresistible recording.
21) TOUMANI DIABATE’S SYMMETRIC ORCHESTRA: BOULEVARD DE L’INDEPENDANCE – We are told in the CD’s booklet that “the Symmetric Orchestra is an institution, a whole legend in Mali,’ and even a brief listen to the pulse of this compelling music with its many surprises in arrangement and sound along the way explains all. Included is a DVD for footage of home turf in Mali with the music being both made and listened too. Kora lovers will have some interesting footage of this kora master explaining the development of the music, and the kora.
22) DOMENICO SCARLATTIT: DOMENICO SCARLATTI SONATAS – One of my regular go-to pianists is Angela Hewitt, whenever I need a dose of Bach, of course. But this collection of Scarlatti is also a special pleasure chez moi, one which invariably delights. And I’m now checking out her take on Beethoven sonatas, especially number 17 which was the first of Beethoven’s I really listened to. I’m always in awe of Angela’s technical precision and astutely-judged fluidity that, combined, denote a well-honed communication between the pianist’s creative spirit and her instrument.
23) IVANA GAVRIC: IN THE MISTS: Another pianist to whom I give regular listenings is Ivana Gavric, here with a selection from Janacek, Schubert, Liszt, and Rachmaninov. With Gavric, I usually feel an instinctive blending of thinking and feeling in her playing, one in which both currents flow, twinned, at one time. Also, I feel a sense of unfolding in her playing as if each recital is a musical path of discovery which, as witnesses, we share. In turn, a subtle undercurrent of suspense sometimes prevails in her playing.
24) SOLLAZZO ENSEMBLE: PARLE QUI VEUT, MORALIZING SONGS OF THE MIDDLE AGES – This CD features a combination of musicians and singers you might not hear, for the most part, in other performances by Sollazzo, since director/fiddle player Anna Danilevskaia certainly shows a repeated knack for putting together new groupings, all of whom delight with their artistic smarts and enthusiastic energy in an always intriguing repertoire. I recorded one performance from MEZO television, a performance in which voice and lyrics seemed uncannily in sync, and here we have another. An important group.
25) MIVOS QUARTET: FOR THOSE WHO DIED TRING BY FRANK HORVAT – Described as a means to pay “homage to these human rights defenders in Thailand who were killed trying to stop powerful interests that wanted to destroy their community environment,” Horvat’s composition in 35 movements is a heart-stopping experience that forces the listener to touch human emotions and thoughts that are sometimes impossible to articulate in fickle words. Thus, a sensitively crafted music from Horvat’s imagination, does the job in creating a dignified and haunting homage. We live in a time when humanity becomes more cruel and ugly in some quarters, and I hope that Horvat continues to watch, experience, and create more such works.
JAMES STRECKER: Please tell us about a creation of yours featured at this year’s Toronto Summer Music Festival. Why exactly does it matter to you and why should it matter to your listeners?
JAMES STRECKER: Please tell us about a creation of yours featured at this year’s Toronto Summer Music Festival. Why exactly does it matter to you and why should it matter to your listeners?
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