Is coming to Ottawa from May 18 to June 4, 2006 under the big top at Lansdowne Park.

Anyone interested?

 › events     2005-11-16 17:43   ...2 comments

I know someone (guess who) who is always interested in the dynamics of relationships between women. I thought that person might be interested in a three-part Ideas series on the topic. Entitled it’s a girl’s world, the series is described as follows.

What does the social world of girls look like? At first glance, it’s about sharing secrets, giggling over boys and carefree fun. But lurking underneath this façade of niceness is a hidden culture of nastiness that pits one friend against another. Lynn Glazier examines the tumultuous nature of female relationships from girlhood to adulthood; from the playground to the office.

The series runs for three Wednesdays starting tomorrow, October 6, at 9:05 pm. 9:35 in Newfoundland. Apparently there is an NFB film to complement the radio show. Apparently the CBC does not know how to use a semicolon.

 › events     2004-10-05 19:51   ...0 comments

The conductor was Thierry Fischer, and man he was weak. This performance only worked because the orchestra know this piece so well that they can carry on without any direction at all. All he did was wave his arms in a random fashion, totally without any relationship to the music. The chorus was on their own, and were remarkably together given that few entries were indicated, and fewer cadences conducted, nor was any significant beating of time present during the sixteenth-note runs that are so prevalent through Handel’s work.

The great amen was actually boring, which it should not be. It was boring because there was no direction for any movement: neither dynamic nor tempo was altered by this vegetative “maestro”. The CAMMAC chorus achieved more passion after 2 hours of rehearsal.

The piece was not helped by a bass soloist who believes that wide and inaccurate vibrato will camouflage imprecise timing of long runs. The soprano was good, as was the tenor (I’ll grant him a pitch problem once, as the rest of his performance was grand).

As always my favorite performer was the timpanist, Ian Bernard who is a delight to watch onstage. After him would definetly be the trumpet solo, smooth as silk in “The trumpet shall sound”.

All in all, a fun evening from the point of view of being a critic, but a disappointing performance, salvaged only by the efforts of the chorus and orchestra to overcome the totally farcical direction.

 › events     2003-12-17 23:32   ...0 comments

As background, I should say that I’m not a huge dance afficionado, although I find some dance performances quite enjoyable. I’m definitely not a fan of contemporary dance as a voyeuristic experience; I find many modern dance companies fall back on sexual innuendo onstage.

The beginning of Break Open Play got off to a shaky start, but quickly became much more interesting as the company left the obvious “we’re in bed together” material behind.

The dance piece constantly had me re-evaluating what was an active part of the production, and what was passive. The music (excellent, trancy, by the way) had CD clicks and needle pop sounds which gradually came to become rhythmic devices. The stage dressing, consisting of three large floor-to-ceiling sheets of paper mounted as a sort of segmented cyclorama, was soon attacked with scissors and converted to set piece, then later (with the help of some gaff tape) converted to costume. A brilliant prop was an overhead projector that lit dancers dressed in white; overhead markers coloured the dancers in while we watched. Of course, the projector later became incorporated into the performance as more than a static prop, as did the low cart it was on.

All in all, I enjoyed myself, although I thought the pace dragged a bit from time to time. I wonder what the teenagers thought of it… perhaps they thought it needed to be sexxed up?

 › events     2003-11-30 16:03   ...0 comments

This rehearsal was mercifully free of lumbering basses, and was really quite good. A few pitch problems in the soprano section, and the tenors were new to the music, but otherwise quite enjoyable.

The “performance” is on Friday at Dominion-Chalmers United Church, which, incidentally, is the church of my grandmother’s (Edith and Len’s) family.

I also found this site about Messiah’s influence on Beethoven.

 › events     2003-11-29 14:04   ...0 comments