The Brott Blog

Carmen: Captivating & Especially Creative

2011-08-10T19:42:00.000-07:00

The Ontario Arts Review
Review by Danny Gaisin
Aug. 7th, ‘11
It’s been this opera-loving writer’s experience that performances of the genre take two forms only…full blown (and expensive) mountings with elaborate sets and meticulous costuming; or in-concert mode wherein formally dressed soloists present the major arias in duet or quartet format. Last evening, the 2011 Brott Festival bridged the gap between both structures with a superlatively professional staging of Bizet’s iconic “CARMEN”. Only omission: - grandiose scenery or flats. Costumes – yes; full orchestra – of course; choir – naturally; surtitles™ - de rigeuer; and talented divas/divos – certainly. Then the icing … creative gloss and imaginative presentational arranging from an inspired Giandomenico Vaccari – artistic coordinator of Italy’s ‘Teatro Politeama Petruzzelli’.
Vaccari ingeniously incorporated the physical layout of Mohawk’s McIntyre Theatre utilizing the aisles and side panels into the story, thus making the audience part of the crowd scenes and eliminating the need for supernumeraries (but we weren’t honorarium-ed!).

Cast of CARMEN, accepting kudos!
His arrangement of the opera expanded the amount of un-sung dialogue which escalated plot progress, without diminishing dramatic buildup. A canny piece of imagery… during the familiar overture, the hero and heroine are motionless silhouettes portending the finale stabbing. Creatively, he had his singers blocked with constant movement negating any sense of static so endemic to concert versions. Director Vaccari admitted post-curtain that he does not micro-manage; instead insisting that his performers contribute their own elements to their portrayals.
The first major aria, Carmen’s ‘Habanera’; had mezzo-soprano Lauren Segal iterating ‘L’amour et un oiseau rabelle’, analogous of her own persona. Barefooted and frowzy-headed, she emanated all the sexuality a temptress can muster. Not only was Segal the title character, she made the show her own, even with a dynamic octet of co-stars. As her lover cum nemesis, Keith Klassen’sDon José was a tour-de-force interpretation. To his commanding presence and superb vocal skills, he added a dimension of vulnerability that is infrequent in this role’s interpretation. As his back-home girlfriend, Sinéad Sugrue’s Micaëla projected all the tentative diffidence that the role demands. Her solo aria at the beginning of Act III; ‘je dis que rien…’ had the insincere bravado we’ve all experienced at one time or other. Not only did she deliver a heartfelt vocal rendering, she projected an equally potent thespian depiction as well.
The hypotenuse of the love triangle is an eminent toreador, and baritone Gregory Dahlimbued all the arrogance of a celebrated Palmer, Bryant or Lemieux. He enhanced his depiction with exaggerated posture and swagger that was not only effective, but genuine. His vocal description of the confrontation his ilk has with the bull was viscerally impacting. Bass Stephen Hegedus gave a credible rendering of Don Jose’s commanding officer who also has the hots for Carmen; and exceptional vocal support came from Mia Lennox-Williams & Rachel Cleland-Ainsworth as Carmen’s BFG’s. Baritone Justin Welsh contributed a strong interpretation to both his roles, including the test of being the opening soloist at the end of the overture.
Vaccari and Luigi Fuiano receiving plaques from Terry Whitehead

The Arcady Singers and the National Academy Orchestra were both led by conductor Boris Brott. A preamble and presentation to the guest directors by Hamilton council-member Terry Whitehead referred to maestro Brott as a “gemlike asset to the culture & status of our city” *** The “ARTS REVIEW” has just learned that Brott has been appointed principal guest-conductor of the acclaimed ‘Teatro Petruzzelli’. This Bari landmark; for those who enjoy B/W subtitled movies, will recall it as the actually-named setting of Sordi’s 1973 movie ‘Stardust”!
Comments, dangaisin@sympatico.ca

Who says opera is boring?

2011-08-09T04:59:00.000-07:00

by NONNA AROUTIOUNIAN
METRO CANADA
Published: August 04, 2011 4:58 p.m.
Last modified: August 04, 2011 5:00 p.m.

Lauren Segal as Carmen & Keith Klassen as Don Jose

in Brott Music Festival's performance of the opera Carmen August 6, 2011

A beautiful, fiery young woman finds herself torn between love and desire for two men and a life of freedom which she has sworn to herself she would live by. She promises herself never to fall victim to love, yet it is love that turns her life completely upside down, ultimately leading to her demise. Interested yet?

Yes, it’s awfully dramatic to be a real life story, but it does have a ring of truth many people can easily identify with: Love, life, jealousy and the trio’s resulting turbulence. No it’s not the latest movie or television drama, it’s Georges Bizet’s legendary opera, Carmen.

L-R Lauren Segal, Rachel Cleland-Ainsworth, Gregory Dahl, Mia Lennox-Williams

The famous French opera premiered in the late 19th century, which may be considered ancient by current popular culture, its basic story is one that has been played out and will continue to play out for centuries to come. Set in Seville Spain around 1820, Carmen depicts the titular gypsy as beautiful young woman free with her love and desires who kicks off a whirlwind of events by wooing an inexperienced young soldier, Don Jose, leading him to reject his former love and trigger a mutiny against his superior ranking officer. When Carmen turns away from him to another man, bullfighter Escamillio, his jealousy pushes him to violence.

Who says opera has to be complicated or boring? This particular piece is packed with drama, emotion and pure passion, not to mention great music and song which many will recognize. Canadian Opera Company’s mezzo-soprano Lauren Segal, who will be singing the role of Carmen, says the work “Is a perfect opera for a first-time opera goer. It’s filled with wonderful music and is a great, passionate story”.

Keith Klassen as Don Jose and Sinead Sugrue as Micaela

The characters themselves seem simple on the surface, yet beneath carry all the struggles and desires that real people do. Carmen herself plays a key role in the opera, and is not an easy woman to figure out.

Carmen is a challenge for anyone, she lives independently and for the moment. She is extremely fiery, headstrong and can be fatalistic. “It’s very easy to play the character of Carmen very one-sided” says Segal, “But I’m enjoying the challenge of finding and expressing her vulnerabilities as well as her strengths.”

For many opera singers, it is important to immerse completely into their roles, technically and emotionally. The first step is to finesse the role into the voice, and once there, the exploration of colour and expression can begin. For an experienced and exquisite singer such as Segal, this has proved to be an enjoyable process.

“For Carmen, I feel that the music itself is so powerful and passionate, that not much additional work is required to get in to her character - it is all there in the score,” she says.

Keith Klassen & Lauren Segal

And, of course, this is no high-school musical. On Aug. 6 at Mohawk College McIntyre Theatre, audiences can expect a full-on production. With director Giandomenico Vaccari and professional singers at the head of the stage, they are joined by the much experienced conductor Boris Brott and the National Academy Orchestra of Canada, not to mention a stage crew full of experienced production staff.

With so few classical music events this summer, this is a true headliner. From the great orchestral overtures to the beautiful arias, there is plenty to experience.

Lauren Segal as the free-spirited gypsy, Carmen

“Two of my favourite scenes are the duets with Don Jose at the ends of Act 2 and Act 4” says Segal. “They are filled with many layers, colours and passion”.

So whether you have seen many operas or none, Carmen is a steamy expressive drama you don’t want
to miss.

The Heat Is On with Brott’s Organ Fireworks!

2011-07-22T23:39:00.000-07:00

Organist Ken Cowan was spectacular

By Nonna Aroutiounian (NAO clarinet '11)
Playing an orchestral concert is tough enough as it is. The pressure to perform beautifully and musically while playing all the correct notes in time and in tune is no easy task.
But when forced to do so in a church with no ventilation and a temperature hovering around 40 degrees Celsius is a completely different story. I hope to tell you ours – from sweaty start to fabulous fini
While citizens of the GTA – including Hamilton and surrounding area -- will remember July 21 as the beginning of a sweltering heat wave, the musicians of the National Academy Orchestra of Canada who performed in the Organ Extravaganza concert that evening will remember it as possibly one of the hottest and most humid concerts ever to be played in the courses of their career

Nonna Aroutiounian (NAO clarinet '11)

The dress rehearsal that day was a challenge. Each musician packed at least two water bottles and towels to dry themselves off. We soon learned how hot it can get in Centenary Church. We quickly realized normal concert dress simply would not do. I could only imagine the anarchy if the men were forced to wear tuxedos.

As for proper concert attire, Boris Brott proudly announced, “Wear as little as possible! Well within reason, and keeping in sanctity of this church”. We all knew that with an audience, the stifling conditions of the church would rapidly worsen. Some in the orchestra were wondering if an audience would even show with a concert under such conditions. But the audience did show, and the concert, heated and sweaty as it was, went on.

I have to commend Ken Cowan, my fellow musicians and the conductors on playing a great concert under such brutal conditions. I don’t think anyone in the orchestra expected to be dripping sweat and panting quite so much while playing a concert. But I do have to say it was not in vain. Many in the audience came out in support of the NAO, and applauded everyone for playing a concert that would have normally been cancelled under such circumstances.

Organist Ken Cowan, a native of Thorold Ontario, has studied at Yale and works at Princeton. He completed his musical studies at The Curtis Institute of Music and Yale Institute of Sacred Music. He has done numerous recordings under the JAV Label and has toured throughout Canada, United States and Europe. While working with the orchestra all week he made do with a piano, but his technical skill and musical ability shined on Centenary’s restored five keyboard pipe organ. Nothing was more satisfying than when the first notes of the organ blossomed in the middle of Saint-Saens' Third Symphony.

I have to constantly remind myself, and I’m sure others do as well, it may have been hot and unpleasant, but it was and always is first and foremost about the music. As a musician, a standing ovation at the end of the concert was enough to make me feel the success of the night.

2011-07-22T23:18:00.000-07:00

Why bother with classical music? (From the Spec)

2011-07-15T16:24:00.000-07:00

Musicians strive to reinvent — to bring new life and energy to — orchestral music

by Nonna Arountinian (NAO Clarinet '11)

Special to the Spectator

2011 National Academy Orchestra performs under the baton of Boris Brott July 14, 2011

In today’s fast-paced world, what is popular and current in music is more often than not driven by those with short attention spans looking to make a quick dollar and piggyback on the latest beat or catchy chorus. So it’s no small wonder many orchestras are in a constant struggle to stay afloat.

Orchestras fight daily to make ends meet, to pay the cost of musicians, directors, administrative staff, covering the cost of venues, rehearsal space, and a number of other things — not to mention trying to keep the costs of attending such concerts low enough to keep them accessible to all types of audiences.

So why bother? Why bother trying to uphold a style of music and an industry that is clearly being pushed out by the pop stars of our generation?

Classical music and the tradition it upholds is one of the jewels of Western civilization, part of what makes the Western world what it is. It played an important role in the history and culture of Western populations and is at the root of our artistic and creative evolution. As a musician and performer, I truly believe it is something to be cherished and celebrated.

Luckily, the musicians of the National Academy Orchestra of Canada and the Brott Music Festival are helping to bring new life and energy to many classical works, symphonies and concertos this summer season. The NAO, primarily based in Hamilton, was founded in 1989 by conductor Boris Brott. It is made up of Canada’s emerging young professional performers who work as apprentice musicians alongside established professionals from some of Canada’s finest orchestras.

With nationwide auditions, an opportunity such as this does not present itself often to Canada’s young musicians. I personally feel incredibly lucky to be able to participate in this orchestra, to help reinvent music and share my passion for it. For many of us in the orchestra, myself included, this is a key stepping-stone to carving out a career as a professional orchestral musician, music administrator or a teacher.

The NAO’s orchestral season began on June 8 and runs through to Aug. 18. With seven concerts already behind us, my colleagues are relentless in bringing an unmatched youthful vitality and energy to our performances. With one of the most exciting starts to the season and a packed audience, the season kicked off impressively with a guest performance by Giampiero Sobrino on clarinet playing Weber’s Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra No. 1 in F minor, and the highly anticipated Beethoven’s 5th Symphony.

To the audience’s delight, the orchestra did not disappoint and followed it with an equally fantastic concert on June 18, with guest conductor and french horn player James Sommerville. He is also the music director for the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra and principal horn for the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

The season has continued to gain momentum with fantastic performances by guest artists Laurence Kayaleh on violin, Valerie Tryon on piano and most recently the young virtuoso pianist Jan Lisiecki.

Also worth mentioning are the wonderful conductors who are behind the creative process of the orchestra. While Brott heads the orchestra full time, he is joined by his apprentice conductor Philippe Menard, and guest conductors Martin MacDonald (resident conductor, Symphony Nova Scotia), Alain Trudel (artistic director, Orchestra London Canada) and Sommerville.

Nonna Aroutiounian

For myself and others in the orchestra, it is a complete pleasure and privilege to be able to work daily with such creative minds. I cannot even begin to describe the excitement and drive that is felt in every rehearsal and performance, it must be seen to be thoroughly understood.
To experience the wonder of what music has to offer, one truly must hear the beauty of sound in the moment of its creation. The NAO’s upcoming concerts on July 21, 23 and the 27, as will the rest of the season, lend themself to the highest of standards in offering audiences nothing but the very sublime.

Nonna Aroutiounian earned her Bachelor’s in Music Performance at the University of British Columbia and is currently earning her Masters in Clarinet Performance at the University of Michigan. She is a performing clarinetist for the National Academy Orchestra of Canada’s 2011 season.

The Three Bowties!

2011-07-15T11:54:00.000-07:00

Boris Brott, Jan Lisiecki, Philippe Menard

McIntyre Centre for the Performing Arts July 14, 2011

From Ontario Arts Review: From Romance to a Love Affair

2011-07-10T19:11:00.000-07:00

Review by Eyal Bitton July 7th, ‘11
Photos by Diane Clark

Famed Metropolitan Opera star Ermanno Mauro

A public love affair with opera was on display last evening as maestro Boris Brott expertly seduced the audience with a selection of stellar romantic works in Opera Romance. The evening opened with the National Academy Orchestra's interpretation of the overture from Rossini's ‘Il Barbiere di Siviglia’, deftly conducted by the NAO's current RBC Foundation apprentice-conductor Philippe Ménard. Ménard's expressive conducting and evident joy in the music infused the opening piece with the evening's theme - passion. Mezzo Lauren Segal then graced the stage as Rosina from ‘Barbiere’.

Mezzo Lauren Segal sings 'Una voce poco fa" under the baton of Philippe Menard

We were indeed watching Rosina and not Segal as the mezzo completely immersed herself in her character. This was no recital but truly opera as Segal, with her rich, full voice playfully, coyly, and beautifully performed ‘Una voce poco fa’. The audience loved it as they could not contain their shouts of approval following the aria. Brava!

Perhaps the most impressive arias of the evening were sung by tenor Ermanno Mauro. What command! What beauty!

What drama! In his first aria, ‘Un di all'azzurro spazio’ from Giordano's “Andrea Chénier”; Mauro's entire body seemed to embrace the music. His tour de force, however, was ‘Vesti la giubba’ from Leoncavallo's Pagliacci. Mauro's acting was unquestionably superb & breathtaking… it was a master class in opera. Watching Mauro's emotionally wounded Pagliacci was an incredibly heart-wrenching experience. As he stumbled, we stumbled; as he fell apart, we too, fell apart. The audience leaped to its feet to give Mauro a merited standing ovation for a formidable performance.

Another guest conductor, Martin MacDonald, made a brief but memorable appearance conducting an energetic and electrifying Bacchanale from Camille Saint-Saëns' “Samson et Dalila”. It was another audience favourite.

Sinead Sugrue sings 'Stridono Lassu' as Boris Brott conducts the National Academy Orchestra

Baritone Peter McGillivray and Mezzo Lauren Segal perform a duet from Saint Saens Samson e Dalila

Silky-voiced Irish-Canadian soprano; Sinéad Sugrue, was magnificent. A standout performance of the evening was her rendition of ‘Sempre libera’ from “La Traviata”. Sugrue possesses a stunning vocal instrument with great emotional and dynamic range. She displayed such facility in singing such a complex vocal piece and it was truly masterful. Baritone Peter McGillivray seemed to relish both the music and the roles he played as well. In a duet with Segal (‘J'ai gravi la montagne’ from “Samson et Dalila”), he was particularly contemptible & snide as the High Priest of Dagon, conveying the essence of the character through his acting as well as his voice. His mellifluous tones and powerful vocal chords filled the room. McGillivray had an opportunity to shine in his aria ‘Di provenza il mar’ from “Traviata”. He sang it beautifully; tenderly, and with lovely sensitivity.

A touching moment- one that captures the mood of the evening; occurred during Mauro's final aria, ‘Torna a Surriento’ by Ernesto De Curtis. Maestro Brott had earlier mentioned that the tenor was battling a vocal problem due to rehearsing for several days in the air-conditioned hall and was soldiering on nevertheless. By this time in the concert, Mauro had, unfortunately, lost his voice. He valiantly tried to sing his opening words but little came out. What happened next was beautiful. The audience took over. It was the audience's way of supporting an admired tenor who had won their hearts. It was a show of compassion and passion - not just for Mauro but for opera itself. The warmth filled the room. Indeed, this installment of the Brott Music Festival, Opera Romance, was a romance in itself. More than that, it was a love affair!

From the Spec: Kayaleh Makes Her Brott Debut

2011-06-22T11:05:00.000-07:00

Kayaleh to make Brott debut

Laurence Kayaleh 2.jpg Laurence Kayaleh will be making her Brott Festival debut this Saturday in Burlington.

Michael Slobodian/Special to The Hamilton Spectator

Some people are born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Laurence Kayaleh was born with a violin in her hand.

After all, she is the daughter of Habib Kayaleh, the noted violin pedagogue who’s been running his elite Kayaleh Violin Academy in Crans-près-Céligny, near Geneva, Switzerland, since 1989, and with his pianist wife, Ingrid Hoogendorp, their Ecole supérieure de musique since 1973.

“He taught me everything,” said Kayaleh of her father over the phone from her Montréal pad.

Though her dad was her primary teacher, she also took master classes and played for the crème de la crème: Nathan Milstein, Igor Oistrakh, and Yehudi Menuhin among others. Not a bad upbringing.

Career wise, she’s played around the globe, giving concerts in her native Switzerland, Europe, the U.S., Latin America, the Far East, Russia, and Canada.

Kayaleh first came to Canada in 1999 to solo with the Montréal Symphony Orchestra under then-conductor Charles Dutoit. She’d been looking for a pied-à-terre in North America, and Montréal, with its Old World charm and French language, not to mention relative proximity to the U.S. (well, it’s closer to the Big Apple than Geneva is), fit her bill.

A Canadian citizen for four years now, she’s been on the faculty at the Université de Montréal for the past two years, counting a dozen students in her studio.

This Saturday, Kayaleh makes her Brott Festival début performing Beethoven’s Violin Concerto with the National Academy Orchestra in St. Christopher’s Church, Burlington.

Scores of people have written cadenzas for this concerto’s three movements. However, none of them have the surname Beethoven. It seems that Beethoven either couldn’t have been bothered to write out the cadenzas, or more likely, simply left that to the improvisational skills of the soloist. So, at the concerto’s première in 1806, that challenge fell to Franz Clement, a violin virtuoso and sometime composer whose own violin concerto may well have been an influence on Beethoven’s essay.

Over the years, composers from Camille Saint-Saëns to Ferruccio Busoni to Alfred Schnittke have had a go at putting the cadenzas to paper. And then there are the cadenzas by violinists such as Joseph Joachim, Henryk Wieniawski, Eugène Ysaÿe, Carl Flesch, Joseph Silverstein, and most recently, Rachel Barton Pine.

As for Kayaleh, she’ll be doing Fritz Kreisler’s cadenzas, something she’s done whenever and wherever she’s performed the concerto.

“I think it’s the most concise cadenza,” stated Kayaleh. “It’s beautifully written, but at the same time it’s not long.”

For the past 18 years, Kayaleh’s hands have held a 1742 Petrus Guarnerius. She owns the violin, after it was purchased for her by a now deceased Swiss maecenae. Kayaleh fondly recalls the day she tried out this Venetian violin in Geneva’s Tonhalle.

“I saw the beauty of this instrument. I cannot describe it. It was something absolutely overwhelming,” said Kayaleh. “I took it in my hands and started to play a few notes. I knew that this was my violin.”

“This instrument is really part of me. It is a continuation of my body, of my soul,” said Kayaleh. “At the same time, it’s a tool I’m working with. It’s living with me actually all the time, my big love.”

The bill also includes Mendelssohn’s ‘Italian’ Symphony, Mercure’s Kaléidoscope, and Beethoven’s Creatures of Prometheus Overture.

Leonard Turnevicius writes on classical music for The Spectator

leonardturnevicius@gmail.com

Beethoven’s Violin Concerto

With: Laurence Kayaleh, Martin MacDonald and the National Academy Orchestra

When: Saturday, June 25 at 7:30 p.m.

Where: St. Christopher’s Anglican Church, 662 Guelph Line, Burlington

Cost: $32, senior $27, student $10 (plus HST); add $5 for a reserved section seat

Call: 905-525-7664

Coming up

The TD Toronto Jazz Festival celebrates its silver jubilee with performances across the city until July 3. Of note to classical fans is Jessye Norman’s concert in Koerner Hall, 273 Bloor St. W. on Tuesday, June 28 at 8 p.m.

Sommerville Conducts Beethoven's Seventh Symphony: An excerpt

2011-06-21T09:53:00.001-07:00

Brott, of course, it's summer

2011-06-09T08:33:00.000-07:00

More than just warm weather has arrived in the city.

So, too, has a batch of 20-somethings from across Canada with their instruments.

Yes, these are the musician-apprentices of Boris Brott's National Academy Orchestra. And for the next three months they'll be providing the area with the sounds of summer.

This Saturday at St. Christopher's Anglican Church, Burlington, Brott kicks off the 24th edition of his Summer Music Festival with the first of four concerts designed as a salute to Beethoven. On the program, “da-da-da-daaah,” Beethoven's Fifth.

The remaining three concerts will see a string of guest conductors mount the podium as Brott heads off to the Teatro Petruzzelli in Bari, Italy, for rehearsals of Puccini's Madama Butterfly with five performances scheduled for the beginning of July.

So, on June 18, Jamie Sommerville, the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra's music director, conducts the NAO in Beethoven's Seventh Symphony. On June 25, Martin MacDonald, resident conductor at Symphony Nova Scotia, accompanies Laurence Kayaleh in Beethoven's Violin Concerto. The Beethoven minifest closes on June 30 with pianist Valerie Tryon in the Emperor Concerto (she played this work with the NAO in 2007) accompanied by conductor Alain Trudel.

But audiences do not live by Beethoven alone. This Saturday's bill will feature Italian clarinetist Giampiero Sobrino in Carl Maria von Weber's First Concerto.

Von Weber, you're saying with furrowed brow?

Now here's a composer, who, in spite of the popularity of his opera Der Freischuetz (The Marksman) in German-speaking lands, is rarely heard in these parts. For modern-day concert programmers and audiences, von Weber seems to have been caught, or rather placed in some kind of vortex between Mozart (he was actually a cousin of Mozart's wife, Constanze) and Beethoven.

Well, no such vortex exists for licorice stick lovers. Any clarinetist worth his or her weight in Arundo donax will have the two von Weber Concertos and the Concertino firmly tucked in a back pocket. Ditto for Sobrino's other piece, the Adagio for Clarinet and Strings by Heinrich Baermann, incidentally for whom von Weber composed most of his clarinet works.

Continuing with the “non in Beethoven solo vivet” theme, next week Sommerville will also be bringing along his axe to solo in Richard Strauss's First Horn Concerto under the baton of current NAO apprentice conductor Philippe Ménard. Similarly, MacDonald and Trudel will offer readings of Mendelssohn's Italian Symphony and Brahms's Second Symphony, respectively.

Later on, the festival will see the return of pianists Jan Lisiecki (July 14), and Sara Davis Buechner (July 27) plus violinists Susanne Hou (July 23) and Lara St. John (August 11). To help wrap up the Royal Canadian College of Organists' six day Hamilton Organ Festival, the Brottfest will have organist Ken Cowan pull out all the stops in Saint-Saëns's Third Symphony among other works (July 21).

This summer's festival, according to Brott, “is leaning toward vocal music,” and not just because the final concert (August 18) features Orff's Carmina Burana. Ermanno Mauro headlines the Opera Ovations concert (July 7).

Bizet's Carmen (August 6), with Lauren Segal as the smouldering gypsy, receives a semi-staging directed by Giandomenico Vaccari of the Teatro Petruzzelli. Vaccari will also chat (Aug. 5) about his role in rebuilding the Petruzzelli after it was destroyed by an arsonist. Sì, one more Italian opera house that went up in flames. Misterioso, no?

No doubt the summer will be really heating up, so stayed tuned to these pages for most of the lowdown on the festival.

Leonard Turnevicius writes on classical music for The Spectator.

What: Brott Summer Music Festival

With: Giampiero Sobrino and the National Academy Orchestra

When: Saturday, June 11 at 7:30 p.m.

Where: St. Christopher's Anglican Church, 662 Guelph Line, Burlington

Cost: $32, seniors $27, students $10 (plus HST); or all four Burlington concerts at 15 per cent discount; additional $5 for a reserved section seat

Call: 905-525-7664

Sunday at 3 p.m., vocalist Tiffany Ormerud, trumpeter Mike Malone, saxophonist Jim Gay, pianist Rick Gillespie, guitarist Dan Willer, bassist Jon Stemmler, and drummer Adam Fielding jam on jazz classics by Porter, Ellington, and others at Church of the Ascension, 64 Forest Ave. Tickets $20, students/seniors $15. Call 905-527-3505.

At 7:30 p.m., Jack Mendelsohn's chamberWORKS! ensemble plays the Lincoln Alexander Centre, 150 King St. E., one last time before moving to The Studio at Hamilton Place next season. On the bill, Schubert's Trio op. 99 with Mendelsohn on cello, Bernadene Blaha on piano, and Mark Skazinetsky on violin, plus Dohnanyi's Sextet with the above lineup augmented by Chris Gongos on French horn, Stephen Pierre on clarinet, and Chau Luk on viola. Tickets: $33, $29, seniors $27.50, $23.50, students $12, $10. Call 289-260-9165.

Boris Brott sings Flanders & Swann's Ill Wind

2011-05-30T12:41:00.000-07:00

Boris Brott sings Flanders & Swann's "Ill Wind" to the tune of Mozart's Fourth Horn Concerto at a celebration of . Philippe Menard conducts the National Academy Orchestra of Canada at McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada to celebrate the donation of the Boris Brott Archives to its library.

Toute une journée (What a Day), by the MCO

2011-05-30T07:45:00.000-07:00

Excerpts of "Toute un journée" (What a Day)
Composed by Maxime Goulet www.maximegoulet.com
Performed by Boris Brott and the McGill Chamber Orchetsra www.ocm-mco.org
Filmed during the premiere by Patrick Peris on May 9th 2011 www.patrickperis.com

What a day, a four-movement work for string orchestra, outlines the parallels between a day and a life, as if one were the microcosm of the other. The first movement "Joyful Morning", embodies a busy morning and a child coming to life. The second movement, "A Long Day at Work" is characterized by the accumulation of many repeated motifs representing the daily hours spent at work or in school. "Tête-à-tête Evening" is a duet between the solo violin and solo cello accompanied by the orchestra. The melodic dialogue symbolizes a romantic evening or the life shared by a couple. The last movement, "Serene Night", uses all the melodies from the previous movements. Like a dream at the end of the day or at the end of a life, it offers a retrospective. To better stimulate the auditor's imagination, lighting effects and small objects are incorporated to the piece, such as an alarm clock and the beginning of the day, a punch clock at work, a pendulum clock at night... The piece is dedicated to The Beatles and and their song A Day in the Life.

Brott’s storied legacy takes root at Mac

2011-05-27T13:58:00.000-07:00

Boris puts his baton down... momentarily to sing Flanders & Swann's Ill Wind, sung to the tune of Mozart's Fourth Horn Concerto

by Leonard Turnevicius

Special to the Spectator

Want to know everything there is to know about Boris Brott’s career? Well, now you won’t have to go any further than Hamilton’s McMaster University to find out.

Last night, a ceremony held at Mac’s Convocation Hall formally marked the university’s reception of Brott’s donated archives.

“My hometown is Hamilton now. I’ve lived here for over 42 years,” said the Montreal-born Brott in an interview with The Spectator. “It was McMaster who gave me my honorary doctorate (in 1988).”

Brott explained that there had been offers from other institutions such as the University of Calgary, as well as Ottawa’s Library and Archives Canada which house the papers of his late father, Alexander Brott. Yet, when the call came from McMaster about his archives, Brott accepted at the drop of a hat.

“I wanted to have close touch also with what I was giving,” said Brott. “There are several books that I want to write, and I’ll do the research at Mac.”

Among his archives is correspondence with some of the crème de la crème of the classical music world from the 1960s onward: Leonard Bernstein, Pierre Monteux, Aaron Copland, Benjamin Britten, Isaac Stern, Mstislav Rostropovich, Jean-Pierre Rampal, Leonard Rose, Glenn Gould and many others.

Brott’s sizeable archives also consist of numerous recordings, photos, posters, and files dating from his early life as a child prodigy to the present. As such, they cover literally every facet of his international musical and entrepreneurial career including, of course, the years 1969 to 1990 when he led the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra.

“Both my mom (Lotte, who passed away in 1998) and dad were pack rats,” said Brott. “And they did teach me to keep everything. And I did. But it was just getting scary, to be quite frank, with all of this stuff at my home. I thought, ‘What if there was a fire? What if there was a flood?’ It was just too valuable to have that (happen).”

Brott began delivering his archives in lots to the university about eight or nine months ago. Archivists at Mac’s William Ready Division of Archives and Research Collections are currently cataloguing the material. Brott also hopes to one day gift his very large library of scores as well as about 50 of his children’s concerts scripts to Mac.

Last evening’s event was emceed by Hamilton native and TVO host Steve Paikin and included the requisite official remarks and thank-yous from Mac librarian Jeff Trzeciak, and president Patrick Deane. Professor emeritus Dr. Alan Walker, an internationally acclaimed scholar and biographer of Franz Liszt and Hans von Bülow, spoke on Contemplating Boris Brott. Also on hand were Brott’s wife, Ardyth, two of their three children, David and Alexandra, plus mother-in-law Betty Webster, staff from the Brott Music Festival, and more than 150 invited guests.

But all was not dry, formal back-patting. Brott and his National Academy Orchestra performed the final movement from Mendelssohn’s Fourth Symphony, nicknamed the Italian, an obvious tip of the hat to the country where Brott’s opera conducting career is currently on an upswing. That was followed by the instrumental version of Alexander Brott’s Cradle Song composed for Boris in 1944, the year of his birth.

Pianist Valerie Tryon, a longtime musical collaborator with Brott and perennial guest at his summertime festival, performed Chopin’s Andante spianato et Grand polonaise accompanied by Brott and the NAO.

Thereafter, Brott ceded the podium duties to NAO apprentice conductor Philippe Ménard in order to sing (yes, you read that correctly) Ill Wind, a Flanders and Swann drollery set to the last movement of Mozart’s Third Horn Concerto. F&S’s lyrics, “I practised the horn and was longing to play it but somebody took it away,” served as a witty wink at Brott’s French horn playing days.

Brott’s archives will be available at McMaster’s Mills Memorial Library alongside numerous other international and Canadian collections.

Leonard Turnevicius writes on classical music for The Spectator.

leonardturnevicius@hotmail.com

2011-04-29T11:08:00.001-07:00

Congratulations to NAO Alumnus Andrew Dunsmore

2011-04-18T09:29:00.000-07:00

Photo credit: Cameron Ogilvie

Congratulations to Andrew Dunsmore (NAO percussion '06-'07) who recently won a position with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra! He wrote this lovely letter to Boris:

Dear Maestro Brott,

A few weeks ago Emily and I traveled to Montreal with a car full of percussion instruments. The purpose of the trip was for me to audition for the OSM. After 19 players, 5 semi-finalists and 2 rounds I was the last person standing for the 3rd and final round in their percussion audition. After what Emily assured me was an eternity of time they announced that I had won the audition and they would be hiring me for their 2011-2012 season!

I start with the orchestra in August, which could not have been better planned for us as we are getting married in July. Furthermore they are going to Edinburgh straight away, so we will enjoy a honeymoon in Paris after their brief tour of Scotland.

Thank you so much to you and the National Academy Orchestra. I learned so much about orchestral playing, repertoire and professionalism while working with the NAO - knowledge that will no doubt continue to serve me well in my new post as Section Percussion in the OSM. I often tell my colleagues what a wonderful opportunity playing in the NAO is and I will certainly continue to do so in Montreal.

Thank you so much,

Andrew

Mr & Mrs. Brott Go To Washington

2011-04-18T07:33:00.001-07:00

That's Boris and Ardyth with guest of honour Paloma Picasso this past weekend at a reception hosted by the Ambassador of Morocco in Washington D.C.

From the Globe and Mail: Former NAO Apprentice "follows his own path"

2011-04-11T14:27:00.000-07:00

Julian Kuerti following his ‘individual path’

COLIN EATOCK

From Saturday's Globe and Mail

Published Friday, Apr. 08, 2011

In February, conductor Julian Kuerti was back in his hometown of Toronto for a concert. At 34, he’s still a “young” conductor – but on stage at Koerner Hall, standing before the Royal Conservatory Orchestra, there was confidence in his bearing and experience in his hands.
The biggest challenge on the program was Stravinsky’s Petrushka Suite, a work that demands strong leadership from the podium. Kuerti’s gestures were precise and clear – an open-handed invitation to the contrabassoon, an abrupt karate chop in the air for the violins – as he steered his orchestra through the score’s tricky changes in tempo and dynamics.

On Saturday afternoon he’s plying his trade at Lincoln Center, where he’ll make his New York debut conducting Oliver Knussen’s opera Where the Wild Things Are at the New York City Opera. His route to New York has been circuitous.
“Every conductor has an individual path,” Kuerti points out. “First, you have to somehow convince a bunch of people to sit in front of you while you hack your way through something. Then you have to somehow gain enough confidence and credibility to make a step up to the next ensemble, and a piece that’s more complex than what you’ve just done.”
Further complicating things, in Kuerti’s case, is the fact that he was a late starter. The son of the Canadian pianist Anton Kuerti (and there’s a striking family resemblance), Julian comes from an intensely musical family – but this wasn’t necessarily a stepping-stone to a musical career.
“When I was growing up in Toronto,” he recalls, “my parents dissuaded me from music. They said don’t be a musician unless it’s the only thing you can do.” Heeding this advice, he completed a degree in engineering science. But music was always part of his life. “I had scores to Beethoven symphonies open on top of my physics textbook, when I was supposed to be studying for my exams.”
A tour to Brazil as a violinist in a world-music band called Kahana, followed by a season with the New-York based Jupiter Symphony Orchestra, convinced him that music was his calling. When Kuerti returned to Toronto, he decided to reboot his career and get serious about conducting. Already 24, he felt he had lost a lot of time.
He spent the next five years studying music in Berlin, followed by a stint as assistant conductor of the Budapest Festival Orchestra. Returning to North America, he scored a big opportunity when he was appointed assistant conductor to the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 2007, working closely with renowned maestro James Levine for three years.
Levine has been in the news lately for ongoing health problems that recently forced him to quit the BSO and reduce his workload at the Metropolitan Opera. But Levine’s frequent cancellations opened up a world of opportunity for Kuerti. On several occasions, the 34-year-old stepped in to conduct the Boston Symphony, earning glowing reviews for his efforts. “Kuerti rose to the occasion and pulled off a triumphant concert,” declared The Boston Globe. “This was easily his finest hour.”
Kuerti can’t say enough good things about his time with the BSO. As he tells it, what he learned from Levine extended beyond mechanical techniques to the realm of psychology. “He’d rarely tell people, ‘No, it’s not right’ – he’d use language and musical gesture to get at something from the positive side. He would depend on the orchestra and trust them.”
Since September, Kuerti has been a free agent. He’s signed up with a prestigious New York manager, and has a full slate of guest-conducting engagements for a year. Over the next 12 months, he faces a trial by fire, leading orchestras in Atlanta; Phoenix; Cincinnati, Ohio; Milwaukee, Wis.; Halifax; Ottawa; Victoria; Kitchener, Ont.; Edmonton and Montreal – many for the first time.
Fortunately, he has his survival strategy all worked out. “One of the things I make sure of when I’m putting together a program,” he explains, “is that one piece is something I’ve done before. If every week is an entirely new program, it’s maddening. It’ll burn you out, and you’ll half-bake everything.”
Guest conducting is all well and good – but what Kuerti really wants is an orchestra to call his own. “As a guest conductor,” he points out, “you have the chance to change things on the surface: You can change a sound, or ask for a different tempo. But you never get as close to what you really want as you do with an orchestra you work with all the time, that knows your body language well.”
The ambitious conductor may soon get his wish: He hints that he’s currently involved in a few music-director searches. Are any of these orchestras in Canada? “Maybe,” is his coy answer to that question.
In the meantime, he’ll spend the next year living out of a suitcase and racking up air miles.
Special to The Globe and Mail

World Premiere of Terry Riley's Zephir

2011-03-21T14:16:00.001-07:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYtXBQ48UeA&NR=1

2011-03-21T08:46:00.001-07:00

2011-03-21T08:45:00.000-07:00

Samson et Dalila TRIESTE

2011-03-16T10:57:00.000-07:00

Composers In Love: Encore Performance Valentine's Day Eve

2011-02-01T09:57:00.000-08:00

'The remarkable Clara Wieck was the creative partner of two men, Robert Schumann and Johannes Brahms. She was remarkable for a number of reasons…. She was unique in her time for being a thorough professional, and a working wife and mother, in an age when musical talent in a female was regarded only as an asset in the marriage market! She had extraordinary sense and stability which sustained her through many personal and artistic crises, and she was a pianist of exceptional gifts, regarded and acknowledged as the peer of Franz Liszt, Thalberg and Anton Rubenstein.

The story of her love affair with Robert, and her close friendship with Brahms will be played out in the 'Composers in Love' programme at The Hamilton Conservatory for the Arts on Sunday February 13th at 2 pm - a great way to welcome in Valentine's Day!!

Internationally renowned pianist Valerie Tryon will perform some of the most beloved and romantic works of both composers, whilst Robert Latimer-Cornell, Jacqui Templeton Muir and Aubrey Boothman relate the story of the 'eternal triangle'!'

Tickets available at the door. Tickets $27–regular, $22- senior, $15 – student

TheSpec - Musical treasure of Hamilton history found

2011-01-31T08:23:00.000-08:00

By Mark McNeil, the Hamilton Spectator

For pictures and the full article

For decades it sat in an old desk drawer with a bunch of yellowed newspaper clippings and a Ziploc plastic bag of military badges.

No one talked about the vaguely remembered sheet music inside a tattered envelope. It was just part of some papers left behind by a long-gone family member.

But a few weeks ago Brenda Robinson got to thinking about her great, great grandfather George R. Robinson, for whom the bandshell at Gage Park is named.

The bandshell had been in the news. Vandals had stolen sections of copper from its side leaving an unsightly scar. And, unrelated to the damage, the Festival of Friends announced it wasn’t going to be using the bandshell or Gage Park anymore because the event was moving to the Ancaster Fairgrounds.

So he opened the drawer, and gently pulled out the music. The paper was tattered around the edges but the print was still very legible. The piano arrangement was published in 1879 in Hamilton and called The Leander Waltz. It was written by “G. Robinson” and “respectfully dedicated to the Leander Rowing Club.”

A few phone calls later and it became apparent that Brenda had unearthed a bit of a musical treasure of Hamilton history.

Click here to hear the piece played

George Robinson was one of Hamilton’s most famous musicians. For nearly 50 years he was bandmaster of the 13th Battalion, Royal Canadian Militia, known today as Royal Hamilton Light Infantry. He was like a rock star in his day, and was one of the city’s most recognized citizens.

When Robinson took over the band in 1869, its finances were short, its instruments worn and its performances forgettable. But through his musical skill, disciplined practice and promotional prowess, Robinson built up a military band that became toasted across Canada and the United States.

Yet the one thing Robinson was not known for — was composition. At least not until now.

“There is nothing I’ve read about him that suggests that he was a composer,” says Mike Rehill, the current director of music for the RHLI band. Rehill is recognized as an authority on Robinson, and is in the process of writing a book about the band for the 150th anniversary of the regiment next year.

“But it doesn’t surprise me that he would write this. (Robinson) was probably asked by the Leander Boat Club to do this or he had some connection to the club.”

George Gage, the current president of the Leander Boat Club, says he was not aware of the piece of music. The Leander Boat Club (formed in 1927) is a descendant of the Leander Rowing Club which operated in Hamilton the late 1800s.

Margaret Houghton, archivist with Hamilton Public Library’s local history and archive section, was unable to find any reference to the music in library files.

Neither Rehill nor Houghton are aware of any other compositions by Robinson. There are George Robinson arrangements of works written by others, such as the hymn Nearer My God to Thee, which is still performed by the RHLI band.

Rehill says there was a major fire at the Armouries in the early 1900s that wiped out all kinds of musical scores. It’s likely that fire destroyed much of Robinson’s musical possessions, and perhaps some original works by him that he dabbled with on the side.

Rehill says he plans to record the Leander Waltz with the RHLI band for a commemorative CD. The Waltz is actually written as a piano arrangement. Rehill is arranging it into a full military band arrangement.

“This is really exciting for this to come to light a year before 150th anniversary of the regiment and the month before the band starts working on the commemorative recording.”

Also interesting about the sheet music is that it was published by “P. Grossman of 49 James St. North.” Grossman was a former bandmaster of the 13th Battalion before Robinson, Rehill said.

Brenda Robinson, 44, a mother of two who lives in east Hamilton, says, “I knew I had the sheet music but I never paid that much attention to it. It was kept in a desk I inherited from my grandparents.”

When she finally got to hear the song played by RHLI pianist Adam Malseed on Sunday – in an impromptu performance arranged by The Spectator and available for viewing on The Spec’s website – she said, “It gave me goose bumps.

“It’s wonderful to be able to finally hear it after all these years.”

mmcneil@thespec.com

Lieutenant George R. Robinson at a glance
Born 1840 in Weedon Northamptonshire, England.
Died 1917 in Hamilton. Buried at Hamilton Cemetery.
*Robinson was revered as a brilliant flautist and music teacher. He led the choir at Wesley Methodist Church and Christ’s Church Cathedral.
• In 1914 he retired from active service for health reasons but continued as honorary bandmaster. He was oldest bandmaster in the colonial service.
• He was succeeded as bandmaster by his son William Francis Robinson. He and his six sons served for a combined total of 185 years in the band — a Canadian and Empire record.
•Robinson was buried with full military honours in Hamilton Cemetery.
•In July 1947, 30 years after his death, a plaque was unveiled at the newly built Robinson Memorial Bandshell in Gage Park that read: “Dedicated to the memory of Lieutenant George R. Robinson … His life was devoted to the advancement of good music and in his many tours with the band through Canada and the United States he brought great honour and desirable publicity to the City of Hamilton.”

Ontario Arts Review names BMF one of its top 10 performances of 2010

2010-12-31T17:07:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Danny & Terry Gaisin for naming our performance of Firebird & Other Legends as one of Ontario Arts Reviews Top Ten Performances of 2010! Brott Festival would like to thank Danny and Terry for their unwavering and enthusiastic support of the arts scene in southern Ontario. We truly appreciate friends like you!

“THE FIREBIRD”Last year, the NATIONAL ACADEMY ORCHESTRA’s “Brott Summer Festival” hit a home run with Mussorgsky’s ‘Pictures at an Exhibition’. This year his [and their] Stravinsky Firebird was a multi-dimensional interpretation. Intrinsically, Firebird is an orchestral challenge because of the numerous solo instances. One individual screw-up and the entire attempt fails. Fortunately, the NAO musicians were faultless and the accompanying choreography by Ottawa’s School of Dance under Merrilee Hodgins visually presented the story of the Russian Prince & his birdie. This presentation alone was a Top-Ten shoo-in’ but Brott’s programme added projected works by Maxine Noel that accompanied a new First Nations composition by Malcolm Forsyth. The evening opened with the Beethoven ‘Creatures of Prometheus’ and was vocally interpreted by the incomparable Veronica Tennant who also insightfully revealed the story behind Swan Lake. The musical pas de deux by concertmaster Skazinetsky and the harp of Erica Goodman was a spine-tingling moment. The Canada Council for the Arts contribution to this event was more than a gift; it was an investment

Shaq Attacks at the Podium!

2010-12-21T22:26:00.001-08:00

Boris Brott on The Agenda with Steve Paikin

2010-12-17T09:27:00.000-08:00

A very fine interview conducted by one of Canada's best journalists, fellow Hamiltonian Steve Paikin.

HAMILTON LIVE PREVIEWS MESSIAH WITH MIA LENNOX WILLIAMS

2010-12-09T13:43:00.000-08:00

Tune into Cable 14 Hamilton Live tonight to catch a preview of Handel's Messiah with Hamilton's own fabulous Mia Lennox-Williams who just happens to be our alto soloist for our upcoming performances of Handel's Messiah.

Lennox Williams performs "O Thou That Tell Us Good Tidings to Zion"

The show, hosted and produced by Linda Rourke, runs every hour on the half hour beginning at 5:30 pm.

BORIS TALKS CONDUCTING WITH STEVE PAIKIN

2010-12-08T10:52:00.000-08:00

Hamilton Maestro appears on TVOntario’s The Agenda on December 8th, 8 PM

HAMILTON – Brott Music Festival and National Academy Orchestra founding Artistic Director Boris Brott sits down to discuss music and his conducting career with TVOntario’s Steve Paikin on the station’s flagship current affairs program, The Agenda on Wednesday December 8, 2010.

Brott has a long and storied career transforming Canadian orchestras and in recent years has seen an explosion in guest conducting duties in Europe, particularly in Italy, where he is scheduled to conduct three fully staged operas in 2011. He is perhaps best known for leading the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra to international acclaim in the 1970s and 80s and for his charismatic style and innovative approach to programming classical concerts.

Paikin, a Hamilton native, is the anchor and senior editor of the program that he describes as featuring “more intelligent analysis, and more robust, thought-provoking debate and discussion among newsmakers and experts.”

The show airs weekdays on TVO at 8 and 11 pm. Content is available on demand online at tvo.org and through mobile media. http://www.tvo.org/cfmx/tvoorg/theagenda/

Letter: Every Child Deserves Music In Their Lives

2010-12-06T07:30:00.000-08:00

Dear Maestro Brott:

I had the good fortune today to go to Hamilton Place with my daughter's grade 7 class. It was an " Ah Ha " full circle moment for me as a parent today.

Before there was an instrumental music program city wide in Hamilton ( Tweedsmuir was still new to the program) You brought each section or sent out each section of the orchestra to the schools to teach about the different musical instruments. ( I went to Prince of Wales) The year was 1975. Then at the end of the sessions, we were brought to Hamilton Place to see them all together in a concert setting. Because of that knowledge and experience, I went way out of my comfort zone and took the instrumental music in grade 9 at Scott Park Secondary. I learned the French Horn.

I also had the good fortune of playing in the HPYO with Mr. Mallory and went to Banff. Martin Beaver was our soloist. All that being said, I want to thank you for having and continuing these very important programs for the kids today. I sat in the audience today and watched the kids from our school R.A. Riddell watch laugh and learn about some of the best music out there and ask questions. I was able to share with them my experiences on playing an instrument. I took a 25 year break ( i did not have my own horn) and after all that time, bought a horn, practised more than when i was in school and now have the joy of playing again. My eldest daughter plays flute, and now my youngest is learning clarinet / alto sax.

In this day and age where cut backs seem to be the norm, the Arts programs always take the biggest hit. And most schools are barely hanging on to their instrumental programs. I am lucky that our school R.A. Riddell has a very strong program.

All of this being said , I just want to thank you for your dedication to the City of Hamilton, but more importantly to the children of Hamilton by bringing this wonderful opportunity to hear, experience, and enjoy classical music. It was very entertaining this afternoon and we learned a lot. In fact the kids wanted to hear more.

For me personally, thank you for this gift that I shared with my daughter. Just so you know too, I got to share with some of her classmates today on how you conducted me. You see when I was in the HPYO, you were our Conductor to prepare us for the joint concert we were doing with the "big" orchestra HPO, that was being taped for the Richard Gale show on CKDS as we were preparing to go to Banff for the first time. It truly was a learning experience although difficult you demanded the best from us and pushed us to strive to be the best.

You have a large heart sir and thank you for sharing your love of music and that every child deserves a chance for music in their lives.

Happiest of Holidays to you and yours and look forward to next year.
Respectfully Yours

Mrs. Debbie Burke

Franz Liszt

2010-11-17T13:15:00.000-08:00

FRANZ LISZT (1811-1886)

by Caspar Zumbusch

This bust of Franz Liszt was presented to the City of Hamilton by Dr. Alan Walker and Rev. Csaba Baksa on behalf of the Hungarian community residing in Southern Ontario. It was unveiled by His Excellency Ambassador Sándor Papp during the Great Romantics Festival in October 1998, and may be viewed on the third floor of the city’s main concert auditorium, Hamilton Place. Flanked by the Hungarian and Canadian flags, the bust is an exact copy of the contemporary version sculpted by Caspar Zumbusch, which is on display at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music, Budapest. It is a worthy tribute to one of

Hungary

’s greatest composers.

The Italian jobs: Boris Brott's career is expanding -and he is eating well

2010-10-18T12:00:00.000-07:00

By ARTHUR KAPTAINIS
The Gazette October 16, 2010

Another Montreal institution that we should not take for granted is Boris Brott. Despite the conductor's identification hereabouts with the McGill Chamber Orchestra -the ensemble founded by Boris's father, Alexander Brott -this native Montrealer has his share of international dates. To judge by his schedule, he is eating well.

Last night, he was conducting the orchestra of the Teatro Petruzzelli, a refurbished historical jewel in the coastal Italian city of Bari. On the program were two Fifth Symphonies, Beethoven's and Tchaikovsky's.

This concert followed the world premiere last Sunday, also in the Petruzzelli, of a violin concerto (titled Zephir) by noted American minimalist Terry Riley. Francesco D'Orazio, a young Italian, was soloist.

Boris Brott conducting a Terry Riley world premiere in Italy: You find that surprising? Maybe incredible? Check out the clip on YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch? v=LYtXBQ48UeA. There was also some Canadian music, Alexander Brott's Oracle, on this program.

The language of rehearsal for all this, necessarily, was Italian. "You can barely get along here with English," Brott writes from overseas.

People who hear this affable conductor introduce works bilingually at McGill Chamber concerts might be surprised to learn that he speaks Italian better than passably.

"When I was 17, I was inscribed in the Guido Cantelli Conducting Competition in Stresa, Italy," Brott explains. "My mother and father thought it was a good idea for me to be able to speak to the orchestra in Italian and sent me to a 9-to-5, six-days-a-week immersion course at Berlitz Language School.

"I took to the language very quickly as I had learned to speak Spanish when I spent nine months studying conducting with Igor Markevitch at Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes in Mexico City.

"I was 14 and was billeted there with the composer Tapia Coleman and his family of seven girls and one boy. He was also the developer of Acapulco and quite wealthy.

"Anyway, back to Italian, I enjoyed my courses very much as there was a very attractive teacher. I was still quite innocent at 17, but I wanted to impress her."

As for the Petruzzelli Theatre, Brott endorses its looks as well, to say nothing of its comfort and its acoustics. As for Bari and surrounding Puglia, they are unspoiled: beautiful scenery, great seafood and not a McDonald's in sight.

Brott is in California in mid-November, leading three concerts by his Los Angeles-area New West Symphony (another hit by Alexander Brott, Critic's Corner, is on the program). By Nov. 20, he is back in Italy, leading the orchestra of the Teatro Filarmonico in Verona through Beethoven's Second Symphony and Holst's The Planets (or "I pianeti," as the famous suite is known in the language of Galileo).

Brott's winter schedule includes chilly dates with the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa (where he is principal youth and family conductor) and the National Academy Orchestra in Hamilton, Ont. (where he actually lives). But in February, he resumes his burgeoning Italian career with a run of Saint-Saens's Samson et Dalila at the Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi in Trieste. This major house has also hired Brott to conduct the Verdi Requiem -a job one might reasonably expect to go to a conductor who speaks Italian as a first language.

Back to Montreal. On Monday you can hear the Maestro concertatore e Direttore of the McGill Chamber Orchestra in Salle Claude Champagne, 220 Vincent D'Indy. On the program are Jacques Hetu's Poeme, the Double Concerto of Mendelssohn (Laurence Kayaleh, violin, and Stephane Lemelin, piano) and the Concert of Ernest Chausson.

This last item is conducted by Jean-Francois Rivest, professor of conducting at the Universite de Montreal. Tickets range from $11 (students) to $45. The concert starts at 7:30. Go to www.ocm-mco.org.

akaptainis@sympatico.ca

Another Tryon Triumph!

2010-10-14T12:13:00.000-07:00

Ancaster’s Valerie Tryon highlights Great Romantics Festival

2010-09-23T19:50:00.000-07:00

By Mike Pearson, News Staff

Arts & Entertainment

Sep 23, 2010

Their music is as vibrant today as the day it was written.

Fryderyk Chopin, Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, Johannes Brahms and Josef Wagner are some of the most celebrated musicians of the Romantic period.

Juno award-winning pianist Valerie Tryon will pay tribute to the Romantic era at next month’s Great Romantics Festival, a celebration of classical music from 1820 to 1910.

The festival returns for its 15th installment during the weekend of Oct. 7. For the first time ever, the festival welcomes the National Academy Orchestra of Canada, conducted by its founder and artistic director, Boris Brott.

Tryon, an Ancaster native, will perform selections by Franz Liszt including Totentanz (Dance of the Dead) and Les preludes, the third of Liszt's 12 symphonic poems. Tryon has performed for sell-out crowds around the world, including performances with the Royal Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Symphony. Her latest recording, released in May, includes a Mozart piano concerto performed with the London Symphony Orchestra.

Tryon is looking forward to her upcoming performance with Brott’s ensemble on Oct. 9.

“He always has absolutely fabulous players,” said Tryon. She will perform two concertos along with the orchestra on a Mason & Hamlin piano, known for its full, rich sound.

The theme of this year’s festival is Ovations. 2010 marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Fryderyk Chopin and Robert Schumann. The Saturday afternoon program on Oct. 9 includes a presentation of Chopin’s 27 studies, performed by seven concert pianists.

Schumann is represented by his two major song-cycles Dichterliebe and Frauenliebe und–leben, along with some of his most recognized piano music. Saturday’s piano gala features 12 talented pianists, followed by a festival banquet at the Hamilton Convention Centre.

Tryon said next week’s event offers great variety, from piano concertos to song recitals, lectures, a piano gala and a closing festival banquet.

A fitting selection leading up to Halloween, Liszt’s Totentanz is one of Tryon’s favourite symphonic pieces.

“It’s been one of my favourites,” said Tryon. “It’s very macabre and sinister.”

Alan Walker, the festival’s artistic director, said this year’s event includes musicians from four Great Britain, the U. S., Spain and Canada. Like all good music, Walker said Romantic era composers produced music of a timeless quality that remains fresh and vibrant, nearly two centuries after it was written.

“Their music has endured so much repetition that it is timeless,” said Walker.

When Walker asked Boris Brott and the National Academy Orchestra of Canada to join the festival, Brott quickly obliged.

“I jumped at the chance to do a Tryon marathon,” said Brott. “Few pianists in the world would be capable of performing this repertoire in one evening and carry it off. Valerie can, and will.”

Brott said Tryon is a pianist who carries away audiences with her soulful interpretations.

“That's why she is in demand around the world. We are fortunate she calls our area home. Musically she is a citizen of the world.”

Brott has performed with Tryon several times in the past in England and Wales when Brott was the music director of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales.

“Valerie and I have made music together annually for the past 25 years at least,” said Brott.

Brott calls himself a Romantic by nature. He feels very much at home with music that examines emotion, feelings and events that are larger than life.

“The program we are performing -Liszt, Schumann, Chopin -this is a great program our emotional National Academy Orchestra and I can really sink our teeth into and bring to life for you, our audience.”

The Great Romantics Festival begins on Thursday, Oct. 7 and runs through Saturday, Oct. 9 with performances at McMaster University’s Convocation Hall, Mac-Nab Presbyterian Church and Christ’s Church Cathedral. The event is presented in conjunction with The American Liszt Society and The School of the Arts, McMaster University. During the event, Dr. Elyse Mach will receive the Medal of the American Liszt Society, the highest honour that the Society can bestow, in recognition of her writings in behalf of Franz Liszt.

All systems go for Great Romantics

2010-09-23T09:41:00.000-07:00

By Leonard Turnevicius

THE HAMILTON SPECTATOR

Just when you thought Alan Walker's Great Romantics Festival was down and out for the count … Surprise! It's back as strong as ever.

That's right. All systems are go for the GRF, which was put on hold last year due to funding issues.

And what got the ball rolling to make the GRF happen instead of letting it become a warm and fuzzy memory for the region's classical music fans as well as the American Liszt Society, one of the festival's co-sponsors?

"We received this year an unexpectedly generous donation from an American benefactor and admirer of the GRFestival who had regretted its absence during 2009, " wrote Alan Walker in an e-mail response to The Spectator.

So, with someone gifting greenbacks to cover the bills, Walker set about organizing the three-day festival which will take place just prior to Thanksgiving.

Much of the GRF's schedule is familiar from previous years. Opening remarks on Thursday at McMaster's Con Hall, followed by a lecture. This being the Schumann bicentennial, Mark Ainley will share his insights on that composer. Louis Nagel will then present an all-Schumann piano recital. Then, in Christ's Church Cathedral, there's Ian Sadler's organ recital, plus soprano Janet Obermeyer's Lieder recital including Schumann's song cycle, Frauenliebe und –leben. Thursday night, it's the traditional orchestral concert in Hamilton Place. But this time, it won't be with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra.

Citing "philosophical differences" coming "after 10 years of frictionless collaboration, " as Walker put it, the HPO and the GRF are parting company, for the time being.

So, Boris Brott and his National Academy Orchestra have accepted Walker's invitation to fill that void in what will be their GRF début. But it was Brott who suggested that the evening's soloist should be pianist Valerie Tryon. Walker, who had originally pencilled in Tryon for a daytime solo recital, gave her the choice between that and a concerto. Her decision was a no-brainer, all the more so since she and Brott have honed their musical rapport over the past 35 or so years.

With 2010 also being the Chopin bicentennial, Tryon will trot out Chopin's Second Piano Concerto as well as Liszt's Totentanz (Dance of Death) on a bill that also includes Schumann's Manfred Overture and Liszt's symphonic poem, Les Préludes.

But Walker won't have Tryon play on either of Hamilton Place's two grand pianos. Instead, he's having a 9-foot-6 Mason & Hamlin brought in from Burlington for the occasion.

"It produces an exceptionally large sound - essential for such a vast auditorium as the Great Hall, " wrote Walker of the Mason & Hamlin. "I have often been disappointed by the poor sound of the in-house pianos at Hamilton Place, which are neglected and not really good enough for a truly professional concert."

And for the concerts at MacNab Presbyterian, including Saturday afternoon's all-Chopin piano gala (you didn't think any other composer would do, did you?) featuring an array of local and international pianists, the GRF is importing a nine-foot Yamaha grand from Toronto.

And don't forget about the traditional Friday night Con Hall piano recital featuring this year's winner of the Hilton Head Competition, Lukas Vondracek, who'll perform in the presence of the Czech Republic Consul General, or the Saturday night Candlelight Banquet in the Convention Centre's Webster Room. For all the info, check www.artset.net/greatromantics.html.

This Saturday from 4 to 6 p.m., Alok and Abhisek Lahiri with Kiran Morarji on tabla present a sarod duet program with a Q&A session on Indian classical music in McMaster's Kenneth Taylor Hall, Room B135. Free admission. Call 905-525-9140, ext. 27289.

GRF schedule

THURSDAY, OCT. 7
McMaster, Convocation Hall
9:30 a.m.: Opening Remarks
10 a.m.: Mark Ainley's Schumann lecture
11 a.m.: Louis Nagel: Schumann recital

Christ's Church Cathedral, 252 James N.
2 p.m.: Ian Sadler, organ
3 p.m.: Janet Obermeyer, soprano

Hamilton Place
8 p.m.: Tryon, Brott & NAO, $20

FRIDAY, OCT. 8
MacNab Presbyterian, 116 MacNab St. S.
10 a.m.: Miriam Gomez-Moran, piano
11 a.m.: Lenard Whiting, tenor, Schumann's Dichterliebe
2 p.m.: Bill Aide, piano
3 p.m.: chamberWORKS! Wagner & Brahms
4 p.m.: reception

McMaster, Convocation Hall
8 p.m.: Vondracek recital, $20
10 p.m.: reception, CIBC Banquet Hall

SATURDAY, OCT. 9

MacNab Presbtyerian
10 a.m.: Jose Cueto & Nancy Roldan, violin/piano

2 p.m.: Donald Manildi on Chopin

2:30 p.m.: Chopin gala
Convention Centre, Webster Room

7:30 p.m.: Candlelight Banquet, $70

Tickets for a morning or an afternoon $15, student/senior $10. One day pass $25, student/senior $15. An evening concert $20. ‘Rose' package (incl. all events except Candlelight Banquet) $100. Candlelight Banquet $70. Call 905-525-9140 ext. 23674.

Leonard Turnevicius writes on classical music for The Spectator

SUNDAY SEPT 19 -- CLASSICAL CAFE AT ARTWORD ARTBAR CAFE

2010-09-07T16:25:00.000-07:00

Classical Covers
SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 19 at 2 PM

Katherine Mrmak, violin & viola

Lorna Heidt, cello & vocals

A charming selection classical duets for violin and cello, as well as accompanied songs, both covers and originals. A lighthearted mix of serious, whimsical and popular music! Join these outstanding musicians for a relaxed and intimate afternoon of music in an artistic surrounding. Refreshments and food available for purchase. (Licenced LCBO)

Admission $10 (all proceeds go to performers)

Presented in co-operation with the Brott Music Festival and National Academy Orchestra of Canada. The NAO has graduated over 1,100 musicians into the fields of performance, teaching and entrepreneurship over the past 22 years. We are pleased and proud to have our alumni take part in these Artword Artbar performances and applaud owners Judith Sandiford and Ron Weihs for their dedication and foresight in founding this series. Please support this most worthy cause. We promise it is a lovely way to spend a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon!

The Artword Artbar Cafe is located at 15 Colbourne Street Hamilton ON L8R 2G2 Call 905-543-8512 or cell 905-912-9083 email artword “at” artword.net. By car: from the 403, take the York Blvd exit, go east on York Blvd. Turn left at James Street North. Turn left at Colbourne. We’re right there.By car from the east: from Cannon, turn right at James Street North, and left at Colbourne. Or from Barton turn south.

A Letter from a Patron to Genevieve Leclair

2010-09-07T16:11:00.000-07:00

Burlington, ON
August 26, 2010

Dear Genevieve Leclair,
This summer I have been lucky attending four beautiful concerts during the Brott Music Festival's season.
I want to send you this special thank you letter because I enjoyed very much your conucting with so much grace and precision and I liked your neat programme notes. Their details are enjoyable to read. It's worth it to come early to the concerts to have enought time to read them, the historical facts and the depth of their musical expressions.
By the way I had never heard anything by Glick so far, but next to Cimarosa's piece I liked the two movements by Glick the best at the last concert of this summer.
I wish you a happy and successful continuation of your career as a conductor and each day brings joyful musical experiences. Greetings!
Signed,
---- from an old person who loves music.

Beethoven's Ninth: More Pics

2010-08-31T14:15:00.000-07:00

Thanks to our own Diane Clark for her fabulous photos all season:

Letter from Scarborough: " I was all teary-eyed listening"

2010-08-31T10:12:00.000-07:00

Aug. 28/2010

Dear Friends of Classical 96 FM,

As winner of the Brott Festival prize [tickets to a performance of Beethoven's Ninth, dinner and a hotel stay], I’m delighted to say that I had a FABULOUS weekend, my daughter Catherine and I. Everything was superb!

Our stay at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, lovely staff and room, dinner at the Pepperwood Bistro in Burlington. I’m still revelling in the taste of the lovely Roast Beef dinner – the ambiance, friendly, delightful.

Sara Chazin, violin

Best of all, the National Academy Orchestra, conductor Boris Brott, one of my favourite Maestros was superb. The choir, Leslie Fagan, Lauren Segal as usual, were wonderful. Two Flautists Gloria Huh and Jennifer Brimson were delightful and Sara Chazin, violinist!!!! SARA CHAZIN – excellent playing! I was all teary-eyed listening to her play.

Of course I did some shopping and got a real bargain on 2010 Soccer Shirts. I strolled around the main streets of Hamilton and wished I had more time to re-visit Mohawk College. Such a beautiful setting up the Mountain – it reminded me of my drive up to Niko, Japan.

Thanks to you all at Classical 96 FM you give me PLEASURE every day. I’ve been a listener from the first of the wonderful station.

Bill Anderson, Alexa, Kerry Stratton, Jean Stillwell, Marilyn Lightstone -- good health to you all and thanks again in helping me stay so happy to be alive and enjoying life.

Sincerely,

Collis Kelly

Scarborough, ON

From Ontario Arts Review: The Ninth: A Magnificent Piece; Performed Magnificently

2010-08-22T14:00:00.000-07:00

Review by Danny Gaisin
Aug. 21st. ‘10

I admit it- I’m prejudiced in favour of all nine Beethoven symphonic creations. Each has its own character; mood and focus. Conductor Boris Brott bestows his personal impression whenever he and his NAO perform any of these masterpieces. My own notion or inkling may differ, but we both find each piece irresistible. Closing the 2rd Brott Festival season: - the brilliant incomparable ‘Chorale’ Ninth.

Beethoven was totally deaf when he composed the work in 1824. To conceptualize a man creating such a work without the ability to hum the themes, codas, cadenzas and motifs boggles the imagination. From the almost hesitant opening notes of the Allegro that segues into its familiar theme, Brott & the NAO appeared to be exquisitely caressing every note with fondness and warmth. The Vivace was enhanced by extended pauses that added a facet of drama to the interpretation. The third movement – the adagio molto, whose theme is introduced by the violas -- was so exquisitely performed as to bring on a wetness about the eyes of this enthralled listener.

For the final movement, the combined Arcady & Brott Festival singers under the direction of Stéphane Potvin, and soloists Leslie Fagan; Lauren Segal; Michael Colvin & Daniel Lichti offered the ‘Ode to Joy’ with faultless tones, vocal clarity and excitement. For novice audience-members (and there were some who required ‘shusshing’ after the allegro), Brott had a projected translation of Schiller’s ‘An die freude’ on screens stage left & right. The program notes, while concise and didactic, did not mention that the work was adopted as the anthem of the European Union, both for its beauty and for an optimistic prayer that someday alle menschen warden brüder – ‘all mankind will consider themselves brothers’.

The four soloists are possessors of magnificent voices. Fagan’s soprano has a honey-smoothness that aurally coats the listener. Tenor Michael Colvin seizes each lyric as though it is his own creation and imparted this every time he sang. There is a power in Segal’s mezzo that belies her stature. The timbre and range she imparted reflected soul. Daniel Lichti is a bass-baritone whose comfort with the normal range of low F to mid C is only equalled by his projection and faultless idiom. The blend of soloists with the 90-member choir appeared seamless.

The other items that comprised the total concert were equally spectacular. Brahms' only violin concerto is a three-movement work, and we were fortunate to hear Sara Chazin (no relative!) perform the opening Allegro movement. The work is so challenging as to be oftimes subtitled concerto against violin for the humiliation it can confer on its attempters. Chazin aced it!

Flautists Jennifer Brimson & Gloria Huh offered Cimarosa’s concerto in G major under the baton of Geneviève Leclair. The facial delight and confidence exhibited by these two talented young ladies is a positive reflection of what Brott’s N.A.O. accomplishes.

S.I. Glick’s ‘Triumph of the Spirit’ is a major work by a composer it was our privilege to know personally. I never had the chance to audaciously ask if its title was a deliberate repudiation of the Riefenstahl 1934 propaganda movie. Like Lightfoot and some other contemporary composers, Glick was overly repetitious but in this piece, it might have been an acknowledgment of traditional Chassidic liturgical mode. Hearing the choir’s Hebraic pronunciation of "Avinu Malkeinu" -- Our Father, Our King -- was especially gratifying with the Jewish High Holidays so close at hand. Like the prayers to be traditionally recited, thanks given, vows renewed, and prayers offered for us as individuals and for the world itself… may alle menschen warden brüder!

Enduring love It lives on, and gets passed on down

2010-08-19T09:22:00.000-07:00

Suzy Zucker and her brother Martin have sponsored the final concert of the Brott Music Festival, in memory of their father, Hamilton businessman and philanthropist Irving Zucker, for the past few years. This year, it will be Beethoven's Ninth, taking place tomorrow

Suzy Zucker with her father Irving in 1997 when he received the Order of Canada.

By Suzy Zucker
SPECIAL TO THE HAMILTON SPECTATOR
(Aug 19, 2010)

The last time I saw my father alive was when he was being rolled into the elevator on his way up to the operating room. He was still taking care of us all, right up until the end, giving us tasks to do. He pointed at me.

"You hold on to me, Suzy."

"OK, Dad," I nodded, "I will." I had brought in a healer, and after she had worked on him, she told me that I could continue on with what she had done by "holding on to him." So I imagined myself holding him, keeping him here, as best I could.

We all knew it was a long shot. The day before the operation, the surgeon had met with me, my two brothers and my father's longtime girlfriend.

"I have to tell you now," she said, "that there is a only about a 20 per cent chance that he will fully recover."

We all stared at her.

"What do you mean?" somebody asked.

"The aneurysm is very close to his heart. First, he needs to survive the operation. After that, the following three days will be critical. But even if he makes it through, there will still be the possibility of brain damage."

There was a long pause.

"Oh."

I went home that night to my two-year-old daughter and my failing marriage. My husband and I had been in counselling for a year, to no avail, and the stress of my father's recent illness had our relationship completely unravelling. I vaguely remember us watching a comedy on television, but the words sounded garbled, nothing made sense. Everything was surreal, far away, gauzy. The only thing that I could hear with crisp clarity was 20 per cent, 20 per cent, like a loop.

The next day we gathered in the waiting room after my father was taken to surgery. I thought about the way he had been the night before: anxious, agitated, with a drawn, hunted look in his eyes. I wish I could go back now, and sit with him, caress him, tell him over and over again, I love you, Dad, I love you. Or even try to joke with him, anything to soothe his fear, my fear, the unspoken. But a virus had recently shut this hospital down, and I had started to feel sick a few days previous. So I had worn a mask, and stayed a good distance away from him. I busied myself by setting up the power of attorney papers, the only affairs he had not attended to, the ones signifying incapacitation and the relinquishment of control. Control had been a common thread between us.

"Everything under control on your end, Suzy?" he would frequently ask.

"Yes, Dad," I'd lie into the phone, protecting him, protecting myself. "How about you?"

"Yup, everything's under control over here, Suzy."

We stayed in that waiting room for over 12 hours, alongside all of the other families that came and went, huddled together, awaiting news of their loved one's fate. It was as if time stood still. I had noticed this phenomenon the last time my father had been in the hospital, 10 years earlier, undergoing a quadruple bypass. Hospitals seem to exist in a world unto themselves when a loved one is critically ill. You get up from your chair to go buy a coffee, then go outside for a guilty cigarette, only to return back. Over and over again. Life and death consume you; all else fades and is made inconsequential. Then there is, of course, the magical thinking. I start to make a deal with God that if he saves him, I will quit smoking. But then I stop myself, panicking. What if, when it comes down to it, I can't follow through with it?

Finally, his surgeon comes in and reports that there had been a lot of bleeding, and she thought that she had lost him at one point, but he had held on and was still alive. He was being sewn up right now, but in a while we could go see him, although he would be unconscious.

We filed into the ICCU and were led into his room. I looked at him, the fallen giant, strapped up to tubes and machines.

I had a job. I stood at the foot of the bed and pushed the sheet up off of his feet. I took hold of his ankles. "I've got you, Dad. I'm holding onto you," I said.

I was sure I felt his leg move.

Over the course of the next two days he never regained consciousness, but we kept up our vigil, orbiting around him, as we always had done. It was four o'clock in the morning, and I was at home trying to sleep, when the call came.

"I think you should come to the hospital. Your father is dying; all of his major organs are shutting down."

We convened around him. The nurse explained to us that after they put a heavy dose of morphine into his IV, the life support would be turned off.

Then he was gone.

We sat Shiva for seven days, saying the prayers every morning and every night. People came and went through my father's house in a blur, sharing their condolences and their memories, and eating the food that magically appeared every day.

Two of my friends came to visit. We went into the den and shut the door.

Shiny black suits, they were the Men in Black. I sat down on the couch in the same blue jeans and T-shirt I'd worn for days. Therapists, the two of them, they encircled me: a tag team, one in front, one by my side.

"How are you doing, Suzy?"

I burst into tears. "All I can think of is that I didn't hold on to him well enough."

I am wailing as they shoot closer.

"We love you Suzy, we love you." They embrace me; hold onto me, keeping me here, as best they can.

* * *

Seven years have come and gone since we buried my father. At first, the pain was unbearable. Crying every day, I tried to explain to my daughter why Mommy was so sad. She in turn became the ballast that I clung to. I would often gaze at the picture taken a month before my father died, a picture of him with my daughter on his knee, and it gave me great comfort. He had lived to see his grandchild.

I see my father in her: her energy and infectious smile, her zaniness and creativity, her warmth and generosity of spirit. Over time I have also come to see my father more clearly, including the challenges that he struggled with in his life, as we all do.

I realize that at 46, under the very best of circumstances, I am half way through my life. When the time comes, and it is my daughter's time to grieve, I only hope that she will know that she loved and was loved by me. We are all complex creatures who fall short in one way or another. And when you have a child, those failings do not magically pack up their bags and leave. We pass on the good and the not-so-good to our children. But now I think to myself that maybe that's OK, as long as we pass on a heavy dose of love with it all.

Song cycle transforms composer's shooting

2010-08-19T09:11:00.000-07:00

What: Srul Irving Glick's Triumph of the Spirit
With: Boris Brott, National Academy Orchestra, Arcady Singers, Brott Festival Choir
When: Friday, Aug. 20, at 7:30 p.m.
Where: McIntyre Theatre, Mohawk College, 135 Fennell Ave. W.
Cost: $27, senior $22, student $10 (plus HST)
Call: 905-525-7664, ext. 16

By Leonard Turnevicius
THE HAMILTON SPECTATOR

January 7, 1993. 10:50 p.m. Srul Irving Glick walked out of Beth Tikvah Synagogue in North York just as he'd done so many times before. But this wouldn't turn out to be just another night.

Glick, then 58 and the synagogue's music director, had earlier wrapped up Thursday evening choir practice and was ready to climb into his car when he was approached by a man sporting a ponytail. Without uttering a word, the man opened his coat, pulled out a gun and fired.

Glick turned and ran. The shooter gave chase, firing four more shots. One of them hit Glick. A nearby female resident heard gunfire and wailing. She called 911. By the time police and emergency personnel arrived, the gunman had long fled. Glick was rushed to Sunnybrook hospital, where surgeons removed a 9-mm bullet from his right calf.

Who would want to do this to Glick? He was a prolific composer in various media including more than 200 liturgical works, a former producer at the CBC, Beth Tikvah's choir director since 1969 and its composer-in-residence from 1978.

Glick wondered this himself. And was this shooting linked to an attempted home burglary eight months earlier in which he fought off an intruder armed with an axe? Glick had suffered head injuries in that incident.

Needless to say, these events had a profound effect on Glick's psyche and music. His Second String Quartet was written some months after the shooting. Glick admitted that he was taken aback at the aggressive drive, the vehemence, and the bitterness of the music that poured out of him.

That, however, would change in another commission, this one from Elmer Iseler and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir. Iseler wanted a choral work with which to celebrate the TMC's centennial and asked if Glick's piece would also include some Jewish hymns.

For texts, Glick chose Avinu Malkeinu (Our Father, Our King) and Adonai, Adonai (The Lord, The Eternal from Exodus 34:6-7). He framed those by opening with Thus Saith the Lord (Jeremiah 6:16), placing Donia Clenman's poem Rainbow Symphony as the third movement, and ending with Rabbi Abraham Kook's Radiant is the World Soul. Glick titled his song cycle Triumph of the Spirit.

In his program notes for the 1996 publication of the work, Glick explained the effect of the shooting on his world view. "The sheer perverseness and unexpectedness of this event forced me to re-examine my deepest feelings about life and my place in it. It was then I realized, and with great impact, that everybody in some way or another struggles against the hardships and adversities in life, and that each personal and spiritual success becomes a 'triumph of the spirit.'

"The origin of this work, as with so many of my compositions, comes from a faith found deep within my soul; the purposefulness, the beauty, the richness, and the indwelling love in our world, is the most precious and wondrous gift of God. That is not to say that I am unaware of the pain and suffering and the evil in this world; rather, it's a turning, an illumination of a totality which makes every moment priceless."

Make no mistake, Triumph of the Spirit is no 30-minute-long, c'mon-let's-get-happy, soporific singfest. Glick poured out music that was in turn reverential, wistful, high-spirited and gentle, culminating in a grand Mahlerian climax on the phrase, "Come find peace, embrace delight and taste of the goodness of God." Glick passed away in 2002 after a long battle with multiple myeloma.

Glick's Triumph of the Spirit will be performed at tomorrow night's Brott Summer Festival closing concert in Mohawk College's McIntyre Theatre. Also on the bill, several concerto competition winners whose performances were bumped from a July concert, plus the paean of all paeans to humanity, Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

Read Leonard Turnevicius's reports from some of Europe's classical music festivals at
http://www.jamilton.ca/.

Brott Firebird Project: An Outstanding and Creative Evening

2010-08-18T11:09:00.000-07:00

Legends:- Prometheus, Coyote, Swan Lake & Firebird

Review by Danny Gaisin
Aug. 15th ‘10

The muse and I attend between 160 & 220 concerts or theatre events a year; Each December we list our TOP TEN most memorable; educational, or entertaining. As memories oftimes fail, we directly record candidates on a whiteboard. Last evening’s incredible N.A.O./Brott Festival offering was immediately added to the list. Titled ‘Famous Firebird & Other Legends’, this was one outstanding & creative evening. Stating that we and the McIntyre Theatre audience were impressed would be an understatement.

Beethoven’s ‘Creatures of Prometheus’ is a compositional phenomenon. Looking at the repetitional score, then hearing the exquisite melodic ballet music seems almost oxymoronic. Introduced and elucidated by the incomparable Veronica Tennant, the three selected movements gave us a pastiche of the mythological character that angered Zeus in order to obtain gifts for mankind. Brott’s interpretation of the adagio permitted unbridled flexibility for Skazinetsky’s violin solo & Goodman’s enchantingly resonant harp.

The melody introduced by the cello was acknowledged by the conductor’s appreciative facial countenance. The finale, more familiar as the theme from the composer’s ‘Eroica’ was performed technically faultless and emotionally charged.

Then an inspiring and emotional premiere:- renowned Canadian composer Malcolm Forsyth was commissioned by Tara-Louise Montour to create a musical interpretation of the First Nations legends surrounding the coyote. His four movements were accompanied by construal projected-animation by David Paseika featuring the art of Maxine Noel. Between listening to Ms. Montour’s violin & the NAO musicians, and being visually impacted by the creative artwork, senses were overwhelmed. The twenty minute piece seemed to pass in mere moments. This is a magical work.

Post-interval, Geneviève Leclair took the podium for Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. Again, Ms. Tennant elucidated the plot, coupled with delightful personal asides from her performing days. Her devotion to the music as well as her insight into both the Siegfried and Odile/Odette roles brought a potent visuality to Leclair’s interpretation. An impacting opening scène was followed by a superb pas de Deux that again demonstrated the expertise of Skazinetsky & Goodman. There was a noticeable tight-reining during the second of the dances, but each of the others received spontaneous applause.

The highpoint of the evening undoubtedly was the Stravinsky ‘Firebird’. Not presented as a suite but rather as an in-concert format of the ballet. Ottawa’s School of Dance & choreographer Merrilee Hodgins visually presented the story of a Russian prince saved from a neighbouring tyrant by the feather given from a captured & released firebird. Conquering the tyrant’s minions & rescuing his beloved princess was enacted by a terpsichorially-talented octet that mesmerized the audience as they danced or acrobatically struggled across the stage. This was a magnificent interpretation, and certainly something theatrically memorable. Post-concert for a brief photo-op, I had the chutzpah to ask maestro Brott how his NAO could afford to stage such a creative but certainly extremely expensive opus. I too, read through the list of sponsors, but this performance seemed a definite financial envelope-pusher. His brief response:- “Thank God for the Canada Council for the Arts!”

On behalf of all of us cultural types, our thanks too! It’s certainly monies well-invested, well-contributed and definitely well-spent.

Today's Spectator Front Page: This Ain't Hollywood, Maestro

2010-08-18T08:41:00.000-07:00

August 18, 2010
by Graham Rockingham
THE HAMILTON SPECTATOR
This Ain't Hollywood, Maestro
Teenage Head, Johnny Cash and now ... Boris Brott

1970 promotional poster for the Hamilton Philharmonic A young Boris Brott, in 1970 a new arrival to the Hamilton Philharmonic, is seen in a promotional poster meant to give the HPO a 'hip' look. A signed...

The walls of This Ain't Hollywood have accumulated a lot of rock 'n' roll memorabilia. The bar displays photos of Johnny Rotten and Johnny Thunders, a bust of Johnny Cash, and posters of the Forgotten Rebels and Teenage Head.

But there's a new member of the collection that definitely stands out from the rest.

Placed right next to a window lined with 33 empty bottles of Jagermeister hangs a 40-year-old promotional poster featuring a very young and hip Boris Brott surrounded by women.

That's right, Boris Brott -- musical director for the National Academy Orchestra of Canada and former conductor of the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra.

His sideburns are long, his curly dark hair thick. He's wearing a double-breasted jacket that could have been cut on Carnaby Street and a piece of silk tied around his neck in the then-stylish "apache scarf" fashion. He's leaning on a dump truck, looking ... er ... sexy.

The poster, taken in 1970 in a Stoney Creek quarry, carries a simple written message -- "Boris Brott: Music Power."

Yesterday, Brott stopped by the James Street North rock bar to autograph the poster for the owners -- Lou Molinaro and Glen (The Hamilton Kid) Faulman.

"My goodness, you've had it mounted," Brott exclaims as he first sets eyes on the poster.

Brott, now 66, then points to the blond standing to his right in the photo.

"That young lady is Ardyth, my wife," he says with a smile. "I probably had met her only once when that photo was taken, but we married a few years later. We've now been married 34 years ..."

Brott turns and asks the bar owners: "Where did you get this?"

Molinaro explains the poster was donated to the club by Teenage Head bassist Steve Mahon, who found it at his sister's house.

"Steve's sister was apparently a big fan of yours, Boris," Molinaro says.

The poster was made shortly after he was hired by the HPO. At the time, Brott was a musical prodigy in his mid-20s coming to Hamilton from Montreal via New York City.

Local lawyer Herman Turkstra, an HPO board member, was pushing to give the symphony orchestra a new youthful image.

The poster was Turkstra's idea, Brott says.

"The goal was to say that classical music was not boring and not just for old people," Brott says.

"And we've been trying to say that same message for the last 40 years."

Two weeks ago, Brott took the stage with the National Academy Orchestra wearing an Elvis wig and costume for a special Brott Festival tribute to the king of rock 'n' roll.

On Friday night, the Brott Festival closes its season at the Mohawk College's McIntyre Theatre in a more traditional fashion -- a performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

grockingham@thespec.com

905-526-3331

Fantasia: The Inextinguishable Firebird

2010-08-12T21:19:00.000-07:00

A Letter from composer Jordan Pal

2010-08-12T06:04:00.000-07:00

I am writing to express my enthusiastic support and appreciation for Boris Brott and the National Academy Orchestra.

Through both the NAO and his summer festival, Mr. Brott has clearly established a highly professional and extremely valuable voice in the Hamilton music community. His artistic team consists of distinguished mentors from the TSO, COC Orchestra, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony to name a few, apprentice conductors Samuel Tam and Geneviève Leclair, and an orchestra of exceptional young-professional musicians. The National Academy Orchestra represents what I believe to be one of the top training orchestra institutions in the country.

I was extremely fortunate to have had the recent opportunity to work with Mr. Brott and his orchestra during their 2010 summer festival. I first contacted Mr. Brott back in September of 2009. He was very receptive to my work as a composer and took a kind interest in programming my concert overture, On the Double. It is a privilege to have gained support from one of Canada’s most distinguished music professionals. Through both my direct communication with Mr. Brott and his work with the NAO, it is very clear that he believes strongly in supporting and fostering young emerging talent.

My experience with Mr. Brott and his creative team while working on On the Double was very positive. Apprentice conductor Samuel Tam, Mr. Brott, the mentors and the orchestra took an active and engaged interest in working towards producing desired results during the rehearsals of the work. This created a very encouraging environment where an open dialogue was established between the conductor, the orchestra and myself.

It is often assumed that young musicians lack the experience and know-how to properly perform contemporary music. This was not the case with the NAO. The musicians that make up the body of this orchestra represent some of the best and brightest across Canada. The orchestra, under Samuel Tam, and as coached by the mentors and Mr. Brott himself, responded very well to the piece. Often more than not, it is our experience as composers that there is only enough time in rehearsals to focus on producing a ‘reading-type’ quality performance of the work. Through the professionalism of the musicians, Mr. Brott’s intimate understanding of the orchestra, and Samuel Tam’s efficient and sensitive approach, the entire team worked towards producing an inspired performance of the work.

Through my experience with the NAO, it is very apparent that Mr. Brott has developed an invaluable learning experience for the orchestral conductors and musicians of Canada’s future, which in turn enriches Canadian culture.
With best regards,
Jordan Pal,

Gulenco, Rachmaninoff, Tchaikovsky, NAO - Russian Romanticism at its Best

2010-08-10T07:39:00.000-07:00

Review by Kamara Hennessey
The Ontario Arts Review
Born in Toronto; 27-year-old ‘new kid on the block’ Canadian composer Jordan Pal’s “On the Double: Concert Overture for Orchestra” is up first on yesterday evening’s Brott Summer Music Festival’s Rocky 3 Meets Tchaikovsky concert program. In the program notes, the composer himself describes his work as “a fast and furious adrenaline-pumping roller coaster of an overture...” Need I say more? However, at the end of NAO’s relatively ‘stable’ performance guided by apprentice conductor, Samuel Tam’s baton; staying on track, I am still trying to peg this composition’s genre. In this 21st C. can it be defined as “neo ‘neo Classical’ / neo ‘neo Romantic’ / neo ‘neo Impressionist’ / neo ‘neo early 20th C’- ‘Avant Garde’? Perhaps it’s ‘Neo all of the above’ But, I must admit it was a very interesting piece. Like most modern compositions this composition will take some getting used to as it grows on one’s aesthetic sensibilities.

Featured attraction / headliner Alexei Gulenco, pianist, submerges into an alter ego’s stage presence to his Russian counterpart- Sergei Rachmaninoff. Quite robust in stature; and guessing that Gulenco is close to 6’ 4” in height, he strides on stage with a very upright military carriage that’s emphasized by his all black attire. With his entrance on stage, I can’t help thinking that two ‘Giants” are about to meld into Russian Romanticism in all its glory. In all of Rachmaninoff’s piano concerto repertoire, his Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, op 30 is reputed to be one of his most difficult concertos for a pianist; especially in the Finale movement! Both Gulenco, and NAO - conducted by Maestro Brott - came through their collaborative performances of each movement – [Allegro ma non tanto; Intermezzo; Finale] - with equal mastery. The highly romantic expressionism is exposed through all its dynamic shadings of the composer’s lush harmonies; often excitable rhythms; rippling and soaring lyrical melodies. With some time to spare before intermission, Gulenco returned to feed the audience thirst for more with an encore number Moments Musicaux (3) Op. 16 by none other than “Rocky” himself. However, it showed another side of the composer as having created a work, to my ear, that had an overall ‘religious’ pace in tempo as well as revealed a somewhat meditative quality in the chordal harmonic progressions.

The 2nd half of the concert program is devoted entirely to Tchaikovsky’s lengthy Fifth Symphony in E minor, op. 64. The stage was shared by Genevieve Leclair, who conducts M1: Andante - Allegro con anima and M2: Andante Cantabile, con alcuna licenza. Maestro Brott conducted M3: Valse; Allegro moderato and M4: Finale: Andante maestoso - Allegro vivace. Both conductors and NAO gave it their all to release this powerhouse of Russian Romantic expressionism. Since this particular symphonic work by Tchaikovsky has now become a much performed and loved standard, it is considered a gem that sparkles with timeless beauty. The opening melody in the Andante cantabile that is expressed out by solo French horn and reiterated by solo oboe and clarinet is so hauntingly beautiful. The NAO performers on the above instruments conveyed it as such. The orchestra presented a very expressive performance that showcased Romanticism at its best throughout the entire concert, thereby showing that oftimes- “the whole is greater than just the sum of its parts”.

A Ravishing Performance from Brott's NAO

2010-08-09T09:50:00.000-07:00

By Hugh Fraser

HAMILTON - It happens from time to time although, come to think of it, not all that often.

It's that muffled roary whoosh at the end of a piece of music. It tells you that the audience has been holding its breath in awed amazement and can finally expel the pent up air. Soon, of course, it turns into shouts of Bravo, Brava or Bravi depending on circumstances. “Encore” is another favourite. Then a small clump rise while shouting and applauding, which draws another clump to its feet across the aisle and soon the whole lot of them are banging away and yelling to beat the band.

That's exactly what happened as the young (everything's young to me except water and dirt) Russian (Moldovian) pianist Alexei Gulenco brought a grand piano back to earth on the stage of Mohawk College's concert hall after a sparkling flight through Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto.

In the true Russian pianistic tradition Gulenco took absolutely no guff at all from what seemed, at first, a rather dull instrument and soon had it singing. Bits I had felt were tacked on for effect seemed apt and unified and it really was a very satisfying performance indeed.

And that orchestra! I kept having to count the strings to make sure it wasn't double the size, because what I was hearing was double the size. Brott proved, as he effortlessly does, that he is the complete accompanist.

Then Rachmaninoff's date, Tchaikovsky – the Festival billed the concert as Rocky 3 Meets Tchaikovsky -- showed up with his Fifth Symphony.

Brott split the work in half with his apprentice conductor Genevieve Leclair. Leclair took the first two movements, while Brott took the Valse and Finale. I must say it is a tribute to Brott's command of the podium that he voluntarily followed such a brilliant student.

Leclair drew an absolutely ravishing performance from the National Academy Orchestra and the Andante cantabile sang and danced like a choir of angels and cherubim. The electricity crackled when Brott took over and what a brass section! They could have called the cattle home from across the Pacific ocean let alone the Sands of Dee and yet it was all balanced.

That huge string sound - most startlingly from the lower strings - had my ears calling my eyes foolish. The woodwinds too were magnificent - clarinets, oboes, flutes and bassoons all played their parts to great avail, which is I suppose a little silly to mention, as it is as an orchestra - a very, very fine one - that the NAO excels and I am not going to omit the drums from my praise.

Apprentice conductor Samuel Tak-Ho Tam opened the concert with Jordan Pal's On The Double: Concert Overture for Orchestra. Pal, a composer for the concert hall and film, had a thesaurus of contemporary musical language for us to interpret and its fragments bustled about pushing each other out of the way before each had the space to really establish itself. There so much that was attractive and I would love to see him expand this work to let the contrapuntal, as well as the other "bits" develop into what they clearly could become.

Tam organized everything with brisk efficiency and sensitivity.

Ontario Arts Review: The King returns to riff with the N.A.O.!

2010-08-06T11:31:00.000-07:00

Review by Danny Gaisin
Aug. 6th ‘10

♫ On a cold and grey (1969) Chicago morning ♪ - Elvis recorded ‘Vicious Circle”… no kiddies he didn’t write it – Mac Davis did & it was the Colonel who changed the title to “In The Ghetto”. Now, you have the true story when the question comes up on Jeopardy!

I and the other almost six billion earthlings (except for Iranians & North Koreans) who anointed Presley as the king of rockabilly (early rock & roll) still can feel that excitement and quiver we all experienced during his two decades on the throne. Another such opportunity came last night when Boris Brott’s N.A.O. presented Stephen Kabakos and his entourage in a tribute performance. Like any artistic caricatures; exaggeration is tantamount- think of the editorial cartoons of Joe Clark [the mittens]; Trudeau [the rat-faced teeth] or Mulroney & ‘the jaw’. Ditto when entertainers do Elvis. The gyrations; costumes; perambulations and last -syllable slurring are obligatory. Kabakos is no excluder, but he does possess a marvellous jazz baritone voice and certainly better lyrical diction than the original.

Serendipity enabled us to sit right beside the enormous sound control panels being operated by engineers Brian & Robert. Watching them making the continual minute adjustments to mikes, monitors and electric guitar output was a little like observing Kuerti at his keyboard. From the opening Strauss ‘Also Sprach’ that segued into Cee Cee Rider, until the encore end, both gentlemen were narrowly focused, and I admit, were a fascinating distraction for this humble writer.

The soloist gave us the requisite ‘Teddy Bear’; Jailhouse Rock; Don’t Be Cruel etc. with change-of-pace selections like ‘Peace In the Valley’ and the Elvis interpretation of ‘O sole Mio’ (he did write the English lyrics himself); and of course – Love me Tender. Biggest audience response by far: – the aforementioned “In the Ghetto” to which Kabakos added an extra dimension of heartfelt compassion, and Paul Simon’s “Bridge over troubled water”. For the latter, he seemed to modify his persona into something a little more comfortable, and no pun intended.

The N.A.O. ensemble performed under Brott, Tam & Leclair without the usual mentoring professionals. Seemingly more relaxed, their technical talents were in no way diminished and there were obvious signs of a connection with the jazz style & taste of their parent’s era. Boris looked stunning in a white jacket embellished with a flashing gold lame scarf…but the wig!!! I understand Conway Twitty suffered an embolism; and Jack Lord spun in his grave.

This was one very fun evening. The sold-out McIntyre audience, in a most un-Hamiltonian manner, exchanged verbiage, traded osculations, even humorously heckled the guest soloist. Obviously, a social connection was established over the footlights; in this case – the monitors. The obligatory encore was ‘Suspicious Minds”. Kabakos took it to a new level, even more expansive than the Dwight Yoakum version of a few years back. To me, it was over the top; sort of a Jumping the Shark moment, but hey, that’s what it’s all about. To Kabakos, Brott, & the NAO....thank ya ---thank ya veer mush !

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Elvis: Stephen Kabakos & The NAO in rehearsal

2010-08-06T10:42:00.001-07:00

More Elvis Pics!

2010-08-06T08:28:00.000-07:00

Elvis: The King Lives!

2010-08-05T10:20:00.000-07:00

Elvis WAS in the building and ROCKED

2010-08-05T00:05:00.000-07:00

this wasn't even the half of it!

Congratulations Stephen Kabakos for a fabulous show, pictured here with his twin, Boris "King In Waiting" Brott. More later. Oh, what a night!

Boris as The King!

2010-08-04T09:02:00.000-07:00

Tonight at 7:30 pm Mohawk College -- Boris conducts HoundDog, Jailhouse Rock and more!

A Letter from Jan Lisiecki

2010-07-31T13:18:00.000-07:00

Photo credit: Andras Schram

I have performed a lot: in many different countries, concerts halls, and of course very different audiences, with different conductors and orchestras. I suppose one can say that I have some experience in what makes a concert memorable.

On July 29th, 2010 I performed with Maestro Brott and the National Academy Orchestra in Hamilton.

The concert hall was packed. What a privilege to have people take interest, to come, to spend time with us: the maestros, the orchestra, and me. It was a fantastic audience, very supportive and they were listening beautifully. This kind of public makes the concert special and it is, for sure, one of the most important factors of a good concert. I can't imagine a better silence during the concert and a more enthusiastic applause afterwards. I couldn't be more thankful for both.

Of course, the second factor of any orchestral concert is the conductor. I have the privilege to know maestro Brott for five years now. He is my mentor, my friend, and I look up to him. Performing with him is always an adventure (in a good way!) and so much fun for me. We are simply making music together, that night we enjoyed Chopin's concerto together loving every second of this composition. It was great to also work with the new generation of conductors: Genevieve Leclair and Samuel Tam, who did a wonderful job in leading the orchestra.

The third element is the orchestra. I have worked with some famous orchestras, I have worked with some great ones. I love the National Academy Orchestra. Why? When performing with the NAO I work with wonderful, fun, young people, who love music, and that have decided that music will be their professional life. They have the energy, happiness, and commitment to make the performance of all compositions, usually new to them, the best they can possibly be at the concert. It is amazing for me that they just met as a group for a number of weeks, and they can play so wonderfully, again I was filled with gratitude to all of them.

The concert is now a history, a memory. I will always remember how great the public, the maestros and the National Academy Orchestra all were that night. From the bottom of my heart - thank you all for making this concert so memorable.

--Jan

Jan performs with visiting concertmaster Robert Uchida and the National Academy Orchestra July 29, 2010

Jan took some time to meet with and sign autographs for many of his fans at a post-concert reception hosted by

the Polish-Canadian Women's Federation, Hamilton branch

Lisiecki leaves audience breathless

2010-07-30T15:37:00.000-07:00

15 year old pianist enthralls at sold out Brott concert

By Hugh Fraser

HAMILTON - If words were adequate to express all that's in the human heart and soul, we wouldn't need music.

That we need music and should, in a worthy and intelligent life, use far fewer words and a great deal more music, was a wisdom brought home with stunning effect by pianist Jan Lisiecki in Mohawk College's auditorium, last night, in a concert with Boris Brott and the National Academy Orchestra.

Lisiecki played a killer program.

To mark the 200th anniversary of Frederic Chopin's birth he played Rondo a la Krakowiak - full of Polish dances and songs - and Andante Spianato and Grand Polonaise Brilliante and that was just in the first half.

The second half was Chopin's Piano Concerto No.1, a piece that normally would have been considered a night's work by any and all of the great pianists of this age and any other.

At the end of it and after a thunderous standing ovation, throughout which some brayed thoughtlessly for an encore, in a hall that was literally packed to the rafters, Lisiecki thanked us for coming and allowed he was really pleased to have been able to play so much piano for us in one night. He failed to add without being carried out on life support by EMS.

Jan Lisiecki takes the stage for a performance of Chopin's First Piano Concerto

I've been trying to think of a word that would sum up Lisiecki's performance and have settled on consummate - meaning complete, perfect.

It was complete in the sense that every touch of a piano key seemed totally intentional - by that I mean that every subtle increase in tempo or volume, every shaded color and inflection was exactly what Lisiecki meant to do. It was perfect, in that as an enthralled listener, it was easy to imagine that we were hearing a person achieving his dream of how the music should sound.

Have I mentioned yet that Lisiecki is just 15 years old?

No. Well, I really don't think it has anything to do with the music. It adds a sensational oooh! of course and Brott opined that in his opinion Lisiecki was "Canada's next Glenn Gould."

I wish with all my heart he doesn't follow Gould's path and absent himself from live performance for remote, technologically achieved moon-landings of music from some hidden and lonely lair.

However long I babble on I can only faintly convey what happened at this concert. But those who were there, live, barely breathing and totally in tune with this superb musician had a connection and an experience few will forget. Lisiecki was, let me add, surrounded by the young and also superb musicians of the National Academy Orchestra.

Jan and his mother Anita at a post-concert reception hosted

by the Polish Canadian Women's Federation, Hamilton Branch

Boris Brott conducted the orchestra for the Concerto and his always superb accompanying reached a zenith of sorts allied as it was by the orchestra's ability to listen so carefully and musically. The piano's first entry in the Romance, the second movement, was actually a true pianissimo and as clear and as clean and as sweet and true as could be imagined. All the while sitting luxuriously on a soft velvet cushion of full string tone. A thing rarer than blue diamonds.

Genevieve Leclair conducted the Rondo, in which Lisiecki's tempi overtook a woodwind or two, with aplomb and understanding. Samuel Tak- Ho Tam had a far more trying job in the Grande Polonaise.
The orchestra is so much on the periphery in this piece it is often played without the benefit, if benefit it is, of orchestra at all.

And it is very hard to come off the bench and hit full stride at once, which made the first pizzicato end of the orchestra's first tutti a little dazed but all was well managed after that.

Brott, as is right, reserved for himself the conducting of his father's piece, Oracle, which opened the program. Composed in 1939 it is a foreboding shudder of musical agony at the declaration of World War II. Amongst the fright, panicked scurrying and brassy alarms there is a touching but monumental resolve. I don't mean monumental as anything big but immovable. A lone, terrified soul facing with valour what no one knew at the time would become perhaps the deepest abyss the human race has ever plunged itself into.

Lest I forget. From the Brott to the Concerto the playing of bassoonist Spencer de Man - not mentioned in the program and if I'm wrong I apologize - was just ravishing. In tone and sophistication of phrase it was one more thing that was consummate in a glorious evening of music.

Oh yes. Did we get an encore? We did. A ravishing Nocturne that effectively pulled the blanket over the canary's cage and sent us all off to bed. It was a real privilege to hear the music, but next time just yell "Bravo," OK? Lisiecki had worked his fingers to the bone already.

--July 29, 2010

Toronto Star: 15-year-old Canadian piano sensation Jan Lisiecki coming to concert venues near Toronto

2010-07-28T21:46:00.000-07:00

07/28/2010

By John Terauds

Toronto Star

Teenage Calgary pianist Jan Lisiecki is the classical world's equivalent of Justin Bieber (ardent fans gushing over an angelic face framed by those currently fashionable sideways licks of hair), except that Jan really has musical talent.
Coinciding with the 200th anniversary of the birth of Frédérick Chopin, the only child of a Calgary Polish-immigrant couple has been charming the world with his interpretations of that Romantic composer's music.
All year, Jan has been performing the two piano concertos, as well as a selection of solo pieces. In May, the Fryderyk Chopin Institute in Poland released a disc of Jan playing the two concertos with Sinfonia Varsovia and conductor Howard Shelley. (For CD info, click here.)
The disc really is beautiful. Jan's playing -- recorded in 2008 and 2009 -- is technically flawless and the music is shaped elegantly.
Jan also has his own YouTube channel. The Chopin and Liszt pieces here are much less convincing.
Given how many times Jan has played his Chopin repertoire in the last six months alone, I'm willing to bet that what an audience may hear tomorrow could be very different from what he has recorded in the past.
Fresh from concerts at the Festival of the Sound, Jan is heading Hamilton-ward today for an all-Chopin concert tomorrow night at Mohawk College for the Brott Summer Festival.
On Aug. 12, 13 & 14, Jan returns to Ontario to perform three separate programmes of Chopin with the Tokai String Quartet at Stratford Summer Music.
If you want to immerse yourself in the world of Jan Lisiecki, you can visit his website.
+++
Someone like Jan presents a challenge for me. As a rule, I don't review students. Jan is 15, but he's released his first disc and has the travel calendar of a professional.
I have a philosophical opposition to encouraging child prodigies, thinking they should go through as normal a childhood development process as possible. However, I also realise that a huge proportion of the world's great musical artists set foot on the stage well before adulthood, and needed that early encouragement and acclaim to bring them to wide attention.
I can only hope that Jan will find his happy balance between music and the rest of life, and continue to treat an eager public with what, at this point, looks like a keen, unaffected artistry.

More Proms PIcs - July 14, 2010

2010-07-26T14:29:00.000-07:00

Our brass takes a bow

Go England!

Liz (oboe) -- truly dedicated to the team!

The fabulous Maestro Brian Jackson

Mrs. Marc Gibbon, oboe & Spencer deMan, bassoon ready for the fun second half of the concert

Brian Jackson chats up the audience

Hat's the spirit, Daniel!

Rule Britannia!

Jean-Norman practices his swing during the clarinet solo

Summer Proms: In Pictures

2010-07-15T11:26:00.000-07:00

Wed. July 14, 2010

Marc Gibbons, oboe and fashionista

Alejandro Céspedes, percussion

Pines & Planets: More pics

2010-07-13T14:54:00.000-07:00

Artists Jamie Lawson (Mars) and Jacqui Oakley (Uranus)

Composer Maxime Goulet with the Maestro

Genevieve with Maxime in the background.

Ontario Arts Review: “Pines & Planets” a successful NAO A/V offering

2010-07-13T11:33:00.000-07:00

July 12th ‘10

L-R. Concertmaster Joseph Lanza, composer Maxime Goulet

RBC Apprentice Conductor Genevieve Leclair and Boris Brott

“The term audio-visual (AV) may refer to works with both a sound and a visual component, the production or use of such works, or the equipment involved in presenting such works. Films and television programs are examples of audio-visual presentations. Occasionally, the format has been used effectively within the creative arts”. *Wikipedia.

Last season; the Brott Summer Festival presented a highly successful rendering of Mussorgsky’s ‘Pictures at an Exhibition’; using interpretive renditions by local artists. This year; Respighi’s “Pines of Rome” and Holst’s “The Planets”. In spite of the mercury [sic] climbing well into the 30’s, this was another blockbuster event. James Street’s Christ Church Cathedral was also the focal point of our Community’s Spanish celebrants, so counterpoint was off-key and unsynchronized. But it did add to the celebratory evening. Overhead projection - Eric Brittan's "The Catacombs"

Opening with a modern composition commissioned by conductor Genevieve Leclair, “Parade of the Puppets” by Maxime Goulet interprets five marionettes, and is so defining as to render the projected titles superfluous. Leclair’s baton emphasized all the musical details and specifics of the dolls, just as the projected portraits achieved. Then:- Brott and the Pines. As a Rome enthusiast, the imagery of those stately trees and the cypresses are intrinsic to every mental & photographic impression I possess. The Borghese and its winding road are replete with uncountable numbers of both; Respighi captured the feeling imparted by those ancient trees, Brott encapsulated both mood and sentiment. Ancient law forbade burials near the Appia or any other of those ‘All roads that lead etc.; hence the catacombs. The music portrays the sombreness of an internment; plus captures the atmosphere one experiences while visiting the tunnels. Every visitor to the area will ultimately be taken to the top of Giancolo, the 8th of the famous Seven Hills. Respighi called it by its Latin name – Janiculum (after Janus) and the segment is both evocative and melodic.

Then:- the Appian Way movement. Tangentially, I fail to appreciate the representation by Kawong Chung. Dark, foreboding and with depictions of the horse’s head from Godfather One; there was what appears to be a Hannibal Lecterish neck nibble. 2300 years old and created during the Samnite Wars, this ancient highway is beautiful with gentle curves; mosaic cobblestones, and of course the verdant vegetation that curb every mile it’s been my thrill to traverse. At least, the N.A.O.’s version of this movement was uplifting and joyful.

Holst’s PLANETS must be an interpretation of their astrological position because ‘MV[e] MJSUN’ is definitely out of whack. Even the musical durational periods are off kilter…Mars is way longer than Jupiter’s movement, but it's even smaller than Earth and Jupiter is 1300 times bigger than our planet!. See, I know my astronomy! The work is a masterpiece and the NAO treatment was about 50 minutes of pure excellence. Not a booboo; no rushing, and those dramatic pauses intrinsic to G.H.’s portrayals. The projected artistic creations were imaginative and showing enlargements of the details were an enhancement. Jacqui Oakley’s cubist impression of Uranus and Cora Brittan’s ‘Venus’ deserve ending up on a deserving & appreciative wall.

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Brott Festival's Planets & Pines Project: The Art

2010-07-12T22:42:00.000-07:00

Holst's The Planets "Mars the Bringer of War " by Jamie Lawson

Holst's The Planets "Venus the Bringer of Peace" by Cora Brittan

Holst's The Planets "Jupiter the Bringer of Jollity" by Maria Lezon

Holst's The Planets "Saturn the Bringer of Old Age" by Ruth Marshall

Holst The Planets "Uranus the Magician" by Jacqui Oakley

Holst's The Planets "Neptune the Mystic" by R. Ward Shipman

Pines of Rome "Villa Borghese" by Anna Constance Lipowski

Pines of Rome "Catacomb" by Eric Brittan

Pines of Rome "Janiculum" by Grace Loney

Pines of Rome "Appian Way" Kawong Chung-Shipman

Visual Art and Vuvuzuelas: The Planets According to Brott

2010-07-12T15:00:00.000-07:00

Concert on James St. North opens the doors to downtown community’s artistic renaissance

By Hugh Fraser

Cora Brittan's High In the Heavens

Inspired by Holst's The Planets "Venus"

HAMILTON - As I mounted the steps of Christ's Church Cathedral, Sunday night, to attend the Boris Brott Summer Music Festival concert there, I wondered how many pieces of music I had witnessed, over my many years, that had come to this place to die.

I have never heard an orchestra sound well in this space. Not even one as brilliant as this National Academy Orchestra. The acoustic is loud, even raucous, when it is not simply crude and harsh. The enormous effort to achieve any nuance or subtlety seems wasted as the effect will soon be swamped by the inevitable uproar to follow. A miniature baroque band to accompany Messiah is the best one can hope for here.

Hopes of great performances of Respighi's Pines of Rome and Holst's The Planets, even when not accompanied by jubilant Spanish vuvuzuelas and horn honkings out on James St., seemed a bit forlorn. However the point of the exercise was not to slam the door shut on James Street but to open the doors and welcome in what has become an artistic renaissance in this downtown community.

To do this, Brott had invited local artists to create pictures inspired by these two great works - pieces that already are so visual they form a thesaurus that composers of film music have used since the works first saw the lights of the concert hall.

These art works were then photographed, turned into slides and screened above the orchestra as Brott conducted the music beneath them. And in this we can report a real artistic triumph.

This job was done by Brott staffers -- Diane Clark who photographed most of the works and Mary Pat Elliott, who edited the slide show to roam the pictures picking out details and fascinations she found within them that so aptly fit the music as to enormously enhance both arts at once. Alongside her was Genevieve Leclair to facilitate the musical and thematic transition of the slides.

The originals were displayed at knee height around the south west corner of the nave and the contrast was striking. Elliott elided the childishness of Anna Constance Lipowski's Villa Borghese -- by highlighting foliage and other details that gave it a gravitas and presence it might have otherwise lacked.

Jamie Lawson's Mars inspired by the movement in Holst's The Planets

Works that Clark and Elliott so effectively enhanced for the Holst were Ruth Marshall's glass mask (Saturn) that shimmered with iridescent layers of light and lovingly lingered over its coils. Also lightened and exploded with vivid life was the geometric wonders of Uranus the Magician and the wonderful subtleties of Ward Shipman's Neptune where backgrounds were wallowed in to reveal enthralling patterns, textures and colours.

Ruth Marshall's Saturn

The artists had mostly gone for the astronomical rather than the astrological and the spheres dominated the gods in the artists visions, though Cora Brittan's Venus the Bringer of Peace gave Earth its first ever appearance in Holst's Planets. May that be prophetic, please.

Parade of the Puppets by Maxime Goulet and conducted by apprentice maestro Genevieve Leclair came with its own child-like paintings of puppets that were screened. The lovely second movement, Wang-Fo, was a nice relief from the jagged, discordant syncopations that just don't come off well in this space.

Ryan Trew's Starlike, commissioned by the Vancouver Symphony for the recent Winter Olympics in that city and conducted by apprentice maestro Samuel Tak-Ho Tam was very pretty; all tinkly bells, glistening arpeggios and scales nestled into thick, comfy chords. It was rarely strenuous and climaxed by merely increasing volume.

The heat was oppressive and the ministering angel who handed out the bottled water at half-time should get a humanitarian award.

Glorious Gershwin with Lindsay Deutsch: In Pictures

2010-07-12T09:25:00.000-07:00

Talisa Blackman, piano

Brass section warms up

Coming in from the sudden rainstorm

This is Breanne and Kilmeny, violinist Jared Mosher's wife and daughter

The lovely Lindsay Deutsch signs CDs at intermission

Ardyth Brott signs copies of her children's book Jeremy's Decision

Guillaume!

Our fabulous celli

A happy crowd at the McIntyre Theatre

Jan Performs on Canada Day and Meets The Queen!

2010-07-05T11:31:00.000-07:00

Peter Appleyard: Definitely still a Legend!

2010-07-05T09:57:00.000-07:00

Boris & Peter Friday night at St. John's Anglican Church

Giampiero Sobrino: Clarinettist AND Arm Wrestler Extraordinaire!

2010-06-26T14:46:00.000-07:00

Festival friend Debra Larocque challenges our soloist Giampiero to a post concert, post dinner arm wrestle. Who will dominate?

No, Giampiero's not cheating, he's using the ancient tactic of distracting his opponent, Debra -- who says she was afraid of hurting his musicians hands was finally overcome after a valiant attempt! Bravi, tutti!

Ontario Arts Review: Sobrino aurally mesmerizing

2010-06-25T11:16:00.000-07:00

By Danny Gaisin
Ontario Arts Review

The guest soloist- renowned clarinettist Giampiero Sobrino teased the audience with Debussy's diminutive first clarinet rhapsody. His physical style may from the ‘Sammy Kaye’ school; which can a little distracting, but his mastery of the instrument is non-pareil. When he performed Von Weber’s Concerto no. 2, the audience was aurally mesmerized. The andante-tempoed Romanza 2nd movement… popular with the new-format classical-lite stations; was performed so precisely and with such feeling that this attentive listener’s throat began to lump up. It speaks volumes about the Brott Festival and the NAO that they can attract such luminaries!

Unter-Konductor Geneviève Leclair took the podium for the sprightly & bright Rossini overture to his “Italian girl in Algiers”. This opera, a dramma magiocoso, tells the story of Isabella- a sort of ‘Wonder Woman’. Cross the Med; rescue your lover; free the slaves and head back home for dinner. Just like my wife! Leclair brought out every nuance of the piece and bestowed such a impacting aspect to her reading that I could smell the salt air. Were it not for Senore Sobrino, this would have been the evening’s apex! Her program notes were no slouch either. Granted they were written from a musicological viewpoint but certainly informative and erudite. Future audiences…READ; Memorize!

Beethoven's Pastorale with Sobrino: some pics

2010-06-24T11:53:00.000-07:00

The three Maestro(a)s: Boris Brott, Geneviève Leclair and Giampiero Sobrino, soloist

Boris, Geneviève, Giampiero and Samuel Tam

Robert Latimer-Cornell (look for him July 4 in Life & Letters of Chopin and Aug. 8 in Composers In Love) chats with BMF Production Manager Steve Newman

Festival friend Debra shows off her spectaular roasted red pepper platter (or what's left of it) at dinner following the concert. Buon appetito!

Brott’s 2010 NAO: One heck of a band

2010-06-18T13:30:00.000-07:00

Brilliant 20 year old Djokic masters Elgar Cello Concerto

By Hugh Fraser

Special to brottmusic.com

Burlington -Edward Elgar was nothing if not a English Victorian gentleman. After all he arose Sir Edward as soon as the royal sword of Edward VII dubbed him on each shoulder. His Land of Hope and Glory shores up The Sceptred Isle's fading past and even more fading future as it is leather-lunged into the English mist at every Promenade Concert. And yet at least half his soul and its musical essence was German.

Mendlessohn, Schumann (particularly) but even Brahms and Wagner - enemies to each other but both colleagues as far as Elgar was concerned - were his musical brothers more than any Englishman.

What would happen to this consummate composer's heart and soul when Queen Victoria's grandchildren took their respective subjects by the scruff of their innocent necks and flung them at each others throats in a bloodbath so appalling it was completely unimaginable until it actually happened?

All you need to do is listen to Elgar's Cello Concerto to find out.

Begun in the summer of 1918 as the last drops of blood from the Great War were wrung out onto Flanders' fields it is bewildered, heartbroken agony recited in the language of music.

It was the major work and finale of the first concert of the Boris Brott Music Festival of 2010 and took place last Wednesday evening in St. Christopher's Anglican Church, Burlington.

Where the brilliant young cellist Denise Djokic - she is 20 years old for heaven's sake - found the maturity to so stunningly render this masterpiece, I'll never know. But she unwound the long downward spiraling laments with such tenderness and understanding and soared to the despairing heavens for answers that never came with such utter conviction that it was soon apparent that we were in the presence of someone who understood instinctively what every note of the music meant.

Is there hope in this music? No. There is bravery, even valor but the music is too truthful to give false hope and Djokic too masterful to mispeak. Is it beautiful? Yes. Sublimely so. The man who gave the cello one of its top 10 hits, the Nimrod Variation from the Enigma, can ravish us even as everything he believed in and lived for lies torn to bloody shreds on the battlefield.

Anxiety about technical questions simply faded away as irrelevant.

Djokic was flawless as the music poured out of her and as Brott wrapped this truly magnificent edition of his National Academy Orchestra about her seemingly fragile shoulders.

The piece that should, by concert convention, have ended the evening, Beethoven's Symphony No. 1 in C major ended the first half instead.

Brott was quite right to flout convention and flip the order as it would have made a jarring follower to the Elgar.

Being Beethoven's First Symphony, it naturally shows the most influence of his teacher Old Pappa Haydn. And even though it floats at times with the elegant grace of a courtly dance, you know from the first 12 bars Beethoven is never going to just ram out symphonies like Haydn, who scattered 108 of the things about the place.
Even in this maiden voyage it is plain it just isn't that easy for Beethoven, who crawled, clawed and struggled his way to just nine. Music for him had to be more than just music. It had to mean more, be more, signify more
What this performance really proved was that this year's National Academy Orchestra is one heck of a band. Forget clean, crisp, clear and capable, that's just the beginning, although it was enough to take the breath away at times. They are - in an astonishingly short time - just two rehearsals - becoming a very musical instrument and Brott is revelling in it.

Revelling in his brilliant young musicians, revelling in the gorgeous music and revelling in his own mastery of the whole situation. It is lovely to see and beautiful to listen to. And it is, (this must be kept between us as our little secret lest it spoil the dignity and decorum of the "classical concert") so much darned FUN.

The clean, crisp, clear and capable also just scratches the surface with apprentice conductor Samuel Tak-Ho Tam. He set the mature, dark, profoundly passionate mature Beethoven amongst us with the concert's opening work the Leonore Overture No. 3 with complete understanding and profound musicality. In fact, I think everyone on stage that night knew what every note of the music meant. How often does that happen?

Denise Djokic Plays Elgar: Preliminary pics

2010-06-17T14:07:00.000-07:00

Boris Brott & Denise Djokic backstage at St. Christopher's June 16

Denise played the Elgar Concerto beautiffuly and the audience adored her

Denninger's delicious nibblies were the highlight of the intermission!

CBC News - Theatre - Opera star Maureen Forrester dies

2010-06-17T07:05:00.000-07:00

CBC News - Theatre - Opera star Maureen Forrester dies

Leonard Turnevicius: Life and death and music

2010-06-15T14:56:00.000-07:00

June 10, 2010

Life and death and music
by Leonard Turnevicius
Special to the Hamilton Spectator

Who: Denise Djokic
What: Elgar Cello Concerto
With: Boris Brott and the National Academy Orchestra
When: Wednesday, June 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Where: St. Christopher's Anglican, 662 Guelph Line, Burlington
Cost: $30, senior $25, student $10
Call: 905-525-7664, ext. 16

FINIS R.I.P.

That's the kind of thing you'd expect to find on a tombstone in some ghost town graveyard.

But that's what Sir Edward Elgar jotted down against the opus number of his Cello Concerto on a works list he made toward the end of his life.

Composed in 1919, the Cello Concerto was Elgar's opus 85. Then 62 years old, Elgar would go on to live for another 14 years during which, however, he published little of real consequence. Some orchestral transcriptions of Bach, Handel and Chopin, a few choral works. Some theatre and brass band music, an aborted Third Symphony. With the Cello Concerto, Elgar knew full well that he'd reached the crest in his creative road.

Can something from that long and creative road be found in the Cello Concerto? At its premiere, Ernest Newman, music critic for London's The Observer perceptively wrote of the concerto as "the realization in tone of a fine spirit's lifelong wistful brooding upon the loveliness of earth."

The work opens brashly with the solo cello voicing a recitative that uncoils ever so softly into a gentle, unobtrusive tune taken up by the viola section. It's a harbinger of things to come in the concerto, and taken metaphorically, also in life.

"A man's attitude to Life" is how Elgar once described the concerto. But don't get the idea that this work is a downer. Nor does it spin its wheels in a rut. The opening movement is latched onto a second movement that frequently changes gears from slow to fast, and contains nervous musical material that distantly echoes his Introduction and Allegro from 1905. A brief, 60 bar Adagio serves as a lament prior to the final movement, which juxtaposes the robust with the contemplative, before ending rather abruptly.

On Wednesday, June 16, at 7:30 p.m. in St. Christopher's Anglican Church in Burlington, the Brott Music Festival opens its 2010 summer season with the Elgar Cello Concerto, Denise Djokic as soloist, accompanied by Boris Brott and his 45-member National Academy Orchestra. The Halifax- born, Boston-based Djokic will perform on her 1901 Romeo Antoniazzi cello.

Though unaware of Elgar's FINIS R.I.P. notation, Djokic is nonetheless well acquainted with the concerto's mood swings and inner workings, having taken its pulse numerous times since her teens.

"I feel like it comes full circle from a very sort of lamenting, very kind of sombre first movement to a very kind of joyful, hopeful second movement, then almost yearning, reminiscing third movement, very romantic, and then almost fatalistic last movement, " said Djokic over the phone from Halifax. "It's sort of a very dark ending, but there are moments of light that show themselves now and then. I guess you could say it's sort of like a lifetime, this piece, going over the course of a lifetime, or maybe somebody's experience."

Elgar's Cello Concerto will be experienced along with Beethoven's Leonore Overture no. 3 and Symphony no. 1 in C Major, which complete the bill. Tickets are $30, senior $25, student $10. Call 905-525-7664, ext. 16.

****
Sunday at 3 p.m., Symphony Hamilton-Symphony on the Bay performs in St. Matthew's Anglican, 126 Plains Rd. E., Burlington. Sabatino Vacca and Arpad Josephson are the soloists in Mendelssohn's Concerto for Violin, Piano and Strings, while special guest Valerie Tryon performs Chopin's Andante spianato et Grand polonaise. Also works by Caplet and Mozart. Advance tickets: $25, student/senior $12, child $5. At the door: $28, senior/student $15, child $5. Call 905-526-6690.

Sunday at 7:30 p.m., Jack Mendelsohn's chamberWORKS! holds its Grand Finale concert in the Lincoln Alexander Centre, 150 King St. E., with works by Mozart, Prokofiev and Farrenc. Tickets are $30, $25, senior $25, $20, student $10. Call 905-308-3446.

Leonard Turnevicius writes on classical music for The Spectator

InsideHalton Article: Sound of Brott Music Festival to fill St. Christopher’s

2010-06-15T13:16:00.000-07:00

InsideHalton Article: Sound of Brott Music Festival to fill St. Christopher’s

CBC News - Music - Montreal violinist wins $25,000 prize

2010-06-15T13:01:00.000-07:00

CBC News - Music - Montreal violinist wins $25,000 prize

Brott: un festival pour former  les jeunes musiciens - L'Express

2010-06-15T12:55:00.000-07:00

Brott: un festival pour former  les jeunes musiciens - L'Express

2010-06-07T14:04:00.000-07:00

2010 Brott Music Festival & Artword Artbar Café presents

FREE CONCERT! This Wed. June 9!

Wednesday June 9 at 7:30 pm -- Get a sneak peak at the 2010 edition of Boris Brott’s National Academy Orchestra. As part of Artword Artbar’s Classical Cafe series — four special chamber concerts with players from this season’s National Academy Orchestra chamber groups.

This performance takes place at the intimate and beautifully refurbished Artword Artbar, 15 Colbourne Street in Hamilton (corner of James St. N.), for more information visit www.artword.net. There is a light menu, coffee, tea and a licensed bar available.

L- Caroline Peach (NAO Bass '10)

Each concert will be a mix two or three of the National Academy Orchestra chamber groups. NAO Orchestra Manager Megan Jones says, “We have six groups in total, one oboe quintet, a piano quartet, a string quartet, a wood wind quintet, a brass quintet and a trio. We will also be adding a flute quintet and a really cool percussion and flute piece somewhere along the way.”

For more information, please don’t hesitate to call our Festival offices at 905.525.7664.

2010 Brott Music Festival Chamber Series Kicks Off

2010-06-02T12:34:00.000-07:00

Here's a rousing performance from last Sunday May 30's debut of the 2010 National Academy Orchestra Chamber Players at the ArtWord ArtBar cafe on Colborne St. in Hamilton (off James St. North) Catch the NAO Chamber Players again on Wednesday June 2 at 8 pm and Sunday June 6 at 2 pm. Tickets are $10 and proceeds go the orchestra.

Happy Birth Day Diane!

2010-03-30T13:32:00.000-07:00

Classical Comedy: French and Saunders Opera Spoof

2010-03-30T12:10:00.001-07:00

Haut Canada Trio Makes Impressive Debut

2010-03-26T10:18:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to the brand new Haut Canada Trio ontheir memorable debut performance at last week's Artbar Classical Cafe.

The trio, featuring oboist Marc Gibbons (NAO '09) Spencer deMan (NAO bassoon '08-'09) and Talisa Blackman combined their exceptional level of musicianship with humour and engaging background information on the works they performed.

Marc did a great job on their logo, didn't he?

Judith Sandiford from the Artword Artbar Cafe was thrilled, writing to us that "I wanted to let you and everyone at Brott Music Festival know that the concert by Haut-Canada Trio yesterday afternoon at Artword Artbar was absolutely extraordinary!

"Marc Gibbons and his colleagues Talisa Blackman and Spencer DeMan are superb players, and very focussed on making some wonderful music with an unusual isntrumentation. The sounds of the oboe, bassoon and piano work beautifully together.

"This was their debut performance as a trio, and we are very proud that it happened at Artword. We hope to see more of them."

Bravo Haut Canada!

The Unbelievable Derek Paravicini

2010-03-16T12:24:00.000-07:00

It isn't every day that a news story can literally restore your faith in the human spirit and make you realize the sheer brilliance and extraordinary mysteries which are contained in the human mind. That's the way we felt after viewing 60 Minutes' piece on British musical savant Derek Paravicini which aired this past Sunday.

Though autism is thought to be the source of Derek's extraordinary musical ability, his blindness may contribute. Because Derek is blind, the part of his brain that would normally be used for sight and light detection could be used for extra auditory ability. Derek is able – with a great deal of precision and accuracy – to detect and recognise not just one but multiple notes played at once (so far he can distinguish over 20 notes). Watch the complete 60 Minutes documentary.

Derek's story will make your day, we promise.

Boris: The Birthday Week Report

2010-03-15T11:40:00.000-07:00

The two conductors: Valery Gergiev & the birthday boy, March 14, 2010

Boris likes to infuriate his entire staff a few times each year by guest conducting (and eating!) in that most fabulous place on Earth: Italy. Boris had a busy birthday week, beginning with a return to the newly rebuilt Teatro Petruzzelli in Bari, Italy.

Though you may not think of the historic port city (on the heel of “the boot” in the region of Puglia) as one of the major cultural centres in Italy, it most certainly is. Its magnificent Petruzzelli Theatre is one of the grandest opera houses in the country after La Scala in Milan and the San Carlo Theatre in Naples. Host to many famous opera and ballet greats throughout the 20th century, it was nearly destroyed by arson in October 1991. Eighteen years later -- just this past October 2009 -- refurbishments were finally completed and it was reopened.

Boris conducted Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade and Tchaikovsky’s Third Symphony to a sold out audience. He says the players were fantastic and of course, so was the Italian hospitality and FOOD!

Post concert meal featuring risotto, roasted snapper, seafood salad and then some...

To make matters worse for all of us salivating at the office, Boris is invited back to Bari this Autumn to conduct La Traviata and some other programs. Not to mention Trieste and Verona AND Bari in 2011. It's really not fair!

And it was back to his birthplace, Montreal for his actual b-day – March 14, which he shared with his late father, conductor and composer Alexander Brott -- where he attended the Montreal debut of the great Russian conductor Valery Gergiev, who conducted the Mariinsky Orchestra. The two Maestros reconnected backstage at Place des Arts.

Happy Birthday, Boris!

Very Cool, Google...Happy B Day Vivaldi

2010-03-04T10:23:00.000-08:00

We are always excited when the Google Doodle is devoted to a legend of classical music. Antonio Lucio Vivaldi, a Baroque composer who would have turned 332 years-old today. Another recent memorable doodle was in honour of Igor Stravinsky, the Russian composer – turned naturalized American citizen – who died in 1971.

But back to Vivaldi. Here are some fun facts about him:

He was born March 4, 1678 in Venice, the same day an earthquake rocked that city.

He was known as "Il Prete Rosso" or The Red Priest. This is a very important factoid to know and our Brott Staff trivia team -The H'Educated Guessers - has come across this question many times at our weekly pub trivia league. It was no doubt given to Antonio because of his long, curly blazing red hair and of course, because he was a priest -- a vocation he may or may not have been forced into by his family in order to secure a free education or in believing the earthquake on his birthday carried some special meaning. His carrot top is obscured in this famous portrait by the fashionable white wig of the day.

He suffered from terrible asthma his whole life, which may have been the reason he was relieved of Mass-saying duties and pursued a career as musical director.

Despite his saintly status, he is supposed to have had many love affairs, one of which was with the singer Anna Giraud, with whom he was suspected of using materials from old Venetian operas that he only slightly adapted to the vocal capabilities of his mistress. This business caused him some troubles with other musicians, like Benedetto Marcello, who wrote a pamphlet against him.

His most famous work, the Four Seasons violin concertos were first published in 1725 and were based on four sonnets, written by the famous poet Anonymous, though many think Vivaldi wrote them himself. On a nice sunny day here in Hamilton today, with the sound of melting snow slipping down the drainpipes, the text bringsthe burgeoning season to life: "Springtime is upon us.The birds celebrate her return with festive song, and murmuring streams are softly caressed by the breezes."

In addition to these sonnets, Vivaldi provided instructions such as "The barking dog" (in the second movement of "Spring"), "Languor caused by the heat" (in the first movement of "Summer"), and "the drunkards have fallen asleep" (in the second movement of "Autumn"). "Winter" features chilling staccato notes from the high strings, to evoke ice. The "Summer" section is often referred to as Storm, due to its final movement that was composed to evoke the clatter of a thunderstorm.

The four concertos were in fact part of a larger set of twelve, entitled Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione (The Contest between Harmony and Invention). Here's Boris conducting the lovely Linsdsay Deutsch and the McGill Chamber Orchestra a year ago.

Lindsay performed this work with our Festival in 2008. Also on the program were two modern takes on the Four Seasons, Argentinian composer Astor Piazzolla's Estaciones Portenas - the Four Seasons of Buenos Aires -- here is an audio recording of Gidon Kremer playing the Autumn movement. and American jazz violinist Mark O'Connor's take on Vivaldi's "Spring." from his The American Seasons.

While Vivaldi had the violin in mind as the principle instrument for the Four Seasons, it became something of a badge of honour for rock guitarists in the 1980s to be able to play its intricate passages.

Vivaldi was as prolific a composer as Mozart in his day, writing over 500 concerti plus operas and sacred music. Sadly, like Mozart, he died a pauper and was buried in an unmarked grave.

His music fell into obscurity until the 1900s. Most of his repertoire was re-discovered only in the first half of the 20th century in Turin and Genoa, but was published in the second half. The resurrection of Vivaldi's works in the 20th century is mostly thanks to the efforts of Alfredo Casella, who in 1939, organised the now historic Vivaldi Week.

Vivaldi's music is innovative, breaking a consolidated tradition in schemes; he gave brightness to the formal and the rhythmic structure of the concerto, repeatedly looking for harmonic contrasts, and invented innovative melodies and themes. Hence, the vast popularity of his music with audiences.

Nigel Kennedy and the English Chamber Orchestra's 1989 album once held the record for the best-selling classical recording of all time. Bravo to the Red Priest!

2010-03-01T11:38:00.000-08:00

2010-02-25T08:22:00.000-08:00

Mahler's Adagietto & How the Gold Was Won.

2010-02-23T15:35:00.000-08:00

Gustav Mahler’s gorgeous Adagietto is the fourth movement of his five movement Symphony No. 5 The fourth movement is arguably Mahler's most famous single piece of music, and is the most frequently performed extract from Mahler's works. Mahler was probably right when he wished he could conduct his Fifth Symphony 50 years after his death when it would be more appreciated. For many years only the Adagietto - sans the other four movements of the symphony was performed by orchestras around the world, too afraid that audiences wouldn't take to an entire Mahler Symphonic work. It is written for harp and strings.

Because Mahler added the tempo marking sehr langsam (very slowly) to the Adagietto many 20th century conductors took the movement well over its normal duration, in some cases over eleven minutes (11'43" in a recording by Eliahu Inbal, 11'52" in a recording by Herbert von Karajan, and 11'55 in a recording by Claudio Abbado). However in recent years the trend moved away from extreme tempi. Simon Rattle conducts clocks in at just over nine and a half minutes.

The Adagietto was also conducted by Leonard Bernstein at the mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York on 8 June 1968, the day of the burial of Robert Kennedy. Sarah Brightman recorded an interesting adaptation of on her Symphony Album called Schwere Träume which means “heavy dreams”

It was used in the film Death in Venice and is about to be covered on British guitarist Jeff Beck’s new album, Emotion & Commotion. Given Beck’s integral role in the development of progressive rock and his treatment of Ravel’s Bolero back in the day – Beck’s Bolero – it is sure to be a memorable take on the work. You may not be interested in Jeff Beck, but here’s a tidbit – he’s the inspiration for Christopher Guest’s character Nigel Tufnel in This is Spinal Tap.

And of course for all Canadians, last night, Mahler (as always) was as good as GOLD as Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir of Ilderton, ON chose to skate their final program to this most moving piece of music. Here they are with the same program at the Canadian Nationals last month.

Lovely

Classical Cafe with Megan Jones, violin

2010-02-22T14:31:00.000-08:00

Yesterday afternoon, NAO alumni Megan Jones and Katherine Mrmak serenaded an enthusiastic crowd at the Artword Artbar Cafe on Colborne St. just off the James North. The two musicians were lovely Mistresses of Ceremony and had an interactive and lovely interchange with audience members.

The concert took place in two halves, the first featuring music from Telemann, Haydn, Brahms and Purcell. To end the first half, the two sat down at a table to perform Mozart's Tabletop Duet, also called the Mirror Duet, where a sheet of music is placed on a table, and one violinist plays the music right side up; the other, upside down, and they meet in the middle of the piece.

The second half featured a charming selection of well-known pieces, arranged for violin and piano and included Brahms' Hungarian Dance No. 1, Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, Dvorak's Slavonic Dance No. 10 and to end, Mendelssohn's Spring Song.

Classical Cafe takes place on the third Sunday of every month and features alumni of the National Academy Orchestra of Canada -- the Brott Music Festival's orchestra in residence. All performances take place at 2 pm and last between 1 1/2 and 2 hours. Admission is only $10 and you can enjoy some light refreshments, wine, beer, coffee, tea and some very reasonable menu items. And best of all, your $10 goes directly to the performers. Thanks to Judith Sandiford and Ronald Weihs (a fine violinist himself!) for their dedication in making events like this happen for artists in the Hamilton area. Check out the Artword Artbar at http://www.artword.net/artbar/

Kat Mrmak, Megan Jones and Artbar owners Judith Sandiford & Ronald Weihs

From Ottawa: Boris, Eugene Levy & the Case of the Cryptic Autograph

2010-02-21T15:43:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to the National Arts Centre in Ottawa on their 40th anniversary – the world class building has housed a world-class theatre, music and dance ensembles since 1969.

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Coincidentally, it is also the 40th anniversary of Boris Brott coming to Hamilton to base his career as a conductor here, while travelling all over the world. Congratulations Boris and thanks for staying! Hamilton and this Festival is blessed to have you if we do say so ourselves… we’ll have to find some ways to celebrate later this year!

Back to Ottawa – Boris was at the helm of a 40th anniversary celebration of the best of Young People’s Programmes at the NAC yesterday with some very special guest stars. Kathy and Karin Kettler stopped by to wow the audience with traditional Inuit throat singing. You’ll remember them from our kids’ concerts at Hamilton Place this past November.

Our Executive Director Ardyth Brott was also in attendance and was thrilled to find Karin`s son Nathan and mother seated next to her at the concert.

Special guest star Eugene Levy also stopped by. He made an appearance at a hugely successful concert two years ago entitled Music & Humour. Here he and Boris have a moment backstage.

All were popular backstage presences and Boris took the time to sign someone's T-shirt -- quite the rockstar!

Huh? let's get a closeup of that.

Looks like something to do with a Bflat and a fermata, but we'll have to get the details from the Maestro himself as to the translation of this most creative autograph!

And Jessica Linnebach, who has appeared as concertmaster and soloist with our Festival many times performed the last movement of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto to the delight of the young families in the audience.She plays for the NAC now and tours with the extraordinary Zukerman Players. She is a passionate player who adds something special to any performance.

She first performed with an orchestra when she was seven (Boris was conductor, of course!)

Letter from Vancouver: Day 5

2010-02-16T14:44:00.000-08:00

The Brott Blog is pleased to have a few Vancouverites at our service who have promised to report on their perspectives as residents in our fair Olympic city to the West during these exciting 17 days. We are always thrilled to hear from the always-effervescent and cultured Irene Kavanagh, whose wit and charm will liven up anyone's rainy (or snowy as the case may be) Vancouver day:

Good Tuesday morning, Brott Festival!

What a weekend! I was positively inspired by Alex Bilodeau’s win….. and OMG… who wrote that Tim Hortons commercial!!….. I was completely run over at my own unexpected emotional reaction…..by the time the reunited family emerged from the airport wearing all the newly purchased winter clothes, I was a blubbering mass of confused protoplasm. The finest in manipulative advertising BUT apparently “based on a true story” as the introductory title stated.

Alex Bilodeau….perfection all the way down that run! And now Mike Robertson from Alberta, who won Silver for the Men’s Downhill Cross…a crazed snowboarding event….. these people have knees from the gods…..

From BC Place last evening, the victory and medal awards ceremony were held honouring Canada, Australia, and the United States. Three young men, at the top of their game, and for Alex Bilodeau, his life is about to change forever. The crowd didn’t want to let go and their cheers went on for several minutes. American Bronze winner Bryon Wilson, smiled brightly at the judges, the crowds, and at his golden competitor; Australian Silver medalist Dale Begg-Smith….not so much…oh dear.

I wondered if Dale had ever heard Jerry Seinfeld’s bit on the Olympics and his wonderfully skewered view of the silver medal. On the other hand, Dale was born in 1985 and this is from Jerry’s “I’m Telling You for the Last Time” Broadway show in 1998, at which time he was retiring all his old material….This means that Dale would have been 13 years old. I never cease to be horrified by people who are often younger than my funniest memories.

Tomorrow I’m hoping that S and I can inch through downtown and find our way into some of the international pavilions - hopefully first at the Canada and BC buildings…. prior to which we might flip a coin to see whose family’s silver service should be sold to pay for parking. Or we could go quite radical and use public transportation, which is currently at its best for all the visitors. During the 2010 Winter and Paralympic Games (Mar. 12 – 21 in Vancouver and Whistler, with opening ceremonies also held at BC Place Stadium), an Olympic Line free streetcar service has been created for athletes, visitors and residents, running along a stretch of specially upgraded historic-railway track and will connect Granville Island to the Line's Olympic Village Station. Some of the teams have been at Granville Island to meet, greet, and press the flesh. The love-fest is on! For seventeen days, everyone is in one place to celebrate excellence and diversity.

Yes indeedy Vancouver is now high on Olympic fever. Did you see the opening ceremony? Spectacular! Or And I thought that k.d. lang’s performance was mesmerizing. She seems to be getting better as she gets older. The city is giddy….Whistler and Cypress mountains have kabillions of people spending money….Granville Island, a trendy, artsy area in mid-town, has tourists and new pay parking that has the locals very ticked off. In fact, the whole parking scene has run amok…..if you park underground for the evening anywhere downtown, don’t expect to come away for less than $30. The city definitely is expecting to rake in truckloads of cash. Considering what already has been spent, I hope it does, even at the risk of having everyone feeling as though they’ve been turned upside down and shaken out for their last few pennies. On the whole, there are bazillions of people everywhere but they’re having a super time.

Irene

From Us To You!

2010-02-15T10:37:00.000-08:00

Artist: Jacqui Templeton Muir

Go Canada!

2010-02-14T23:42:00.000-08:00

CBC News - Music - Popular music a way to preserve Inuktitut

2010-02-14T23:28:00.000-08:00

CBC News - Music - Popular music a way to preserve Inuktitut

Classical Cafe - Finally! An opportunity to enjoy NAO performances in the offseason

2010-02-08T13:25:00.000-08:00

Join the fantastic musicians of the National Academy Orchestra for a lovely afternoon of music at the Artword Artbar Cafe the third Sunday of each month.
Upcoming performances of Classical Cafe -- all begin at 2 pm include;

Sunday February 21 - 2 pm

String Extravaganza with Megan Jones, violin

Sunday March 21 - 2 pm

Haut Canada Trio

(Marc Gibbons, oboe; Spencer de Man, bassoon; Talisa Blackman, piano)

Sunday April 18 - 2pm

Musicians TBA .

Classical Café presents monthly classical chamber concerts in association with the Brott Music Festival, at Artword Artbar, 15 Colbourne Street, Hamilton. The admission of $10 goes entirely to the musicians. [Below: The launch Jan 31 with Lorna Heidt cello and Katherine Mrmak violin playing some Handel.] Judith, owner of the Artbar reports that Kat & Lorna "were wonderful!" The concert takes place in an intimate, artistic and friendly cabaret setting, where you can enjoy an espresso or a glass of wine.

Lorna Heidt, cello and Katherine Mrmak, violin (NAO viola '06-'07) at Artword Artbar Jan. 31

The Classical Café offers a wonderful chance for emerging professional musicians to perform new works in their repertoire, in a warm intimate setting. The musicians, drawn from the alumnae of the National Academy Orchestra and Brott Music Festival, will perform classical chamber works for small ensembles (duos, trios, quartets).

Artword Artbar, the latest project of Ronald Weihs and Judith Sandiford of Artword Theatre, is a neighbourhood bar in the James North Art District, that the owners are transforming into an arts hub for live music, art, poetry, theatre and dance. For more information visit www.artword.net/artbar and mark February 21st on your calendar! Hope to see you there! For more information, you are also welcome to phone 905.525.7664.

Boris conducts NAC's Sports Fever: Just in time for the Olympics

2010-02-05T10:45:00.000-08:00

Boris recently conducted the National Arts Centre Orchestra’s Sports Fever performance on January 23, 2010, which celebrated music associated with sport, spirit and a certain event coming soon to a Canadian city near us (or not so near).

In addition to the concert, there were activities on the three levels of the NAC. Families could meet Olympians signing autographs, experiment with a musical instrument “petting zoo” and made arts and crafts or try their luck at golf putting.

Said one mother: “The line up of special guests and athletes was outstanding. I was really impressed by the thought and effort that went into organizing the event. Broadcaster Kevin Newman from Global Television hosted, skiing legend Nancy Greene Raine led the warm up exercises and NAC Principal Youth and Family Conductor Boris Brott took it all in stride. Also featured were gymnasts, dancers, cheerleaders and über talented 14-year-old pianist Jan Lisiecki.”

L-R Global News' Kevin Newman, Jan Lisiecki, Senator Nancy Greene-Raine backstage at NAC

Jan Lisiecki is no stranger to BMF audiences and has been wowing us in Hamilton and Burlington performances for three years now. At the Sports Fever concert, he deconstructed the final movement of Chopin's Second Piano Concerto for the audience, demonstrating how he had to practise both technically and emotionally to prepare the piece, just as an athlete would practice his/her sport technique and hone his/her competitive drive for an optimum performance.

Calgary's Jan Lisiecki backstage at the NAC with the

Ottawa 67s mascot, Riley Raccoon

Of course the upcoming Vancouver Olympics were on the tips of everyone’s tongue and what better guest than Nancy Greene Raine, Canada’s Female athlete of the 20th century and now a Senator.

Senator Nancy Greene-Raine, former Skiing Champion and Boris Brott backstage at NAC

It was definitely a meeting of Canadian Who's Who as the Orchestra performed works such as David Foster's Olympic Fanfare (1988 Calgary Olympic Games) John Williams Olympic Fanfare (1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games), Peter Schikele's Beethoven 5 (read out in play by play fashion by Boris and Jacques Bergeron, and Khatchaturian Sabre Dance to name a few.

Boris made sure to practise his play-by-play commentary before the concert and here's a sampling of his behind the scenes preparation.

Also on the program was a piece Festival patrons will remember from this past summer. Composer Maxime Goulet's rousing and stately Citius Altius Fortius was composed for a Vancouver 2010 Olympic fanfare competition. The five minute work was conducted at the 2009 Brott Music Festival on July 4 by NAO apprentice conductor Genevieve Leclair. Listen to the work here http://www.maximegoulet.com/fr/mus_concert.htm

Here's CTV's official theme for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. I Believe, composed by Stephan Moccio of Toronto and sung by Nikki Yanovsky.

One more week and the world comes to Vancouver!

NAO Alumni Update: Martin MacDonald (Conductor '06-'09)

2010-02-04T14:35:00.000-08:00

We're often asked by patrons how conductor Martin MacDonald is faring in his new post as Resident Conductor of Symphony Nova Scotia. The answer, judging from this picture (taken Jan. 29, 2010 at the Rebecca Cohn Auditorium), is he's having a whole lot of fun in his new role.

L-R Scott Long, bagpipes; Ashley MacIsaac, fiddle;

and the kilted Martin MacDonald, conductor

As resident conductor, Marty has gained a bit of profile in Halifax, where he used to attend cello lessons as a child -- a six hour commute from his native Ironville, Cape Breton Island. Check out SNS's 2009-10 billboards - right beside the Maestro is Eileen Walsh (NAO Clarinet '07) who won a job with SNS not very long after graduating from the NAO. Don't they both look lovely?

Throughout the SNS season, Marty gives many pre-concert lectures, has conducted numerous interesting programs, including the one with Ashley MacIssac a couple of weeks ago.

Music & The Inuit Spirit - Nov. 2009

2010-02-04T14:08:00.000-08:00

A lovely clip from Cable 14's show called Hamilton Life covering Music & The Inuit Spirit, the Festival's renowned Education Concert. It attracted 6,000 students to Hamilton Place on November 18, 2009. We were especially pleased to welcome Inuit performers Kathy & Karin Kettler, who astonished everyone with their throat singing talents and Karin's son Nathan, who did a great job demonstrating the art of drum dancing. Bravo!

Piano Masterclass with Fry & Laurie

2010-01-22T15:30:00.000-08:00

If there is one thing we love, it's British Comedy and it doesn't get much better than A Bit of Fry & Laurie, the brilliant pairing of Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie (aka Dr. House before the American accent). In fact, we can't think of anyone we adore more at the moment than Stephen Fry and could talk about him forever. North American audiences will know him best from his title role as Oscar Wilde in the film Wilde (in which a then-unknown Jude Law played his lover) ,the detective in Robert Altman's Gosford Park, Jeeves in Jeeves & Wooster and the writer/presenter of the fascinating documentary Stephen Fry in America, the last two of which can be seen here on PBS. We promise lots more on musically related Britcom material, especially where he's concerned! Not to mention the novels, the non-fiction, the panel show QI, oh, we could go on for hours, really....

Okay, just one more luvvie moment for Stephen Fry, we promise (for now!). Just last night the author/actor/comedian/director/quiz host/documentarist/general brilliant Renaissance man received Special Recognition Award at the National TV Awards. The tribute reel and acceptance speech were just lovely and Stephen was - as always - seemingly abashed and genuinely modest and touched by the honour. And Stephen took a hiatus from his self imposed moratorium on Twitter (on which he has more than a million followers) to thank everyone. He had announced after the New Year he was taking a break from Twitter and his blog to concentrate on writing the second installment of his autobiography, to follow Moab Is My Washpot. All in all, a well-deserved, honour, Mr. Fry!

Artistic Lives Well Lived: Kate McGarrigle (1946-2010) & Paul Quarrington (1953-2010)

2010-01-21T17:07:00.000-08:00

Canada has lost two of its most prolific artists in the past few days. A wise commenter on CBC’s website wrote that when an artist dies, it is fitting to take some time out to listen, read, or view a sample of their lives' work. With the Internet providing such instant access to musical and artistic output, we think this is a fine and fitting idea.

It was difficult to narrow down the selection as with folk singer-songwriter Kate McGarrigle (pictured above with son Rufus Wainwright) and musician/writer Joel Quarrington, the songs and words from which to choose were overwhelming.

Kate McGarrigle may be better known to many of the younger generation as the mother of Rufus and Martha Wainwright, but she and her sister Anna as the McGarrigle Sisters are not only pure Canadian music legends, but legendary folk singer-songwriters south of the border too. Their songs have been recorded and re-recorded, covered by the likes of Linda Ronstadt, Billy Bragg and Dolly Parton to name a few. Heart Like a Wheel, Talk to Me of Mendocino and Hard Times Come Again No More were a few of their most well-known songs.

One of our favourites is Goin’ Back to Harlan, which was performed and recorded often by Emmylou Harris, perhaps most beautifully on her 1995 album Wrecking Ball, produced by Hamiltonian Daniel Lanois. Here the McGarrigle Sisters perform it live in 1998. Check out Emmylou’s versions too, in fact check out the entire Wrecking Ball album, it is fantastic.

Anna wrote of her sister’s death: "She departed in a haze of song and love surrounded by family and good friends. She is irreplaceable and we are broken-hearted. Til we meet again dear sister."

Kate’s voice, along with her sister’s is probably inescapably indelible in the Canadian collective imagination as those singing the famous NFB animated short, The Log Driver’s Waltz. You can’t resist this tune, penned by Brantford native Wade Hemsworth, whose great nephew and namesake is well known to Hamiltonians as a veteran reporter at the Hamilton Spectator. The Log Driver’s Waltz was written in 1979. We defy you not to hum/sing along/tear up at the sound of it.

Paul Quarrington lost his battle with cancer at the age of 56 this morning. He packed a prodigious amount of musical and literary accomplishment into those years with a Governor General’s Literary Award and a Genie among other gathered accolades. Michael Ondaatje paid tribute in a video that was shown when Quarrington was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the International Festival of Authors this past October.

Quarrington’s humour and extraordinarily ability to craft a vibrant, relatable story was still on display this past October when he wrote of his reaction to the cancer diagnosis for the National Post. It is a poignant reflection by a man who has boldly come to terms with the end of his life and his place on the planet .He contemplated life on a cruise of Newfoundland/Labrador.

“As we journeyed through the Torngat Mountains [in Labrador], I finally realized what this trip was all about, for me. [These mountains }]are amongst the oldest mountains in the world, almost four billions years old. …. In short, the Torngat Mountains took what little breath I have away from me. The thought occurred that I was on another planet, and that's when I realized, no, I'm on this planet, I'm just none too clear on what it actually looks like. I realized that what I wanted to do was spend a little time getting to know the third stone from the sun; it has been my home for 56 years, but I have spent much of it confined in the settlements. I wanted to explore and examine, I wanted to interact-yes, in the broadest, most spiritual sense, I wanted to go mountain climbing. “

His brilliant novel, Whale Music inspired the now-disbanded Canadian band The Rheostatics album of the same name. Quarrington himself was so impressed by Whale Music's quirky pop—which was perfectly suited to a novel about a quirky, reclusive pop genius liberally based on Brian Wilson—that he chose the band to compose the soundtrack to the film version of his novel. Music from the Motion Picture Whale Music was released in 1994. He co-wrote what would become the bands only top-40 hit – Claire.

These words end the National Post article: “It's a life and death struggle I've got going on here, except that, you know, I wouldn't put any significant money on life raising the final flag. But having decided that life is beautiful-not a decision I laboured over, by the way, more a certainty that seemed unassailable-one year should seem as full of beauty and grace as forty.”

From the Archives #1 - Boris Plays the Guitar

2010-01-20T12:57:00.000-08:00

This past summer, the Maestro pitched in and learned the guitar chords to Deep Purples infamous riff, Smoke on the Water, never having played guitar before. The Spectator's Mark McNeil -- himself a fine guitarist and singer-- taught Boris the chords in an effort to encourage Hamiltonians to help break the Guinness Book of World Records for most people to perform the riff in one place. The great guitar project was spearheaded by Lorne Lieberman of Festival of Friends and alas, came up 75 short of the record. It's always great to see Boris, who has played the violin and french horn learn new music -- not to mention a new instrument -- so quickly, and we especially love him in the jeans!See http://www.thespec.com/article/615234

A Classical Cafe

2010-01-20T11:51:00.000-08:00

If you're like us, you miss hearing fantastic musicmaking by our National Academy Orchestra musicians in our Festival's offseason. Well, miss out no more! We're HUGE fans of the James North arts (and restaurant!) scene, and were thrilled to get a phone call from Ron Weihs and Judith Sandiford who have done a splendid job of transforming the former sports bar Three Amigos into a cozy and charming neighbourhood arts bar called Artword Artbar. They are dedicated to featuring all sorts of live music, art, poetry, theatre and dance and had great success with the concept in Toronto

So on the third Sunday of every month, they are launching the Classical Café, featuring none other than chamber groups made up of NAO Alumni. The inaugural concert will be Sunday Jan 31 at 2 pm and patrons can enjoy an espresso or glass of wine while listening to great chamber music. We suggest strolling the fabulous gallery downstairs, or just saying hello to the musicians during the intermission. Admission is $10 at the door, and all proceeds go to the musicians. Subsequent dates are Sunday February 21, Sunday March 21, and Sunday April 18, all at 2 pm. Artword Artbar is located at 15 Colbourne Street, Hamilton. Tickets can be reserved by calling 905.543.8512 or can be purchased at the door. For more information visit www.artword.net/artbar