Semaine du Neuf | The Power of the Organ and the Wind

by Elena Mandolini

On the penultimate day of the second edition of the Semaine du Neuf presented by Le Vivier, the public was invited to Ascension of Our Lord Church for an unusual concert: an improvisation composed for a computer-controlled organ. The work featured, L’être contre le vent by German composer Matthias Krüger, was presented as part of his residency. Although primarily an improvisation, this piece is built on the desire to explore the sound potential of the organ. Knowing that there’s almost nothing an organ alone can’t do, imagine what it’s like when you add a computer! The possibilities are now truly endless.

The piece opens with a rumble of low organ notes, in which we hear the wind. This introduction even shakes the church floor. An excellent introduction. Right from the start, you sense just how powerful, imposing and monumental the organ is. You can hear the architecture of the music in this work: the organist, Adrian Foster, plays and repeats chords, while Matthias Krüger, using his electronic device, modifies the sounds. In addition to the acoustic sounds of the organ, purely electronic noises are added, reminiscent of metal squeaks, bells and sirens.

The location adds a great deal to the appreciation of the work. One thing is certain, the listening conditions in which the audience was immersed are rare. As is customary in organ concerts, the audience could not see the instrumentalists. As a result, the architecture of the church was immersed in half-light. With the sound reverberating off the stone, we had the impression that the organ sound was coming from everywhere and surrounding us. The effect is striking, even a little disquieting, but you’re transported and moved.

The different sections of the work, of varying intensity, follow one another almost imperceptibly to paint as many images. The music created is highly evocative. At times, it’s like being underwater, and at others, it’s like being in a glittering forest. And of course, the wind is never far away.

L’être contre le vent is a moving, even troubling, work that transports and embraces us. Despite some lengthy repeated chords, the audience is constantly moving through the work and the changing sonorities. A great success!

To find out about upcoming events presented by Le Vivier, click HERE!

expérimental / contemporain / Modern Classical

Semaine du Neuf | Sturm und Klang

by Varun Swarup

It was in the heart of the Elizabeth Wirth Building of McGill University’s Schulich School of Music, in its large underground multimedia room, that the Between Feathers ensemble (made up of Laure-Catherine Beyers on vocals, Audrey G. Perreault on flutes, Hannes Schöggl on percussion, and Maria Mogas Gensana on accordion) performed a selection of music by various composers from around the world in a programme entitled Sturm und Klang, or “storm and sound” in German.

The concert opened with a single, sharp brushstroke from a snare drum. The composition, “(des)en)canto” by Pedro Berardinelli, proceeds by becoming a kind of soundtrack to an evening in an otherworldly restaurant; the low notes of the accordion played like chairs scraping on the floor, two percussive bowls were struck and rubbed together, and over this, the extended technique of the other musicians like the “slap tongue” – a percussive effect – of the bass flute, and the voice singing through the snare drum, among other interesting effects.

Continuing with Tanja Brueggemann’s “La Somme des Chiffres 1+2”, the ensemble, equipped with flashing headlamps, was plunged into the darkness and gloom of the composition. There were sounds almost like rain playing in 3D through the seventy speakers around the hall, as the musicians played an ambience that evoked sea waves beneath a ship in the night, with vocal notes piercing the air like siren songs through the mist. The huge projector screen hanging over it like a big sail reinforced the image, and even when they sat at a table over a single illuminated glass, it was like a tense dinner in the ship’s cabin.

The other compositions took advantage of similar techniques, with the addition of projections for Nour Symon’s “Mâ‘lesh I – leurs étreintes bouleverserait la mer”, which followed two brushstrokes of black and multicolored ink on a scrolling canvas that corresponded to the flute and accordion, respectively; and Lisa R. Coons’ “Essay I: Mater”, in which a voice spoke over a photo of several pieces of paper with personal reflections, musical instructions, and drawings, on a table decorated with bones and flowers. This second piece succeeded in capturing the effort to define one’s craft as an artist and the incessant thoughts of doubt that accompany it, but the projections, especially the second with its montage of jumbled zooms and color changes, remained dynamic but lost their novelty before the end.

The pieces “La forma delle conchiglie” by Lorenzo Troiani and “about, away – Création” by James O’Callaghan, also had their strong points, with the addition of almost operatic moments, made all the more captivating by the grandeur of the hall. Both, with their use of lighting effects and alternative techniques, were as dramatic and cinematic as the compositions by Bernardinelli and Brueggemann.

In all, the musicians demonstrated superior control of these difficult materials and a high level of performance. Sturm und Klang indeed.

Contemporary

Semaine du Neuf | Collectif9 : musical hero for everyone

by Frédéric Cardin

On Friday 15 March, collectif9, supported by two composers/videographers (Myriam Boucher and Pierre-Luc Lecours), gave the North American premiere of Héros, a work first performed in France in 2020, but which has never been able to travel since because of the pandemic crisis. It was a sort of second Première for this five-movement piece, written for the ensemble’s nine instrumentalists (4 violins, 2 violas, 2 cellos and 1 double bass) and two live video artists.

Thibault Bertin-Maghit, founder and general/artistic director of collectif9, explains the process of musical creation in the interview he gave me, which I encourage you to listen to here:

Semaine du Neuf | Beethoven 3.0 par l’ensemble collectif9

I’ll just give you a brief summary: starting with Beethoven’s music (2020 was the 250th anniversary of his birth), Boucher and Lecours, who are used to working with electronics, wove a digital musical framework in which Beethoven becomes difficult to recognise, which they then transcribed for the Montreal acoustic ensemble!

From acoustic to digital and back to acoustic again, the rather original approach promised some surprising moments. In truth, this was not the case, which is not to say that it was not good. It’s just that I was expecting some technically virtuosic instrumental passages, spectacularly drawn with millimetric pointillism. I was imagining something perhaps experimental.

Instead, Héros is draped in the hyper-seductive garb of repetitive American minimalism. The five movements develop in slow-fast-slow-fast alternation with a mixed finale. The overall effect is far more ‘pleasant’ than the original premise suggests, and results in a product whose ‘exportable’ potential for touring outside the usual circles of creative music is very interesting.

Concert Héros
collectif9
cr.: Philippe Latour

The video projections animated live by Boucher and Lecours move back and forth between abstraction and natural scenes (lots of birds) filtered by effects of transparency and chromatic color changes. Beethoven’s relationship with nature is probably what most reminds us of his presence in the background, as we search in vain for some melodic reference to the composer (apart from a few chords here and there). In any case, the interest lies not in finding familiar quotations, but rather in the sensory, audio-visual journey on offer.

I found the fourth movement to be the most exciting and absorbing. Against a backdrop of vertical stripes of varying widths and speeds, the highly rhythmic, even nervous music creates a hypnotic trance effect. Certain geometric bands appear in perfect synchronicity with the attacks of the instrumentalists. A fine example of live video creation truly integrated with a musical score.

The final movement offers an almost lyrical synthesis in its elegiac amplitude, touching and much appreciated by the audience.

The Espace Orange at the Wilder was filled to capacity, confirming another success for the Semaine du Neuf contemporary music festival.

As I mentioned, the export potential of Héros is undeniable. I can see this contemporary creation, which is by all accounts fairly user-friendly, being very well received throughout Quebec and elsewhere, in venues not used to the repertoire normally offered by Le Vivier contemporary music hub. Where Andréa Streliski and Jean-Michel Blais draw in the crowds, the Montreal ensemble should be able to pull its weight with Héros.

Another fine coup by collectif9.

Contemporary

Semaine du Neuf | Afghanistan, looking back at us

by Frédéric Cardin

One of the highlights of the Semaine du Neuf festival, organised by le Vivier in collaboration with Innovations in concert, was the musico-video-cinematic-theatrical adventure concocted by Montreal composer and instrumentalist Sam Shalabi and Ontario writer-actor Shaista Latif. For more details on this work, whose starting point is an old Afghan film partly projected on screen during the evening, listen to the interview I conducted with the main protagonists of the creation (it’s here!!).

This intriguing proposal came to fruition on Wednesday evening, 13 March, at La chapelle scènes contemporaines in front of a packed house. On stage, a string quartet plus Shalabi himself on oud and electric guitar, and Shaista Latif standing up, narrating her own text, superimposed on the film images and music.

Shalabi’s music has a fine modal classical feel, with appropriate but not overdone oriental hues. There are rare moments of more chromatic exploration, and sparse atonal touches, as in the section where Latif’s text refers to the attacks of 9/11 2001. Here, for the only time in the show, the guitar shrieks and unleashes a strident energy that is fully in keeping with the reprise of a speech by a certain American president by a Latif oozing sarcasm. On the screen, a young girl dreaming of modernity sees planes flying overhead. She is filled with pride, but the contrast is heartbreaking with the revenge-filled speech swollen with aggressive nationalism recited by Latif. Other planes will fly over the skies of Afghanistan many years after the film, but with far less noble results for the country. One patriotism follows another, but in the end the Afghans themselves are just spectators. A beautiful reversal of direction, and probably the most powerful moment of the show.

Through the character of the young girl in the film who dreams of the city and its modernity, Latif recounts her own questions about identity. The images are as much a pictorial backdrop as they are symbolic and psychological projections of a revealed intimacy. And above all, she also questions our relationship with patriotism and nationalism. Afghanistan (through the eyes of the young girl) and its shattered dreams of modernity hold up a mirror to our own shattered dreams. In relation to that country, we have “succeeded”, but to do what exactly? It’s not a question of denying anything about our way of life, but of reevaluating and reframing it in a context where we absolutely must question the values that will drive this still young 21st century, in order to get through it and come out better than when we started. Maybe.

I’d like to point out one detail of the staging (for future performances): two vertical veilsof silvery hues bordered the screen. However, where I was sitting, one of these strips obscured part of my view of the film because of the lighting reflections that accumulated on it. We’ll have to think of something else…

That said, at barely forty minutes long, the show has no time to bore and we come away satisfied with a discovery (I’d never, ever heard of this film) as well as having been moved to think soberly about some burning issues.

The original film Like Eagles (”Mānand-e ‘Oqāb” in the original language) is available for free online :

expérimental / contemporain

Semaine du Neuf: Architek Percussion au service de 2 architectures

by Alain Brunet

Architek Percussion se produisait lundi à la Salle Multimédia(MMR) de l’école de musique Schulich de l’Université McGill, soit le plus formidable espace montréalais pour une sonorisation top niveau. L’Ensemble avait prévu un programme double amorcé par l’adaptation de Folk Noir / Canadiana par sa conceptrice Nicole Lizée, Montréalaise originaire des Prairies. Encore une fois, l’émerveillement.

La compositrice est connue pour ses mashups hallucinants, sa capacité phénoménale de fondre dans sa musique les vidéos d’archive, le collage artisanal et autres formes DIY d’art visuel. Réécrite pour différents instruments de percussions ceci incluant les marimba / vibraphone permettant de produire de la matière harmonique, Folk Noir / Canadiana est rythmiquement puissante et d’autant plus exigeante, les patterns prescrits par la partition se fondent sur un langage polyrythmique complexe et exigeant.

Qui plus est, ce langage des plus inspirés puise dans une grande diversité de styles populaires ou savants. Les ruptures du discours, digressions, virages à 180 et autres soubresauts y sont multiples, nous avons droit à une relecture foisonnante de canadiana dont de rigolos montages de Mr Dressup, animateur pour enfants ayant sévi à une lointaine époque et marqué des générations de téléphages canadiens. Ce Nicole Lizée fait de tout ça est absolument brillant, son esthétique absolument unisque.

La deuxième partie du programme, soit Stircrazer I de la compositrice canadienne Sabrina Shroeder (également prof à l’Université Simon-Frazer, en Colombie Britannique) n’a peut-être pas été aussi marquante dans le contexte d’une première partie aussi forte. Cette perception était probablement amplifiée par la linéarité de l’œuvre et la minceur relative de ses variations.

On nous avais promis un trip, ce fut un trip assez calme, sauf exceptions – au moment, par exemple, où les grosses caisses étaient martelées par les pédales, technique empruntée au métal, et autres roulements sporadiquement exécutés sans compter quelques éruptions vers la fin. Ainsi, les infragraves et les bourdons dressaient la nappe à une série de vibrations générées par les tambours et les cordes frottées à l’archet au-dessus de leurs cadres.

Cette idée de long murmure/ vrombissment percussif est tout à fait défendable en soi. Ainsi on pouvait d’abord ressentir que la proposition ici soumise manquait de trouvailles dans ses variations, pour finalement réaliser que l’économie de moyen pouvait faire partie du jeu.

Publicité panam

Auteur Pop / Avant-Pop / Chamber Pop / Électro / Electronic / Experimental / Experimental / Contemporary

Erika Angell: Everybody, in trance!

by Frédéric Cardin

Last night at Montreal’s Ausgang Plaza, singer-songwriter Erika Angell (of Thus Owls fame) launched her debut solo album, The Obsession With Her Voice (which was discussed at length in my interview with the artist – listen to it here!) The packed house resonated to the sometimes soaring, sometimes spiritually incandescent waves of the Swedish-born Montrealer’s music. Her voice, beautiful and in tune, was regularly manipulated by electronic equipment. Next to her, Mili Hong’s drums (excellent) sometimes gave the impression of having an independent life. But this was intentional. To round things off, there was a string trio with two cellos (Audréanne Filion et Jean-Christophe Lizotte) and a viola (Thierry Lavoie-Ladouceur), favoring the lower notes. The packed audience listened with remarkable attention to music that is, after all, demanding and sometimes even difficult. Angell’s music is not about seductive pop. She explores the expressive possibilities of her own vocal abilities through long, spare lines, but harmonically steeped in sophisticated modernism. The lyrics, too, raise the bar with thoughtful symbolism. That said, against a backdrop of beat box pulses of various stripes, purring post-romantic strings and often arrhythmic drums, the artist convincingly won over the audience, who showed a remarkably interested and respectful ear. The audience was in a state of trance in front of the stage beauty, which reached a level of musical quality matched only by other artists like Björk, Joanna Newsom or Kate Bush (even if Erika is stylistically totally different). Not a bad line up to be part of.

The evening was part of the FIKA(S) festival devoted to Scandinavian/Nordic culture. SEE THE FIKA(S) PROGRAMME.

expérimental / contemporain / musique contemporaine

Semaine du Neuf | VIVIERMIX // QUASAR + NEM + FIOLÛTRÖNIQ

by Varun Swarup

Hier soir, on nous a servi trois cours de musique numérique, chacun présenté par l’un des ensembles distingués dirigés par Le Vivier. Au cœur de cet événement, deux œuvres mixtes de l’invité d’honneur Pierre Jodlowski et une pièce de Cléo Palacio-Quintin résonnaient dans un mélange éclectique de sons et de récits transdisciplinaires.

Le premier cours a débuté avec « ALÉAS », de la compositrice et interprète elle-même, Cléo Palacio-Quintin à la flûte et son collègue Bernard Falaise à la guitare électrique. Ensemble, ils ont sonorisé en temps réel une projection visuelle ostensiblement d’eau qui coule, dans une invitation à redécouvrir le monde qui nous entoure à travers un prisme déformant de son et de poésie de Thierry Dimanche. Vous pouvez lire notre entretien avec Cléo ici.

André Leroux, l’un des saxophonistes du prestigieux quatuor Quasar, a été à l’honneur lors de la deuxième représentation, dans son interprétation de “Le dernier songe de Samuel Beckett”. Leroux a fait preuve d’une maîtrise considérable dans cette performance qui impliquait des lignes atonales araignées et de nombreuses techniques étendues. Avec son pied, il contrôlait une pédale qui déclencherait une piste d’accompagnement, des paysages sonores banals et effrayants dans cet hommage au dramaturge estimé.

Pour moi, le point culminant de la soirée a été la représentation de l’œuvre de Jodlowski, “Respire”, interprétée par le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne. Il s’agit d’une œuvre qui semble explorer le mécanisme même par lequel nous nous maintenons en vie, notre respiration. Des corps humains sans visage se contorsionnent et bougent en synchronisation avec les sons hypnotiques de l’orchestre, parfois fous, mais parfois beaux dans cette danse entre son et silence. On peut certainement entendre l’influence du minimalisme à la Steve Reich, prononcée par les accords sublimes occasionnels du clavier. Un ouvrage vraiment envoûtant et qui fait réfléchir.

expérimental / contemporain / Modern Classical / musique contemporaine

Semaine du Neuf | Lascaux + Mad Max

by Varun Swarup

La Semaine de Neuf de cette année, présentée sous le cadre du Le Vivier, promet d’explorer les liens entre les arts numériques et la musique de création, donnant jusqu’à présent des résultats prometteurs. La représentation de ce soir, une double programmation, a été une autre soirée réussie pour le programme de cette année, qui comprend des performances à caractère multimédia et interdisciplinaire.

La première moitié du programme, Lascaux, a été interprétée et composée par deux artistes électroacoustiques italiens, Giulio Colangelo et Vittorio Montalti, qui cherchent à explorer le moment où l’étincelle créatrice est née dans ces célèbres grottes avec cette pièce. Il est difficile de dire si cet objectif ambitieux a été atteint ou non, mais considéré uniquement comme une expérience sensorielle et audiovisuelle, ce fut certainement un plaisir à vivre. Les deux artistes ont joué avec des sons et des bruits incroyablement tactiles et viscéraux grâce à la magnifique installation son et lumière de la salle du Conservatoire de Musique. Cependant, je n’ai pas été très convaincu par la narration de cette pièce ni ému par son arc, car il révèle beaucoup de choses dans les mêmes textures, mais c’était quand même très agréable.

Le point culminant de la soirée a été cette interprétation éclectique de Mad Max du compositeur français de musique mixte Pierre Jodlowsky, dont l’œuvre est à l’honneur cette année. Sa vision de ce héros hollywoodien est en fin de compte un examen brutal des défauts et des vices souvent associés à de tels personnages : violence, machisme, brutalité. Charles Rambaldo a livré une performance captivante en tant que personnage principal, se frayant un chemin non seulement à travers une post-apocalypse mais aussi une partition musicale incroyablement détaillée qui impliquait beaucoup de coordination de sa part. La composition commence avec l’interprète mimant la conduite d’une moto avec des détails convaincants, avant d’interagir avec une grosse caisse sur laquelle est projetée une bouche. La pièce monte en crescendo dans sa partie du troisième acte avec l’interprète se mettant enfin au vibraphone, menant au moment le plus « musical » de la partition invoquant les sons du gamelan. Certainement une performance très amusante et réfléchie, et qui rendait justice au matériel source explosif.

Contemporary

Semaine du Neuf | Ice, Creation, and Immersion

by Elena Mandolini

Saturday evening at the Centre PHI featured an immersive, contemplative concert presented by the Paramirabo ensemble. The program focused on three works by Quebec composer Jimmie Leblanc, which flowed together to create an intimate atmosphere. All in all, a very successful concert, with both visual and aural highlights.

From the moment we entered the hall, we could feel the desire to immerse the audience in the work, as Jimmie Leblanc spoke of in an interview with PAN M 360 earlier this week. The small room set up for the occasion at the Centre PHI is admittedly cramped, and we’re very close to our neighbours, but this contributes to our feeling of connection between members of the audience, but also with the artists. By literally sitting inside the art installation, we really feel part of the performance.

The first piece, …and the flesh was made word. has a very joyful, dynamic energy about it. There’s a sense of anticipation, as if something is in the making as if we’re witnessing the creation of something new. The work is rhythmic, guided by a single note repeated with relentless regularity on the piano. To this single note are added more or less dissonant chords. The next piece, Clamors of Being, follows on almost imperceptibly: a change in lighting and a change in the repeated note on the piano are the only means of realizing that we are in the second half of the concert.

It’s easy to see how the two works are related, with the latter complementing the former. Here, the melodic lines are more dynamic, with rapid arpeggios shared between piano and wind instruments. There’s a great lightness and delicacy to this work. You feel like you’re floating, guided by the swirling melodies. What these first two works have in common is the relentlessly repeated note, which acts as an anchor and landmark on which the entire score can be built.

The transition to the title piece, Ice, is unfortunately not without its pitfalls. We think we understand a technical problem, with technicians moving quickly around the hall and stage. Despite this, we try to keep the audience in the contemplative, immersive atmosphere that had been so well established. Pianist Palema Reimer and percussionist Krystina Marcoux continue to create a light soundscape, to avoid creating a cut in the sequence of the program and still enliven this moment of transition, of floating.

The program resumes under the direction of Cristian Gort for the piece Ice, born of a collaboration between Jimmie Leblanc, artist Fareena Chanda and physicist Stephen Morris. The audience is seated inside three metallic fabric curtains, onto which Fareena Chanda’s work is projected, while the Paramirabo ensemble musically evokes the formation of ice. In this work, too, the piano comes to the fore with a magnificent, highly melodic score. The piece is punctuated here and there by chords full of friction and dissonance. The mood is peaceful, contemplative and truly immersive. Throughout the evening, the performers’ playing is precise, in perfect cohesion. The challenge of immersion has been met.

It will be possible to experience the installation on Sunday, March 10 at the Centre PHI between 12.30 and 5.30 p.m., for free.

To find out all about the program for the Semaine du Neuf at Le Vivier, click HERE!

Contemporary / Post-Minimalist

The tranquil and (too) discreet music of Missy Mazzoli

by Frédéric Cardin

On Wednesday 28 February, Salle Bourgie welcomed violinist Jennifer Koh and composer and pianist (and keyboardist) Missy Mazzoli for a type of concert that is still rare in Montreal, hence the title of this article. It’s a discreet kind of music, because here in Montreal it’s still under-recognised. Yet Mazzoli is one of the most important musical creators of our time. Elsewhere in English speaking North America, she is a star.

The programme presented in Montreal was part of a tour by the two musicians and friends celebrating fifteen years of collaboration. It featured works by Mazzoli either written for solo violin or as a duo with piano (or synthesiser keyboard). With perfect organic coherence, this programme was deployed like a great thin veil, with undulating movements that swell and deflate the sound fabric, in a stylistic whole that is quite soaring and resolutely post-minimalist.

The final result gives an imperfect idea of Mazzoli’s musical contribution to the early 21st century, for her output is far more complex and fleshed out than yesterday’s relatively monochrome programme. Listen, for example, to her superb Double Bass Concerto ‘’Dark With Excessive Bright’’, her opera Proving Up, or These Worlds in Us for orchestra, and you’ll get a better idea.

That said, this concert, full of beautiful moments of intangibility and contained spirituality, was important because it presented in Montreal a still too rare concert of what I would describe as real “music of our time”. Scholarly music that blends the need for a return to tonality with the sonic possibilities inherited from the modernist avant-garde, scholarly influences with vernacular, impressionistic and affective atmospheres with textures more akin to indie pop/rock or electro. But, because Montreal has been a strong continental hub of avant-garde post-Boulezian contemporary music, the awareness, even less the appreciation, of newer post-minimalist stuff has been slow coming.

This is not to say that this music is better than ‘traditional’ contemporary avant-garde music. Not. At. All. It’s just a paradigm shift. Traditional contemporary music, with its abrasive and abstract worlds, is in fact a tool, a way of doing things that is hyper-concentrated on intellectual formalism. The result can be works of fabulous, suprasensible beauty. New contemporary music, on the other hand, takes an infinitely more holistic (or inclusive) approach, aiming to create new worlds of sound and, above all, emotion, without denying itself any compositional tool or technique, and shunning concepts of High and Low art.

The first is fuelled by rigorous knowledge, and leads sometimes to emotions. The second is fuelled by emotions and imagination, using a large amount of knowledge that leads to transcendence.

I’d like to thank Olivier Godin, Artistic Director of Salle Bourgie, for his commitment to the development of a Montreal listening culture for this music that we can’t afford to ignore for long.

Africa / Afro Funk / Afro Fusion / Afrobeats / Dancehall / Kompa / Reggaeton / Soul/R&B

Burna Boy almost fills two Bell Centres: Nigeria on our doorstep!

by Alain Brunet

Over the past sixty years, Africa has popularized some of its most remarkable stars in the West: Miriam Makeba, Fela Kuti, Touré Kunda, King Sunny Adé, Alpha Blondy, Youssou N’Dour, Salif Keita, Angélique Kidjo, Oumou Sangaré and Yemi Alade. The last black, non-Western frontman to fill a major Canadian arena as a headliner was Bob Marley… who wasn’t a native of the continent of his forefathers, that’s saying something!

Outside Africa, where they easily fill stadiums, none of the artists mentioned has had such an impact in North America as that seen this week. There is now one exception, the first of many to come.

Burna Boy makes history this week, 18 months after his sensational performance at Osheaga (August 2022), a precursor to the Nigerian Afrobeats movement’s invasion of North America. The first African artist to play Bell centers twice in a row, the frontman embodies a global transformation of pop culture. Wow.

Over 30,000 fans will have flocked to the Bell Centre this week, two nights in a row, to applaud the biggest star of the Afrobeats movement, a non-Western style that has gone global. The influence of this style compares favorably with other powerful movements born outside the U.S. and Western Europe, starting with reggae and reggaeton.

On Thursday evening, the arena was packed with diversity. Predominantly populated by the 18-30 generation, the crowd sang along to the offerings of Lagos-based DJ Lambo, one of the opening acts in a wide-ranging program that began at around 7.40pm and ended shortly before midnight. Also from Nigeria, singer Nissi Ogulu did her best (with ups and downs, to put it politely) and the program’s first DJ, Spaceship Billy, returned to warm up the room before Burna Boy triumphed for two hours. Generous!

The playground is an urban setting inspired by a working-class district of Lagos. A telephone booth is set up in front of several local shops, including a barber and a grocery store. The 4 reeds and brass instruments overhang the stage on the right, while the 3 backing singers do the same on the left. Drums and percussion are arranged at the ends, with the harmonic core of 4 musicians (keyboards, guitars, bass) in the center. A string trio (violin, viola, cello) appears a few times, while 6 dancers express themselves throughout this highly ambitious show.

Burna Boy is frontman, bandleader, crooner, groover and sex symbol all rolled into one. His ascendancy over the female gender is more than obvious, with the ladies clearly in the majority singing along to his megatubes, particularly his romantic ballads.

On the PAN M 360 side, we preferred the mostly epidermal Afrobeats grooves, an infectious mix of dancehall, reggaeton, afro-funk, juju, konpa, soul/R&B or even jazz, matched with a significant layer of Nigerian culture. Among the thirty or so songs on the program, we’ll have noticed the performance of the following hits: “I Told Them”(also the title of the tour), “Gbona”, “Pull Up”, “On The Low”, “On Form”, “Giza and more.

We all know that humanity is going through a critical period in its presence on Earth, but it’s not all bad news. The rebalancing of planetary cultural forces is good news! Burna Boy is here to remind us that there is always hope for humans of good will.

Photos by Stephan Boissonneault

Contemporary / musique contemporaine

“In the Half-Light” – Barbara Hannigan with Orchestre symphonique de Montréal

by Varun Swarup

Under the guidance of Rafael Payare, Barbara Hannigan, accompanied by the OSM, delivered an enthralling rendition of Zahra Di Castro’s composition, “In the Half-Light.” As title itself suggests, this work is an exploration of the liminal spaces of dusk and dawn, weaving a fragile narrative that gracefully shifts between moments of tension and resolution, between the light and the dark. The composition, a song-cycle featuring text by Malaysian writer Tash Aw, transcends mere musicality to delve into themes of human displacement, reflecting the aspirations and dreams of migrants, refugees, and those in search of a metaphorical light elsewhere.

The work, appropriately charged with tension, incorporates cinematic and impressionist textures reminiscent of Ravel and Lili Boulanger. Hannigan, renowned for her virtuosity and adept command of contemporary repertoire, skillfully brought to life the inherent drama embedded in Di Castro’s composition. Her vocal prowess, marked by a rich vibrato that effortlessly filled the Maison Symphonique, revealed not only technical mastery but also a profound emotional depth. Each note carried a sense of authenticity, resonating with the integrity with which Hannigan approached the performance.

While the overall impact of the piece was undeniably powerful, any potential criticism could be directed more towards the nature of the work itself than Hannigan’s execution. As is common in many contemporary compositions, “In the Half-Light” ventures beyond traditional tonal structures, embracing dissonance to convey broader thematic nuances. While this may not always align with conventional musical preferences, it serves a narrative purpose, underscoring the broader themes of the composition. Despite moments of dissonance, these choices only served to amplify the impact of the luminous moments, where the intricacies of Di Castro’s orchestration seamlessly merged with Payare’s direction and Hannigan’s delicate execution, creating moments that approached the sublime.