FMA 2025 | The Great Class of Lila Borsali

by Alain Brunet

A singer of great talent, Lila Borsali explored the complexities of thought surrounding exile on Saturday. Her introductions to each song on the program evoked various states of exile through the melodies, rhythms, and lyrics of the artists who created them.

This time, she highlighted Ya Ghorbati, “a centuries-old song where the wounded memories of exile throb.” This refined repertoire also included a Kabyle component (Algerian Amazigh or Algerian Berber), an indigenous language that existed before the Arab invasions and colonization beginning in the 7th century. And which still exists today. Given that a large portion of Algerian-speaking Quebec is Kabyle, and many still speak their native language, one can understand the interest of the festival-goers who filled the 5th hall at Place des Arts this past Saturday, November 8th.

Originally from Tlemcen, Lila Benmansour adopted the name Borsali when she married Selim Borsali, from whom she has been widowed since 2013. A specialist in the Arab-Andalusian repertoire, she didn’t speak the Kabyle language, which she explored in depth for this program, she told us. Her musical director and oud player assisted her in mastering the pronunciation and stress patterns of the Amazigh language. We won’t comment on the results, but we can assure you that the audience thoroughly enjoyed it.

For any Westerner who only has a theoretical knowledge of this culture, the exoticism is complete: the (2) violins are played vertically, the qanun is a plucked string instrument requiring a complex technique, ney (traditional flute), two ouds (Arab lute) and two percussion instruments – darbuka, cymbals, frame drums, etc.

Of Arab and North African origin, the modal melodies of these Arab-Andalusian songs can lie on soft and silky accompaniments, but also involve real rhythmic impulses, strong pulses arousing hand clapping and even high-pitched ululations from galvanized spectators.

Two full hours, concluded without the euphoria generated by this excellent singer, whose timbre recalls voices with very different careers but united by their vocal texture and their mezzo-soprano tessitura – Joan Baez, Edith Butler, Nana Mouskouri.

Proud and very elegant in her traditional white dress adorned with oriental gold trim, Lila Borsali delighted the FMA audience, who were clearly already won over.

Publicité panam

classique / Moyen-Orient / Levant / Maghreb

FMA 2025 | Cantiques de l’amour, Between East and West

by Sandra Gasana

Thirty-six choir members. Seven musicians. A musical director. A whirling dervish. And of course, there were the two stars of the evening: Syrian singer Khaled Al-Hafez and Quebec contralto Gabrielle Cloutier.

The Fifth Hall at Place des Arts was almost full, but this time, unlike the other concerts of the Arab World Festival, there was a predominantly Quebec audience, mostly older, the families of the choir members were probably numerous.

The choir, composed of the Vox Ensemble, provided a backdrop. It returned between the songs performed sometimes by Khaled, sometimes by Gabrielle, and sometimes by both. In fact, Gabrielle sang in Arabic for Khaled’s songs and in French for her own. Dressed in a long red dress, she stood out in the hall, as everyone else was dressed in black. Her voice was breathtaking, especially when she stood in the middle of the stage and let it out freely.

Khaled’s chants had the feel of prayers, a bit like those that resonate through mosques, while the choir immersed us in the atmosphere of a church service. And we waltzed between these two worlds throughout the evening. Before the end of the first part, we saw the whirling dervish arrive and illuminate the room with his spinning meditation. He seemed completely in a trance, and all the while, I wondered how he didn’t get dizzy at the end of it all.

The musicians each had their turn to shine. They made sure to take their time during their solos, without rushing, so that the audience could enjoy it to the very end.

Images were projected throughout the evening, sometimes letters of the Arabic alphabet, other times geometric images or decorations that blended well with the music.

I would say the only drawback was perhaps the length of the concert. A spectator sitting very close to me thought the show was over at the intermission, since we had just enjoyed an hour and a half of performance. The second half was admittedly a bit shorter, but for fans of this kind of music, they were well served.

Publicité panam

Électro / Electroacoustic / musique acousmatique

AKOUSMA | Caught between the talons of James O’Callaghan

by Loic Minty

There is something oddly unique about a gathering of people sitting on the floor in the middle of a pitch-black room. From the outside, it could appear to be a strange cultish ceremony, but at Akousma, it’s also a way to experience the finest pleasures of listening.
When purged from all other senses, even the most microscopic sonic detail can redirect thought. That’s why it takes someone who understands the silence of these large, empty spaces to make them speak.

This is where James O’Callaghan comes in.

He walked, unperturbed, to his laptop, which was centered in the room, and gazed down at the screen with the eyes of a falcon. With precision, he began.
Under the softest breaths of wind, the quietest shuffle of people shifting in their seats could be heard. Everyone froze, their ears attuned. The wind picked up and sounds accumulated, scattering across the dome of speakers. A clatter of knives, a far-distant cricket, and creaking doors set the scene for a disaster.

O’Callaghan caught our imaginations in his talons and swept us away. In one instant we were drowned in glitchy breaks that moved violently around the room; in the next, we bathed in the rich harmonies of noisy sawtooth pads reminiscent of witch house. But we always came back to the eerie narrative of a soundscape buried deep in the forest. When finally our mind’s eye could make out a path, his hypnotizing voice began guiding us back through this maze of obscure mysteries, back to the wind, and to that distant cricket. He left us as we had been found: sitting in the dark.

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Arabic / arabo-andalou / Chaâbi / Moyen-Orient / Levant / Maghreb

FMA 2025 | Nostalgic Evening With Lamia Aït Amara

by Sandra Gasana

Montreal’s Algerian community turned out in large numbers to see Lamia Aït Amara, who was making her first appearance in the city. She was accompanied by her eight musicians, a condition she stipulated for her first participation in the Arab World Festival.

Dressed all in black, with a gold jacket that matched those of the musicians, she appeared on stage and the audience erupted in cheers, a cry of celebration, from the very first notes.

The musicians also sang in the choir, which added intensity to the show and contrasted with Lamia’s soft voice. She was draped with the Algerian flag from the very first song, which she then removed for the rest of the concert.

“Tonight is even more special because it is the date so dear to our hearts, the day that symbolizes courage, resistance, the thirst for freedom for our dear Algeria,” referring to the beginning of the Algerian War.

Some songs begin with just the oud, while others start with the flute or piano, before the other instruments join in one after another. We were treated to a medley of several Algerian music classics that the audience knew by heart. Although the seats at the National are usually seated, many people stood up to dance, so strong was the urge to join in.

The hall was almost full, with spectators of all ages but mainly in their forties and older. His songs speak a lot about Algeria but also about love, about what I was able to get out of it with the little Arabic I have left.

Lamia primarily addresses her audience in French, but also speaks in Arabic, throwing in a few jokes along the way. While she is rather reserved during the first few songs of the show, you can sense her becoming more and more relaxed, even breaking into dance at times.

The evening becomes increasingly festive after the short intermission. “We’re going to do a very nostalgic program,” she announces to her audience before launching into a song in French with the feel of a bolero but sung in an oriental style, beginning with a piano solo.

“I was afraid to come to Montreal, I wondered if there would be many people. But now, it makes me want to come back,” she admits.

She performs the famous song “Historia de amor,” singing it in Spanish and Arabic with great precision. Some songs begin calmly, gradually accelerating as the crowd applauds and cheers, culminating in an explosive finale. Among the well-received covers was Rachid Taha’s famous song, “Ya Rayah,” with Lamia letting the audience sing along. The number of dancers increases, leaving their seats to move to the sides of the stage to create more space for dancing.

But the dancer who stole the show was a young girl of about ten who found herself on stage at the very end of the performance and began to dance with class and great confidence. She was also given an Algerian flag draped over her shoulders, as if the torch had been passed to her.

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Electroacoustic / musique acousmatique

Akousma | IRL Dissolves Time in The Big Room

by Marc-Antoine Bernier

On October 31 at Espace C, during the third night of the Akousma festival, Montreal sound artist IRL, also known as Amanda Harvey, presented Big Room, an immersive piece where sound becomes space, memory and sensitive matter.

IRL’s practice revolves around listening, sound architecture, and the body as receiver. With Big Room, they shape an auditory landscape that gradually envelops the audience. The room opens like a breath: a slow vortex of bass, drones, and radio frequencies that seems to transform the space, bending and stretching it. The sound doesn’t simply fill the space; it reconfigures it. We no longer know if we are moving within the music or if it is the music that is circulating around us.

A Lynchian atmosphere quickly takes hold. The dark, grainy layers of analog synthesizer breathe like nocturnal entities. Their slow modulation suspends time and creates a floating state where the music imposes no emotion, but opens up an inner, available, floating space. The lo-fi textures, the deep, enveloping bass, and the delicate melodies reveal a subtle, almost secret, ambient beauty.

On stage, IRL deliberately effaces themselves. No spectacular gestures, no imposing presence: only the sound remains, autonomous. As they emphasize in their interviews, they want the audience to be able to close their eyes and hear only the soundscape.

Big Room is not simply something to be listened to. It transforms the room into a memory and makes the interior space vibrate, offering an immersive experience that transcends performance to become an intimate journey into the heart of imaginary spaces shaped by memory and sound.

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Electroacoustic / musique acousmatique

Akousma | Daphne Oram’s Echoes, Joseph Sannicandro, Rehab Hazgui

by Joséphine Campbell-Lashuk

On October 30th, Akousma presented their second night of acousmatic and electroacoustic music. Daphne Oram’s piece opened the first block.

An analog hum takes over; small sounds spin around us like friendly aliens. It is part singing bowl, part synthetic bell, all old-school grainy reverb. It’s a warm, enveloping piece that inhabits us like hope itself. Oram plays with distance, letting some whirls hover farther away. This use of subtlety keeps our attention on the details, so even as the piece begins to grow, we can still hear the resonance of the small sounds. The central part of the piece brings a countercurrent of darkness, train-like rhythms that swell and fade, giving way to the return of the hopeful soundtrack.

The next piece, by Joseph Sannicandro, strikes us as quite particular; it kicks us from Oram’s mystical world to the bank of a very real river. We hear water, rustling, and people. The sound remains close to us throughout, the river traveling from left to right while the white noise stays constant. The piece, “al-rambla / Las Ramblas,” stays firmly in the realm of water. At first, it simply rocked me thoughtlessly, but its constant recurrence made me acutely aware of its subtle variations. There seemed to be no repeated water sound; each held its own pattern and tone. This made every one of them feel special, as if Sannicandro were crouched by a river or creek, listening closely to its voice. In the second half of the piece, one moment struck me as an incarnation of claustrophobia, when the white noise was suddenly pulled away, the environment shifted indoors.

The last piece, “Chôra (creation)” by Rehab Hazgui, begins with vitality. Two resounding explosions hit us, followed by a haka taken straight from the New Zealand House of Commons, announcing resistance, change, or destruction. The people’s voices strike us clearly, making us sit up with attention. Next, drumming takes over, floating above our heads. It feels as if these drummers have ascended past this plane, beyond here and now. On our level, a synthesizer lulls us. While this is lovely, it lacks the same intense urgency that made the opening so striking. It seems to simply wind down and rest there. This Akousma program was incredibly diverse, a rare opportunity to hear works that go beyond what is usually expected in such settings.

Photo of Joseph Sannicandro from Akousma Instagram page

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Country / Folk

Odie Harr at Casa del Popolo : A Joyful Montreal Chaos

by Félicité Couëlle-Brunet

Montreal’s own Odie Harr filled Casa del Popolo to the brim for their sold-out show last night, and the energy was nothing short of contagious. I hadn’t seen them since their first gig at Turbo Haüs, but the spirit was just as alive, maybe even wilder this time. The stage was crowded with fiddle, accordion, trumpet, trombone, and a rotating cast of friends who seemed to appear and disappear mid-set, feeding into the band’s spontaneous rhythm.

Odie Harr’s performances are rare gatherings… Apparently, the full ensemble only manages to reunite during shows, which makes each one a singular event. Their music blurs the line between rehearsal and revelation, balancing folk roots with experimental improvisation. The result is a sound that feels communal and alive, like a street parade squeezed into a tiny venue.

What makes this band special is the way they play for and with each other, no hierarchy, just a tangle of melodies, laughter, and trust. Watching them feels like stepping into a celebration you didn’t know you were missing. At Casa del Popolo, the joy was real, and the chaos was perfectly orchestrated.

Arabic Classical / arabo-andalou / classique persan / Flamenco

FMA | Olé Persia Subtle “Trialogue” Between Three Cultures

by Michel Labrecque

The venerable National Theatre on Sainte-Catherine Street East was packed for the opening of the 26th Montreal Arab World Festival (FMA). A wonderfully diverse crowd—it felt like stepping into Alain Farah’s novel, Mille secrets mille dangers, or its film adaptation. Among the spectators of Iranian origin were Nima Mashouf, recently released from an Israeli prison, and Amir Khadir. A multitude of languages could be heard, sometimes spoken simultaneously. We were in Montreal, without a doubt. And we felt right at home.

But then, in her opening speech, the festival spokesperson sent us a dark message:

“You can’t imagine the outpouring of hate on our social media,” she said, referring to the difficulty a festival like this faces in navigating an era where rising exclusion complicates matters. This isn’t the first time, however: I remember how much the aftermath of September 11, 2001, weakened the festival. It’s resilient, though, and it responds with the quality of its shows.

The FMA thus begins with an original creation: Olé Persia, which aims precisely to unite cultures rather than divide them. Under the musical direction of Saeed Kamjou, we witnessed a blend of Arabic, flamenco, and Persian music and dance. We are already familiar with the links between flamenco and Arabic music, due to conquests and coexistence in Andalusia. But classical Persian and Arabic music have also influenced each other, as Saeed Kamjou explained in an interview you can listen to on PAN M 360.

We were treated to a musical journey that lasted almost two hours.

On the flamenco side, there was the formidable guitarist Caroline Planté and the fiery singer Fernando Gallego. From the Arabic side, there was Montreal oud player Abboud Kayyali, originally from Jordan; from the Persian side, the accomplished percussionist Pejman Hadadi, the tar (a Persian guitar) player Behfar Bahadoran, and Saeed Kamjou on the kamancheh, a bowed instrument, who orchestrated the show. Singing in both Persian and Arabic, a rare feat, was Mina Deris with her sweet and melodious voice.

Let’s say it right away: we were dealing with highly talented instrumentalists, perfectly masters of their instruments, including vocals. And then, the dancers joined us: Rosanne Dion from Quebec, who studied for a long time in Spain, and Shahrokh Moshin Ghalam, a Franco-Iranian master choreographer of Persian and contemporary dance.

The idea behind the show was to juxtapose these three cultures, to illustrate their similarities as well as their differences. The repertoire consisted of works from the different cultures. It was a series of dialogues or “trialogues” rather than a fusion of styles. And, in that sense, it was a complete success.

The audience clearly enjoyed it, judging by the level of applause. I also had a lot of fun, especially when a mini fusion of genres took place. When Behfar Bahadoran started improvising on the tar over Caroline Planté’s rhythm, I started to look away. I would have been curious to hear the Spaniard Fernando Gallego sing in harmony with the Californian-Iranian Mina Deris. Perhaps it’s the uninitiated improvisation enthusiast in me who would have liked the fusion to go even further.

But it was a fantastic inaugural concert. Let’s wait and see what’s next for FMA.

Musique de création

Quatuor Quasar, 40 Years After the Tragic Death of Claude Vivier

by Jeremy Fortin

As part of the CAM tour, the Quasar saxophone quartet presented its program entitled Five Liquid Pieces, a tribute to Claude Vivier, on Wednesday. This concert, which is not its first performance, is part of the events organized in 2023 commemorating the 40th anniversary of the tragic death of the great Quebec composer Claude Vivier.

If this tribute concert features only one work by the composer, it is to highlight Vivier’s mentors, such as his two teachers, Paul Méfano and Gilles Tremblay, as well as those who were inspired by Vivier, such as Florence M. Tremblay, Émilie Girard-Charest and Yassen Vodenitcharov.

The concert began with “Pulau Dewata,” a piece with variable instrumentation composed in 1977 by Claude Vivier. In Balinese, Pulau Dewata means “island of the gods,” a tribute from Vivier to his trip to Bali, where he became familiar with the gamelan, a major source of inspiration for the composer. Blending homorhythms and a sound very close to that of the gamelan, “Pulau Dewata” was undoubtedly the ideal piece to start this concert. Quasar delivered a very respectable performance of this flagship piece in their repertoire.

The concert continues with “Mouvement Calme” by Paul Méfano, which, despite its careful writing combining rhythmic passages of “slap-tongue” and lyrical moments both unfolding in gentleness, unfortunately gets lost within the eclecticism of the concert.

Next up was Gilles Tremblay, who, in 2009, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Vivier’s death, composed the piece “Levées” for Quasar. This piece perfectly illustrates one of Quasar’s strengths: the dialogue between the different members of the quartet. The piece itself is largely structured around questions and answers, and the potential for dialogue between the instrumentalists. This reaches its peak during a series of short interventions featuring the Quasar musicians’ acting skills, which delighted the audience.

Next, we entered the world of Florence M. Tremblay with “Vapeurs taillées,” a captivating piece that showcased the saxophone’s diverse sounds. But the evening’s biggest surprise was Émilie Girard-Charest’s “Bestiaire,” a completely playful piece blending a wide range of techniques, such as playing only the mouthpiece or the neck, but the most surprising element was the finale with a baritone reed solo. In short, a piece that had the audience laughing like I’ve rarely seen in new music! The concert concluded with the concert’s title piece, “Cinq pièces liquides,” a solid work that, for me, perfectly illustrates the eclecticism of an excellent concert presented by Quasar.

Oiseau de nuit on Stage, by Antoine Corriveau: Beef Effect!

by Simon Gervais

Wild and ferocious, Antoine Corriveau brilliantly performed at Ausgang Plaza on Thursday evening, the Montreal debut of his excellent Oiseau de nuit, an album released on April 25. A title that reflects the man, who is often seen prowling concerts and musical events with his werewolf look.

Shy at first, almost anxious, he appeared on stage, wearing a large red coat and narrow glasses reminiscent of the Inuit iggaak. The formula is complete: guitar, bass, and drums add strength to the project.

The show opens abruptly with Moscow Mule—even as I sip mine—and gradually ignites until it truly ignites during the very sexy Interruption. Alongside him, Cherry Lena, a talented and charismatic backing singer, completes the lineup and sheds some light on the dark feline’s rough vocals. Their stage complementarity creates an atmosphere that’s both ritualistic and intimate. We feel a bit like we’re part of a family, a bit like curious onlookers who have come to discover resolutely energetic material, more so than on the four previous albums.

“It’s been four years since I’ve performed, the last time was during the pandemic and it was a bit weird,” he confides with nervous humility. This initial fragility makes his transformation all the more striking as the concert progresses: the cat gradually invites us to dance in his alley, and the die is cast.

His cavernous, otherworldly voice serves up pieces that are both danceable and narrative, with a rap cadence reminiscent of Dédé in Belzébuth or Leloup in Johnny Go. It’s deliberately disconcerting at times, often catchy. The depth we know from Antoine Corriveau is now dressed in powerful arrangements and a rock attitude.

Moving away from the more austere and airy sound of his debut, Corriveau explores a groovy, densely textured territory in Oiseau de nuit, tinged with jazz, funk and hip-hop. A direction begun in his previous album Pissenlit, released five years ago.

Under the red strobe lights, this cat danced and made us dance, proving that by reinventing ourselves, we can be reborn from our shadows to shine brighter in the middle of the night.

Photo: Compte Instagram Antoine Corriveau

Akousma/ Electrochoc/Tempo Reale | A Fitting Homage to Berio

by Joséphine Campbell-Lashuk

On Thursday the 23rd of October a great collaboration between Akousma, Electrochoc and Tempo Reale came to fruition in the multimedia room of the Montreal conservatory. The lights go down, and an archive of music and sound is reactivated. The first piece of this program, dedicated to the late Luciano Berio’s one hundredth birthday, was in fact not by the Italian composer, but instead a work created by Simone Faraci and Francesco Giomi.

This work, called In-Naturale, drew from extensive ethnographic and folkloric archives that Berio collected over many years. The piece weaved together voices singing and playful, cartoonish calls. It begins with a simple folk melody that emerges from the back left corner of the room and slowly expands into a sweeping composition that harmonizes a French lullaby with a Russian folk song and fragmented acoustic instruments.

The next piece, Thema (Omaggio a Joyce), offered a glimpse into the remarkable collaboration between Berio and Cathy Berberian, one of the most accomplished and innovative singers of her time. Her voice begins speaking clearly at first, straight in front, then gradually shifts through the room.

The following piece, Chants Parallèles, struck me as far more contemplative. There’s greater ambiguity in the sources used in its creation; it floats between sounding like a soft synthesizer and, at times, a distant choral voice. The second half of this piece was particularly moving because of its sheer delicacy. This contrasted with the final piece, Visage, a theatrical tour de force. In this rare North American multi-channel presentation, it filled the entire room, once again featuring Berberian’s extraordinary talent, her voice shifting conversationally through grunts and gibberish.

This concert was a beautiful dedication to Luciano Berio. I have still heard very few things that sound anything like Berio’s music. He was a composer who reached both forward and back. He created something deeply complex yet so inviting, or ‘accogliente’, as Francesco Giomi put it.

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classique

Thus Spoke the Trombone and the Cello

by Alexis Desrosiers-Michaud

This week at the OSM, there is not one, but two concertos, with two house soloists: trombonist James Box in Samy Moussa’s Concerto “Yericho” and cellist Brian Manker in Ernest Bloch’s Schelomo: Hebrew Rhapsody.

Moussa’s concerto takes its name from the city of Jericho, which, according to the biblical story, was surrounded by Israel before falling within a week. It is an intense work from beginning to end, which gives its performer no rest. Strongly inspired by minimalist music and the presence of an organ, the terror is felt from the first minutes of the work, with a motif of two descending notes (the opposite of Jaws) repeated many times sounding the alarm, and the soloist will be the last to play it. What follows is a series of virtuoso sequences for both orchestra and soloist, leading to climaxes reminiscent of Shostakovich with abundant percussion and strings in the extreme treble, in particular. James Box delivered an exceptional performance combining his powerful, wide-ranging register and flawless coordination. Yericho will keep the audience on the edge of their seats until the very end, who will jump to their feet to congratulate the orchestra, soloist and composer.

Brian Manker would later distinguish himself in a completely different way. As King Solomon, his musical proclamations and phrasing are impeccable, so much so that the massive orchestra behind him never overwhelms him. Like his colleague, his technique is tested, but, like a king, Manker never falters. Like Yericho, Schelomo is a seamless and more fluid work. The musicians play the role of the faithful wonderfully, chanting wildly whenever the king falls silent.

While there is a clear religious connection between the two concertos, the comparison ends there. This is partly because neither Richard Strauss nor Friedrich Nietzsche were Jewish, and partly because the opening of the concert was from the opera Tannhaüser by Richard Wagner, a notorious anti-Semite. This version was very successful, thanks to the accuracy of the woodwinds and the dexterity of the strings, but also to the majestic sound of the brass in the final theme.

The pièce de résistance of this long concert was Richard Strauss’s symphonic poem Also sprach Zarathustra. While the first minute may be well-known, one still has to be able to face the remaining 32, especially after an hour and a half of concert. The endurance test was met with flying colors. One might have expected a slackening of power and precision, especially from the overused horns and strings, but this did not happen. This (another) technically very demanding score gave us the right to very well-balanced contrasts between the woodwinds in the background and the solo violins, as well as interventions from scattered soloists on the lookout. The waltz was played with verve, before plunging back into the abysmal sweetness to which Rafael Payare has accustomed us since his arrival.