The Montréal baroque 2024 festival takes place from June 13 to 16, as usual, all over the Old-Montreal area (plus an excursion into the Quartier des spectacles). Vincent Lauzer, the festival’s co-artistic director and an excellent flautist, agreed to talk to us about this edition, whose theme is the encounter between styles and artists from different, yet complementary, horizons. Parallel Universes – Improbable Musical Meetings aptly bears its title: gospel and South Africa meet Baroque, 17th-century Europe dances with Persia and India, and the age-old tales of China, the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa come to life with music by Dieupart, Scarlatti and Jacquet de la Guerre. In short, an abundance of musical dialectics that will result in original moments of artistic communion.
For the third time in six years, the previous of which was celebrated with an Opus Prize, the Orchestre de l’Agora and its conductor Nicolas will present the Gala de la Terre. The event takes place on June 12, 8pm, at the Maison symphonique. This time, the program is built around Richard Strauss’s Alpine Symphony and also the premiere of a composition both orchestral and electroacoustic, composed by Claudie Bertounesque.
For this creation, the Orchestre de l’Agora will be reinforced by 75 choristers from the Petits Chanteurs du Mont-Royal, an electro-acoustic framework and the songs of belugas collected near Tadoussac using hydrophones from the Group for Research and Education on Marine Mammals (GREMM).The Gala de la Terre is an environmental initiative: it aims to raise public awareness of environmental issues, by supporting the efforts of local organizations dedicated to protecting our planet: GREMM, WWF Canada and Sierra Club Canada.
Plus de 100 musiciens se trouveront scène pour le pat principal de la soirée, soit la Symphonie alpestre de Strauss, choisie pour ses évocations de la splendeur des Alpes, tout en abordant de facto la beauté universelle de nos environnements naturels planétaires et aussi de leur inquiétante fragilité dans le contexte des changements climatiques.
In addition, Innu poet and event ambassador Natasha Kanapé Fontaine will declaim her own writings, created especially for the Gala de la Terre. Last but not least, Innu soprano Elisabeth St-Gelais, recently named Révélation Classique Radio-Canada and winner of the prestigious Prix d’Europe 2023, will perform Richard Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder .
Contacted a few days ago on a train bound for Quebec City, Nicolas Ellis tells Alain Brunet how excited he is to be directing the next Gala de la Terre.
You enter the exhibition area and recognize modified versions of pieces from the album Sound House, recorded in Vermont in the home of violinist Sarah Neufeld and released on the Erased Tapes label in March 2021. Bell Orchestre breathes new life into this document by reshaping the tracks for interactive use with the AATOAA concert.
In this way, you walk through different stations in the exhibition, at the foot of which objects are placed. Each object can trigger a track on the master tape, modifying the mix in real time. Authentic audiovisual immersion!
Produced by Envision Management and realized by AATOAA, Vincent Morisset and Caroline Robert, Sound House is an interactive audiovisual installation. Sound House transforms itself according to the interactions generated by visitors. “A spatialized score is co-composed in real time from the original recording, while the time of day, seasons and places scroll by through the window.
Bell Orchestre Sound House is on view from June 7 to July 27 at the Society for Arts and Technology (SAT). For PAN M 360, Alain Brunet met up with Vincent Morriset and Caroline Robert, designers of the installation, this time alongside two members of Bell Orchestre: horn player Pietro Amato, responsible for the installation’s sonic remodeling, and bassist and multi-instrumentalist – also co-founder of the band Arcade Fire, as we all know.
Real deal Montreal punk-dub-ska-east-European-trad-Ukrainian-balkans band Dumai Dunai have been raising the roof on every stage and audience they’ve visited since their first show in 2022. We’ve seen them a lot and everywhere in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and Europe, so much so that we were under the impression they’d already released at least one album. Not so. Sometime Between Now and Never, the band’s first opus, will be released on June 14, 2024. The launch will take place at the Ukrainian Federation of Montreal, during an evening featuring other explosive groups such as Dusty Brass and Sumak Brass Band, as well as an essential complement of booze and food! An evening that will end very late, according to Eli Camilo, co-frontperson (with Natalia Telentso) of Dumai Dunai. Here’s an interview with Camilo about the album.
After reading her bio profiles (more specifically the one on Futura Artists website) and having a few listening sessions of her great stuff, we ask a few questions to Elena Colombi before her coming at SAT Domesicle series, on Saturday June 8, late evening.
Born in Italy, Elena Colombi relocated to London in 2008 and got involved in parties that made her popular in that circle of friends and young emerging artists. Then she became a talented DJ and radio host on NTS, while she was experiencing her broad influences and inspirations: industrial, techno, ambient, synth pop, disco, house, non occidental music and conceptual sets well above average. Since 2019, she has also collaborated as a key member with the record label Osàre! Editions’ – the namesake derives from the Italian word for “daring” or “bold” – seeking experimentation and idiosyncratic ways of making electronic music.
“Elena Colombi’s sets are geared toward the unexpected. From cosmic psychedelia and pounding jungle to obscure post-punk and spoken word, they swirl through a cerebral world of noise.”
PAN M 360 : Can you describe briefly your musical path, from your teenage years to your first professional engagements?
Elena Colombi: As a young child, my introduction to music that wasn’t accessible via standard means was a mixed cassette tape a friend of the family made. This guy had an incredible knowledge of music! I’m grateful for those discoveries.
My parents didn’t own any records.. I don’t come from a musical background. As a kid I played only two instruments: the recorder and the bass (both badly!). As a teenager, I spent late nights recording videos from MTV on VHS tapes. The kinda stuff that wasn’t on rotation during the day. And at weekends I would travel by bus to Milan with my best friends to check out gigs in “centri sociali”. One night we missed the last bus and unexpectedly ended up at an afterparty. That was my first introduction to a club. We were so naive!
A few years later I did an internship at a booking agency and my spreadsheet skills were so bad that the owners gave me a chance as an assistant promoter instead. I was a natural! So I promoted nights for a while. Then I felt the music scene in Milan was too limited so I took a chance and moved to London. From there, the parties I ran for several years (Abattoir and BREED), as well as the slot on NTS radio and a DJ set at Rye Wax that many people ended up talking about, all contributed to the beginning of the regular touring.
PAN M 360 : How did your musical tastes evolved through your professional career ?
Elena Colombi : I’m not sure the music taste changes really. It expands, for sure! Often, fans/listeners make associations with one set or one recorded show in particular—especially if the set becomes very popular. The “label” or “genre” most prominent in that show sticks to the artist and it’s hard to untangle from that. I want to fight this as hard as I can! I love to be able to play completely different sets and wouldn’t want my way of performing to be any different.
“ A longstanding resident of NTS, an interest in theory and literature, aesthetics and film, inspire their avant-garde selections. Spiritually, they’re most at home in the club serving up a concoction of pulsating polyrhythms, industrial groove and flexed techno.”
PAN M 360: Your interests in other art forms and the intellectual world is clearly impacting your musical choices, which is a great thing. Can you give some examples of this very interesting relationship between your craft and your own intellectual universe?
Elena Colombi: Yes, it all intersects! I think it would be impossible to separate interests, personal life experiences, discoveries, as well as events happening in the world from creating.
PAN M 360: : Are you involved in different art events that combine all your interests
Elena Colombi: No, not all of them—that would be dreamy—but definitely more of them! I love wearing the curator hat more often, for instance. In fact, I might be working right now on creating a series of experimental music-centered events for next year.
PAN M 360 : What is your gear? How do you build your pieces with this gear?
Elena Colombi : What I use at the moment in my studio in Hastings is: SOMA Pulsar 23, Roland SH01A Boutique, Elektron Model Samples, Meris Polymoon pedal, Roland 303 Boutique. I’m experimenting with the connectibility and dialogue between some of these instruments, and I’m working on a series of improvised live sets, some of them premiering this year and continuing in 2025.
PAN M 360: And now you are coming in Montréal. What kind of set are you preparing for us?
Elena Colombi : I never fully know what I will play until I enter the club. It’s my first time performing in Canada so this applies even more. Right now I am thinking of a more trippy set maybe?! But this could be because I only landed last night and feel pretty jet-lagged, hehe. Once I arrive at the space and feel the energy, feel the crowd I’ll be able to decide on the spot what direction to take. I can’t wait!
PAN M 360 : How do you see the link between improvisation and composition?
Elena Colombi: I see the link between improvisation and composition as a continual, promiscuous exchange between spontaneity and structure, chaos and order, innovation and form. A beautiful, dynamic marriage, nurturing and challenging in equal parts.
Publicité panam
Vancouver singer Jill Barber has already released two albums of songs in French, which have been immensely popular with the public, particularly in Quebec. Now the beautiful Francophile is at it again with her third album, Encore! on all platforms on 14 June. Jill will also be at the Francos de Montréal two days later to present it to the public. It’s a mutual love affair that’s still going strong, and one that continues to nurture some very fine musical offerings, beautifully reworked for the singer’s gentle, warm personality. We rediscover Piaf, Trenet, Josephine Baker, Blossom Dearie and Charlebois through readings dressed in surprising and seductive finery. I met Jill Barber who told me all about this new album.
At this year’s Classica Festival, the acclaimed duo Stick&Bow is set to deliver an exhilarating program that traces the artistic journey of one of the most intriguing composers of new music, Astor Piazzolla. Joined by the distinguished pianist, John Roney, the duo of Canadian marimba player Krystina Marcoux and Argentinian cellist Juan Sebastian Delgado, will explore Piazzolla’s dynamic evolution, from his early influences in New York’s jazz scene to his innovative tango compositions in France.
PAN M 360 : Hey thanks for taking time! Looks like an amazing program. Perhaps we could start by delving into your personal connection with Piazzolla’s music. What does it represent to each of you personally?
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Oh, that’s a good question, if a long one! How much time do we have? Well, though Montreal has become my home for the past 12 years, I hail from Argentina originally. So Piazzolla’s music is deeply ingrained in me because of my Argentine roots. But honestly, you don’t have to be from there to appreciate his brilliance.
Krystina Marcoux : That’s right. Piazzolla’s style goes beyond just tango; it’s such a unique mélange of musical techniques and traditions, from European classical to jazz, to folk. There’s something there for everyone.
Juan Sebastian Delgado : His music is played even in academic contexts, which I find incredible and which he himself imagined impossible. I pursued my doctorate in performance at McGill, focusing on post-piazzolla tango. What to do after such an important genius? I love new music and tango, and Piazzolla bridges these aesthetics beautifully. He has been a part of many sound worlds and, although he was not born in New York, he spent 15 years there, which profoundly influenced his musical vision.
Krystina Marcoux : Yes, especially in the 1930s and 40s when jazz was booming.
PAN M 360 : So is this program specifically designed to trace his career and influences?
Krystina Marcoux : Well it’s not a complete picture that we’re able to give, but it’s definitely the starting point for our program. While we’ll focus on Piazzolla’s career trajectory, we’ll also highlight the broader influences of his era, showcasing composers like George Gershwin, who was a significant figure in New York during Piazzolla’s time there, or Nadia Boulanger in France.
PAN M 360 : Your firsthand experiences recording with Piazzolla’s former collaborators must have provided invaluable insights into his music. Could you share more about what that was like?
Krystina Marcoux : We’ve been so fortunate to collaborate with musicians who have deep connections to Piazzolla’s music, such as his pianist Gustavo Beytelman and bandoneonist Marcelo Nissiman. Through these collaborations, we gained valuable insights into the oral tradition of tango and the nuances of Piazzolla’s compositions, which go far beyond just reading the notes on the page. How fascinating to learn all this from people who lived through the golden age of this music. It’s not just about playing the notes. Tango is a unique style, with a distinct tradition and precise playing codes, which is distinguished from jazz or classical music. This concert aims to highlight these influences.
PAN M 360 : When I think of tango, Piazzolla is the first name that comes to mind. Yet it seems he was the black sheep of the tradition.
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Yes, internationally, Piazzolla is second only to Gardel in fame. And interestingly enough, when Piazzolla started innovating the tango, many in Argentina disliked what he was doing. He was seen as destroying the traditional tango.
PAN M 360 : That makes me even more excited for this concert. Piazzolla’s music and its unique instrumentation are fascinating. It seems his compositions lend themselves to some flexibility with the arrangements?
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Yes, similar to Bach, his pieces are arranged in numerous ways. For example, we use cello and marimba, which is rather unique.
Krystina Marcoux : : This flexibility is partly due to its jazz influence. He trusted his musicians and generally worked with the same instrumentalists for years, a bit like a jazz musician, to the point where a range of musical elements come from the musicians rather than the score.
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Exactly. To understand his music fully, you should listen to recordings of Piazzolla performing with his musicians. Their phrasing and style are exceptional.
PAN M 360 : How does the marimba fit into the program?
Krystina Marcoux : Piazzolla didn’t necessarily write for the marimba, but he wrote for the vibraphone, collaborating with musicians like Gary Burton. They even recorded an album together.
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Absolutely, it’s worth checking out. We’re also including a piece by Gerry Mulligan, who recorded with Piazzolla.
PAN M 360 : Both Mulligan and Burton are legends in the jazz world.
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Yes, and they both brought something unique to Piazzolla’s music. In the album notes, Burton mentioned he was initially intimidated, but Piazzolla reassured him to just play.
Krystina Marcoux : In our arrangements, the marimba often plays parts originally written for the violin. But it’s not always the case, we mix things up a lot, shifting roles between instruments.
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Yes, and John Roney, our pianist, is a big part of this program. He’s an example of a musician who is able to inhabit both the classical and jazz worlds simultaneously. He will be improvising on a Gershwin piece. It’s fantastic.
PAN M 360: Nadia Boulanger was of course mentor to so many titans of contemporary music, can you tell me more about the influence she had?
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Nadia Boulanger played a crucial role in Piazzolla’s career, encouraging him to embrace his unique vision of music that fused tango and classical composition. Initially, Piazzolla sought to distance himself from tango in pursuit of the latter, however, Boulanger recognized the authenticity in his bandoneon playing and encouraged him to infuse classical elements into his tango compositions.
Krystina Marcoux : That’s right. Piazzola had a deep love for Stravinsky, Ravel, and Bach, and I think it was in France that the classical influences began to take shape in his music alongside the tango.
PAN M 360: So what would you tell the audience to expect from this show?
Krystina Marcoux : We invite the audience to embark on a musical journey with us, exploring the lesser-known facets of Piazzolla’s repertoire. We won’t be playing Libertango, our program offers a fresh perspective, incorporating French influences and lesser-known compositions that showcase the breadth of Piazzolla’s genius and the many musical worlds he was a part of.
PAN M 360: And I’m really looking forward to it. Thank you both for taking the time to chat. Enjoy this beautiful Montreal day.
Juan Sebastian Delgado : Thank you, we will try but we have to go practice now!
PAN M 360: Of course.
Krystina Marcoux : Thank you and see you soon!
For the 24th edition of Suoni Per Il Popolo, the artistic direction of the Montreal festival presents 44 concerts from June 12 to 23. A multi-genre, multi-generational happening, the Suoni are very much in left field. Once again this year, the line-up includes Yoo Doo Right, Anthony Braxton and Wolf Eyes, Erika Angell, Sarah Davachi and even Benjamin Patterson, founding member of the famous Fluxus collective. That’s why Alain Brunet went to meet Kiva Stimac, co-founder, general and artistic director of Suoni Per Il Popolo.
On Thursday May 30, 7 PM, at Phi Centre, Montréal producer Kee Avil is performing the material of her second studio album on Constellation Records, Spine. In her own way, she combines guitar, voice, and electronic production to assemble deconstructed song or pieces. Her influences are post-industrial, avant-pop, glitch, minimalist, folk, free jazz or noise, and what she does with all those genres or sub-genres is simply unique. Her first EP has been released in 2018 (Black Bough Records), then she got this record deal with Constellation where she actually released 2 albums in 2 years: Crease in 2022 and now Spine, a beautiful continuation of her first album. A few days before her first concert in Montreal in this new cycle, she talks with Alain Brunet about her quest, her recent evolution and achievements.
On Thursday May 30 in Salle Bourgie at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, excerpts from three new operas written and composed by women will be presented for the first time. In collaboration with Le Vivier, Musique 3 Femmes and Sixtrum, Fables and Legends – Opera of Today (the title of the evening) will present the results of three commissions to three female composer/librettist duos. The first is by Analía Llugdar and Emné Nasereddine (Émile Nelligan Prize 2022), entitled Je suis fille de la fille (I am Daughter of the Daughter). The second, by Rebecca and Rachel Gray, is a black comedy entitled Raccoon Opera, featuring a particularly charismatic raccoon (!!). The third musical/libretto duo is formed by Alejandra Odgers and Nicole O’Bomsawin. This opera, entitled Nanatasis, features puppets that bring traditional Abenaki legends to life.
Several artists will be on stage, including Andréanne Brisson-Paquin (soprano), Krystina Marcoux (percussion), Nicole O’Bomsawin (storytelling) and Sixtrum (percussion ensemble).
I had the chance to speak with Kristin Hoff, General and Artistic Director of Musique 3 Femmes, who explains how these operas are closely connected to our contemporary reality, with themes such as immigration, exile, the revival of aboriginal cultures and the housing crisis!
Vancouver Turning Point Ensemble (TPE) celebrates its 20th anniversary in Montréal with RASAS by Montreal composer Sandeep Bhagwati, and two pieces by Farangis Nurulla-Khoja and Jocelyn Morlock. This concert is presented by the SMCQ as part of its Homage series, dedicated this year to Sandeep Bhagwati.
SMCQ describes RAZAS as a “great epic modular composition” . According to Bhagwati, “the Rasas consist of a system for classifying the emotions that form the basic components of all artistic manifestations. More precisely , 64 sections are progressing within a matrix which can be arranged in different combinations. Before the concert, the performers choose a specific combination and, through their arrangement created in real time, offer a unique version of the piece. And what’s more, works by excellent composers Jocelyn Morlock and Farangis Nurulla-Khoja, and one by Owen Underhill, also artistic director and conductor of TPE. Turning Point Ensemble is a large chamber ensemble that performs music “in innovative contexts across genres and intersecting with multiple art forms”. The ensemble concentrates on modern an contemporary music, from the early 20th century to the present day. Owen Underhill, answers PAN M 360 questions before crossing Canada.
A conceptual leader, American saxophonist Steve Lehman creates music for ensembles of different configurations and aesthetic allegiances. In this case, Sélébéyone is a particularly spectacular project at FIMAV, as it highlights elements of hip hop and Senegalese culture to which he applies free jazz medicine. The line-up proposed for Victoriaville is particularly eloquent in this sense: American HPRIZM (HIGH PRIEST in Antipop Consortium), Senegalese GASTON BANDIMIC, who speaks Wolof, American DAMION REID, one of the first to adapt hip-hop beatmaking to drumming (with Robert Glasper), French MACIEK LASSERRE and STEVE LEHMAN on saxophones. The experiment began in the middle of the previous decade : the eponymous album Sélébéyone (which means “intersection” in Wolof) was released in 2016, followed by Xaybu : The Unseen (Pi Recordings) in 2022. It’s May 2024, and Steve Lehman is finally presenting this finished project at FIMAV, explaining its ins and outs.
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