Opera fans know her as the host of the popular podcast Aria Code, in which she brings together an eclectic mix of singers, music professionals, and other experts (including more than a few relationship coaches!) to discuss the greatest arias in the repertoire. Soap opera aficionados will have caught her multi-season arc on TV’s Nashville, while gamers will recognise her major contributions to the soundtrack for Rockstar’s critically acclaimed Red Dead Redemption 2. In 2023, she won a Pulitzer Prize for her opera Omar.

A polymath of the first order, Giddens is best known as a folk musician – one of the world’s greatest – with two Grammy wins and nine more nominations to her name, across the Folk, Americana, and American Roots categories. A singer-songwriter, she plays the fiddle, violin, banjo, and viola, and is widely known and just as widely loved for her diverse musical collaborations, including appearances on Beyoncé’s Texas Hold ‘Em (that’s her on banjo and viola), and her Pulitzer prize-winning opera co-written with film composer Michael Abels (he scored Get Out). This year, she contributed to the Sinners soundtrack. (She keeps busy.)

Last week, Rhiannon and friends (technically, “Rhiannon Giddens and The Old-Time Revue”) dropped by Toronto for a pair of sold-out performances at the Royal Conservatory of Music’s Koerner Hall. Embracing her self-proclaimed “lifelong mission” to celebrate the many criminally overlooked (typically female and BIPOC) musicians and creators from across the history of North American music, the show was a wonderful showcase for the superstar that is Rhiannon Giddens.

The evening began with a short opener, bandmates Demeanor (Justin Harrington) and Amelia Rose Powell offering up essentially a warm-up act, with cross-genre songs like Demeanor’s “Go You One Hundred”.

It was a nice touch, Giddens handing over the floor to her two youngest bandmates, and that generosity of spirit shone throughout the evening, with Giddens regularly handing over the floor to a bandmate, whether to sing lead vocals or for a bit of audience work as the rest of the band got ready.

Still, it was Rhiannon we were here to see, and on that front, the show delivered. A wonderful, engaging, intelligent performer, Giddens’s ability to interweave stories with music, provide necessary (and all-too-often missing) contextual background for the songs and musical forms on display, made the evening so much more than a straightforward gig. It was, we were pleased to learn, Giddens’s fourth appearance at Koerner Hall, testament to a warm relationship between the performer and her many Canadian fans. (In fact, Giddens has a number of noteworthy Canadian collaborations, including working with Daniel Lanois on the Red Dead 2 soundtrack and forming a music collective with Allison Russell.)

Highlights of the evening included “Red Bird Road” (originally recorded solo by bandmate Dirk Powell), the traditional Congolese song “Pipi Danga”, and a cover of Etta Baker’s “Marching Jaybird”, which Giddens recently recorded with bandmate (fiddler, vocalist) Justin Robinson for their new album What Did The Blackbird Say To The Crow.

Those who stuck around for the encore were treated with a rather unique offering, one that’s almost certainly not showing up on her U.S. tour dates: “Un Canadien errant”, a 19th century ballad/folk tune written by Antoine Gérin-Lajoie in tribute to the vanquished (i.e., the dead, the exiled) in the aftermath of the Lower Canada Rebellion. It’s a relatively obscure pick – it appears on a late-career Leonard Cohen album, and more recently, in a recording by Whitehorse on the soundtrack for the Joshua Jackson Canadian road trip movie One Week – but a wonderful one to close out the show. In addition to being a lovely tune, it only further demonstrates Giddens’s commitment to unearthing the musical history of the places she visits.

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Keep track of everything Rhiannon Giddens, including upcoming tour dates, here.

The Koerner season is winding down at the Royal Conservatory of Music, but the new season announcement is coming soon.

The post Rhiannon Giddens at Koerner Hall (Review): Old-Time Revue appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

First up is Alban Berg’s Wozzeck (1925), the strange, grim, if sporadically (darkly) comic masterpiece, adapted from German playwright Georg Büchner’s unfinished play Woyzeck (1836-37).

Centering on the woeful life and existence of the title character, a barber, it depicts his nigh-endless suffering at the hands of the inhabitants of the military town where he lives. (The first aria, “Yes sir, Captain!” – Wozzeck’s refrain in response to mounting insults from a soldier – gives you a flavour.) The unremitting mockery and scorn of those around him – not least, the woman with whom he has a child, and who can barely tolerate Wozzeck’s presence – would almost be too much to bear for an audience, if not for the fascinating, penetratingly deep psychological study the opera embarks upon, about the consequences of all this cruelty. And, of course, the eerie, beautiful music

German baritone Michael Kupfer-Radecky stars as the title character, with soprano Ambur Braid as the cruel Marie and well-liked Canadian tenor Michael Schade as the sadistic captain. The extraordinary production, previously mounted at the Salzburg Festival, Metropolitan Opera, and Sydney Opera House, is by visionary artist William Kentridge.

Alexander Pushkin’s 19th century “novel in verse” Eugene Onegin is a classic of Russian literature – and mainstay of undergrad Lit. courses worldwide – but it might even be better known in its operatic format, this Tchaikovsky masterpiece, which premiered in 1879.

What’s most fascinating about Onegin, tiptoeing around spoilers, is how willing it is to interrogate the actions and motivations of its title character. While Onegin appears at first blush to be your typical romantic hero, as the story unfolds – all to Tchaikovsky’s mesmerising score – you come to realise there is something far more interesting going on, involving what today we might call toxic masculinity.

Onegin is also a wonderful, lyrical showcase for its stars, with highlights such as Onegin’s Aria and Tatyana’s Letter, which remain a mainstay of the repertoire (and conservatory auditions). The COC production features bass-baritone Andrii Kymach in the title role, with Australian soprano Lauren Fagan as Tatyana, and U.S. tenor Evan LeRoy Johnson as Onegin’s friend Lensky.

Finally, the COC is treating Toronto audiences to a one-off: an in-concert, fully orchestrated performance of Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana (1890). This one-act opera, typically staged alongside Leoncavallo’s sad clown fable Pagliacci, depicts (as the COC describes it) “an explosive love triangle”, set against an Easter weekend in a Sicilian village. Odds are, you’ll recognise its famed “Intermezzo” from the midpoint of the opera. While this in-concert version will sadly not benefit from the lovely production design associated with its setting, this 80-minute classic is well worth your time.

The COC’s Cavalleria borrows its cast from a mix of recent and upcoming performances, including bass-baritone Andrii Kymach (also starring as Onegin this season) and tenor Russell Thomas (who will star as Werther next season). Our only complaint? One performance isn’t enough!

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Wozzeck runs now through May 16, 2025, at the COC (Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts).

Eugene Onegin runs May 2-24, 2025.

Cavalleria rusticana-in-concert plays for one night only, May 23, 2025.

The post COC Spring Features An Expressionist Showcase, a Tchaikovsky Masterpiece, and a One-Act Marvel appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

October’s recent, too-short run of Handel’s 18th century “serenata” Acis and Galatea is a prime example of what Atelier does best, even if the libretto in this case isn’t entirely up to the task.

Acis and Galatea (HWV 49) technically isn’t an opera at all. Composed by Handel in 1718 a few years after his relocation to England, it’s an English-language adaptation of the Ovid version of the “Acis and Galatea” myth. The story of two lovers who attract the jealous attention of the evil Cyclops Polyphemus – incidentally, that’s the same Polyphemus who harassed Odysseus in The Odyssey – it was intended as a one-act showcase of Handel songs, later fleshed out into the two-hour version shown here.

To say the plot of Acis is low stakes is to suggest there’s much in the way of plot at all: when the opera begins, the title characters (tenor Antonin Rondepierre and soprano Meghan Lindsay) are already in love, with zero obstacles in their way, resulting in a first act which consists solely of love declarations while maidens and woodnymphs prance about them. (Atelier co-Artistic Director Jeannette Lajeunesse Zingg’s dance choreography is, as always, excellent).

In the second act, things mildly pick up with the appearance of Polyphemus (bass-baritone Douglas Williams, who clearly understood the assignment), who sets out to win Galatea by charm or by force. Engaging, roguish, and with a wonderfully low voice (which elicits more than a few chuckles), Williams is the clear standout of the production.

There are parts of Acis which work in isolation, and certain arias – Acis’s “Love in her eyes sits playing” or Polyphemus’s “I rage, I melt, I burn” – have made their way into the concert repertoire. The Overture and Act 2 Chorus “Galatea, dry thy tears” are also quite lovely, and were the clear standouts of the Atelier production.

Still, a clunky libretto – sample lyrics: “Happy we! Happy we!” – suggest that even at two hours this one probably runs a bit long.

As is typical for Atelier, this Acis was also a joy to look at, with colour-coded dresses clearly inspired by Disney princesses, and painted backdrops worthy of fabled Disney artist Eyvind Earle. I was not expecting to be shepherded back to the days of Cinderella and Aurora and Snow White, but it was a pleasant surprise.

Next up at Atelier is Charpentier’s 17th century David and Jonathan, hot off a successful run at the Ópera real de Versailles (France). An Old Testament adaptation written for Charpentier’s Jesuit patrons, David and Jonathan tells the story of the powerful friendship between King David and Jonathan, son of Saul. This is Charpentier at his best.

Atelier’s David and Jonathan (“David et Jonathas“) runs April 9–13, 2025 at Koerner Hall.

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Want to learn more about Toronto’s other opera company?

Check out our interviews with Opera Atelier set designer Gerard Gauci and Co-Artistic Directors Marshall Pynkoski & Jeannette Lajeunesse Zingg.

The post Acis and Galatea (Opera Atelier) Review: A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

I suppose a good start would be listing her numerous academic and professional accolades, but I’m certain we don’t have enough space for that. Char is an accomplished opera singer, talented songwriter, and passionate nonprofit founder, and that is not even scratching the surface. She studied Classical Voice Performance at the University of Toronto and Opera and Voice at McGill University, after which she joined the Canadian Opera Company’s Young Artists Program. She is the co-founder of the Marigold Music Program, a nonprofit dedicated to empowering marginalized youth in Toronto with music educational programs. If you are interested in learning more about Char the professional (which you should be), I highly encourage you to look her up.

But I would much rather tell you about Char, my best friend of nearly 15 years. She is profoundly generous and has a boundless compassion for others. She is steadfastly determined. Tenacity is her superpower. She feels the fear and does it anyway. She is brave beyond words and has always been unwavering in her commitment to singing and her loyalty to others. She dominates at karaoke (duh) and is an excellent baker. She is usually asleep by 9 pm and awake before the sunrise. We have known each other for nearly half our lives and I can tell you that the one thing that has never changed about her is her sense of self. Char has always known exactly who she is, and it is my absolute favourite thing about her.

This fall, Char made her COC main-stage debut at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts as Musetta in La Boheme. Char and I were both born and raised in Toronto and have always shared a deep love for the city we call home. Seeing her perform on the main stage in our home city was a level of pride I can’t quite describe. You can catch Char next as Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and the hen/innkeeper’s wife in The Cunning Little Vixen. I promise you won’t regret it!

Like all true best friends, Char and I have a disappointing lack of pictures together.

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Which ‘hood are you in?

I live in North York (Downsview Park area)

What do you do?

I am an opera singer, singer-songwriter, and Co-Founder and Co-Managing Director of the Marigold Music Program, which aims to close the gap between underrepresented youth and music education.

What are you currently working on?

I am currently working on my role and cover role for the COC’s spring shows Medea and Aportia Chryptych. I am working on Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 for an upcoming concert as well. I am always learning new arias for auditions and possible competitions, and I am excited to start working on a new concert repertoire that I can’t quite announce yet for next season!

Where can we find your work?

You can check out my Instagram and website to see what I’m up to!

The post “A Day in the Life” with Toronto Opera Singer Charlotte Siegel appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

As the opera begins, Pasquale has refused Ernesto’s entreaties to approve the marriage; instead, Pasquale sets out to find a young bride of his own, heedless of whether any marriageable young woman would be interested in this unkempt, ornery old man. Sensing an opportunity for some old-fashioned mischief-making, Ernesto’s good pal Dr. Malatesta (Joshua Hopkins) offers to oblige by arranging Pasquale’s marriage to his “sister” (who is not, in fact, who she claims to be). Shenanigans – mistaken identities, miscommunications, disguises – ensue.

The COC/Scottish Opera production resituates the action to 1960s Italy, with an aesthetic and some comic beats that call to mind the Commedia all’Italiana cinema of the era (think 1961’s Divorce, Italian Style). The set is wonderful, walls askew, hanging laundry everywhere, but some additions to this production – like a running gag about cats – fall flat, undermining the jokes already present in the libretto (by Donizetti and collaborator Giovanni Ruffini).

Other additions, like a funny bit about the extravagantly oversized staff recruited against Pasquale’s wishes, are more successful. (Meanwhile, the nerd in me can’t resist pointing out that the Catwoman comic book Pasquale carries around was clearly published in the 1990s, a glaring anachronism in this 1960s-set production.)

Donizetti’s score, including some hilariously tongue-twisting arias (“Cheti, cheti, immantinente” is one of the highlights of the repertoire), is wonderful from start to finish. All four leads acquit themselves, though Kiria is the standout as the vain oaf Don Pasquale, ably meeting the demands – musical and physical comedy – of the opera. Osborne as Norina is less successful, her voice occasionally strained and her performance – no doubt a victim of the lazy comic stylings of co-directors Renaud Doucet and André Barbe – not nearly as feisty or playful as the libretto requires.

Hopkins’s Dr. Malatesta is quite funny, and nearly steals the show on several occasions, including the aforementioned, show-stopping “Cheti, cheti, immantinente”. (Though he can’t hold a candle to Mariusz Kwiecien, Malatesta of Malatestas.) Meanwhile, Ballerini’s Ernesto seems, amusingly, to have walked in from an entirely different opera, delivering one heart-rending, romantic, deeply beautiful tenor aria after another.

Donizetti, who composed the equally delightful L’elisir d’amore, was clearly in his element with Pasquale, threading together a succession of alternatingly beautiful and ridiculous musical showpieces for his cast. While there’s nothing quite on the scale of the gorgeous “Una furtiva lagrima” from L’elisir, the parts still add up to a decidedly entertaining whole.

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Don Pasquale runs now through May 18, 2024. Tickets available here.

The post COC’s “Don Pasquale” is a Good-Natured Romp (Opera Review) appeared first on Toronto Guardian.