|
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Imagine Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky as nothing more than a lowly harmony teacher. Imagine Ludwig van Beethoven as a gigging pianist struggling to make ends meet. These chilling scenarios would have left the world starved of some of the greatest music we know. For as long as artists have created, philanthropists have stood in the shadows behind them. The list of these complex relationships goes far beyond Tchaikovsky and Mme von Meck and Beethoven and the Lichowsky family - there is Stravinsky and Diaghilev, Ravel, Poulenc, and Mme de Polignac, and many more. Join us as we delve into these fruitful collaborations and celebrate Off Centre's own generous philanthropists, in a programme featuring bass baritone Peter McGillivray, mezzo soprano Lauren
Segal, violinist Jacques Israelievitch, accordionist Joseph Macerollo and pianists Inna Perkis and Boris Zarankin.
This concert is sponsored by JACKIE AND HORATIO KEMENY & TAKETO MURATA
[ Earlier this season... ]
Sunday, October 14, 2012
It is no surprise that the first "hearty meal" of our 18th season should be devoted to our beloved Schubert! Robert Schumann once described Schubert's magical ability to create great works of "heavenly length", and indeed his final piano Sonata (in B flat major) is just that - full of expansion, musical space and breath. Pianist Boris Zarankin's interpretation of his sprawling work has been praised for its power to "cause time to slow down and [even...] stand still as his fingers indulge the composer's creative ramblings". To sweeten your palate, for dessert we offer an array of favourite lieder performed by soprano Allison Angelo and tenor Lawrence Wiliford.
This concert is sponsored by the BMO FINANCIAL GROUP
and the IAN IHNATOWYCZ FAMILY FOUNDATION |
|
 |
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Last season, in an unprecedented twist of fate, we set our sights on sunny Italy and ended up in "The Big Apple": New York, New York. Our inaugural American Salon left us all wanting more - especially more of composer/pianist Jimmy Roberts! This year, Jimmy is joined by Met sensation tenor John Easterlin, sopranos Sarah Halmarson and Ilana Zarankin, baritone Vasil Garvanliev and violinist Marie Berard in a programme of Sondheim, Gershwin, and Berstein, among others!
This concert is sponsored by ANNA AND LESLIE DAN & KATALIN SCHAFER
Sunday, January 27, 2013
A couple of years ago we watched composers face off in our musical heavyweight championships - it was a very exciting match to watch but we thought this year our German Salon ought to be devoted to the more peaceful relationships between our favourite composers. With the help of Canadian superstar baritone Russell Braun, Off Centre newcomer mezzo soprano Rihab Chaieb, pianists Carolyn Maule, Elina Kelebeev, Inna Perkis and Boris Zarankin, we will be delving into the fruitful musical worlds born of the lasting friendships of Schumann and Brahms, Wolf and Mahler, and finally, Haydn and Mozart. Join us... "this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship."I
This concert is sponsored by ROGER MOORE & CROWE SOBERMAN
Sunday, May 6, 2012
"There is no true love, save in suffering." Sounds Russian, doesn't it?
These are actually the words of Miguel de Unamuno, a Spanish essayist,
poet, playwright and philosopher. Though Spain and Russia are
geographically and culturally very far apart , there is a virtually
identical saying about Russians who are "only happy when they are
unhappy." Considered side by side, how does the music of each country
complement the other? Soprano Joni Henson,
baritone Peter McGillivray and mezzo soprano Leigh-Anne Martin
(OFF CENTRE DEBUT) help us find out!
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Ah! Sweet Mystery of Life - Inaugural American Salon!
> Please note the programme change for our next salon.
The mystery of life is indeed sweetened with the fascinatin' rhythms of Bernstein, Copland, Gershwin, Kern and Barber. In true Off Centre fashion we've had to re-route our musical travel plans, and though we will not make it to sunny Italy as planned, we do still mean to journey South, in the great copmany of tenors Keith Klassen (OFF CENTRE DEBUT) and Rocco Rupolo (OFF CENTRE DEBUT), baritone Giles Tomkins, soprano Ilana Zarankin, and pianists Inna Perkis and Boris Zarankin.
Special guest: Jimmy Roberts - composer, pianist, entertainer from New York, composer of the second-longest running Off Broadway musical in theater history, “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change”.
|
|
View enlarged >> |
|
Sunday, October 30, 2011
 
Shostakovich's only Cello Sonata was composed in 1934, only two years
before Lady Macbeth of Mtensk gave Soviet censors
the opportunity to publicity denounced Shostakovich as an enemy of the
state. Twenty five years later, while he was being hounded to join the
Communist Party, Shastakovich composed the Satires song
cycle, setting five dangerously satirical poems by Sasha Cherny. Again,
the censors were up in arms. To save himself, he joined the Party - a
questionable move that ultimately allowed Shastakovich to keep pushing
the compositional "envelope". From there, our program reminds 100 years
to Tchaikovsky's 1879 opera Eugene Onegin based on Pushkin's novel in
verse. But who was Onegin? A careless, selfish cynic sacrificing the
promise of young love and loyal friendship, or a man who could not
recognize happiness because it was just too close? Uncovering the
mysteries of a character who still resonates with audiences today are
soprano Lindsay Barrett, mezzo soprano Erica
iris Huang, tenor Ryan Harper, baritone Geoffrey
Sirett (OFF CENTRE DEBUT), cellist Winona Zelenka, and our very own Inna
Perkis and Boris Zarankin at the piano.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Robert
Schumann once described Schubert's sonatas as being of "heavenly
length" and his B flat major sonata (written in the final year of his
life) is truly a piece of heavenly contemplation. But Schubert also
wrote intensely dense and concise lieder - those one-page wonders! -
that show off a kind of 19th Century musical intensity and humour that
we've come to think of as twittering. Soprano Charlene Santoni,
baritone Vasil Garvanliev, and violinist Jacques
Israelievitch, joining Inna Perkis and Boris Zarankin in
contemplation and in twittering.
Our
Feb.5 Annual Schubertiad concert will also be launching Boris
Zarankin's exciting new recording of Schubert Sonatas on the DOREMI
label. Boris will be signinig copies of his new CD following the
concert. View new album >>
|
|
 |
Very shortly after Janacek's 1917 summer holiday in the Moravian
spa-town of Luhacovice, he began setting the poems of Ozef Kalda - a
railway official who had a knack for fiction writing - detailing a
young farm boy's infatuation with a gypsy girl. Janacek himself was
living a similar story - that summer in Luhacovice he had fallen in
love - or perhaps lust? - with the young wife (he was twice her age!)
of an antique dealer from Pisek. Though Kamila Stosslova did not return
his affection, there are more than 700 letters that survive to
chronicle the composer's unrequited affection. The Kalda settings
eventually came to make up the celebrated song-cycle The Diary of One
Who Disappeared, considered to be one of Janacek's most sensual - even
perverse - compositions. We leave this dramatic Czech 'glutton for
punishment' (700 letters is a LOT of letters!) for another kind of
music drama - this time, Italian "style"! We will regale you with
excerpts and operatic gems from Verdi, Donizetti, Tosti and
Rachmaninov.
The programme will include Rachmaninoff romances, Janacek's Diary of
One Who Disappeared, Italian songs by Tosti, highlights from Verdi's
Rigoletto, Donizetti's Lucia di Lamermoor and a four-hand arrangement
of the ouverture from Rossini's L'Italiana in Algieri. To convey these
tips on love, longing and lust, are tenor Colin Ainsworth,
baritone Peter
McGillivray, sopranos Rachel Cleland-Ainsworth
and Lucia
Cesaroni, together with pianists Inna Perkis and Boris Zarankin,
soprano Sarah Halmarson and mezzo soprano Leigh-Anne Martin.
The first 50 ticket orders for this special Mother's Day
concert, will receive an additional ticket, compliments of Inna and
Boris.
Bring your Mom, bring a friend, the choice is yours.
* Based on a first come, first serve basis, applicable to new sales
only, for the May performance only
> All Concerts start at 2pm at the CBC's Glenn Gould
Studio, 250 Front Street West, Toronto
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
Have you ever wondered why it is that
the most exotic countries of Europe are found along the edges of the
continent? And yet, for all their richness, fullness of character and
vibrancy, they are nothing alike in their music! Our Urgo-Finnic group
- made up of Bartok, Arvo Part, Kodaly and Sibelius - is entranced by
mysterious Asia, while the Spaniards - Albeniz, Granados and Rodrigo -
embrace the Gypsy presence and the sounds of ther North African
neighbours. Inviting you on this colourful journey are sopranos Joni Henson
and Teiya
Kasahara, baritone Olivier Laquerre, accordionist
Joseph Macerollo and pianist Ricker Choi. The
concert will be hosted by Julia Zarankin, who will
introduce the Spanish, Hungarian, and Finnish cultures, what unites
them and what makes them different.
Canadian actor Fiona Byrne will be reading poems by the great
Spanish poet Garcia Lorca. Fiona recently starred as Natalya in
Soulpaper Theatre’s ‘A Month in the Country’, and is a regular at the
Shaw Festival.
This concert is sponsored by Horatio and Jackie Kemeny.
> All Concerts start at 2pm at the CBC's Glenn Gould
Studio, 250 Front Street West, Toronto
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We've uncovered a new mystery of
history! Within a three year span at the end of the first decade of the
19th Century, a "Mighty Four" was born - Mendelssohn, Chopin, Schumann
and Liszt! We promise not to overwhelm you with these Romantic composer
heavyweights - lighter fare on our teatime menu will be provided by our
winded musicians, and will include Brahms' lyrical Op. 40 Horn trio.
Creating this bearable lightness of being are sopranos Allison Angelo
and Eve-Rachel
McLeod, mezzo soprano Erica Iris Huang, violinist Marie Berard, clarinettist Katie Norman
and Joan Watson
on the French horn.
> All Concerts start at 2pm at the CBC's Glenn Gould
Studio, 250 Front Street West, Toronto
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
