Toronto Summer time Music: Finale. Marie-Claire Saindon: “Turtulette Acadienne Montréalaise”; J.S. Bach: Magnificat; Samih Choukeir: “Lao Rahal Soti” (arr. Shireen Abu Khader) — Kathleen Allan, conductor; Pleasure Lee, piano; Neighborhood Program-Chamber Choir | Chopin: Ballade No. 3 In A-Flat Main, Op. 47 — Luke Zhang, piano | Eric Abramovitz: Bleep Bleep Bass (World Première) — Eric Abramovitz*, bass-clarinet; Miles Haskins, bass-clarinet | Kelly-Marie Murphy: Fierce Urgency of the Now (World Première) — Cassia Drake, viola; Jonathan Mak, piano | Debussy: String Quartet in G minor, Op. 10, L. 85 — Clarisse Schneider, Sophia Lee, violins; Bridget Allen-O’Neil, viola; Lara Isaac, cello; Track Hee Lee, coach | Mozart: Serenade No. 10 in B-flat Main, Okay. 361/370a, “Gran Partita” — Sarah Jeffrey, Cristina Sewerin, oboes; Isabelle Dumas, Farimah Khorrami, clarinets; Jonathan Krehm, Eric Abramovitz, basset-horns; Zenghao Wang, Dorothy Cotton, bassoons; Jesse Dale, bass; Gabriel Radford, Robert Bernstein, Noah Hawryluck, Ethan Chialtas, horns | J.S. Bach: “Jesu, Pleasure of Man’s Needing” (Cantata 147, Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben) — Byungchan Lee, Claire Heinrichs, Jonathan Crow, violins; Vanessa J. Goymour, viola; Sabina Crow, cello; Caitlin Wooden, Sarah Mole, sopranos; Jennifer Mak, piano | Janacek: Mládí for Wind Sextet — Claire Lee, flute; Cristina Sewerin, oboe; Jonathan Krehm, clarinet; Eric Abramovitz, bass clarinet; Dorothy Ward, bassoon; Avram Selick, horn | Dvořák: Piano Quintet No. 2 in A Main, Op. 81 — Yura Lee, Yoanna Haeun Jang, violins; Remea Elisa Ines Friedrich, viola; Bethany Bobbs, cello; Emmanuel Roberts Dugal, piano. August 2, 2025, Walter Corridor.
“Classical music is in good fingers,” a visibly moved Jonathan Crow introduced, his towering determine dominating the Walter Corridor stage. The final evening of this 12 months’s Toronto Summer time Music Pageant was an event to pay homage to its indefatigable Creative Director, who, after 9 seasons, is ending his tenure. He’s succeeded by one other Canadian violinist, William Fedkenheuer.
Not surprisingly, this was a transferring occasion in so some ways: from voices cracking with emotion to a standing ovation for Crow as he walked all the way down to obtain a trophy, to a 16-minute compilation of video tributes from pals and alumni of the Pageant, together with stars resembling James Ehnes, Peter Oundjian, Angela Hewitt, and Gustavo Gimeno.
Neighborhood Program & World Premieres
It was additionally becoming that the night ought to have a good time TSM’s neighborhood program, one of many best legacies of Crow’s tenure. This system’s Chamber Choir walked in, singing Marie-Claire Saindon’s ‘Turtulette Acadienne Montréalaise’; a significant alternative, if not precisely a musically rewarding one, for all of the choir’s enthusiasm and infectious power.
Two actions from Bach’s Magnificat supplied a extra worthwhile car for them and their conductor, Kathleen Allan, as they easily negotiated complicated polyphonies. For the ultimate track, the choir dispersed on both aspect of the stage, forming a dome as they echoed the soloist’s mournful tune, a track by the Syrian Samih Chukeir, organized by the Jordanian-Palestinian-Canadian Shireen Abu Khader.
This system supplied no description or translation of the phrases. However, some post-concert analysis revealed how poignant and related they have been: “If my voice departs, your voices is not going to / If the singer dies, the songs will stay / bringing collectively the damaged and struggling hearts.”
A message of warning for an additional human catastrophe got here with the COVID-delayed premiere of Kelly-Marie Murphy’s ‘Fierce Urgency of the Now’ for viola and piano, that includes Cassia Drake (for whom the music was composed) and the ever-reliable Jonathan Mak. A name to motion to avoid wasting the setting, every of the piece’s three actions was impressed by a distinguished environmental scientist. The music moved from contemplative ruminations within the first two actions to frenetic drive within the third.
Between these works, Luke Zhang demonstrated the end result of his coaching with the Neighborhood program’s Piano Masterclass, in a courageous and largely completed efficiency of Chopin’s third Ballade.
Then, Eric Abramovitz and Miles Haskins, each Neighborhood program mentors, introduced a contact of comedian showmanship with the previous’s medley of acquainted tunes for 2 bass clarinets, in homage to Chang Lee, one of many TSM’s members of workers.
4 first actions for bigger ensembles adopted: an animated Debussy String Quartet, a heavenly Mozart Gran Partita for wind, an enigmatic Janáček Mládi for wind sextet, and eventually an invigorating Dvořák Piano Quintet.
The Spirit of Neighborhood
However, this night was not primarily about technical prowess.
It was concerning the spirit of neighborhood, concerning the viewers’s enthusiasm and help even after two hours with out interval, concerning the smiles and tears as Jonathan Crow joined his workers in Bach’s ‘Jesu, Pleasure of Man’s Needing’, concerning the TSM workers’s continuous work and broad smiles, about studying that the matching fund-raising marketing campaign had surpassed its objective, and above all about mentors and mentees, amateurs and professionals, collectively celebrating the fun of music-making.
Classical music in Toronto is certainly in good fingers.
Thanks, TSM workers. Thanks, Jonathan!
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Michelle Assay is a Marie Curie/UKRI International Fellow on the Universities of Toronto and King’s School London engaged on Girls and Western Artwork Music in Iran (Womusiran.com). She holds a PhD from the Sorbonne and College of Sheffield and has been a Leverhulme Fellow on the College of Huddersfield. She is the creator of award-winning articles on Russian and Soviet music and on Shakespeare and music, and usually seems in concert events as a pianist. She is a daily broadcaster for the BBC and contributor to Gramophone, Worldwide Piano, and Bachtrack, together with Ludwig Van.
