With mid-June upon us, the 2013-14 season winds down to a trickle, and the summer festival season, not quite ready to unveil itself, starts revving its engines. This means our weekly critic’s picks will be a bit thin for while, but there are still some shows worth your while.
17 Tuesday
- The Shift via Music in the Barns and The Wandering Eye at the Drake Hotel. 8 p.m. $15-20
It’s a film. It’s a concert. It’s the Shift, a collision between film, live music, movement, and politics. In what looks like an incredible immersive 360° experience, the audience can expect the world premiere of four short films that include documentary, experimental, dance film, and music video genres, all created by the award-winning tactical media duo Joseph Johnson-Camí and Ayelen Liberona and starring celebrated dance artist Margie Gillis. The films will unfold on four screens accompanied by musical performances from Music in the Barns Chamber Ensemble and LAL’s politically charged electronic music. Not to be missed. Details here:
The Shift | June 17, 2014 from Wandering Eye on Vimeo.
19 Thursday
- Against The Grain Theatre: Pelléas et Mélisande at Canadian Opera Company’s Max Tanenbaum Courtyard Gardens, Joey and Toby Tanenbaum Opera Centre. 7:30 p.m. $40 +
Against The Grain Theatre presents Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande featuring an all Canadian cast including baritone Etienne Dupuis as Pelléas, soprano Miriam Khalil as Mélisande, baritone Gregory Dahl as Golaud and bass Alain Coulombe as Arkel. The text will be sung in French with English titles. Details here.
Production runs: June 19, 21, 23 and 25, 2014
20 Friday, 21 Saturday
- Porgy & Bess: Toronto Symphony Orchestra and Conductor Bramwell Tovey with Marquita Lister, soprano; Jermaine Smith, tenor; Alfred Walker, baritone; Toronto Mendelssohn Choir. 7:30 p.m. $38.75 – 169
Bramwell Tovey will be in town this week to present selections from Gershwin’s classic Porgy & Bess. In many ways this could be called an American folk opera, and Tovey’s idiomatic flair for conducting should make this well worth the ticket price. Included on the program are songs such as Summertime, It Ain’t Necessarily So, Bess, You Is My Woman Now, and many more. The great Marquita Lister and Jermaine Smith will lead the way. Details and tickets here.
Michael Vincent
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