Night Off at the Nickel 9 will feature a concert with dynamic vocalist Teiya Kasahara on April 26. Teiya and the Night Off team are assembling a string quartet of some of Toronto’s finest chamber musicians to accompany Teiya in selections by Handel, Andrew Yee, and new arrangements of music by Jane Siberry and Klaus Nomi.
Night Off At Nickel 9 is a monthly concert series that takes place on the last Sunday of each month at the Nickel 9 Distillery in Toronto. The series features an eclectic mix of music that often includes contemporary classical music and artists.
The show will take place at the Nickel 9 Distillery.
Teiya Kasahara
Teiya Kasahara 笠原 貞野 (they/them) is a Nikkei-Canadian, queer, trans non-binary, multi and interdisciplinary creator/performer, opera singer, teacher, and more. They earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of British Columbia, and are a graduate of the Canadian Opera Company Ensemble Studio.
Teiya’s background includes more than two decades of singing both traditional and contemporary music. They have appeared in productions across North America and Europe, and performance highlights include the Queen of the Night from Die Zauberflöte, Cio-Cio San from Madama Butterfly, and the soprano solos in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and Verdi’s Requiem, along with the soprano solo Verdi’s Requiem with the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir to a sold-out audience at Koerner Hall in 2024.
Teiya has performed with companies such as the Canadian Opera Company, Edmonton Opera, Vancouver Opera, Vancouver Symphony, Toronto Symphony, Windsor Symphony, Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, Against the Grain Theatre, Aalto-Essen Musiktheater (Germany), Opéra Toulon, Tapestry Opera, the Luminato Festival, and Theatre Gargantua, among others.
Other notable performances include singing alongside Polaris Prize and JUNO award winner Jeremy Dutcher, and premiering two roles by Japanese Canadian composer Leslie Uyeda, Solana—When the Sun Comes Out (Queer Arts Festival 2013) and the title role of Silence (Nuova Vocal Arts 2025).
They have created interdisciplinary works in theatre that look to reimagine and expand the landscape of canonical opera. Teiya’s first original work The Queen In Me uses elements of opera, theatre, and electronics to examine the ways that gender, sexuality, and race intersect. The work saw its world premiere in June 2022 at the Canadian Opera Company. Performances sold out, and the production (which garnered five Dora Mavor Moore nominations) toured to the Belfast International Arts Festival to critical acclaim.
Teiya is an artistic associate with Confluence Concerts, a co-founder of Amplified Opera, and a member of Fractal Arts Collective. Teiya has collaborated with re:Naissance Opera developing new works including Imaginarium, Inferno a new hip hop opera by Omari Newton and Amy Lee Lavoie, performed with a live computer animation and dancers in Live From the Underworld, and has a new work in development called River Island, inspired by the life of Yoshiko Kawashima.
They are the 2025 recipient of Opera Canada’s Change Maker Ruby Award, and the 2022 recipient of the Joseph S. Stauffer Prize in music from the Canada Council of the Arts.
The show will take place at Nickel 9 Distillery (90 Cawthra) at 6 p.m. on April 26 with a $10 suggested donation.
- Find details on future shows [HERE].
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