{"id":54287,"date":"2018-05-30T13:41:57","date_gmt":"2018-05-30T17:41:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/?p=54287"},"modified":"2018-05-31T09:57:43","modified_gmt":"2018-05-31T13:57:43","slug":"cmim-2018-day-one-art-song-first-round-gets-rolling-with-the-cream-of-the-crop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2018\/05\/30\/cmim-2018-day-one-art-song-first-round-gets-rolling-with-the-cream-of-the-crop\/","title":{"rendered":"CMIM 2018 | Day One: Art Song First Round Gets Rolling With The Cream Of The Crop"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"CMIM
Ludwig van Toronto begins our coverage of the annual Concours musical international de Montreal, which opened yesterday with the First Round of the Art Song competition. Image: CMIM First Round winners (Photo: Tam Lan Truong)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It\u2019s that time of year again! \u00a0I am referring to the Concours musical international de Montreal<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 It has been taking place annually since 2002 in rotation between Voice, Violin and Piano. It\u2019s voice this year, and for the first time, there is the addition of an Art Song Division.<\/p>\n

This year, the jury panel is particularly distinguished, with such luminaries as Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Ben Heppner, Soile Isokoski and Dame Felicity Lott. At a total prize money of $270,000 CDN, it is the richest voice competition in the world.<\/p>\n

CMIM 2018 opened yesterday with the First Round of the Art Song competition, in two sessions of eight singers each. Session 1<\/em>: David Tayloe, tenor (USA); Suzanne Fischer, soprano (UK); Julien Van Mellaerts, baritone (New Zealand-UK); Irina Jae-Eun Park, soprano (South Korea); Axelle Fanyo, soprano (France); Magali Simard-Galdes, soprano (Canada); Rihab Chaieb, mezzo (Canada-Tunisia); Gemma Summerfield, soprano (UK). Session 2<\/em>: Hagar Sharvit, mezzo (Israel-Germany); John Brancy, baritone (USA); Suzanne Taffot, soprano (Canada-Cameroon); Tomi Punkeri, baritone (Finland); Anna-Sophie Neher, soprano (Canada-Germany); Satriya Krisna, tenor (Indonesia), Clara Osowski, mezzo (USA); Mengxi You, soprano (China).<\/p>\n

Before giving my impressions of the First Round, I should say that I was not present in Salle Bourgie but was listening through the live stream. (I will be reporting on location for the Semifinals and Finals of the Arias Division June 4 \u2013 7)<\/p>\n

In terms of voice, expression, musicality, and communicative power, the quality of the candidates in this First Round were impressive. No wonder \u2014 these sixteen singers were chosen from a total of 469 applications representing 52 countries. These are the cream of the crop. Often the difference between the winner and the also-rans boils down to minor issues of vocal production or finer points of interpretation. And then there are the intangibles \u2014 I\u2019m referring to the individual preference of each jury panel member.<\/p>\n

Each singer performed a maximum of fifteen minutes, anywhere from a minimum of three to five or even six songs, depending on length. I enjoyed all the performances. The ones that stood out for me included tenor David Tayloe, in a program of Schubert, Finzi, and Hugo Wolf, songs well suited to his beautiful lyric tenor. Particularly lovely was Schubert\u2019s \u201cIm Fruhling,\u201d the very first song of the afternoon. A Schubert song is a requisite in this competition, so there was a surfeit of \u201cGretchen am Spinnrade\u201d among the women!<\/p>\n

Indeed, most stuck to the tried and true, with the occasional rarity, such as Korean soprano Irina Jae Eun Park choosing an angular and dramatic piece by Aribert Reimann. Hers is a pure, well focused if slightly fluttery lyric soprano. Her best moment was a lovely \u201cO quand je dors,\u201d with a nice pianissimo <\/em>ending. French soprano Axelle Fanyo impressed with rich tone and sang a beautiful Copeland song. Canadian mezzo Rihab Chaieb, a former COC Ensemble member and now a Met Lindemann artist, is sounding better than ever \u2013 her \u201cDeath and the Maiden\u201d a standout. The first half concluded with UK soprano Gemma Summerfield, who impressed with beautiful, gleaming tone, including an excellent \u201cGanymed.\u201d<\/p>\n

The evening session also had eight contestants, with a few singers who have had successes in previous competitions. Top on the list was American lyric baritone John Brancy. In Schubert\u2019s \u201cNachtst\u00fcck,\u201d Brancy showed off his legato and mezza voce, and he had all the requisite dramatic intensity for Debussy\u2019s \u201cNoel des enfants.\u201d\u00a0 Mezzo Clara Osowski, another successful contestant at other competitions, sang beautifully songs by Schubert, Poulenc and Britten, though a bit too serious and earnest in her delivery \u2013 I would have preferred greater variety of tone colours and a lightness of touch. Canadian soprano Anna Sophie Neher\u2019s rendition of \u201cAuf dem wasser zu singen\u201d was very fine. We\u2019ll be hearing more of Neher, who\u2019s joining the COC Ensemble this fall.<\/p>\n

The announcement came around ten o\u2019clock \u2013 the eight singers chosen to advance to the semifinals are Gemma Summerfield, John Brancy, Irina Jae Eune Park, Rihab Chaieb, Julien Van Mellearts, Clara Osowski, Axelle Fanyo, Tomi Punkeri. Interestingly, Van Mellearts was already in T-shirts and shorts when he was called to go up to the stage \u2013 how\u2019s that for a relaxed attitude!<\/p>\n

For us audience members, either in Salle Bourgie or over the web, part of the fun is to come up with our own list of winners. I can say I had on my list six of the eight candidates picked by the CMIM jury. It often boils down to a matter of individual preferences by the jury members.<\/p>\n

James Norcop, the driving force behind the newly created Art Song Division, sums it up the best: \u201cAnybody who goes into a competition is already a winner. They put in months of preparation, which raised them up to a higher level. Even if they don\u2019t get accepted they have won. And if they get in and get eliminated, they still have won.\u201d<\/p>\n

Follow our coverage of CMIM 2018 HERE<\/span><\/a>.<\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ludwig van Toronto begins our coverage of the annual Concours musical international de Montreal, which opened yesterday with the First Round of the Art Song competition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":54288,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[14761,76,20200,19,9567,39,70],"tags":[6179,4839],"yst_prominent_words":[19666,20179,19669,20159,20160,20178,20175,20173,20164,20177,20162,20180,20161,20181,20174,20163,20182,20176,20166,6640],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/05\/CMIM_First_Round_winners_photo_Tam_Lan_Truong.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9bakr-e7B","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54287"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54287"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54287\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54296,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54287\/revisions\/54296"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54287"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=54287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}