This Week In Art/Culture/Entertainment
By John Swartz
Happy New Year, but first, an explanation. Since this little thing started in December 2017, I have not taken a break. I stretched a deadline or two in 2025, but kept plugging away, until mid December, or the week before Christmas. This iteration of the column I justified delaying until the Monday following because there were three concerts happening and I figured it made sense to roll reviews of them into one last column before Christmas.
Well, what I soon realized is I needed to give myself a break. Compounding things was a needless technical issue with my email threatening to be the recipe of making all my old archived emails a pile of digital garbage and incoming emails unreceivable. There is a special hell for techies at Microsoft who don’t make things backward compatible and change protocols because they are bored with old formats. There are companies much larger than this one who are facing, or will soon find out they are facing, the same dilemma. That headache is not resolved, but a temporary path is working until I solve the base issue. Dealing with it burned some brain cells I would rather have burned with a nice glass of rye and coke.
So I took a vacation at home and after 8 years it was needed and I’m back.
The entertainment landscape is ramping up. Most years there is nothing happening in January, but not this year.
North Simcoe Arts has a roundtable happening January 28 at Creative Nomad Studios. It’s from 1 to 3 p.m. and you can register online. The agenda is what you bring to the table.
The Old Dance Hall Players have an imrov night, Making Snowflakes January 30 at Brewery Bay Food Company. You can get tickets online.
OMAH
In November I reported the Orillia Museum of Art and History acquired 50 items from an auction of things from Gordon Lightfoot’s Estate. It turns out it was 100 items. They will be added to the permanent exhibit and unveiled in May.
At the same time OMAH is making a pitch for financial donations to cover the costs of maintaining the exhibit, and to acquire other items which might become available.
The museum was able to get the things they have to date because of a major donation someone made specifically to buy items targeted in the two auctions which have taken place so far. Among the things the museum got in the most recent auction are 45 RPM recordings made by CFOR which Gord made, all the school books and other books from his personal collection, his electric train set, a collection of hotel keys, and some garments. They also got some of Gord’s awards including the Mariposa Folk Festival award.
Aside from individual donations the museum is also open to corporate sponsorships and welcomes assistance from those with expertise to further develop the exhibit. Financial donations can be made online and for anything call the museum, 705-326-2159, and ask for Vanessa Santala.
Arts Orillia
A few weeks ago Arts Orillia announced a partnership with the Opera House which should create more opportunities for young people to participate in performing arts.
It’ s an expansion of the Forever Young program Arts Orillia developed. One of those events resulted in 100 young people performing at a concert in early December at the Opera House. That event was developed by three high school co-op students. The next venture will be a similar concert in March.
Seven of twelve students who have done co-ops with Arts Orillia are now doing post-secondary education in arts programs. While with Arts Orillia they learned about producing, curation, arts administration, and the technical side of theatre.
Arts Orillia has also sponsored workshops and master classes in area schools with working musicians who are performing at Arts Orillia events.
Reviews
This past Christmas concert season feature not one rendition of Sleigh Ride, but three. The Orillia Concert Band, The Orillia Silver Band and the 4th Street Jazz Project all played it at their concerts. For several years only the Silver Band played it, but not as part of their published program. they did as part of the audience request portion, and because I used my teacher voice to get attention for my request for it.
I was a bit disappointed this year Neil Barlow, the band’s conductor, seemed to be ignoring my shouts. I knew the band had practised it because he told they were preparing it. At halftime I asked, ‘Did you not hear me?’ He said he didn’t, but don’t worry they were using it for an encore. Relief, but sneaky.
That concert also featured Russian Christmas Music, a composition I have favoured for 50 years. They played an edited version, the original is almost 15 minutes long, and they arranger kept all the exciting parts to trim it to a little more than 7 minutes. Interestingly I noticed the arrangement was almost exactly the same as another short version by a drum corps that was instrumental in making this tune a staple for concert bands all over the world. I made the observation to Neil and he agreed it was very close.
The band played it magnificently and the audience gave them a standing ovation when it concluded. It really is a powerful piece of music that begs applause whenever it is played.
The band also played some arrangements of Christmas music that are off the beaten track and I am, as always, extremely satisfied with how the band members play the stuff they do.
The Sunday before Christmas the 4th Street Jazz Project and the Salvation Army band had a concert. Imagine my surprise to learn the army band was not just half a dozen brass instrument players but a band almost the size of the Silver Band.
They sounded very good and played some interesting arrangements of standard Christmas tunes. Trumpet player Abby Howard sang the old Vince Guaraldi song, Christmas Time is Here, from A Charlie Brown Christmas. I have mentioned a few times Abby is an excellent trumpet player. There have been many very good, young trumpet players over the years, but her tone and control is top of the class, and that class is at Orillia Secondary School where she is still a student. I’ve heard her sing before as part of student choirs and can now say as a soloist she’s as good singing as playing trumpet. I think she has a bright future as a musician if she pursues music.
The jazz band played a couple of tunes that weren’t Christmassy, including a killer arrangement of The Defibrillator. They also played standards, but not the way anyone in the audience ever heard them done before. The band, with Robin Watson waving her arms around in front came up with some great jazz arrangements and played them very well. The band has a really good saxophone section. Really Good.
They closed out the show with both bands playing Sleigh Ride. This was unexpected and a pleasant surprise.
The Orillia Vocal Ensemble and the Orillia Community Children’s Choir had a concert at St. Paul’s Centre December 14. The OVE concerts are always fundraisers and this time it was for The Lighthouse and more than $5,000 was raised from the approximately 200 in attendance
This was the largest version of the OVE that I recall. They, and the next group in question, could use some more male voices. It’s worth noting some attention is being paid toward making sure the men’s voices are given space in the sound palette to make the music.
The Cellar Singers had their concert December 20 at St. James’ Anglican Church. I really liked their opening piece, Healy Willan’s Hodie. You have to admire when the sopranos and altos are kept in check to balance against the tenor and baritone voices when the latter are outnumbered so decisively.
The concert zipped along with a series of shorter works performed. Even the featured numbers by Charpentier and Ralph Vaughan Williams were short works in comparison to the marquee selections performed at past Cellar’s concerts.
They even did In The Bleak Mid-Winter, but this time they used an arrangement by Alexander Tilley instead of the late Albert Greer’s arrangement they sang many times before.
The Shorts
- Mariposa Arts Theatre has an opportunity for students to create visual art which will be displayed at the Opera House during the run of their next play, Without Rule of Law. Sorry, it’s not a play about the criminal-in-chief. There is a deadline of January 16 and you can get details online. The play runs from February 5 to 15. It’s about a group of young people confronted with a mystery how it affects them and it’s a comedy. Tickets are on sale now online.
- The City has two mural projects open for submissions. It’s for an indoor and an outdoor mural at Brian Orser Arena. Closing date for submissions is Jan. 16 and you can get details online. There is a $20,000 budget for both murals.
- The annual Mariposa Folk Festival Gospel and Blues concert with Lance Anderson leading the band is Feb. 21 at the Opera House. The band members this time around are: Garnetta Cromwell, Gavin Hope, Wade O. Brown, Mackenzie Jordan, Steve Pelletier and Everton White. You can get tickets online. And it’s time to apply to be an artisan vendor for the summer festival; you can do that online.
- The Orillia Concert Association has season tickets on sale (still only $90) and their lineup is: Terry Lim And Friends Feb. 22, Daniel Vnukowski March 22 and The Brooks, Ronai, Teske Trio May 3. All concerts are at 2:30 p.m. You can get the season tickets online.
- OMAH has the annual Carmichael Landscape Show, Tradition Transformed, up to see (it’s great), they also have John Gould: Travels Of The Mind And Body, and Tracing Places: Advertising In Orillia… Peter Street Fine Arts has the annual 6×6 show.
- Quayle’s Brewery has Chris Lemay playing Jan. 2; Stephen Bernard Jan. 3; Daniel Humphreys Jan. 4; Dave Shaw Jan. 9; and Vince Therrien Jan. 10… the Hog ‘N Penny has an afternoon jam session every Sunday with Sean Patrick and others… The ANAF Club has Smoking Joe Band playing Jan. 3 and a jam happening Jan. 4 from 2 to 4 p.m.
(Photos by Swartz – SUNonline/Orillia and Images Supplied)
