DVDs - Documentary

Oundjian's annual Mozart Festival, starting with Mozart@250, is now firmly established. It will return in the 2008-9 Season as Mozart@253. The same can be said of his New Creations Festival. While other music directors had attempted to bring new works to the attention of the public, they fail where Oundjian has succeeded with aplomb.

Now, as we see the final months of the 2007-8 season coming to a close, we can look forward to ever new ideas from the maestro and his team. With the popularity of opera in Toronto, Oundjian has decided the TSO is ready to draw on that popularity by presenting two operas in concert: Berlioz's The Damnation of Faust, and Mozart's The Magic Flute. We can only applaud.

Not satisfied with the lack of attention given by various recording companies to Canadian orchestras, Oundjian told an audience of journalists and TSO supporters at the official launch of the 2008-9 Season that the TSO is taking a new direction by launching its own label. Called TSOLive, the first of these CDs will be officially launched on February 26, when the maestro will be on hand at L'Atelier Grigorian to sign copies. "By producing these recordings, we are joining the ranks of other major orchestras around the world in making our music available to a wider audience," Oundjian stated. This first CD, titled Portraits, features two works, Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Elgar's Enigma Variations. What's more, the cost of the CD will be less than $15.00. But, the TSO won't stop there. It is making this CD available as a download from a variety of online music retail outlets. These are accessible by visiting www.tso.ca. Podcasts have been available on the site for some time, offering a wide variety of programs, including Beethoven on Demand, some of which date back to 2006. This is another innovation that no other previous director had taken advantage of. It appears that Oundjian and his team are not averse to taking some risks.

As Oundjian pointed out at this official 2008-9 Season launch, the TSO tries to listen to its audience to come up with innovations that will suit a variety of audience needs. Hence, the Thursday Matinee concerts, which are offered at 2:00 p.m., will now be presented without an intermission so people can get home before the start of the rush hour. One of these matinee's will feature Measha Brueggergosman with Oundjian conducting.

The TSO will also present a brand new series in the Masterworks series called Afterworks. It was created for those who want to sit out the rush hour. These consist of 6:30 p.m., intermission-free concerts on several Wednesdays in the coming season, which will still get the audience home in time for a late dinner. This is an excellent innovation, which one hopes will be a well-received series so that in future seasons, it will be increased.

Commissioning composers can be an expensive venture for orchestras. The TSO's efforts in this direction has become a vital contributor to new music internationally. To present new works, the orchestra has now turned to co-commissions from prominent contemporary composers with some of the most esteemed orchestras around the globe. In the new season, the TSO will collaborate with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra in a co-commission of Mark-Anthony Turnage's Mambo, Blues, and Tarantella written for Christian Tetzlaff. It will be given its North American premiere in November in Toronto and Ottawa. In April, as part of the New Creations Festival, the TSO will introduce a Canadian premiere of Jennifer Higdon's Violin Concerto, which was co-commissioned with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, and the Curtis Institute of Music; the New Creations Festival will also feature a world premiere of Alexina Louie's TSO commission, a concerto for string quartet and orchestra. Other Canadian premieres include William Bolcom's Violin Concerto and three pieces by Tan Dun: The Map, and his concertos for piano and pipa.

Mentioning sponsors in a feature story is not usually done in our publication, but one cannot help mentioning the new series of Masterworks concerts called Prestige, which will present some of the finest talents going. Midori, Lang Lang, Emanuel Ax, Hillary Hahn are just a few in this new series on Wednesdays at 8:00 pm. Porter Airlines, the little airline that flies out of Toronto Island Airport, is the series sponsor. But, more importantly, the airline has made it possible for the TSO to fly to New York to accept an invitation to perform at Carnegie Hall on October 4, something it has not done in 10 years. The concert presented there will first be performed as a North American premiere at Roy Thomson Hall on October 1 and 2. Maestro Oundjian will lead the TSO in a dramatic program featuring Benjamin Yusupov's Viola Tango Rock Concerto with guest performer, Maxim Vengerov, the multi-award-winning violinist. This piece, not yet performed on this continent, was conceived with Vengerov in mind. He will perform the viola, the electric violin, and dance the tango in this remarkable concerto. The program in Toronto and New York will also include Shostakovich's Symphony No. 11, The Year 1905.

Ever sensitive to its audience, the TSO is very careful how it juxtaposes works by various composers in its concerts. This reflects in a six percent increase in subscriptions, as well as in the sale of single tickets, Oundjian pointed out. "We are very careful how we place [the] repertoire," said the maestro. "When we do music we have to try to give it context." This is why the TSO will present a Bartók/Strauss Festival in June 2009. The aim is to show how the works by the two composers can enhance each other in a way that may not otherwise be obvious.

In the coming season, more 'Seasonal' concerts will be presented. Jeff Tyzik is fast becoming a popular conductor with the TSO. He will conduct the orchestra in 'A Very Merry Pops!' concert with 2 200-voice choir comprised of the Mississauga Choral Society and the Canadian Children's Opera Company. As always, there will be an offering of the Messiah. The TSO and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir will be led by TMC's artistic director, Noel Edison. Then, there is a special family screening of Howard Blake's The Snowman, accompanied live by the TSO, and the every popular vocal comedienne, Mary Lou Fallis, will the audience in The 12 Days of Christmas, conducted by John Morris Russell.

Two Canadian guest orchestras will be presented as part of the TSO season. The National Arts Centre Orchestra, led by Pinchas Zukerman, will offer Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, and Zukerman, a violinist of considerable renown, will play and conduct Mozart's Violin Concerto No. 3. Also coming to Toronto will be the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra led by Bramwell Tovey. It will present music that ranges from Debussy to the VSO's former composer-in-residence, Jeffrey Ryan.

In an effort to bring music to the attention of the next generation of music listeners, the TSO will devote some Saturday afternoons to children ages five to 12. These youngsters will not only hear orchestral music, but will see dancers, actors and other special surprises, whose efforts will make the music come alive for them in the Young People's Concerts series.

For a more mature audience of young people, there will be Light Classics Concerts. These will explore the music of Mozart, Berlioz, Cherubini, Kodály, Brahms and Liszt.

Guest conductors are an important aspect of the TSO's concert season. In addition to those already mentioned, there will be many more. Once again, Sir Andrew Davis (TSO music director 1975-88) and the orchestra's conductor laureate, will lead the TSO in two concerts. Included in this line-up will be Stravinsky's Symphony in 3 Movements, violinist James Ehnes performing Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto, and violinist Leonidas Kavakos playing Brahms' Violin Concerto.

Günther Herbig, another former TSO music director, who has returned here almost yearly, will conduct the rarely performed Mahler's Symphony No. 6. Some of the other returning guest conductors will be multi-Grammy Award winner, Leonard Slatkin, in a concert that will feature violinist Gil Shaham; Gary Kulesha will make his appearance as conductor in the New Creations Festival; Bernard Labadie will conduct the concert performance of The Magic Flute; Alain Trudel is scheduled to lead the TSO in Mendelssohn's Reformation Symphony No. 5; Yannick Nézet-Séguin returns to the TSO with a program of Prokofiev and Ravel.

New to the TSO will be the Danish-Italian conductor Giordano Bellincampi, Costa Rican Giancarlo Guerrero, Chinese Xian Zhang, American Edwin Outwater, Hungarian Gregory Vajda, and two Canadian conductors: Michelle Mourre and Joey Pietraroia.

Guest performers are always a huge draw to the TSO concerts. In addition to those mentioned earlier, there will also be such well known artists in the line-up as Yefim Bronfman, Radu Lupu, mezzo-soprano Susanne Mentzer, tenor Gregory Kunde, bass Sir Willard White, cellists Anssi Karttunen and Johannes Moser, violinist Joshua Bell, pianists Lang Lang, Natasha Paremski and Jeremy Denk.

Among the Canadian artists to make their debut with the TSO will be sopranos Aline Kutan and Gillian Keith, mezzo Allyson McHardy, tenors Peter Blanchet and Frédéric Antoun, baritone Joshua Hopkins, and bass Robert Gleadow. Returning will be soprano Karina Gauvin, bass-baritone Nathan Berg, violinist James Ehnes, cellist Shauna Rolston, and pianist Louis Lortie. There will also be concerts that will feature many of the TSO's principal as soloist performers.