Diary of a Indolent Musical Voluptuary

#JoeLewisMusicNotes Fall 2015

Play Me I am Yours this piano painted by Lee Claremount  is  in Union Station in Toronto.
  

There is music all around Toronto, a lot to heard for free, as there is in most cities across the country. I heard Charlie Rose interview with Architect Frank Gerhy during it a clip from a "Letter to Your Younger Self" was shown and Frank Gery says "Your mother will take you to concerts at Massey Hall and your world will be expanded" My world was expanded as a six year old by being in my church choir. and it was the music not the services that reached deep inside and awaken an appetite which remains ravenous. Sister Noella's musical education through the choir and the classroom  was built upon in High School with vocal/ instrumental (the flute) history and composition classes from Duncan Addison and Ernie Crawford.  This was added to with Music Theory correspondence courses through the Royal Conservatory of Music I am not sure what grade level i reached but at 18 and on my way to start my musical life in Toronto I didn't bother to write the exam I had prepared for. I suppose i should look back at this with regret but i don't and I can read music scores like a book and hear it in my head

in 19 74 75 I was a flute player in the Ayr Paris marching band we were in the Graham Bell 150 parade or something http://www.ayrparisband.com/

 I have been trying to share on facebook the concerts and recitals i am going to try and get to, in advance them happening. Suggesting others might join me or go out  and "#IExperienced"  it for themselves. I invested in season tickets for the Toronto Symphony Orchestra creating my own "series" selecting performers i did not want to regret missing,

 The photos and other miscellaneous things posted on Facebook are about the Music i have seen / heard since September 2015, starting with the Honens Piano Festival opening #ConcreteSonata  performance in Calgary.

2012 Honens Laureate Pavel Kolesnikov  plays a Bagatelle on the Garden Piano Wednesday September 2 2015. this part of one of the 5 outdoor concerts that took place. I was not able to attend any other of the Honens but did watch of it as it was being streamed live via the CBC and MediciTV .  I watched Luca Buratto | Solo Recital in the 15 HONENS QUARTERFINALS: and it was when he played Thomas Adès
"Darknesse visible' (1992) he knocked my socks off. I watched as much as l could of the live streaming and watch as he went through to become this years prize winner.  I really am not sure of the etiquette of embedding other peoples YouTube videos into my blog but i am also aware people don't follow links, so here goes,

 

By the end of September  this year I had attended 7 concerts in Toronto;
Music At Midday,Tuesdays at 1 pm the organ at St James Cathedral in Toronto
over august into September I heard  J Thomas D Gonder play 3 of the 6 Organ Symphonies of Louis Vierne, i also heard Thomas Fitches, and  David Briggs in recital, I went to The COC Free Concert Series in the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre  and to see the Toronto Symphony Orchestra;  I have now heard Beethoven's 5th Symphony live for the first time. I t was like losing my virginity and really good sex at the same time. The reality is no matter how much you think you know about music and even if you have listen to it on records/ CDs/ downloads it is not the same as hearing it live. Live Streaming experienced in real time can almost get you there but its repeatable, live is not. Live is that once in a lifetime thing you can be fully engaged in, if you let yourself. 

 

Last February i saw Pavel Kolesnikov Honens Prize Laureate 2012 play this piano . 

Later that day in a pre-concert performance at the Toronto Symphony Orchestra pianists Pavel Kolesnikov and Orion Weiss playing a Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances arranged for two pianos on the TSO Hanover and New York Steinway (s) the full Orchestra also play the full orchestral version after the intermission while Pavel Kolesnikov, played Chopin: Grande Polonaise in the first half of the concert which began with Emanuel Ax, playing Schubert: Impromptu and Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 14, K. 449 all under the baton of Peter Oundjian. 

Pavel Kolesnikov returns to the TSO for From Mozart to Rachmaninoff on Feb. 20 & 21 2016 to play Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini under the baton of Earl Lee, RBC Resident Conductor
Visit his website to see if he will be performing in your area http://pavelkolesnikov.com/

We are honoured to receive a 2014 Vitality Award for enhancing downtown Calgary with #ConcreteSonata #IAMDOWNTOWN pic.twitter.com/qE78rTHK52

— Honens (@honens) May 14, 2015

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I went to this #Honens2014 noon hour piano and enjoyed the performances of Georgy Tchaidze, 2009 Honens Prize Laureate

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I have been trying to keep a listening journal using YouTube to locate the music I have heard live so I might hear it again by different performers 

  

 

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it is now September 2015 and the #Honens2015, has begun. It was attending four of their #Honens2014 last year at this...
Posted by Joe Lewis on Wednesday, September 2, 2015