The invitation sought uncommon music to be performed. I proposed to play a piano transcription of an orchestral piece.

Alex Cappellazzo, Artistic Director of Apocryphonia encouraged me to participate for their Cabinet of Curiosities2 in the Heliconian Hall Sunday June 8th. For once he was just a master of ceremonies, but not singing himself.

In the background as I write this I can hear an acceptance speech at the Tony Awards from a tearful artist speaking about not believing you belong, who could be reading my mind, given that I felt I was lucky to be there.

I call myself “embedded” in the spirit of the embedded journalists of the Iraq War, riding alongside the troops: but there are no guns, just violins, a guitar, a theorbo, a Steinway and great singing voices. It’s been so long since I did my last show at Ryerson gulp they don’t even call it Ryerson anymore. Yes I still do the occasional gig from a keyboard in church or at a party, but this was a bit different, as I was playing a wee bit but also there as an observer, honoured to be in this group.

Here is what the program showed before the program was randomly selected.

That last sentence is key, speaking about a concert order “Decided Randomly By The Audience”. Our pieces were put onto small pieces of paper to be chosen by the audience and then stuck to another page, with a new sequence, that looked like this (I took a picture):

When we began nobody knew when they would perform. Alex had this page hidden, but allowed me to photograph it at intermission (when I ate popcorn).

Yes it was fun.

The usual assumption in calling someone a critic: that they’re playing for the other team, in an adversarial game especially if critics evaluate. I aim to help the audience discover and understand what they are seeing, hoping to help artists promote their work by appreciating rather than evaluating.

The evening was very informal, relaxed.

The artists we saw & heard tonight:

Guitarist Daniel Ramjattan played the three movements of Echoes from the Sea by Naoko Tsujita.

Daniel explained the subtext of the work, concerning hidden Christians in Japan. During this period, many of the Christians in Japan were executed for their beliefs. I’m no guitarist but watching Daniel he seemed to display great virtuosity in playing complex music, sometimes two different parts of the instrument sounding at once, and with great subtlety.

Pianist Narmina Afandiyeva had a busy night, both as collaborative artist and soloist. She played Six of the Preludes by Qara Qarayev, including a couple that were surely very challenging, getting tremendous sound out of the Steinway.

Narmina also played for two singers.

Soprano Maeve Palmer sang two songs from Donnacha Dennehy’s That the Night Come, articulated clearly in English, sometimes showing fabulous dynamics from the softest tones to a brilliant sound at the top of her range.

She made a strong case for this music, making impressive interpretive choices.

Tenor Cameron Mazzei sang three songs from Ottorino Respighi’s Deita silvane cycle in Italian. I will have to find these lovely pieces that I had never heard before, sung with sensitivity by Cameron.

Violinist Rezan Onen-Lapointe played the Anonymous six movement Sonata for solo violin on “Nighean donn an araidh”.

Rezan also teamed up with theorbist Benjamin Stein (reminding me again that the theorbo looks like a fiendishly difficult instrument: and Benjamin played beautifully). So many strings…(!).

They played Johann Schop’s Lachrimae Pavane, and Robert Brenner’s Variations on “Hit her on the Bum”, the latter as playful as the title might suggest. I resisted the urge to tap my foot a number of times. When I say resisted I mean, because I was at a “classical concert” and also, a participant unsure about the rules of decorum. As an audience member? I would have had no hesitation to start clapping in time because the music had a really strong insistent dance-rhythm, especially the last two (a gavotte & a gigue).

Alex will soon communicate on social media concerning Apocryphonia’s upcoming season, likely to include another Cabinet of Curiosities program. Follow Apocryphonia here.