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Category Archives: Popular music & culture
Questions for Jack Hui Litster in anticipation of his Gates of Heaven: Requiem for a Life of Peace
Jack Hui Litster has recently had two original operas produced by OperOttawa. Jack is a multi-instrumentalist and composer of concert music and film and TV score based in Ottawa, blending his classical and popular music training. As Composer-in-Residence for OperOttawa, Jack … Continue reading
Posted in Interviews, Music and musicology, Opera, Popular music & culture
Tagged Gates of Heaven: Requiem for a Life of Peace, Inter Pares, Jack Hui Litster, Kahlil Gibran, King Arthur, Norman E Brown, OperOttawa, Requiem, Tan Dun, The Day You Were Born, The First Emperor, The Prophet, What Is Love?
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Pete Davidson’s Bupkis
Pete Davidson’s new series Bupkis is in the twilight zone between reality tv and fiction. It’s a kind of fiction made from reality…? I’m not sure, perhaps I’m giving it too much credit. It feels original. And so we watch … Continue reading
A Blue Christmas pointing me to Elvis’s redemption
The recent Saturday Night Live hosted by Austin Butler persuaded me to watch the recent biography of Elvis Presley, starring Butler. As we watched, Erika pointed to the similarity between Butler and Elvis, two men who both lost their mother … Continue reading
Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Dance, theatre & musicals, Popular music & culture
Tagged Austin Butler, Blue Christmas, Cecily Strong, Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis, Elvis Presley, Forrest Gump, Gabor Maté, Joseph & the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Moulin Rouge, saturday night live, Strictly Ballroom, The Great Gatsby, Tom Hanks
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Popular Tchaikovsky at the TSO
Handel speaks from beyond the grave to remind musicians how he helps pay the rent in a meme. Ballet companies owe Tchaikovsky a similar debt, when families flock to the theatre for The Nutcracker. Popularity can be problematic when it … Continue reading
Sarah Polley – Run Towards the Danger
I have just finished reading Sarah Polley’s Run Towards the Danger, a book like none I’ve ever read before. It might be the most authentic autobiography I’ve ever encountered. Except that it’s not an autobiography. I notice too that while … Continue reading
Moving memoir from Molly
I’m re-reading Hello Molly, the memoir of Molly Shannon. It’s likely a bestseller mainly because of the fame of its author, a star on Saturday Night Live from 1995-2001. But I didn’t expect to be so moved, reading the book … Continue reading
Philip Glass: The Complete Piano Etudes
Do you compartmentalize? I ask because it’s common, a given in a modern life. Whether we’re speaking of the things we do for work-life balance, as part of an artistic discipline or simply to get through a busy day, it’s … Continue reading
Posted in Animals, domestic & wild, Books & Literature, Food, Health and Nutrition, Music and musicology, Opera, Personal ruminations & essays, Popular music & culture, Psychology and perception, Spirituality & Religion
Tagged discipline, Etudes, Leslie Dala, Mary Trump, Philip Glass, Sarah Polley
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Who’s Afraid of Titus? Sky Gilbert isn’t.
The title Who’s Afraid of Titus? has at least three meanings I can see. 1: Performers who fear that audiences won’t come see an unfamiliar play. 2: Professors (Shakespeare theorists) confused by a play that doesn’t fit the usual template. … Continue reading
Posted in Books & Literature, Cinema, video & DVDs, Dance, theatre & musicals, Interviews, Popular music & culture, Press Releases and Announcements
Tagged Brian Smegal, Ellen-Ray Hennessy, Eric Woolfe, gender, genre theory, George Alevizos, Hermogenes, horror, John Humeniuk, Max Ackerman, Michelle Mohammed, Queer theory, Ray Jacildo, Red Sandcastle Theatre, Sandy Crawley, Shakespeare Beyond Science: When Poetry Was the World, Sky Gilbert, Stratford Festival, Titus Andronicus, violence, Who's afraid of Titus, William Shakespeare
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TSO + Rajaton = ABBA
This week the Toronto Symphony under their pops conductor Steven Reineke presented three concerts of the music of ABBA featuring Rajaton, the Finnish vocal ensemble. While they describe themselves as an a cappella ensemble –singing their vocals accompanied—it was electrifying … Continue reading
The Mel Brooks Songbook
Happy Birthday Mel Brooks. He turned 96 today. And no joke, there really is a Mel Brooks Songbook. When I picked it up from the shelf in the Indigo bookstore I was a bit disbelieving myself. Mel Brooks, songwriter? The … Continue reading
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