Category Archives: Reviews

Canoe

Posted on September 19, 2023 by barczablog

For such a brief title, the opera Canoe invites me to go on at length. It’s not that it is a difficult work, for it was very accessible to the audience at Trinity St. Paul’s. But I want to properly … Continue reading →

Posted in Dance, theatre & musicals, Opera, Reviews | Tagged Canoe, Catherine Magowan, Conlin Delbaere-Sawchuk, Dr Spy-Denomme-Welch, Kristine Dandavino, Michelle Lafferty, Native Earth Performing Arts, Nicole Joy-Fraser, The Toronto Consort, Theatre Passe Muraille, Trinity St. Paul's, Unsettled Scores | Leave a comment

Days of Happiness / Les Jours heureux #tiff23

Posted on September 12, 2023 by barczablog

It’s a pleasure and privilege to watch a film at tiff followed by a talkback, where directors and performers respond to our questions. A woman in front of me asked writer & director Chloé Robichaud the question I would have … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Music and musicology, Reviews | Tagged Ariel Méthot, Arnold Schönberg, Barbara Hannigan, Chloé Robichaud, Days of Happiness, Gemma New, Gustav Mahler, Keri-Lynn WIlson, Les Jours heureux, Norm Wilner, Nour Belkhiria, Pelleas und Melisande, Sophie Desmarais, Speranza Scapucci, Sylvain Marcel, Tár, TIFF, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart | Leave a comment

Blithe Spirits

Posted on September 6, 2023 by barczablog

Hmm: another trip to Shaw, another ghost story. Last time it was Wharton’s The Shadow of a Doubt. “Shadow” is another word for spirit, right in the title. This past weekend Erika and I went to see Blithe Spirit at … Continue reading →

Posted in Books & Literature, Cinema, video & DVDs, Dance, theatre & musicals, Reviews, Spirituality & Religion | Tagged Bert Lahr, Blithe Spirit, Constance Cummings, Damien Atkins, Dan Stevens, David Lean, Donna Soares, Edith Wharton, Edward Hall, Isla Fisher, Jenny Wright, Judd Apatow, Judi Dench, Julia Course, Kay Hammond, Leslie Mann, Margaret Rutherford, Mike Payette, Rex Harrison, Richard Addinsell, Shaw Festival, The Shadow of a Doubt | Leave a comment

Three Oppenheimers

Posted on August 27, 2023 by barczablog

No one left the IMAX theatre for the three intense hours of Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer. Nightmare images that night reminded of my childhood, portents of the end of the world as I tossed and turned. Kai Bird and Martin J … Continue reading →

Posted in Books & Literature, Cinema, video & DVDs, Opera, Reviews | Tagged agency, American Prometheus, Black Panther, Bruce Robinson, Christopher Nolan, Ennio Morricone, Fat Man and Little Boy, Gerald Finley, J Robert Oppenheimer, John Adams, John Cusack, John Donne, Kai Bird, Laura Dern, Ludwig Göransson, Martin J Sherwin, Melodrama, Miserere, Oppenheimer, Otello, Roland Joffé, The Mission, The Untouchables | Leave a comment

Edith Wharton’s The Shadow of a Doubt at Shaw Festival

Posted on August 12, 2023 by barczablog

There’s a mystery underlying Edith Wharton’s play The Shadow of a Doubt. The text was just rediscovered by scholars in 2016, after sitting unproduced. There was almost a production in 1903 but it was cancelled. And now the Shaw Festival … Continue reading →

Posted in Books & Literature, Cinema, video & DVDs, Dance, theatre & musicals, Reviews | Tagged Damien Atkins, Daniel Day-Lewis, Edith Wharton, Georges Feydeau, Gillian Gallow, Haui, Katherine Gauthier, Martin Scorsese, Melodrama, Michelle Pfeiffer, Oscar Wilde, Patrick Galligan, Peter Hinton, Tara Rosling, The Age of Innocence, Winona Ryder | 4 Comments

TSM Metamorphosis

Posted on July 29, 2023 by barczablog

Toronto Summer Music’s theme is the same as the title for last night’s concert, namely “metamorphosis”. I’m writing about it Saturday on the closing weekend of the festival. I’ve been pondering that word over and over in response to the … Continue reading →

Posted in Music and musicology, Reviews | Tagged Aaron Schwebel, Carl Lyons, Francis Poulenc, Johannes Brahms, Jonathan Crow, Keith Hamm, Koerner Hall, Michelle Cann, Rémi Pelletier, Richard Strauss, Royal Conservatory of Music, Rudolph Leopold, Sheila Jaffé, Toronto Summer Music, University of Toronto | Leave a comment

TSM J’Nai Bridges

Posted on July 28, 2023 by barczablog

The drama of tonight’s Toronto Summer Music Recital at Koerner Hall was as much about the one who didn’t sing (Sondra Radvanovsky) as the one who did (J’Nai Bridges). I’m sympathetic to Sondra however much I may have wished to … Continue reading →

Posted in Dance, theatre & musicals, Music and musicology, Reviews | Tagged J'nai Bridges, Johannes Brahms, John Carter, Koerner Hall, Maurice Ravel, Rachael Kerr, Sondra Radvanovsky), Toronto Summer Music | Leave a comment

TSM: Tradition

Posted on July 22, 2023 by barczablog

Some words have such broad definitions that we miss some of the possibilities. That’s what I experienced last night at the Toronto Summer Music Concert titled “Tradition”. We don’t always get the opportunity to reflect upon this process nor to … Continue reading →

Posted in Dance, theatre & musicals, Music and musicology, Reviews | Tagged Anton Dvorak, Barry Schiffman, Bartlett Sher, Fiddler on the Roof, Gabriela Lena Frank, Iman Habibi, Jennifer Frautschi, Jerry Bock, Kelly Hall-Tompkins, Matthew Zalkind, Philip Chiu, Toronto Summer Music Festival | 1 Comment

The Butterfly Project

Posted on July 13, 2023 by barczablog

Teiya Kasahara gave the first iteration of a self-exploratory monologue from Amplified Opera tonight at the Toronto Summer Music Festival in Walter Hall. It’s called The Butterfly Project because it’s to be an ongoing investigation, inviting us to explore the … Continue reading →

Posted in Dance, theatre & musicals, Music and musicology, Opera, Reviews | Tagged Andrea Wong, David Belasco, Giacomo Puccini, John Luther Long, madama butterfly, Nikkei, Teiya Kasahara, Toronto Summer Music | Leave a comment

Asteroid City, America

Posted on July 4, 2023 by barczablog

Wes Anderson is at it again with Asteroid City. Once more, an elaborate structure plays games with the viewer. Asteroid City is the name of a play within the movie, a fictitious place in America. We go back and forth … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Reviews | Tagged Alexandre Desplat, Asteroid City, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Edward Norton, ET, Grand Budapest Hotel, Isle of Dogs, Jason Schwartzman, Moonrise Kingdom, Oppenheimer, Paris Dispatch, Scarlett Johansson, Tilda Swinton, Wes Anderson | Leave a comment