Featured
Walter Kaufmann: The Transcendent Exile
The nature of exile [παρεπίδημος or parepidémos] is rooted in both mythology and history and is often expressed as a fate worse than death. Exile is an early motif in ancient Greek tragedy. The motif reached its peak on Euripides’ great tragedy Medea, written in the fifth century BC. The Romans also passed a law – making exsilium both voluntary exile and banishment as a capital punishment alternative to death. In addition, deportation was forced exile, and entailed the lifelong loss of citizenship and property, a fate that befell the poet Ovid, who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was forced to leave Rome and move away to the city of Tomis on the Black Sea. There he wrote his famous work Tristia [Sorrows] about his bitter feelings in exile. The Italian poet Dante, was also exiled temporarily. Franz Kafka described the exile of Karl Rossmann in German in the posthumously published novel Amerika [Kurt Wolff, 1927]. Klaus Mann in Der Vulkan [1939] and Anna Seghers in Das siebte Kreuz [1942] also wrote searing accounts of exile.
Diaspora is collective exile; one which the Jewish Nation had experienced for five thousand years before the fraught return to Israel. Jewish exile culminating in the most heinous Holocaust – like the forced enslavement and transportation, and further enslavement of the Black people of Africa – resulted in much great and sorrowful art like the Blues of the Afro-American. But both Blacks and Jews also produced art born of joy and rebirth. This joyousness – quietly celebrated in music, often in near-coded secrecy – was something of an homage to the pain of exile. However, tragically, much of this art in and of exile has been either suppressed or sadly, just forgotten. But the ARC Ensemble, under the stewardship and musical direction of Simon Wynberg, have created a recorded archive of this extraordinary experience with an iconic series Music in Exile. The fourth – and latest in the series is a superb disc, The Chamber Works by Walter Kaufmann [CHAN 20170].
What is remarkable about the Music in Exile series is not simply its [self-explanatory] raison d’être, but much more so the kind of music that was revealed in each of the three recordings [so far]. The first in the series, Chamber Works by Paul Ben-Haim [CHAN 10769, released in 2013], by the composer and one-time assistant to Bruno Walter had music – as a review in Gramaphone that year put it – that “revealed a distinctively lyrical slant all its own… [and unlike music that “evokes the spirit of Jewish prayer and (occasionally) ritual], Ben-Haim…suggests the world of dance and outdoor celebration.” That release was followed by Chamber Works by Jerzy Fitelberg [CHAN 10877, released in 2015] revealed the work of a composer with “the energy and high voltage music of Stravinsky, a focus on linear and harmonic complexity as in Hindemith, and colors of contemporary French music [such as Milhaud], as well as styles of satire” according to Rainer Cadenbach [1944-2008]. Then came Chamber Works by Szymon Laks [CHAN 10983]. Laks, who was incarcerated in Auschwitz and forced to compose and perform by the SS suffered acutely during his period of imprisonment and yet his chamber works on the Chandos release rarely expressed “this disquiet”, according to Mr Wynberg [in his booklet notes].
Clearly, Mr Wynberg had not only discovered “lost” works by composers eminently worthy of revelation for his beloved ARC Ensemble to perform, but it seems clear that the ensemble’s director displays an uncommon sleuth-like character with a determination to seek a vaunted expression of the triumph of human endeavor despite exile in music; something he, happily, found in the work three – and now four – composers who conquered the devastation of a diaspora. Remarkably each of the releases also reveals new truths about human responses to the impulse to adorn the sound of music. But this fourth release, Chamber Works by Walter Kaufmann is remarkably different. Unlike the other discs in the series, this one not only evokes the inquiry into the nature of exile and its myriad expressions of sadness and joy, but due to a set of remarkable historical and geographic, cultural and academic circumstances Mr Kaufmann the journey of exile found him sweeping across the globe. This, together with his characteristic and fascinating musical curiosity, enabled one of the most extraordinary musical careers to unfold, producing quite brilliant music. Happily, some unique pieces appear on this disc.
Of all the four featured composers in Music in Exile, Walter Kaufmann is perhaps the most noteworthy. A native of the German-speaking erstwhile Sudetenland Mr Kaufmann was born in Karlsbad [now Karlovy Vary, in the Czech Republic]. The only child of Josephine Wagner and Julius Kaufmann, the young Walter came under the influence of his violinist uncle Moritz Kaufmann before leaving for Berlin to study composition with Franz Schreker and musicology with one of the icons of the discipline, Curt Sachs – both at the Musikhochschule. It was Mr Sachs who introduced the young student to the music of India, virtually unknown – and certainly little-understood – in Europe in the early 20th century. Mr Kaufmann, by his own admission, also found Indian music “alien and incomprehensible”. But he had to admit: “this music was created with heart and intellect… [and] I decided that the fault [or incomprehension] was entirely my own, and that the right way to understand it would be to undertake a study tour of the place of its origin.”
By the tie he was in his twenties, Mr Kaufmann became an assistant to Bruno Walter and, according to Mr Wynberg’s excellent booklet notes began “conducting at summer festivals in Berlin and Eger, a spa town in Northern Hungary. His Symphony No. 1, Piano Concerto, Suite for Strings, Five orchestral Pieces and a number of songs were enthusiastically received in concerts and broadcasts, from Prague, Vienna, and Berlin.” Between 1927 and 1934, when Mr Kaufmann boarded the SS Conte Verde in Venice, en route to Bombay, he had befriended an array of artists and intellectuals including, writer Franz Werfel and Kafka’s biographer, Max Brod and – later, even Albert Einstein, who would be instrumental in his crossing the Atlantic to Canada [and finally to the United States]. Meanwhile, in Berlin [and elsewhere] German Nationalism was heating up and when he discovered that his doctoral supervisor was also part of Hitler Youth, and with intolerance and persecution intensifying, Mr Kaufmann acquired a visa to India and set sail on what would result not only in a fascinating journey, but also become a singular composer whose work became defined by a singular aesthetic so unique that perhaps not even Béla Bartók’s ethnic Hungarian folkloric music can compare with it.
Walter Kaufmann may have been an exiled individual, but he was far from an intellectual one. He was – what the Palestinian-American professor of literature [at Columbia University], a public intellectual, and founder of the academic field of postcolonial studies, Edward Said called – someone who was “…able to transcend the pain of separation without downplaying the human rights violations leading to the estrangement. [Someone in whom] there [was] a constant awareness between the physical exile and the metaphor arising out of the imposition which allows the exiled intellectual to question with freedom while refusing to “minimise the turmoil of exile.” Mr Kaufmann plunged – in short order – into the life of an intellectual exile in Bombay. Within 12 short months he was appointed Director of European Music at the Bombay station of All India Radio, writing its station signature – the AIR Theme – that the Indian National Radio still uses to open its broadcasts each day, some eighty years on. Mr Kaufmann also established the Bombay Chamber Music Society, gave weekly concerts at the Willingdon Sports Club, and hosted the Italian cellist Egidio Verga and violinist Mehli Mehta, father of the illustrious conductor Zubin Mehta. By the end of the twelve years that Mr Kaufmann spent in that country the Society had presented over 500 recitals.
![Walter Kaufmann conducting [Walter Kaufmann Archive]](https://i0.wp.com/thatcanadianmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Walter-Kaufmann-conducting-Walter-Kaufmann-Archive.jpg?resize=500%2C1186 "Simon Wynberg Artistic Director of the ARC Ensemble [Courtesy Simon Wynberg]")
Mr Kaufmann also composed symphonic works, concertos, chamber music and several radio and film scores for commercial Bollywood films. As a result of all this arguably frenetic – and enormously successful – activity he dreamt of a future in Hollywood. However, even his friend Albert Einstein –whom he had often accompanied on piano [while Mr Einstein played violin] could not manage to arrange a suitable visa for Mr Kaufmann. The composer migrated instead to England, by virtue of having qualified [as a long term resident in Bombay] and rather quickly made a name for himself, writing scores for two Rank Organisation documentaries on invitation from Sir Adrian Boult. Mr Kaufmann also conducted the BBC Theatre Orchestra, but when war broke out, relocated – once again – to Nova Scotia, where he became head of the piano department at Halifax Conservatory [the Maritime Conservatory] of Music. Thanks to Sir Adrian and Sir Ernest MacMillan, then Canada’s premier musician, Mr Kaufmann was invited to me the first professional conductor of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. With Mr Kaufmann as its conductor, the Orchestra hosted a slew of important soloists in numerous performances including a young Glenn Gould who gave a celebrated performance of Bach’s “D minor keyboard concerto”. In 1956, after 25 years in exile, Mr Kaufmann finally realized his quest to go to the United States and accepted a position at Indiana University’s School of Music in Bloomington. This position afforded him enough time and money to pursue the music that he loved to its fullest extent; to write and publish papers and books based on his extensive [Asian and Oriental] ethnomusicological research. He died of heart disease, having succeeded in making an enormous contribution to music, on the 9th of September 1984.
Chamber Works by Walter Kaufmann
The music composed by Mr Kaufmann and performed by the Toronto’s ARC Ensemble on this disc represents just a smidgen of his vast output. But ARC Director Simon Wynberg has chosen wisely and the works on this disc bring his exquisitely unique musical voice to life with uncommon drama and emotion. A feeling of loss and nostalgia characterizes much of this music, often evoked by the haunting and transcendent classical Indian modalities. This is a remarkable recording. “The String Quartet No 11” is resplendent in undulant sounds of Indian modes with notes that literally leap off the staved paper forming a vividly hued instrumental palette. “The Sonata No 2 Op 44” that follows is also born of eloquent motifs and gestures, vivid colours, and the edgy anxiety of its first half suggest an homage to Mr Kaufmann’s own film scores. “The String Quartet No 7” – the longest work on this disc – explores exotic-sounding instrumental relationships from which exquisite flashes of colours often emerge in a burst of immaculate harmonic energy.
The shortest piece – the “Sonatina No 12 for violin and piano [arranged for clarinet and piano]” contains a panoply of beautifully evocative gestures and tone colours – suggestive of a mysterious world – as well as strikingly and highly imaginative textural variety. The final, “Septet [for three violins, viola, two cellos and piano]” is an incredibly positive piece of music. It shows Mr Kaufmann’s sublime understanding of both strings and piano. Throughout this recording the ARC Ensemble sounds completely at home in Mr Kaufmann’s extraordinary sound-world. The rhythmic dares, unexpected changes in mood and lurking Eastern musical elements are all perfectly judged and handled with sublime assurance of Mr Kaufmann’s idiom.
The music of these Chamber Works by Walter Kaufmann appear to be born of a muted serenity as well as a sense of wonder at the world of both the familiar and unfamiliar landscapes of music. An obsessive perfectionist, Mr Kaufmann polished these works into gleaming gems. As a composer who played the piano, but also had a breathtaking feel for strings, he wrote idiomatically for every instrument. He is never flashy, unlike others more flamboyant contemporaries. Yet, in a strangely “Germanic” way, he seems open to new ideas and also – not surprisingly – took to Eastern musical modes with a sense of zesty adventure.
The members of the ARC seem to have interiorized all of this and also parley with the familiarity of old friends, yet their playing always retains the sense of gracious etiquette associated with noble Western academies. Nothing is forced or exaggerated or overly mannered; tempos, ensemble and balance – all seem effortlessly and intuitively right. The string sound is lucid and the piano and clarinet add warmth land breadth to the music. These are, in sum, sincere and poised accounts, a fitting tribute to the chaste and faultless character of the music of Walter Kaufmann. It is also a fine addition – both musical and intellectual – to the Music in Exile series developed and presented by the ARC’s illustrious director, Simon Wynberg.
Track list – 1 – 4: String Quartet No 11 [before 1939]; 5 – 7: Sonata No. 2 Op. 44 for violin and piano [before 1946]; 8 – 12: String Quartet No. 7 [before 1939]; 13 -15: Sonatina No. 12 for violin and piano, arranged for clarinet and piano [before 1946]; 16: Septet for three violins, viola, two cellos and piano [before 1946]
The ARC Ensemble – Erika Raum: violin [5 – 7; Marie Bérard: violin; Steven Dann: viola; Thomas Wiebe: cello; Joaquin Valdepeñas: clarinet; Kevin Ahfat: piano; Special Guests – Jamie Kruspe: violin [16]; Kimberly Jeong: cello [16]
ARC Ensemble’s new CD Chamber Music by Walter Kaufman is out today and you can purchase a copy right here.
Join the James Conlon, Robert Elias, Simon Wynberg and the ARC Ensemble for Bohemia, Bombay, Bloomington: The Musical Exile of Walter Kaufmann
On Tuesday, September 15, 2020 at 5 p.m. PT/8 p.m. ET, a remarkable live online event will be hosted by two world class music institutions, The Colburn School in the US and the Royal Conservatory in Canada, both committed to the exploration and recovery of music marginalized and forgotten in the wake of National Socialism and World War II. The event will feature an online Conversation with
James Conlon – acclaimed conductor and Music Director of the Los Angeles Opera
Robert Elias – Director of the Colburn School’s Ziering-Conlon Initiative for Recovered Voices
Simon Wynberg – Artistic Director of The Royal Conservatory of Music’s ARC Ensemble
Also featured will be recorded performances by members of the ARC Ensemble and students from the Colburn Conservatory of Music.
How one composer spent four decades forging a distinctly Québécois path through the experimental music landscape
When Joane Hétu picks up her alto saxophone, she claims territory. At sixty-six, the Montréal composer, vocalist, and saxophonist has spent forty years carving out space for experimental music in Québec, building institutions and communities that define the province’s musique actuelle scene.
Her latest recording, Elle a son mot à dire, captures Hétu leading Ensemble SuperMusique through thirteen of her compositions from across two decades. The album opens with “Elle n’a pas de mot” (She has no words)—a brief ambient piece that stacks wordless singing atop a chorus of “whirly tubes,” ribbed hoses spun above players that pirouette through the harmonic series. An apt introduction to an artist who has spent her career finding new ways to give voice to the unspoken.
Finding Her Voice in the Underground
Hétu’s path began in the early 1980s with avant-pop groups like Wondeur Brass, Justine, and Les Poules. These bands merged the pluralist ethos of New York’s downtown scene with European progressive sensibilities while maintaining something distinctly Québécois. “I was very young, in my twenties, and this fusion happened quite instinctively, without real premeditation,” she recalls. Through connections to figures like Zeena Parkins, Ikue Mori, and Fred Frith, and the Recommended Records network, these groups found their place in an international experimental music community.
Even while performing with these bands, Hétu was thinking beyond individual artistic expression. In 1980, she co-founded SuperMusique with Danielle Palardy Roger and Diane Labrosse. Eight years later, they organized a Festival of Innovative Women Musicians, devoted entirely to women’s groups working in avant-garde music—a radical curatorial gesture that signaled Hétu’s growing interest in building infrastructure alongside making music.
“We were connected to the New York scene,” Hétu explains, “but we wanted to create something here, something that would support the community we were building in Montréal.”
From Performance to Institution
The instinct to support that community would shape Hétu’s career as much as her compositions. By 1998, she had taken on co-direction of Ensemble SuperMusique, transforming the organization into one that explicitly welcomes “emerging artists, mid-career artists, and major figures alike.” Where many experimental music scenes fragment along generational lines, Hétu has consistently worked to bridge those gaps.
“This intergenerational cohabitation is a great richness for us,” she explains. “It opens perspectives, stimulates listening, and provokes essential exchanges.”
On Elle a son mot à dire, this collaborative philosophy becomes musical practice. In “Mot elle a,” vocalist Sarah Albu’s written part interweaves with improvised percussion, creating what Hétu calls “flexible, malleable” pieces that depend on interpretation. “For now, I only have one recording, but I hope it will live through other recordings and interpretations,” she says. “This is one of the objectives of open scores: to encourage multiple and living interpretations.”
[click on image to enlarge]
The Economics of Experiment
Running an experimental music organization led Hétu deeper into the infrastructure questions that determine which music gets heard and preserved. As founder and longtime president of DAME Records (Distribution Ambiances Magnétiques Etcetera), she took on the less glamorous work of documenting and distributing Canadian experimental music—a role she maintained for three decades.
“I’ve always had a passion for sound recording,” she reflects. “From 1985, I got involved in Ambiances Magnétiques, then DAME took over.” The work came with unexpected costs. “After my daughter’s birth in 1990, I was looking for a certain stability, knowing that tours would be more difficult. Naively, I believed that having a record label would offer a form of security. It was quite the opposite. This enterprise cost me a lot in creative time. Looking back, it’s perhaps what I regret most: having carried it for so long, for thirty-three years.”
Despite the personal sacrifice, DAME has documented a vital chapter in Canadian music history, providing a platform for artists like Jean Derome, Pierre-Yves Martel, Tim Brady, and dozens of others who might otherwise have remained unrecorded. “DAME documents this precious musical heritage and ensures that these musics are represented, supported, available, and that this artistic history is accessible,” Hétu explains.
Claiming Creative Territory
The questions of space and belonging that drove Hétu’s institutional work find their most direct artistic expression in her concept of territory. The idea runs through much of her work, most explicitly in her piece La femme territoire ou 21 fragments d’humus. For Hétu, territory encompasses everything from the intimate to the political: “the Earth, my room, Quebec, my soul—a woman who becomes vastitude.”
“In it, I take a position, as a woman, on my territory—intimate and collective,” she explains. “I doubted while writing it; I had trouble trusting myself. Today, I’m happy with the path traveled and with this work.”
The territorial thinking extends to her approach to voice and instrumentation. Hétu never formally learned to sing, drawing from influences like Tenko, Phil Minton, Jaap Blonk, and Paul Dutton. “I have a deep love for the voice and its noise-making potential. It’s visceral and fundamental to me,” she says. In her work with La chorale bruitiste JOKER, founded in 2012, she explores what collective vocal improvisation can accomplish using techniques like soundpainting.
[click on image to enlarge]
Seasons of Composition
Hétu’s relationship to place extends to her famous engagement with Québec’s harsh winters. Where others see obstacles to cultural life, she found creative catalysts. Her trilogy Musique d’hiver emerged from the practical reality that “January, February and March are rather quiet in the record industry, which leaves time to compose.” But the relationship between season and creativity runs deeper than scheduling.
“I love winter, I love the sound, the cocoon effect it produces,” she explains. The final piece in the trilogy, Récits de neige, focused specifically on snow’s geometry: “I hoped to compose 30 short pieces that musicians could amalgamate as they want, like snowflakes, which each have a different geometry.”
Building for the Future
Today, as Hétu approaches her fifth decade in music, she remains committed to the experimental principles that have guided her career while grappling with new challenges facing the experimental music community. “I believe the public has the capacity to welcome innovation,” she argues. “But it needs tools, which are becoming scarce: radio broadcasting, interviews, production support, and venues dedicated to new music.”
Her work with Ensemble SuperMusique continues to demonstrate that experimental music can build lasting institutions and communities. Recent projects include ongoing workshops in graphic scores and conducting gestures, international collaborations, and regular concert series that have sustained the musique actuelle community for decades.
“I respond to the call, to the impulse of the moment. I am still, fundamentally, the same composer,” Hétu admits. Viewed across four decades, her work reveals a consistent thread: the understanding that experimental music concerns itself with creating the conditions for a community of artists to flourish.
In an era when funding for experimental music remains precarious and cultural institutions focus on measurable outcomes, Hétu’s approach offers a different model. Her career demonstrates that sometimes the most radical act is creating space for other voices to emerge, building the infrastructure for artistic communities to sustain themselves across generations. After four decades, Joane Hétu still has something to say. She’s still creating spaces for others to find their own voices within the experimental music territory she has helped map. In Québec’s cultural landscape, that may be her most enduring composition.
“One of the most unforgettable moments of the Festival was the electrifying performance by Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue”
The Festival International de Jazz de Montréal took place from June 26 to July 5, 2025, in the Quartier des Spectacles. The 45th edition of the world’s largest jazz festival was a resounding success, attracting jazz enthusiasts from around the globe.
The Heart of the Festival
Located in the heart of downtown Montreal, the Festival site becomes a meeting place for jazz lovers worldwide for ten days. The area is closed to all vehicular traffic and remains open until midnight, allowing visitors to enjoy close to 150 indoor concerts and more than 350 free, open-air shows presented on the specially redesigned Quartier des Spectacles.
A Personal Journey
As a jazz fan and festival enthusiast, I had always intended to attend the Montreal Jazz Festival. Despite missing several chances, I finally managed to go this year, although for a shorter time than I would have preferred, from June 30th to July 3rd.
Arrival and First Impressions
I enjoyed a pleasant 5-hour Via Rail train trip from Toronto to Montreal, arriving around 2 PM. After settling into my Airbnb, I found the jazz festival site and met up with Danilo Navas, the editor-in-chief of That Canadian Magazine. We eagerly waited for the first act to perform on the TD Stage, a free concert by UK tenor saxophonist Nubya Garcia.
Garcia and her band delivered an energetic and incredibly enjoyable set that featured music from both of her recordings. This is an artist I will be watching more closely.
One of the most unforgettable moments of the festival was the electrifying performance by Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue. This mind-bending concert had everything thrown into the mix, creating an explosive fusion of world jazz, funk, and New Orleans soul.
The unbridled excitement and energy from the stage were infectious, drawing the audience in and making them an essential part of the show. The crowd danced, cheered, and grooved to the irresistible beats, unable to resist the magnetic pull of Trombone Shorty’s music.
After this exhilarating experience, the only thing left to do was find a chill spot to unwind and bask in the afterglow of this burst of New Orleans magic.
Canada Day Celebrations
On July 1st, Canada Day, I took a walk to Old Montreal to check out the celebrations. The area, reminiscent of Europe, was closed off to most traffic, allowing visitors to enjoy the numerous restaurants with patios and sidewalk cafes. I indulged in a coffee and biscotti at one inviting cafe before making my way back to the jazz festival area, with a brief stop in Chinatown for some delicious dumplings and soup.
Memorable Performances
This Canada Day was my most active in terms of concerts, with three free shows happening almost consecutively at outdoor venues.
The Sugar Darlings: Miche Love, a key figure in the Montreal blues scene, captivated the audience with her powerful and soulful voice, supported by the electrifying solos of Paul Lucyk on guitar and Kaven Jalbert on saxophone.
Julien Fillion Band: This lively quartet, led by the talented Julien Fillion on saxophone, guitar, and keyboards, delivered an energetic performance to a rain-soaked crowd. The show must go on despite the unpredictable weather challenges.
Endea Owens & the Cookout: Detroit-raised recording artist, bassist, and composer Endea Owens captivated the audience with her soulful singing and jazz and soul-infused playing.
My Last Full Day at the Festival
My last full day at the festival was spent exploring the grounds and soaking in the vibrant atmosphere of the Montreal Jazz Festival, discovering the many facets of this grand celebration.
Christine Jensen Quartet at Le Studio TD
One of the last jazz concerts I attended was at an indoor venue that offered a free performance by the Christine Jensen Quartet, which featured alto saxophonist Christine Jensen. This outstanding group of world-class musicians includes Jim Doxas on drums, Gary Versace on keys, and Adrian Vedady on contrabass. The quartet played tunes from Jensen’s latest recording, “Day Moon,” released in 2023, as well as selections from her other quartet albums.
A Memorable Experience
In summary, the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal is an excellent event held at a captivating venue, offering a wonderful experience with many free concerts and more. I look forward to returning and delving even further into the modern music of our era.
Editor’s Note: We will publish our photo gallery from the 45th Festival International de Jazz de Montréal in a separate post in the next few days.
Luminato at Harbourfront – June 15, 2025
Somd’agua: A Dance Migration Performance
A mesmerizing collaboration featuring Esie Mensah, Alex Oliver, Reimundo Sosa Reinoldes, and Adrianna Yanuziello, Somd’agua provided a profound exploration of Afro-Brazilian culture. The performance artfully depicted the sacred connection between the deities Oxum and Yemanjá through movement and rhythm.
The fusion of powerful singing, chanting, and dynamic Afro-Cuban and Afro-Brazilian percussion created an immersive backdrop for the dancers’ graceful movements.
As the river meets the sea, the performers wove their magic, creating a flowing exchange of energies that stirred deep emotions and evoked memories of distant lands.
The natural setting of Harbourfront Centre enhanced the experience, with the breeze from Lake Ontario and passing tall ships complementing the performance’s aquatic themes. The audience’s enthusiastic participation peaked during the climactic duet, where the dancers achieved perfect harmony.
Santé! By Cirque Kikasse
Quebec’s innovative circus troupe transformed a food truck into an extraordinary performance space.
Their show seamlessly blended fast-food preparation with spectacular acrobatics, showcasing remarkable athleticism and gravity-defying feats both on and above their unique mobile stage.
Musical Performances and Workshops
Afro-Indigenous roots of Colombia Cumbia workshop with Beny Esguerra
Beny Esguerra, the Juno-nominated multi-instrumentalist, delivered an engaging exploration of Afro-Colombian rhythms. Accompanied by his daughter, who acted as her father’s assistant. She helped distribute percussion instruments.
Esguerra created an interactive experience where the distributed percussion instruments became integral to the musical performance. It featured a fun and engaging demonstration that showcased the communicative power of drumming.
Kombilesa Mi
This vibrant Afro-Colombian ensemble brought the distinctive sounds of San Basilio de Palenque to life. Their dynamic performance merged traditional rhythms (Mapalé, Bullerengue, Son Palenquero) with contemporary hip-hop elements, performing in both Spanish and their native language, Palenque.
Formed in 2011, the group serves as a cultural bridge, connecting young people with their heritage while embracing modern musical expressions. The show was well-attended, and these fantastic entertainers had the crowd singing along, clapping in time, and seemingly having a joyful experience.
The festival experience concluded perfectly with an evening stroll along the Harbourfront paths. The day’s artistic celebrations settled into memory as night descended over Lake Ontario.
Photo Gallery: Adrianna Yunuziello Dance Migration performing Somd’agua
Photos by Paul J. Youngman [click on images to enlarge]
Meditation in Motion: Remembering the Healing Flow of Abdullah Ibrahim
This article captures a 2012 Guelph Jazz Festival performance by the late Abdullah Ibrahim at the River Run Centre, incorporating...
Sonny Sounding So Sweet: A Tribute
Sonny Rollins passed away on May 25, 2026, at his home in Woodstock, New York. He was 95. With his...
John Coltrane and the Paradox of Dance
The Room Upstairs is a sold-out, critically acclaimed production — and that tells you something. The Winchester Street Theatre was...
Audrey Ochoa: The Trombone as Storyteller in Contemporary Canadian Jazz
A Voice Beyond Boundaries In the evolving landscape of Canadian jazz, few artists embody creative freedom as vividly as Audrey...
Ariacne Trujillo at Jazz Café in Escazú, Costa Rica
Too Darn Hot! In eager anticipation of a live performance at the renowned Jazz Cafe in Costa Rica—quite close to...
A Defining Year for Canadian Music: 2026 JUNO Award Nominees Announced
The nominations for the 55th Annual JUNO Awards are officially in—and they paint a vivid portrait of a Canadian music...
Marta Elena – Por Amor
Set for release in April 2026 on Lulaworld Records, Por Amor finds Toronto-based Cuban-Canadian singer Marta Elena delivering her most...
A a | a B : B E N D
Ambrose Akinmusire and Aszure Barton = BEND | Bluma Appel Theatre, Toronto — December 5, 2025 | The prospect of...
MJ the Musical at the CAA Ed Mirvish Theatre in Toronto. Oct 25, 2025
MJ the Musical debuted on Broadway on February 1, 2022. It was directed and created by choreographer Christopher Wheeldon. The...
The Vaudevillian at the 2025 Markham Jazz Festival
Sunday, August 17, 2025—On a sunlit afternoon at the 2025 Markham Jazz Festival, amid the constant flow of festivalgoers along...
