Audio News for June 6, 2007

Two Huge Canadian Music Festivals This Month – The Luminato/L’oréal Festival in Toronto – now in progress thru June 10th – features world premieres including Philip Glass’ Book of Longing – inspired by Leonard Cohen poetry, Not the Messiah – an original oratorio by Eric Idle and John Du Prez, and designs by Daniel Libeskind for the Royal Ontario Museum. A special venue along Toronto’s harbor front called Spielgel tent ‘n tavern will feature day and night festivities in the style of a 1920s European cabaret. Luminato’s visual arts explores kinetic movement, and Pulse Front will be the largest light sculpture ever produced – 200,000 watts of power choreographed to the heart rate of participants at the site. There are several ballet productions, including The Rite of Spring. Winnie Madikizela-Mandela will make a guest appearance for he world premiere of a multimedia opera, The Passion of Winnie. Music events include The Gryphon Trio’s revision of chamber music production, Cuban jazz, African drumming, opera galas, and The Toronto Symphony Orchestra.

The Festival International de Jazz de Montréal turns the French Canadian city into a major musical fiesta from June 28 thru July 8. 30 countries are represented, with roughly 3000 musicians and 500 different concerts – including 350 free shows at ten outdoor stages. It appears the free shows are made possible by commercial sponsorships along the lines of Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola at Lincoln Center – the stages have designations such as Alcan Stage, General Motors Stage, Best Buy, XM Radio, Rendezvous Samsung, etc.  Among the many performers will be The California Guitar Trio, The Klez Dispensers, Chris Jagger’s Cajun band, Harmonicarama, Swing Tonique Jazz Band, flamenco performers, an Afrobeat party, an Arabian Night and a Brazilian Carnival Bash. More details at montrealjazzfest.com

First Classical Hi-Def DVD – Opus Arte has released the very first classical music DVD in HD format, distributed by Naxos of America. It is a production of Tchaikovsky’s complete ballet Swan Lake, from the Paris Opera Ballet, with choreography by Rudolf Nureyev. It was released on standard DVD in January, and is now out on HD DVD. Opus Arte is not limiting itself to just one of the two new HD formats, but is planning to also release Swan Lake on Blu-ray shortly. In the Fall, Warner Bros. will debut the new Total Hi-Def format (THD) – both HD DVD and Blu-ray bonded back-to-back – and Swan Lake will also be released in that form. The audio portion of all the HD discs is DTS 24-bit uncompressed surround sound. More details at www.opusarte.com