featured press

In its latest annual report, Opera America documented a depressed state of affairs for the business in North America. For example, figures showed that as many as 30 per cent of subscribers had not returned to theatres in 2022 after the live-arts restrictions had lifted. The report also noted the widespread “Great Resignation” had affected the world of arias, as companies struggled to rebuild their staffs after professional talent scattered during the pandemic.

Edmonton Opera, a company that is “going slowly broke,” according to its interim general director Richard Cook, has appointed opera-world wunderkind Joel Ivany as its artistic director. Recruiting the maverick founder of Toronto’s indie collective Against the Grain Theatre is a bold remedy for a long-running company built on traditional North American opera practices, which have become increasingly unsustainable for regional companies.

Here, The Globe and Mail spotlights a handful of these heroes of Canadian arts who made 2020 such an exciting and invigorating year, despite absolutely everything else.

A gay Chinese-Canadian tenor struts through the streets of Vancouver, joyously proclaiming that “ev’ry valley shall be exalted” as the camera focuses in on his six-inch-high stiletto heels. A Tunisian-Canadian mezzo-soprano reimagines Jesus as a Muslim woman in a head scarf. In Yukon, an Indigenous singer praises the remote snow-covered landscape in Southern Tutchone, the language of her ancestors.

An orchestra-less, modernized, localized and English-sung version of the Puccini classic La bohème is up and running at Toronto’s Tranzac Club, where an 11-show residency is part of indie opera company Against the Grain’s groundbreaking national tour in partnership with Alberta’s Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.

In the summer of 2011, in the main hall of the ramshackle Tranzac Club in downtown Toronto, patrons milled about with pints in hand, talking and laughing in a languid humour, ready to enjoy some Puccini. This was not the sober climate one expects of a performance of La Bohème...

We are in an era where opera looks very different from the stereotypes which pervade popular culture; any fan of the genre knows that the days of large, helmet-horned women and parking-and-barking are gone. It is through partnership, and through the sharing of resources, that opera can be well represented in the twenty-first century...

You’d never know Joel Ivany heads up one of the most acclaimed opera companies in Canada. Clad in faded jeans and a loose, cotton t-shirt, Ivany, who is Artistic Director of the award winning, critically-lauded Against the Grain Theatre, recently chatted in Toronto’s Trinity Bellwoods Park, as stroller moms, fitness buffs and Queen West Artists walked by...

You wouldn’t immediately cast soft-spoken, gentle Joel Ivany as a superhero, but there’s something of a Peter Parker/Spider-Man vibe about him nonetheless. By night, Ivany is the founder and one of the artistic leaders of Against the Grain Theatre, perhaps Toronto’s most creative opera producers...

Toronto’s arts and culture scene should be as vibrant as ever in the new year. But for five city residentsin particular — representing a range of disciplines from pop music and literature to art, opera and film 2016 will present an opportunity to test their skills and creativity to the max...

We are transitioning into a new age for opera. Those within the industry are seeing (some fearing) sweeping changes. Now more than ever, the call goes out to our generation to step up and care for this collaborative artform. All across the country, gifted young artists are no longer waiting for opportunity, but rather creating it…

Joel Ivany and Christopher Mokrzewski seem like your typical latte-drinking buddies as they saunter through the coffee shop on Queen East in Toronto. Both are dressed casually, in T-shirts and jeans. Maybe they’re in tech, or working on a startup. No, film, that’s it. Commercials, maybe...