Lowville Festival kicks it up a few notches
Bob Missen and Lorretta Bailey are raising the bar big time for their fourth annual Lowville Festival, which is running from June 8-10.
The two co-directors have snagged a couple of big names for their three-day festival, which kicks off Friday at 7:30 p.m., as singer-songwriter Sarah Harmer returns to her hometown to play St. George’s Hall at 7051 Guelph Line. Folk-soul singer and 2013 Oscar Peterson Award winner Lydia Persaud will be the opening act. Tickets are $60.
Then on Saturday, at 7:30 p.m., acclaimed Wagnerian tenor and CBC Radio on-air host Ben Heppner appears in concert at St. George’s Hall with the 35-voice Lowville Festival Choir under their new director Janice Schuyler Ketchen, while local countertenor Richard Cunningham debuts his new vocal quartet.
“I’m part of a grand tradition,” chuckled Heppner, 62, about the annual Lowville shindig while on the phone last weekend from Quebec, where he was on the jury of the Concours musical international de Montréal — Voice 2018,
the winners of which are to be announced this Thursday.
At Lowville, don’t expect to hear anything from Tristan, Parsifal or Peter Grimes, which are Heppner’s calling-card roles from his halcyon days on stages throughout North America and Europe.
“I’m not going to be trying to dazzle anybody with any operatic skills,” said Heppner who hosts Saturday Afternoon at the Opera and Backstage with Ben Heppner on CBC Radio Two.
“I’m going back a little bit to my roots, at least for the first half, and I’m going to be doing some gospel. I mean, I was raised in a church, in fact, I still go to a church (The Bridge community
church in Markham where his wife, Karen, is pastor of adult ministries).”
So, expect tunes such as “His Eye is on the Sparrow,” and a medley of “Precious Lord, Take My Hand,” “Put Your Hand in the Hand” and “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hand.”
In the second half, Heppner will veer into a different direction.
“I’m going to take a diversion a little bit and do some musical theatre and then connect with the choir,” said Heppner.
So, expect “Soliloquy” from “Carousel” and tunes from Heppner’s 1999 easy-listening release on RCA Red Seal Records, “My Secret Heart: Songs of the Parlour, Stage and Silver Screen.” David Warwick will play the piano. Tickets are $60.
“I actually don’t know Lowville. I hear it’s a beautiful hamlet,” added Heppner.
“I’m looking forward to get to know it a little bit, and I’ll come back on my motorcycle (a sixcylinder, 1800cc Honda Gold Wing), of course.”
The festival ends on June 10 at 7 p.m. at Lowville United Church at 5800 Guelph Line, with a dramatic musical workshop/presentation of “Truth and Illusion,” by Burlington’s June Cupido and musical director Michael Mulrooney. Tickets are $35.
For the lowdown on the Lowville Festival, go to lowvillefestival.com.
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Cem Zafir is stepping it up this year with the fifth annual Something Else! Festival of Creative Music, thanks in part to an Ontario Arts Council grant in February and a City of Hamilton Enrichment Fund grant in May.
Initially scheduled to run three days with 10 sets in total, the festival is now running for five days from June 13 to 17, with seven ticketed events, a free concert and a workshop equalling 30 sets of music and dance.
The events will be held almost exclusively in Zula Music and Arts Collective’s new digs at 126 James St. N. The festival’s artistin-residence is Jesse Stewart, percussionist/composer/improviser and associate professor of music at Carleton University in Ottawa, who’ll be heard with his Sonoluminescence Trio alongside saxophonist David Mott and bassist William Parker, plus at a free concert in the Hamilton Public Library’s Central Branch at noon on June 16 with Torontobased artist-pianist Michael Snow.
The SEF lineup also includes American free-jazz icon Joe McPhee, the Texas-based sextet The Young Mothers, Swedish saxophonist Lisen Rylander Löve, as well as such home grown talent as Earth, Wind & Choir, Edgardo Moreno, and the Lee/ Palmer/Bennett Trio of double bassist David Lee, guitarist Chris Palmer, and Connor Bennett on reeds, plus many, many others.
To learn more about the SEF’s artists, dates, times, ticket prices and festival passes, go to zulapresents.org/festival/
••• Congratulations to Hamilton’s Slavko Popovic who just won the principal clarinet chair at the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra.