Profile: Anora Mark Eydelshteyn and Mikey Madison in 'Anora.' Contextualizing Sean Baker’s latest film within cinema’s history of sex-positive self-actualizing female leads Words by Gabriel Frieberg ISSUE 15 | IN FOCUS In Sean Baker’s new film Anora , it’s Mikey Madison's brassy, audacious, star-making performance that hits you first. But equally impressive is its tonal complexity—a mix of beats both familiar and new, combined with subversive twists both classical and modern. Pitched as Pretty Woman by way of the Safdie Brothers, there’s something to that comparison, as Anora sprints down a more volatile path than the 1990 Richard Gere, Julia Roberts film. Whereas Pretty Woman told a neat Cinderella story, Anora flirts with and then mocks that idea. In fact, the film’s been marketed with Variety ’s pull quote: "makes Pretty Woman look like a Disney movie." There’s an undeniable fairytale quality to Anora , but it’s spiked with a volatile sense of danger and unpredictability. The film thrums with electricity, keeping you on your toes while also pulling you deeper into the lead character’s tumultuous journey. Madison’s portrayal of Anora, a sex worker trying to navigate the chaos that engulfs her life, makes you root for her as she loses terra firma and spirals out of control. This intoxicating, uneasy balance between dreamlike fantasy and gritty realism helps Anora find its edge. How Anora deftly navigates its tonal shifts—feeling like five movies in one—without losing its core identity is remarkable. The first act plays like a sex-positive rom-com, as Anora is swept off her feet for a Vegas-set whirlwind romance. It’s too ideal, too dazzling, and this false sense of security leads to manic whiplash as the bill comes due, and we downshift from carefree romance to farcical crime thriller. Here, Sean Baker channels the absurdity and dark humor of the Coen brothers, laced with outer-borough NYC rawness. That energy carries over to Anora ’s next evolution, into a one-crazy-night-in-New York caper in the vein of classics like Martin Scorsese’s After Hours or Spike Lee’s 25th Hour . Gradually, Anora is changing before our eyes. No longer the wide-eyed dreamer, but a woman slowly hardening to her circumstances and the inevitable crush of power. This is a smart, deliberate evolution, as Anora begins to align more with her gangsters than with the naive lover she initially fell for. Baker pushes the film past the standard tropes of these kinds of narratives, refusing to flatten Anora into a stereotype or an object of pity. Just as we finally think we know who Anora is—a bawdy firecracker, a hopeful dreamer, a rebel, a victim of circumstance—the film shifts again, and we get perhaps our truest understanding of the character. The final act embraces a melancholic wistfulness and sense of longing reminiscent of Wong Kar-wai. The manic energy of earlier scenes gives way to a slower, more meditative pace, allowing the emotional weight of the experience to hit us like a ton of bricks. Sean Baker’s oeuvre is known for emotional devastation, and Anora is no exception. Yet, the feeling here is tinged with hope. The ambiguous ending leaves us wondering what the future holds for Anora, but her resilience is undeniable. Despite (or even because of) everything that’s transpired, you know Anora will live to fight another day. Her moxie, her steel, and her sense of self are all strengthened. In this sense, Anora most closely evokes Federico Fellini’s 1957 film Nights of Cabiria , starring his eternal love, the unforgettable Giulietta Masina. Like Anora, Masina’s Cabiria contends with the best and worst of humanity, but her perseverance carries her ever onward. Both characters endure betrayals and hardships, yet their resilience and determination make them indelible figures.

Fehinti Balogun Presents Can I Live? Filmed production, Complicité’s "Can I Live" with Fehinti Balogun. Photography by David Hewitt In conversation with the actor, playwright, poet, and the creator of Can I Live? WORDS BY TASH COWLEY | LONDON | THEATRE NOV 15, 2022 | ISSUE 8 Climate conversation is everywhere, and its pressing present-tension can be overwhelming. The United Nation’s recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that we are facing “code red” levels of environmental destruction, and everywhere we turn, doom-laden statistics pursue us in a relentless, deafening stampede. The seriousness of what we are facing can leave us feeling isolated and helpless. However, actor, activist and playwright Fehinti Balogun (he/him) is working to switch up the narrative, with an uplifting, educational digital performance that “toured” UK venues. Can I Live? addresses the physical manifestations of global warming through Balogun’s lens as a British-Nigerian activist, and deftly highlights the intersectionality between climate crisis and social justice. With poetry, graphics, music, scientific fact, and narration, Balogun intertwines anecdotal snapshots of his own life with wider atrocities, mining the issues with a personal specificity rarely seen before in this conversation. Shortly after professing his love for plantains, Balogun reveals that Cameroon has experienced a 43% decrease in plantain yield due to heat and dryness. Amongst giant, translucent projected photographs of family members, our protagonist dances and raps in a joyful tribute to his Nigerian heritage—but in an instant, the light wanes, and we learn that Nigeria is losing 350,000 hectares of land a year to drought and desertification. With his head resting in his mother’s lap, Balogun faces hard truths as to why he hasn’t seen many members of his community in climate space. She argues that in a corrupt and racist system, basic survival takes precedence: “Some people are jobless. Some people are homeless. Some people are hopeless.” In this moment, Balogun’s excess of emotion and exhaustion breaks like a wave. His song “Kiss me, Hold me, Watch me Weep” explores a sentiment shared by many who lack the support they need to stay in this fight, that we may “just need to be held” to move through the storm. In conversation with smART Magazine , Balogun discusses his influences, the role of music in truth-telling, and how Can I Live? aims to encourage safe, communal spaces for people of color who refuse to sit back and watch the world burn.

Arooj Aftab’s Night Reign Arooj Aftab A journey into the night reveals jazz idioms beneath folk gestures Words by Nat Lazzarotto ISSUE 13 | ALT.ITUDE CANNOPY x Arooj Aftab Pakistani-American Vocalist Arooj Aftab is a vocalist striving to elude definition. In each note of her gliding melodies is heard the harmonic depth of South Asian classical music, the clarity and polish of pop music, and the heart of jazz, blues, and folk music. Aftab refers to this complex melding of inspirations as “global soul,” with which she aims to convince audiences of the superficiality of defining music by genre. Her past solo albums include the Grammy-nominated Bird Under Water (2014) , Siren Islands (2018), and Vulture Prince (2021), the latter of which won Best Global Music Performance at the 64th Annual Grammy® Awards for “Mohabbat”. Her collaborative efforts with Vijay Iyer and Shahzad Ismaily in the album Love in Exile (2023) were also awarded Best Alternative Jazz Album at the Grammy® Awards this year. With her fourth solo project Night Reign , Aftab introduces us to her main inspiration─the night. She seeks to paint a heady picture of a “perfumed, public garden of renewal, peaking the senses with each composition…” and delivers this in spades. From the first notes of each song, the setting immediately comes into focus through the hazy air of lush chamber ensemble arrangements mixed with the glitter of synthesizers and soaring vocals. While the lyrics—carefully chosen from beloved poets—are delivered beautifully by Aftab herself, the most memorable moments in this music are deeply acoustic. Some vocal processing and overtly electronic mixing decisions cause disharmony, standing out amongst the delicate harp affectations and earthy grooves. Perhaps this is by design─a muffled, hidden garden tucked away beneath the halogen glow of neon signs. There are a few choice moments where this juxtaposition broke the atmosphere of an otherwise highly immersive album. Beginning with “Aey Nehin”, we see Aftab soaring above thick vocal harmonies. Pulsating, lush instrumentation sets a mood that at once evokes the night calm in a dense urban environment. The music breathes with life organically before wandering off again into the night. Taking liberties with a poem by 18th-century Urdu musician Mah Laqa Chanda, Aftab pairs the poetess in conversation with the 16th-century queen Chand Bibi with “Na Gul”. Again we hear Aftab’s stellar vocal presence in a very rubato first passage. As the conversation nears its peak the music builds in tempo and texture before Aftab passes the torch to Australian trumpeter and composer Nadje Noordhuis for another tender treatment of the melody, this time on flugelhorn. The overall effect is pensive, contemplative, and hopeful. Joseph Kosma’s “Autumn Leaves” seems like an out-of-place choice, Aftab showcases a rather inspired take on a well-worn jam session staple. With repose, Aftab pulls and stretches the melody near to tearing─sometimes doing away with the original motifs entirely─attempting to justify this new take. What occurs is a feeling-rich vocal performance of a tune performed countless times in countless ways. All in all, she breathes new life into the jazz standard and subverts expectations. “Bolo Na” takes us through more restless moments of the night, touching on various issues of modern society. The beginning of the track sounds very compact, tense even. Possibly overly processed at first, this quickly becomes justified by Moor Mother’s gripping performance. Here especially we hear unbridled emotion erupting from every line. Although listed as featured, Joel Ross feels supremely under-utilized here, delegated to sparse textural accompaniment throughout. This piece is primarily a vehicle for Mother’s strong lyrics and animated delivery. There are only so many ways to say how amazing Aftab’s vocals are on each track. From the clear influences of South Asian classical music and her studies in jazz to the more esoteric influences of her many communities and her ultimate muse of the night, each line is delivered with such sincerity as to lay all of herself bare. This is no more clear than in “Saaqi”, another compelling display of the lush chamber ensemble she has collected. With strings, keys, and vocal improvisations she paints a delicate portrait of the night that could share space with the works of Monet or Pissarro. The star-light touch of Iyer on piano provides just enough illumination to the night sky scene. Easily one of the highlights of the entire album. “Last Night Reprise” provides us with an entirely new adventure. Upright bass sets the tone of mysticism, wonder, and heady smoke that is enforced by harp and flute improvisation and whirling electric piano. These swirling sounds evoke intrigue and danger as they briefly escape harmony before returning. This track, another highlight, showcases more of Aftab’s jazz influences. With “Raat Ki Rani” we hear some evidence of pitch correction. Possibly intentional, but given the acoustic direction of the album, this stands out more than intended. Lyricism abounds in “Whiskey” , as Aftab speaks to heady romance as the waves of the orchestration build and crash before receding again. This shimmering effect compliments the underlying groove and overall folk sensibility. Compared to other tracks from the album, this one focuses more on dynamic direction. While not a criticism of the other tracks, this allows “Whiskey” to stand out even more. “Zameen” provides a poignant end to the night. Feelings of restfulness, revival, and content as the track progresses. Aftab never rises above a breathy whisper and the quietude of the sparse orchestration reflects this intimacy. Overall Night Reign is a pleasant outing by Aftab. Highly conceptual, sparse, and delicate, allowing the power of the spoken and sung word to shine. Aftab’s influences and inspirations are laid bare in a highly personal reflection on the power of the night. Listen Now

On Set: Women Talking "Women Talking" Actor Sheila McCarthy on the Oscar-nominated film’s work culture WORDS BY MILES FORRESTER ISSUE 11 | TORONTO | IN FOCUS "Women Talking" starring Sheila McCarthy (Left Front) Sheila McCarthy first came to international attention starring in the 1987 Canadian indie dramedy, I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing. It was the first English-language Canadian feature to be awarded at Cannes and, domestically, earned McCarthy her first Genie for Best Actress. With two Genie Awards, two Doras, two Geminis, and an ACTRA Award, she is one of the most decorated Canadian actors working on stage and screen. In Women Talking , an adaptation of the 2018 novel by Miriam Toews, McCarthy plays Greta, the matriarch of a community of Mennonite women who must decide how they’ll respond to systematic abuse. Miriam Toews has described her novel as “a reaction through fiction” to a campaign of sexual assaults spanning from 2005 to 2009 in the Manitoba Mennonite Colony in Bolivia. Both Toews’s novel and the film adaptation by Sarah Polley — Oscar-nominated for Best Picture and Adapted Screenplay — dramatise a debate between eight women who have 48 hours to choose their course of action, weighing their faith, community, and bodily autonomy before their rapists are returned to the colony from police custody. For McCarthy, “that’s the guts of the movie, the decision─which is a very simplistic thing to say. It’s much harder to actually act on it.” McCarthy compares working with her seven co-stars to 12 Angry Men , “Eight Angry Women.” With Frances McDormand, Jessie Buckley, Claire Foy, and Rooney Mara, the film has an excellent ensemble of intergenerational actors. Due to the vicissitudes of COVID protocols, Polley and her cast rehearsed for two weeks while sequestered together before filming. The shoot featured diligent COVID testing, reasonable working hours, and support for parents. Women Talking was made in the crux of historical currents and McCarthy lauds Polley — herself a film veteran who grew up seeing the exploitative side of the industry — for taking advantage of the moment to tell this story while making the politics informing it integral to how it was made. CAN | Sarah Polley created an environment on the set of Women Talking that was different from most: you and the cast were supported emotionally and your work hours were humane. What was it like working on a set where everything was structured to respect everyone as collaborators and human beings? SM ── Sarah’s philosophy of having a set that was kind to everybody was incredibly deliberate. And I think it stems from her needs. She has three young children, and I think she gave it a great deal of thought. She grew up on sets where that was not the case, and she was not particularly well-protected. Her book Run Towards the Danger is full of stories about her childhood gigs. She was very concerned with Women Talking being a set that collaborated with everybody. She was kind to parents and was sensitive to our working hours─enabling everybody to go home, put their children to sleep, and have good sleeps. She was so concerned that everybody be very careful with each other. She wanted to protect us because of the subject matter, but also have the luxury of time to shoot this movie. It’s hard because I do a lot of low-budget stuff in Canada where time is money and there is no money, and it’s a very difficult thing to achieve. But Sarah did have a lot of support from people like Dede Gardner, the president of Plan B Entertainment, and Frances McDormand, who fully supported this notion of civilised shooting. On the set of "Women Talking" CAN | How does the subject matter of Women Talking relate to the experience of women in an America where the bodily autonomy of women is under siege? SM ── I heard this great quote that Bono said: “Art is the discovery of beauty in unexpected places.” And I think that when I think about Women Talking . Miriam Toews took the real story of a colony of women in Bolivia who were sexually assaulted and wrote about it, and the film Sarah Polley carved out of the book is one of hope. It’s the hope that by telling these stories, things can improve and awareness can grow. Maybe there will come a day when we don’t need stories like Women Talking , but we’re nowhere near that yet. On the world stage, a movie like Women Talking speaks volumes. I’m meeting tons of people now who have seen the movie — focus groups, gender study groups, and lay people — who are incredibly moved by this story and having conversations. They’re talking about Women Talking ! And that’s a great first step. It’s a drop in the water. Even though the movie takes place in a specific world of Mennonite women, and perhaps watching it you feel a bit distanced from your own experience, at the same time you can feel, “Oh my God, I’ve been there.” It’s not just for women, it’s for all genders. Anybody who has been at the hand of any kind of assault, whether it’s verbal or emotional, in the workplace or at home, the takeaway from this is tell your story. Speak out. Because it is just one story at a time, isn’t it? CAN | What was your experience like of working in that kind of cloistered environment as an actor? SM ── We were right in the thick of COVID and so there were restrictions: everybody was masked up in rehearsals and the crew were masked up the entire time. I never saw Sarah Polley’s face. And when I think about it now, it really gave a purity to working on this movie. I didn’t see anybody, and I was fine with that. I was alone, happily just mired in the story of the film. The isolation really fed us─we were all down the rabbit hole of this and nothing else. CAN | How did you view your character Greta's role within the group? SM ── There were two elders in the group, Agatha and Greta, and we were eight women. The two of us were elected to impart some empathy and patience, since there was some hotheadedness from the younger ones. We were the ones that bided our time in making the decision of what to do: to stay and fight? Stay and do nothing? Or leave? And my particular character, Greta, she had a lot of humour and rye storytelling that I just loved. Especially since we’re discussing such horrifying experiences that happened to all of us, and happened to our children, and our grandchildren as young as four─that we were all horse tranquilized and raped. I think, for Greta, her crisis and her conflict with that is that she’s allowed her daughters to be at the hands of these men and not done anything about it. She enabled it. And that was my cross to bear, and Greta is apologizing for the very first time. We are women who are speaking about this for the very first time in our lives and it’s not easy. The denial’s been going on for years and years because one doesn’t talk about those things. It’s as if we think, “if I just make my bed after my rape then that will never have happened,” and we’ll just tuck it away and compartmentalize. To be an older woman and to have to come to terms with having denied my daughters and grandchildren a voice for so long, it’s pretty tough. You’re finally talking about it and there’s no going back.

Xiaoyu Weng at the AGO Xiaoyu Weng by Evgeny Litvinov A Fresh Perspective for Toronto'sTightly Knit Art Community WORDS BY ISABELLA ELIAS | OLD HEATHFIELD | VISUAL ARTS MAR 03, 2023 | ISSUE 10 Xiaoyu Weng has a unique vantage point. With international curatorial experience – including The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City – she is able to view the trajectory of Toronto’s gallery ecosystem, with its entrenched identities and histories, from a global perspective. Weng has brought her artist-first curatorial practice to the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), along with her excitement and eagerness to learn, and now works collaboratively with her colleagues to bring together the tightly knit community, the diverse audience, and the museum collection. Weng joins smART Magazine to discuss the inspiration behind her creative mission and the way our understanding of art shapes everyday connections.

CLAY: Silly Ceramics and Calaca’s Creatures Nastia Calaca “I rarely need to explain myself: this is a blue elephant, he wears a cylinder and smokes a pipe ─ what is unclear here?” Words by Amelia Johannsen ISSUE 15 | PARIS | MATERIALS When it comes to ceramic art, it’s often hard to tell where artistic form ends and quotidian function begins. The work of Nastia Calaca makes this distinction quite easy with a unique mix of clay and whimsy, fantasy and glaze. Writing from Barcelona, Amelia Johannsen - herself a ceramic artist - pens an introduction for Cannopy’s profile of Calaca with an insider’s look at the art of the kiln. Born in Ukraine and now based in Paris, Nastia Calaca never planned to become a ceramic artist. She initially dreamed of becoming an illustrator, bringing her characters to life on paper. It was a summer art camp that led her down a path where her childhood doodles of mythical creatures would find new life as tactile, three-dimensional forms. Her ceramic sculptures feature whimsical and charmingly absurd characters that might have wandered out of a children’s book. The balance between function and fantasy plays a key role in her practice, where each object is imbued with a personality and whimsical warmth that’s been unpredictably transformed in the kiln through the alchemic mix of heat and glazes. "Croc" As an artist working with clay myself, I find her process intriguing. Her approach seems spontaneous and fearless, letting the clay guide her rather than imposing rigid structure. Yet, her characters seem to land on the right side of quirky—they’re playful, unapologetically odd, and they invite us to suspend our expectations, leaning into a world where imagination takes center stage. In her work, I can see how small, unexpected observations spark her creative instinct. Like her, I’m drawn to the strange beauty found in everyday moments and objects, where something as simple as the moss on a tree or a stranger’s unusual hat can inspire entirely new forms. And then there’s the element of surprise—the unpredictability of the kiln, a space I know well, where a glaze can make or break a piece, sometimes literally. I appreciate the thrill she embraces in this, where the process itself introduces a touch of chaos that adds to the character of her sculptures. Her style might not fit neatly into everyone’s taste, and that’s part of the joy of it. In a world where ceramics often lean toward sleek, polished finishes, her approach is wonderfully organic, embracing the unpredictable. Calaca’s work reminds us that art can be an invitation to savor the playful, tactile nature of clay without taking it all too seriously. CANNOPY x Nastia Calaca Nastia Workshop CAN | How did you get into ceramics? NC ─ I am trying to remember where exactly my journey started; maybe it was a magical coincidence or proof of the determinism theory, depending on what you believe. But, my grandmother took me to the nearest educational institution, which happened to be an art school in the neighborhood, with the hope I could finally stop vandalizing our tiny apartment with doodles on the wallpaper, furniture, a neighbor’s cat, several hamsters, and other objects that looked boring to me and needed aesthetic improvement. SUBSCRIBE BELOW TO CONTINUE READING

Pablo Larraín’s "Maria" meets Angelina Jolie’s Callas Still from "Maria" “Maria follows in the footpath of its thematic predecessors─but backwards, in heels, and with great music” Words by Katarina Zeni ISSUE 14 | IN FOCUS When it comes to telling the story of a powerful woman whose humanity has been overshadowed by her fame, Director Pablo Larraín is in a league of his own. In analyzing the calamitous experiences of notable women, the filmmaker repeatedly plays upon the idea that life is a stage, yet so much of what matters in life happens offstage. In his most recent work, Maria (2024), Larraín handles the complexities of a life in the spotlight by subverting the tropes of the tragic heroine and forcing audiences to find the superseding humanity. Larraín—like other notable Hollywood filmmakers of South American heritage (Alejandro Iñárritu, Alfonso Cuarón)—is a Chilean filmmaker who got his start in the industry with internationally recognized Latin films such as Fuga (2008), Post Mortem (2010), and No (2012). Since then, Larraín has produced several English language films that have solidified his directorial and narrative styles─and his propensity for producing accidental trilogies. There’s a throughline, for example, running between his Jackie (2016), Spencer (2021), and Maria . Following the frenzied life of Jacqueline Kennedy after her husband’s assassination, Jackie ’s success revealed the public’s desire for introspective biopics that centre the lives of hyper-scrutinized women. Next was Spencer, the story and the life of Diana, Princess of Wales, who was at once a figure of establishment opulence and the subversion of the British Royal Family’s decorum. Maria follows in the footpath of its thematic predecessors─but backwards, in heels, and with great music. Backwards in the sense that the film is a retrospective on the life of renowned Greek opera singer Maria Callas who died from a heart attack at 54. Performing her first opera when she was only 17, and rewarded given a titular role the following year, Callas became a household name and a public figure with a whiplash-inducing rapidity. With a disjointedness that mirrors the sharp contrasts between Callas’s operatic characters, Maria follows the diva’s final week as she desperately tries to piece together the different stages of her life and make an unlikely comeback. Surprisingly, this biopic on a great musician is filled with music─rather than peppering in the music that made Callas great, Larraín lays it on thick with plenty of screen time for opera in all of its naked glory. Still from "Maria" Maria is Larraín’s second adaptation of accomplished screenwriter Steven Knight’s work, having previously collaborated with him on Spencer , but the two films are not all that similar. As Jackie takes place during a tragedy, and Spencer follows the events preceding one, Maria takes a more distant perspective, not on a particular tragedy but on a life filled with equal parts triumph and letdowns. Larraín’s filmography comes full circle with Maria when Callas’s last chance at romance comes to an end as her lover, Aristotle Onassis, gets married to Jackie Kennedy. Despite the splashes of world-historical figures via on-screen portrayals of Jackie and John F. Kennedy, Larraín never gives up on making this a film about Maria. The film’s glaring struggle is that Callas is depicted with compelling flair by Angelina Jolie. Jolie’s performance was perhaps a little too compelling, as the biopic becomes a visible three-way tug-o-war between Callas as a global phenomenon, Larraín’s mission to reveal the real Maria, and the gravity of Jolie’s own celebrity. Whether this struggle was intended—or the accidental result of what happens when the unstoppable force of opera’s biggest star meets the immovable object of a Hollywood icon—is something only the storytelling team can reveal. In the end, the real winner of this tug-o-war is Larraín who, somehow, made a coherent film with three main characters embodied in its titular role. INTERVIEW WITH ANGELINA JOLIE Why did you want to play Maria Callas? AJ ─ I met Pablo Larraín many years ago and told him how much I respected him as a filmmaker and hoped to work with him one day. He reached out to me about Maria , and he took the process of casting very seriously, which I appreciate. He really wants to make sure the artist is up for it and understands the job. I’m also a huge fan of writer Steven Knight’s work; it’s a very unusual script and construction. There’s a lot of bravery in the choices they’ve made in their storytelling, which says a lot about how capable they both are. I was happy that I was with a very serious filmmaker coming to me to do real work and expecting a lot of me and challenging me. That’s not always the case. It wasn’t just an opportunity to tell the story of Maria Callas, a woman I find interesting and care for, but it’s really to have a director who’s going to take you on a journey and is so serious about the work and tough on you. I like that he was tough on me! He’s a dream director, and I would want to work with him again and again. Also, I learned such a lot as a director myself, from watching him work. How much preparation did you have to do for the role? AJ ─ Well, Pablo expected me to really work very, very hard, and he expected me to sing. I went into classes six or seven months before he expected me to really sing, to take Italian classes, to understand and study opera, to immerse myself completely and do the work, which for Maria , there was no other way. The funny thing as an actor, when you first start acting, somebody says, “Can you ride horses? Can you speak this language?” And as a young actor, you say, “yes” to everything. Then you go home, and you think, “Oh, I have to learn how to sing!” When Pablo said, “Can you sing?” I thought, “I mean, sure, a little,” but the truth is, as he said to me, “You have to learn how to sing opera, or I will be able to tell when we are close on your face, because it’s who she is.” But it was much more than that, it was to understand Maria Callas and be able to play the character. The music was her life. Her relationship to her voice and her body, her ability to sing, her presence on stage and her communication with the audience, it was her life. It was the key to her as well. How was the experience of learning how to sing that way? AJ ─ To be very candid, it was the therapy I didn’t realize I needed. I had no idea how much I was holding in and not letting out. So, the challenge wasn’t the technical, it was an emotional experience to find my voice, to be in my body, to express. You have to give every single part of yourself. When opera singers express pain, it’s not like a little bit, it’s the biggest depth. It requires everything that you’ve got. It requires your full body, and it requires you to be full emotionally, as open and as loud, in as big a voice as you can possibly do. Has your relationship with opera changed? Do you enjoy it? AJ ─ I have such a love of opera now, a real true love of opera, and I have it in my life now in a different way. I go now and I sit through it and let it overtake me and affect me. There’s something about opera that I hadn’t understood before. I think we do sometimes see it as an elitist thing that’s separate from us. It’s so huge. But maybe you have to go through certain things in life that have the depth of that pain or the depth of that love, where you now understand and need the size and feeling of opera. Still from "Maria" It must have been quite an experience to perform these scenes, often alongside a full orchestra. What was that like for you? AJ ─ It was transformative as an artist and a human being, as I’ve not been involved with music for so much of my life. I didn’t play music, in part because like a lot of parents, I’m often listening to what other people want to listen to. I don’t think I’d ever given myself music and had let it slide away from my life. So, to be reintroduced to music in such a complete way, and then to be surrounded by musicians, to be on set with other pianists, singers, the entire orchestra, I think I fell in love with it and became very small. I felt just grateful to be awakened to it again. I really believe in the benefits of music therapy these days. And to be standing in some of these locations, I just felt like I was the luckiest artist in the world. There’s one thing having scenes where you’re expressing emotion and pain as an artist—there’s quite another thing when you’re surrounded by the musicians playing that pain. Through the miracle of technology, your voice was combined with the voice of Maria Callas in Maria . How did that influence your performance? AJ ─ Well, the good news about playing Maria Callas is nobody expects you to sing Maria Callas because nobody in the world can sing Maria Callas, right? Nobody at her time could match her, and it would be a crime to not have her voice through this, because in many ways, she is very present in this film. Her voice and her art are very present. She’s the partner in this film with me; she and I are doing this together. It was an honor and sometimes a bit of a head trip to be me playing her and us playing a third person on stage. As an actor, I wasn’t doing my performance of say, Anna Bolena, but Maria’s. It was me trying to understand why she made those performance choices. I’ve never played a performer before. As I would learn of her choices, I just became more of a fan of her work. She was also a brilliant actor. Still from Maria You mention it was both you and Maria Callas on stage. How do you feel about her now, having spent so much time with this character? AJ ─ I care for her deeply. I’m very moved by her, and I’m so happy we had the opportunity to show her as a human being. There’s something I learned about her, that she couldn’t see. When someone looked at the prescription glasses that she wore later in her life, they said to Pablo, “That lens, that prescription, this person’s almost legally blind.” Wow. When she was young, she couldn’t wear those glasses and be on stage. It wasn’t accepted, so she had to memorize everything very differently. When you understand that, you see this person’s survival instinct. It wasn’t that she just wanted to be this; she had to survive and hide it and find a way around it and work twice as hard. Maria was pushed into singing as a young person by her mother, and when she was able to give it everything she had and be her best, she communicated something to people that was transformative. But as she got older and made choices in her life and different things happened, that same audience punished her for not being able to do that for them anymore. She had an enormous amount of pressure on her. And I think she was a very sensitive person. You can’t express the emotion she expressed without great sensitivity. Although it’s a different era, is this another example of women in the spotlight suffering harsher criticism than men? AJ ─ That’s just what happens when you have that level of success, and I think Maria understood that. She worked very, very hard to do her job. She understood that if she stood in front of people and they came out to see her, she had to be as close to perfect as she could be. She wanted to give everything she had, and she really did give everything she had fighting through different things. It couldn’t have been easy to have a relationship with a mother who calls you names and tells you you’re not good enough. I just can’t imagine it because so much of what helped me be okay in life was having the kindness of my own mother. The film is about her relationship to her voice and her pain and her deep love. Her true love is her music. The film’s supporting actors include Pierfrancesco Favino, Valeria Golino, Alba Rohrwacher, Kodi Smit-McPhee and Haluk Bilginer. What did you enjoy about working with them? AJ ─ The interesting thing is, we were all playing real people, and these were real relationships. Ferruccio the butler, who Pierfrancesco plays, he’s still alive, and he’s never sold stories about Maria to the press. He shared some thoughts and stories with us but didn’t want to come to set. It’s beautiful to know that she had a few people at the end of her life who really loved her, and I’m so happy the film honors them because of what wonderful people they were who understood her. And in a funny way, I think without saying it, the other actors took care of me. I could feel their support. I could feel the support, the care, the nurture when I had to do very emotional things. Their genuine kindness and compassion were real. This interview is published in collaboration with MUBI

The First “Golden Age” A Brief History of Disney: Part 4 WORDS BY RICHARD OUZOUNIAN | LIGHTHOUSE IMMERSIVE After the tremendous success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and the well-honed production team that had been created by Disney, their next venture should have been a slam-dunk. And at first, it looked like that. Though a number of titles were considered for the follow-up animated feature, Pinocchio (1940) was the chosen project, to be based on the classic story by Carlo Collodi about a wooden puppet who dreams of becoming a real boy. The colorful Tuscan background, the assortment of memorable supporting characters, and a leading figure whose central goal cried out for animation – it seemed perfect. But six months into production, Walt put on the brakes. “It isn’t working,” was his reason, and when the team of Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston (who had initially been designing the character of Pinocchio) looked at what they had accomplished to date, they realized that their wooden puppet was brash, selfish, and lacking in appeal. Animator Fred Moore tried pushing him in a more boyish direction, but it was only when relative newcomer Milt Kahl took over that the character and the story surrounding him found its true center. “They were obsessed with the idea of (Pinocchio) being a wooden puppet,” Kahl would remember later. “My God, it was terrible!” He convinced them that they should draw him as a cute little boy first “and worry about the wooden puppet afterwards.” That was exactly what Walt was looking for, and Kahl became one of the leading lights of the studio for the next 37 years, not only as a designer of characters, but as one of the premier draftsmen in the history of animation. But it still wasn’t quite enough. Pinocchio needed a quirky upbeat sidekick to balance out all the larger-than-life villains in the piece. Collodi had created a very minor character in the original, a cricket who briefly advised Pinocchio to do good and was stomped upon for his troubles. Largely thanks to the wacky efforts of the iconoclastic animator Ward Kimball, the cricket was given a name, Jiminy, and a major role in the story. He even wound up singing the song “When You Wish Upon a Star,” which won the Academy Award® for Best Song and in time became the unofficial Disney anthem. Despite its false start, Pinocchio ended as a beautifully realized work and earned universal rave reviews, such as the one from the New York Times , which enthused that “Pinocchio is here at last and every bit as fine as we prayed it would be – if not finer.” Its reputation has only grown over the years, with Leonard Maltin writing in 1973 that “with Pinocchio, Disney reached not only the height of his powers, but the apex of what many critics consider to be the realm of the animated cartoon.” It also helped establish what is considered by many to be the “Golden Age” of Disney animation. Walt had assembled a team that he would jokingly refer to as his “Nine Old Men,” an allusion to Franklin D. Roosevelt’s dismissal of the aging Supreme Court Justices at the time, even though Walt’s animators were in their 20s and 30s when he gave them the nickname. Les Clark, Marc Davis, Ollie Johnston, Milt Kahl, Ward Kimball, Eric Larson, John Lounsbery, Wolfgang “Woolie” Reitherman, and Frank Thomas were instrumental in shaping the Disney style and helping execute it through dozens of films right into the early 1980s. Next up was probably the single most ambitious project in Disney history. It began when Walt decided to give Mickey Mouse’s profile a “boost” with the most elaborate Silly Symphony yet, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice . Superstar conductor Leopold Stokowski offered to conduct the orchestra, and he did just that with a hand-picked group of 100 musicians. However, Walt realized the project was becoming too expensive for the production of a single short, and Stokowski gave him the idea for Fantasia (1940), an entire film of classical music visualized through animation. Adding to the spectacle was the invention and presentation of Fantasound, a stereophonic recording and playback system that made audiences feel they were listening to a live symphony in the confines of a movie theatre. Fantasia was the first American feature film with a stereo soundtrack and received superlative notices, but only made its cost back after decades of increasingly popular re-releases. The looming anxiety of World War II made the next two Disney films, focused on familial and emotional experiences, a much needed respite, their stories of universal humanity told through the perspective of animals. Dumbo (1941), the story of a flying elephant who survives terrible bullying, and Bambi (1942), in which a young deer loses his mother but finds a new life, were both warmly and beautifully made along the creative guidelines that had been established. Dumbo succeeded in the simplicity of its story and in the sincerity of its emotions. Bambi , which was initially intended to be the second animated feature after Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs but had character and stylistic challenges of its own, succeeded through its own simple sincerity and through the visual influence of artist Tyrus Wong, whose ethereal pastel artworks were key in creating the delicate and memorable look of the film itself. Both Dumbo and Bambi would receive excellent notices and be nominated for a total of five Academy Awards®, but, the “Golden Age” came to an end as the Second World War and its dominance of world affairs took precedence. After the war, things would be different on both sides of the screen. Arooj Aftab, Vijay Iyer & Shahzad Ismaily LISTEN NOW https://loveinexile.lnk.to/pre order Cody Fry LISTEN NOW www.codyfry.com Víkingur Ólafsson ON TOUR NOW www.vikingurolafsson.com Samara Joy LISTEN NOW www.samarajoy.com Bruce Liu ON TOUR NOW www.bruce-liu.com Gimeno Conducts Beethoven 5 TICKETS ON SALE NOW www.tso.ca/concerts-and-events Disney Animation: Immersive Experience TICKETS ON SALE NOW https://lighthouseimmersi ve.com/disney/toronto/ Issue 11 – 1NTERSECT1ONS Sign Up to Keep Up ! Our newsletters bring you the best in the visual and performing arts. Exclusive interviews. Global Coverage. Local Perspectives. Substack Medium

5.9 by Camilla Mikolajewska chekhovOS / an experimental game / Concept art for chekhovOS courtesy of Igor Golyak On Sunday, June 20th and Thursday June 24th, Artistic Director Igor Golyak will premiere chekhovOS /an experimental game/ , an interactive online theatre experience. Better yet, it’s a performance that thousands of people can enjoy together from all around the world. Golyak has been a leading innovator of virtual theatre since the start of the pandemic, with his recent production State Vs. Natasha Banina being a Critic’s Pick in The New York Times . chekhovOS /an experimental game/ combines film, theatre, and video game technology together to create a new medium where viewers are able to interact with the performers. We had the opportunity to sit with Golyak to discuss his creative process, working alongside Mikhail Bayshnikov, and the impact virtual theatre has on society today. Inspired by Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard and Chekhov’s letters, chekhovOS accesses the operating system behind Chekhov’s computer and the world in which his characters live in search of happiness. The project was developed in the new and emerging genre of virtual theatre at Arlekin’s Zero Gravity Lab, by an elite group of collaborators, fostered by Golyak himself. The start of this production began when it gained some interest from the Baryshnikov Art Centre. Reflecting on this moment, Golyak recalls that, “we had the pleasure of having Mikhail Baryshnikov at three or four of our shows after which he invited us to present The State vs Natasha at his art centre. That’s where our relationship started. The same with Jessica Hecht, who attended a few of our performances, after which we started speaking and thinking about what we can do together.” From there, Golyak and Hecht got together with a few of their close friends and colleagues for a two-day rehearsal via Zoom, followed by a one-day reading and exploration of Chekhov’s Cherry Orchard . This was when they realized that Chekhov was extremely fitting to the current psychological and physical state we’re all currently experiencing. “It is a sense of loss,” Golyak continues, “the fragility of human life, a sense of life having almost no logic and being taken away from the characters in the play, just like life was being taken from Chekhov while he was writing this play dying from tuberculosis. All of these things are embedded in the play, and although not directly spoken of, it’s what is not being said that is at the forefront of Chekhov’s poetics.” As a result of that reading, they decided it would be interesting to keep exploring these poetics through this digital lens. “We started filming some scenes from the Cherry Orchard and I thought it would be a good idea to share it virtually to many people who may find themselves struggling through the pandemic, and for people to relate to some of these characters from 120 years ago.” The filming process took about a week, including three days of rehearsal and three days of filming. As an end result, the production will include some live elements and some pre-recorded elements. Golyak then had the idea of incorporating Chekhov into the production itself, so he contacted Baryshnikov to ask him for some advice and discuss this project. Baryshnikov jumped on the idea and said he wanted to play the role of Anton Chekhov himself. The remainder of the cast is composed of a wide variety of well known stage and film actors including Jessica Hecht, Mark Nelson, Anna Baryshnikov, Melanie Moore, Nael Nacer, Jeffrey Hayenga, Darya Denisova and Anna Bortnick. A question that arose was what some of the challenges may be for these actors when the audience is absent from the same space? Surely it would be a different experience than performing on stage for a live audience. However, Golyak explains that all of these actors have a lot of experience in film, where you don’t usually have an audience present. He mentions in fact that sometimes the audience helps a production but other times they hurt the production. “We treated this production as a film, and one of the challenges was that they had to trust me completely. I had no idea what was going to happen, I had some drawings of what the space would look like, but they just had to trust me that it was all going to come together in the end. We didn’t do the whole play, only particular scenes, we didn’t have costumes, it was kind of a proof of concept and see what happens with it. Although I had an initial concept page that I later designed, that ended up changing." Golyak explains that the most difficult thing with these actors was that only two of them had seen his productions before, one being The State Vs. Natasha , which was a virtual production. “They just had to be ok with not knowing how anything was going to turn out while working with a director that doesn’t have any film experience. This production is a mixture of film, game, and theatre; so in that sense no one has any experience with mixing these three elements and no one knows how to do it right. I think we got some things right, while others we can keep developing.” Being a virtual production makes chekhovOS a very site specific theatre. According to Golyak, any theatre is always site specific. “Every theatre space has its own energy and pathway of affecting the audience and it’s up to the director to figure out what the best uses of each space are. Virtual theatre is a type of site specific theatre, so there are many advantages of using Zoom as our platform.” Golyak states that the fact that everyone is in the front row is an advantage. “We have a chat function, that you don’t normally have in a theatre, we have backgrounds and I can rearrange the gallery view. We are together from different places, experiencing something together.” In trying to figure out what makes it unique, Golyak raises the question of just how one makes it work. In order to make it work some sort of agency of the audience is needed. An example of this would be considering how virtual theatre is different from Netflix. “Netflix will always be better as it doesn’t have to be live. However, what is the advantage of it being live? The audience needs to have a role, when you’re asked to see something, it’s one thing, if you’re asked to participate, it’s different. While watching this performance, the audience is going to be catching on to points, they’ll be interacting differently, it will be an experience versus being an observation.” So how exactly will the audience be interacting? The audience makes a choice on the order of scenes and they interact directly with a live actor on stage by having their Zoom windows inserted into the virtual space. For example, your face appears in the back of the screen and the actor will ask you questions directly. The audience then makes a choice on how the play continues by deciding on whether we as human kind have changed since Chekhov's time and whether we should. The votes are put inside the game and theatre patrons will be able to use their phones as a remote control. A common misconception with theatre is that it is for a bourgeois crowd, which many of the times it is. Here, however, you are receiving that high level theatre experience for a much cheaper cost. With that, it also opens an entire new market of accessibility. “You don’t need to go to Broadway or spend lots of money, with virtual theatre tickets can be much cheaper, the market is bigger and more people can now enjoy the arts, it’s a lot more accessible. I can get audience members from all different walks of life to have a shared human experience and make connections.” While you may think that your chances of having culturally inspiring evenings are a thing of the past, chekhovOS presents an opportunity to order from your favourite restaurant, put on a nice outfit and tune in for a unique performance. Igor Golyak’s chekhovos /an experimental game/ is the start of a new genre that will continue to thrive and excel well beyond the pandemic.

MINNEAPOLIS — AiR TOUR — Issue 8 Margaret Vergara MINNEAPOLIS — AiR TOUR — Issue 8 "Van Gogh Irises" by Margaret Vergara Margaret Vergara sM | What is the one social issue that your art speaks to the most? MV ── Mental health. I’m very open when talking about my struggles with mental illness and how it shows up quite often in the themes of my work. My work is centered around the theme of exploring the relationship and interaction of joy and pain in the same space. I started painting when I was 8 years old, and while it started as a fun, creative outlet, it eventually became a way for me to transmute my negative emotions into something pleasant and calming. Now my most effective and powerful paintings are the ones where I felt an overwhelming emotion and transformed it into an abstracted landscape. Continue the AiR tour in print: ISSUE 9 | ISSUE 10 Sign Up to K eep Up! Our newsletter brings you the best in the visual and performing arts. Exclusive interviews. Global coverage. Local perspectves. sM | What have you accomplished in your residency? MV ── I’ve done quite a bit of live painting and digital collage-making. Most of my current work is abstract. I tend to create pieces based on the emotional state I’m in, so it’s been a challenge trying to come up with new ideas of what to paint after I’ve exhausted my emotions. I’ve really enjoyed revisiting painting more traditional landscapes, but still finding ways to make it feel like it’s still in-line with my voice as an artist. When I collage, it’s a whole different process where I center play and experimentation. I’ve had a lot of fun creating collages using van Gogh’s work, and I discovered so many pieces I had never seen before during my research and collection phase. sM | What inspiration do you get from artists around you? MV ── I’m very lucky to be a part of Public Functionary’s incubator program, Studio 400, so in my studio practice I’m surrounded by eight other incredible emerging artists. Often I’ll peek in on my studiomates’ work and be inspired to try a new technique or they’ll lead a workshop where I’ll learn new forms of making I had never considered before. We also have conversation labs, so if I’m ever stuck and need ideas on how to move forward, I have folks I can turn to for advice or validation. We uplift each other while building community, and it’s great being around artists with new and exciting perspectives. PREVIOUS NEXT

DECA: Alex Kaplan on Vinyl Gone Viral For this installation of DECA—our inter-issue series inviting artists to curate top-ten lists—Alex Kaplan shares 10 albums she’s excited to hear on vinyl this spring. CANNOPY | Photography by Alex Kaplan ISSUE 15 | FORT LAUDERDALE | ALT.ITUDE Alex Kaplan wanted to find a sense of calm, community, and normalcy in the crazy unknown of March 2020. She took to Instagram, and created @ vinylgoneviral . Over five years later, her community has upwards of 42,000 followers there, and more on TikTok. The premise is simple: almost every day, Kaplan shares what vinyl records she’s spinning, sometimes honouring the anniversary of a release, sometimes highlighting music that suits the season, or just posting a video of the good tunes she’s got on her record player. CANNOPY x Vinyl Gone Viral Kit Tour What was your first record player, and what does your current setup look like currently? AK — I started buying records back in 2016, before I even owned a turntable. I did some research, and soon purchased an Audio-Technica AT-LP120-USB which, in hindsight, was pretty good for a starter table. At the time, I was using my dad’s vintage Sansui 881 receiver from the ‘70s, and secondhand Paradigm speakers from my cousin. My dad has gotten back into listening to records in the last few years, so he’s now using my former setup. I’m now using a Pro-Ject Essential III turntable, a Pro-ject Debut Carbon EVO, and an Andover Audio SpinBase 2 speaker. I’m also using an audio visualizer from Petru Designs. It’s a perfect setup for the small space I’m working with, and it sounds great! Stacks on Stacks How many records do you have? And was there a strategy to amassing your collection? AK ─ According to Discogs, I’m at 528, but I don’t have all of my records logged there, so it may be closer to 550 or so. I pick up albums that I have a personal connection to, whether it’s nostalgic albums from my youth (shoutout '90s and early 2000s!), or albums by bands I’ve seen live before or grew up listening to. I also have quite a few records that were passed down to me from my parents and other relatives’ collections. Sometimes I pick up an album that’s recommended to me by a friend, a record store employee, or online. Two incredible albums that I picked up after discovering them online were Wet Leg’s self-titled album, and Fontaines D.C.’s Romance. I’ve also promoted many records over the last few years via VinylGoneViral, which have contributed to my growing collection. A few times a year, I’ll browse my collection for records I’m not listening to often, and trade them in at my local record shop to make room for some new albums! Just Do You Is there one thing you’d advise people not to do when it comes to collecting records? AK ─ Don’t compare your collection—or your setup—to others’. Everybody started somewhere, and it takes years to grow a collection. Focus on collecting the records that you have a personal connection to, and that make you happy. You don’t have to have 1000 albums in your collection, or a super fancy audiophile system, to be able to enjoy the vinyl experience! Don’t let that hold you back. Fad or Fab? Why do you think Vinyl Gone Viral has gone viral? Where do you think this desire to form community around a format of music storage comes from? AK ─ Music connects people. I’ve been an avid music lover my entire life, and am fortunate to have this platform to connect with like-minded people from around the globe. We live in a digital-dominant world, and I believe that the tangibility of vinyl records really appeals to people—the physical act of digging through crates in a record shop, admiring an album’s sleeve, artwork and liner notes, putting a record on your turntable and flipping it from side A to side B. These days, records come in all sorts of variants—colored, splatter, liquid-filled, picture discs—so there’s an aesthetic appeal as well. Vinyl is a timeless hobby. There’s a reason that it was popular decades ago, and is still relevant today—it’s a medium that all generations can enjoy. I, personally, love listening to records with my parents, and plan to pass on my collection to my own children one day. If you go to a record store, you see people of all ages, and from all walks of life. Vinyl is intentional—when spinning a record, you listen to an album in full, in the order that the artist intended. I stream music as well, but there’s something special about playing an album in its entirety, as opposed to putting on a random playlist. Alex Kaplan’s DECA 1. Elton John and Brandi Carlile – Who Believes in Angels? Elton John may have retired from touring, but he’s far from slowing down. A legend known for his incredible musical collaborations, he’s always working on something new—most recently, by teaming up with the exceptionally talented Brandi Carlile. The album’s Indie Exclusive Pink Spiral Vinyl pressing looks absolutely stunning, and I’ll definitely be adding this one to my collection. 2. Djo – The Crux It was hard to escape Djo’s smash hit, “End of Beginning,” which skyrocketed his music career. Like many, I was surprised to learn that the mastermind behind it was none other than Stranger Things star, Joe Keery! His upcoming album and the lead single, “ Basic Being Basic, ” is packed with electric grooves, synth-driven indie pop, and an impressive falsetto. Count me in! 3. Spin Doctors – Face Full of Cake Alt-rock icons Spin Doctors knocked it out of the park with their debut album, Pocketful of Kryptonite , back in 1991. As a ’90s kid, I grew up on their music, so I was beyond excited to hear they were releasing their first studio album in twelve years. I’m loving the band’s fresh energy, garage-rock vibe, and signature playful lyrics. It’s clear they don’t take themselves too seriously—that’s exactly what makes them so fun to listen to. 4. Gorillaz- Demon Days Live from the Apollo Theater I love going to concerts, so a live album is the next best thing. I haven’t had the chance to see Gorillaz live yet, so I’m hoping to grab this Record Store Day exclusive, and bring the concert experience to my living room. Early 2000s music holds a special place in my heart, and Demon Days is undeniably one of the best albums of its time. It’s hard to believe it’s turning twenty this year! 5. Joywave – How Do You Feel Now? (10th Anniversary Edition) This is easily the Record Store Day release I’m most excited about. I first saw Joywave at a music festival in 2017, and have been hooked ever since. Their music defies genres, blending electronica, indie rock, and pop in a way that’s completely captivating. I dare you to listen to “Tongues” and not be intrigued. Celebrating the album’s 10th anniversary, this special edition includes bonus tracks and comes pressed on gorgeous yellow and blue vinyl. With only 3,000 copies available worldwide, I’ll definitely be lining up early at my local indie record store to grab one. 6. Tunde Adebimpe - Thee Black Boltz Best known as a founding member and co-lead vocalist of indie rock band TV on the Radio, Tunde Adebimpe is finally releasing his long-awaited debut solo album. The lead singles “ Magnetic” and “ Drop” are instantly catchy, highlighting Adebimpe’s distinctive musical style. From what I’ve heard so far, the sound takes a different direction from TVotR, yet remains close enough in spirit that I think longtime fans will be on board. 7. Mayday Parade – Sweet This year, Mayday Parade celebrates twenty years of pop-punk, with a legacy that’s still going strong in 2025. For me, it all started with their 2009 hit “Kids in Love,” which was on repeat through my high school and college years. Sweet is the first installment of a three-part album and comes pressed on a vibrant bubblegum-pink vinyl. This release not only showcases their signature heartfelt lyrics, but also highlights how the band has evolved over the past two decades. 8. Sunflower Bean - Mortal Primetime Sunflower Bean is a band I stumbled upon a few years ago while crate digging at my local record shop. I found their 2018 album, Twentytwo in Blue, and was instantly drawn to its Fleetwood Mac-inspired sound. Mortal Primetime marks their first self-produced album, and I can already tell it’ll be a staple in my spring listening rotation. Fun fact: the band used the alias “ Champagne Taste ” (the title of their first single off the album) to play secret shows in their hometown of New York while testing out new material. 9. The Head and the Heart – Aperture I first discovered indie-folk band The Head and the Heart through their 2016 hit “All We Ever Knew”, and have been a fan ever since. Their sixth studio album, Aperture , brings the band back to their roots in a beautiful way. The album centers around camaraderie, with every member having contributed to the songwriting process. The blue ember vinyl pressing complements the album’s artwork perfectly: this is one I’ll be picking up for sure. 10. The Doobie Brothers – Walk This Road For over five decades, The Doobie Brothers have been a household name, and their relevance endures today. I’ve been lucky enough to see them live and, of course, have several of their albums in my record collection. It’s therefore no surprise that I’m eagerly anticipating the release of their new album this June. Walk This Road marks the return of band member Michael McDonald, and carries powerful themes of recovery, enlightenment, hope, and togetherness.

Yolanda Bruno’s Dear Jeanne Yolanda Bruno INTERVIEW ─ On gut strings, gratitude, and the enduring generosity of Jeanne Lamon Words by Nolan Kehler | Illustration by Dane Thibeault ISSUE 16 | TORONTO | ENSEMBLE Most mornings of the week, I start my day with a cup of coffee, an incandescent lamp in the corner of my radio studio, and Jeanne Lamon. Because of laws regulating the music that we can broadcast (at least 30% of the music in a given time period must be Canadian content, known colloquially as CanCon), we hear a lot of the luminaries that have moulded the national classical music scene over the past three decades. Many of these recordings were made in the 1990s to early 2000s, especially when it comes to recordings of larger ensembles such as the Montreal Symphony Orchestra or the now-defunct CBC orchestras. In an age where large-scale works from the Western classical canon are becoming increasingly less viable in Canada, the recordings made by Jeanne Lamon and her Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra stand as a rich legacy of performances. That legacy resonates through my studio headphones each morning as I listen to the ensemble’s sensitive and nuanced renditions of the Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos , Marin Marais’ Alcyone , and Vivaldi’s Four Seasons , their warmth welcoming in each sunrise. Over the course of Lamon’s three-decade-plus tenure as the music director of Tafelmusik, the ensemble’s performances in turn imbued her 1759 Santo Serafin violin with its own richness and resonance—a physical archive of the ensemble’s sound and of period-informed performance echoing across centuries. Indeed, Lamon configured the instrument to serve as the most faithful vessel for these sounds, attuned to the sensibilities of musicians whose artistry predated hers by nearly three centuries. After Lamon’s untimely passing in 2021, the Canadian classical music scene was quick to cement her legacy. Many of Tafelmusik’s performances these days take place in Jeanne Lamon Hall, part of the Trinity St. Paul’s United Church complex on Bloor Street West. But what becomes of her musical legacy? In a very literal sense, that has passed into the hands of Yolanda Bruno. With the blessing of Lamon’s partner, cellist Christina Mahler, Lamon’s former student has picked up her Santo Serafin for a tribute called Dear Jeanne . Alongside Mahler, violinist Julia Wedman and longtime Tafelmusik harpsichordist Charlotte Nediger, one gets the sense that even though it’s not a large ensemble recording, the legacy that Lamon built is championed in a superbly humble way by those who knew her and worked with her. L: Yolanda Bruno (by Curtis Perry); R: Jeanne Lamon The listener feels an understated expertise from Bruno and Wedman right from the start with the opening notes of Jean-Marie Leclair’s Sonata for Two Violins in D major, op. 3, no. 6 . At 415Hz (the timbre within which period-informed performances take place, a half-tone lower than modern tuning), there’s a distinct warmth to the opening movement’s simple triads, chords that resonate across the centuries. Everyone is welcomed into the celebration, and every note adds, even the dissonances that give the movement its character. Conversations abound in the allegro, the violins trading phrases that recall the spirited energy Lamon once drew from the Santo Serafin. There is space in the sonata for grief – a brief yet necessary moment of mourning in the – before the performers invite us back into celebration with the final movement. Here, Leclair’s roots as a dancer shine through, and the players perform with a distinctly Canadian energy—almost as though the sounds of Lyon are mixed with a kitchen party. A longtime member of Toronto’s classical music fabric at institutions like the Glenn Gould School and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Bruno’s versatility and knowledge shine through on this recording, with ample care given to doing justice to the legacy of her former teacher. She shares a beautiful solo rendition of the largo movement from J.S. Bach’s third violin sonata - perhaps a little extra weight than one might anticipate, but the result is not unpleasant, but rather, insistent. The crown jewel of Dear Jeanne is undoubtedly the ciaccona from Bach’s Partita no. 2 in D minor . An arrangement created by Lamon before her passing, this piece is a supreme example of the utilitarian legacy of the musical arrangements that Bach himself employed in Leipzig for his collegium gatherings. Each member of the ensemble lends themselves wholly to the performance, with special mention to be made of the syncopations brought out by Wedman and the driving nature of Mahler’s cello acting as an engine throughout, grounding and encouraging the other players. Mahler’s drive is also present on the final track, Vivaldi’s “La Follia” trio sonata, with Nediger enhancing the madness of the piece’s nature with dazzling colour, all highlighting the distinct Venetian character that is the Santo Serafin violin. Dear Jeanne is an assurance of the continuation and stewardship of a legacy of sustainability, repertoire and humanity, and will no doubt be an excellent accompaniment to incandescently-lit, warm, coffee-soaked mornings.

Static Channel Static Channel by Talia Ricci The Audio-Visual Collective on Building Immersive Cymatic Landscapes WORDS BY MILES FORRESTER | VALENCIA / ESPOO | MUSIC NOV 14, 2022 | ISSUE 9 Joining smART Magazine from Espoo, Finland, and Valencia, Spain, Monika Hauck and Alex Ricci are the two halves of the performing duo Static Channel. I first experienced them playing shows in makeshift venues across Toronto. Using cymatics (visual representations of sound waves) induced by Alex’s groove-heavy bass, Monika would manipulate and project a swirling vat of pigments, immersing the room in rumbling colour. They are an act a fan can follow, adding new sounds and visual implements to each performance and installation. Over the pandemic, they’ve taken time to develop their upcoming multimedia project Levadas , a meditation over distance, memory, and place. sM | What new forms of expression do you find interesting in this trend towards combining visual art and music in performance? AR ─ I mean, some people even talk about what venues should smell like. The stuff that I’m into is exploring the convergence of these two fields in such a way that it doesn’t even necessarily seem like music anymore; it seems like something that you can’t quite define. One thing that’s really inspired me here [in Valencia] is this festival called Volumens, which a few of my professors are involved in. In particular, Professor Marta Verde had a really cool collaboration with another artist, José Venditti, called Omen . He was playing saxophone over his modular synth music and she was doing modular visuals—affecting it with gestures and video feedback. That element of the human — making little mistakes, little variations, little choices in the moment — I think that’s what other humans want to see in a performance. MH ─ Since we started our project in 2015, there’s been increasing demand for musical artists to have visual components. During the pandemic, seeing how artists and promoters are adapting performances has been really inspiring. Particularly in Toronto, Wavelength Music has been doing variety shows, increasing the potential for audience interaction. Right now, there are so many tools available for artists. It’s also a supersaturated time for people’s attention. There’s higher tolerance for watching performances in alternative formats. By the same token, not every performer can conform to a virtual format. We took our time during the pandemic to focus on other things, thinking about what it means to be in a room with people performing. I’ve always been interested in bringing forward installation elements and thinking about shows more as sharing space and creating an atmosphere, as opposed to a performer-and-audience dynamic.

Kate Lorenz Kate Lorenz by Kalya Ramu Executive Director of Hyde Park Art Center WORDS BY MADELEINE KANE | TORONTO | VISUAL ARTS APR 11, 2023 | ISSUE 6 For Kate Lorenz and her team at Hyde Park Art Center, the transformation that began in 2020 has inspired tremendous generosity. From granting more than $560,000 to emerging artists, to creating accessible online classes–they are seeking to revive Chicago’s art-scene, one project at a time. The Hyde Park Art Center has always been recognized as a welcoming communal space for artists and activists alike. Lorenz joins smART Magazine to discuss her organization’s mission on diversity, inclusion, curation, and their plan for community outreach.