By Ruth Tecle A group of Ottawa-based stand-up comedians is trying to grow the local comedy scene by hearing from underrepresented members of their community. To that end, they have created the Ottawa Comedy Community Facebook group. It began in May, started by comics who decided performers need
The #metoo movement is sweeping through the international arts world and now a legendary conductor has been accused of sexual harassment. In an Associated Press story out of San Francisco, three opera singers and a musician have accused Charles Dutoit, who led the Orchestre Symphonique de
The No. 2 person at the National Gallery of Canada is packing his bags and returning to his European home. Paul Lang, the gallery’s deputy director and chief curator since 2011, will leave Ottawa March 16 to fill a position in Strasbourg, France. As of April
Old chestnuts, new creations, sleigh bells and choirs, an international virtuoso, even a carol singalong to two — NACO’s sold-out Christmas concert on Wednesday had something for every music lover on Santa’s Nice list. The biggest gift under the tree was the Canadian premiere of
A century ago, Tom Thomson's body was found floating in Canoe Lake in Algonquin Park. The mystery surrounding his death remains unsolved. Was he murdered or did he die by misadventure. No doubt the debate will continue for another century. But Thomson's legacy as a painter
When it comes to building a music career, you need a musical community. Just ask Wallis Giunta. The striking mezzo-soprano from Ottawa has made her way in the opera world on the strength of a musical family home, the help of a great teacher and a
What began as a journalist's idea of a social experiment in the Washington D.C. subway system has become so much more. When the Washington Post writer Gene Weingarten suggested to the superstar American violinist Joshua Bell that he busk at a metro station in 2007, Bell
Anyone who thinks the private house concert is a new invention should think again. In fact, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was doing them 250 years ago in Vienna. One of his patrons, Baron Gottfried van Swieten, a wealthy diplomat and amateur musician, regularly arranged private performances of Baroque
The irony of Ebenezer Scrooge’s blindness to his own past isn’t lost on Bruce Horak. That’s because Horak, who plays The Ghost of Christmas Past in the National Arts Centre stage adaptation of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, is himself visually impaired. Scrooge, as you’ll recall, has
On Friday night, a handful of die-hard piano fans braved the elements and frigid windchill for the opening concert of the 2017-18 Masters Piano Recital Series at Southminster United. Mid-December is a late start for this excellent three-year-old series, one of several organized by hardworking
