Beautiful Feet

NORTH AMERICAN PREMIERE ENGLISH LANGUAGE PREMIERE Music is the only thing that matters in the life of celebrated concert pianist Liv Stein. When her son Henri dies, she gives it all up - the piano, her career, her marriage, herself. But the unexpected visit of a young promising piano student claiming to have shared Henri's last couple of years forces Liv to face past demons she is trying to forget. A mysterious pact is made that seems to reawaken Liv's will to Liv... Canadian Stage Artistic and General Director Matthew Jocelyn directs this suspenseful and exquisitely crafted drama by one of the most prodigious young voices in new German theatre. " Liv Stein  is a unique and unexpected examination of the relationship between truth and happiness. If something makes us happy, does it have to be true? In a moment when our fundamental relationship to truth is being challenged, this work provokes the audience to consider the shades of grey in what we think of as black and wh...

Photo courtesy of http://bridgerecords.com/products/9466 Zachary Wadsworth (composer) - The Far West         Lawrence Wiliford (tenor); Luminous Voices; Timothy Shantz (dir.)     Bridge Records  9466       bridgerecords.com I’m submitting a briefer version of this for publication in the CD review section of a music magazine later this month but I wanted to expand on my necessarily truncated comments there. I was given The Far West to review: it’s a modern cantata for tenor, choir and instruments, written by the crazy-young Zachary Wadsworth , an American composer who’s already internationally known and respected. This work won the 2016 Choral Canada’s Outstanding Choral Competition Award. Recently, I reviewed the stunning Trinity Requiem by Robert Moran, and its poignancy has kept me going back to it. The Far West is going to be on my shelf of favourites, too. Tracks 1 a...

©Vanessa Wells, 2014 All rights reserved. I spent the day deliberating about posting a personal commentary here, which I rarely do. And maybe that's part of my problem. I've been feeling depleted lately (physically, spiritually, emotionally) and this has been complicated by feelings of grief for which I still haven't attained "closure." The best info I have seen on this topic is that it's not linear, it's very individual in its course, and it doesn't make any damn sense. I have come to accept that. But there are moments—and they tend to hit me in the early morning—when I am hit by grief like a Mack truck. This is both unexpected and really annoying. I tend to be a morning person (that is, I don't want to actually talk to anyone in the morning; I just have all my energy and optimistic outlook for the day then), and then wham , I'm crying. Backtrack: I'm a child without a real sibling [skip that story]. My dad died ten years ago. H...