Plum Reading
Welcome to the latest edition of Plum Reading, my weekly roundup of arts and culture to view online.
Here are this week’s picks. Happy viewing!
I was lucky enough to see the Crow’s Theatre production of Ghost Quartet last year and it was fabulous! It’s a kind of ghost story fable that entertains you with tales of Edgar Allan Poe, Thelonious Monk and a lot of whiskey! Thankfully, Soho’s new Boulevard theatre filmed it and has made it available for home viewing. Pour yourself a drink and enjoy!
Carrying on the music theme, I firmly believe that jazz makes everything. It just does. There is no point in arguing about this! And, well, amongst the greats is, of course, Miles Davis. His music was recently celebrated and brought to life by another great, Wynton Marsalis and Jazz at Lincoln Center. This concert is just what is needed to end the week.
While we can’t plan an evening at the ballet, we can still enjoy the gorgeous talent of the National Ballet of Canada with their online series, Ballet Moments. Here, we get to see snippets of past performances including Romeo and Juliet, Giselle and Angels’ Atlas, choregraphed by the amazing Crystal Pite.
The National Arts Centre is helping us get our arts fix with an incredible schedule of performances, taking place daily. #CanadaPerforms, a partnership with Facebook, livestreams a wide variety of performing arts, spotlighting new and known artists from across Canada for a digital only experience.
The National Theatre School of Canada (NTS), which has trained some of Canada’s most beloved actors, is not going to let Covid-19 stop them from once again highlighting the country’s brightest new talent. The school recently launched Art Apart, an initiative that provides support to emerging theatre artists, professional artists, and the artist community during the coronavirus crisis. 100 emerging artists were selected and have received $750 grants to present a piece of art online. This is a brilliant initiative that provides much-needed assistance to artists and gives us the opportunity to enjoy and appreciate their incredible pieces of work.
While all are worth watching, I’d like to recommend Trapped, an immigrant story that describes itself as a call for hope to our society. Particularly fitting for this week.
The plays and exhibition are all available to watch for free.
And, an ask: While we’re enjoying these wonderful performances, let’s remember that for the arts organizations producing this incredible content, this is their livelihood; not a hobby. If we can, now is our time to continue to support our incredible arts community!