The 2013 Toronto Jazz Festival descends on the city this Friday with a huge “free for all” event. That means all of Friday’s programming at every Jazz Festival venue is, yes, completely free of charge. There will be concerts from local favourites Molly Johnson and Mary Margaret O’Hara, plus a show by Smokey Robinson and Martha Reeves, who will be launching the fest from its epicentre, Nathan Phillips Square.

Here’s a rundown of some of the shows worth checking out on Friday—and during the rest of the festival, when you’ll actually have to pay.

Folks who are planning on having a swim in the pool at Scadding Court Community Centre over the next few days may find themselves a little disappointed. Those who want to go fishing, however, will probably be ecstatic.

For the rest of the week, the Community Centre will be holding its annual Gone Fishin’ event, meaning its indoor pool will be an indoor fish pond. The pool has been drained, dechlorinated, and refilled with 2,000 rainbow trout, to be caught by local children and families.

The truth behind the tales people tell about Toronto.

In 1964, when Raymond Moriyama received the commission to design what was then known as the Centennial Museum of Science and Technology, the young architect told the Star, “I think it’s important to give every building the personal touch.”

When it came to the first big project of his fledgling career, he meant this literally. Rumour has it that he actually built his name into the museum’s roof.

At the time, Moriyama’s star was still rising. He had already created buzz with his design for the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre on Wynford Drive.

Prior to the cultural centre, Moriyama’s most recognized public commission had been the Garden Pavilion at Edwards Gardens. The Centennial Museum of Science and Technology—which we now know as the Ontario Science Centre—would turn out to be a milestone in his career. Soon the architect would be receiving accolades for the designs of many now-iconic structures around the city, the country, and, eventually, the globe.

Perched atop the Don Valley, the Science Centre consists of three linked structures. Moriyama’s design envisioned patrons entering a grand temple-like hall, crossing a 70-metre, glass-enclosed bridge connected to a trillium-inspired Tower Building. From there, patrons would descend to the Valley Building on a series of escalators.

In September 1969, after a delay of two years, the Science Centre opened to rave reviews. At the same time, word began to spread that Moriyama had surreptitiously imprinted his name on the roof of the Valley Building. At roof level, however, nothing was visible. Had Moriyama included his name in some inconspicuous location?

Nothing could have been further from the truth.

Moriyama had actually incorporated the four Hiragana characters of his surname into the roof surface itself. He accomplished this by using various hues of roofing aggregate.

Aerial photograph of Valley Building in 1970 showing Raymond Moriyama’s original roof design. Image courtesy of the City of Toronto Archives.

Like crop circles, the arrangement was only visible from the air, or from the rim of the valley. You can see it in the image above. (The characters are written abstractly, in the lighter areas.)

In an email to Torontoist, the self-effacing Moriyama said the goal of the clandestine undertaking was to prove it was possible to break up the monotony of a flat roof without additional spending. The design was reminiscent of Bonseki, the Japanese art of creating miniature landscapes using sand and rocks. The unique creation was also a nod to the ancient Tibetan art of sand painting.

Aside from enhancing the visual aspect of an otherwise plain roof, Moriyama told us he also wanted to rouse the curiosity of those who would eventually discover this enigma.

“My intention was to…provoke a question or two. What does it mean? Who was the culprit?”

Shown a Google Earth image of the rooftop today, the renowned architect was disappointed to discover alterations to his original design have erased all traces of the Hiragana characters.

Alterations to other parts of the Valley Building—including the addition of unsightly steel cladding—go a long way toward destroying Moriyama’s overall vision for the squat building.

“Some parts of the roof now look bland, even boring,” Moriyama wrote.

Aerial photos show the rooftop design lasting until around 1988. After this it fades considerably. Between 1990 and 1991 it vanished completely. Of the numerous buildings Moriyama later designed, the Science Centre rooftop was the only structure on which he accomplished this unique feat.

Asked about the one-of-a-kind detail, Science Centre director of communications Anna Relyea told Torontoist, “The markings…are long gone, having not been repeated when the roof was redone.”

Additional material from the November 26, 1964 edition of the Toronto Star.

Photo by Edward Brown/Torontoist.

Despite being part of the official curriculum for schools in Ontario, music education is becoming increasingly marginalized because of budget cuts. Music Monday, an annual initiative of the Coalition of Music Education, highlights the importance of music education for young Canadians through a simultaneous concert that reaches across the country. This year, it even reaches into space, thanks to Canadian astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield.

Music Monday, now in its ninth year, focuses on the importance of music. “We celebrate the galvanizing power of music and how that’s rooted in our schools,” said Holly Nimmons, executive director of the Coalition for Music Education.

Each year for the past nine, the coalition—in partnership with CBC Music and, this year, the Canadian Space Agency—commissions an original song by a well-known Canadian artist, and that piece becomes the official song for Music Monday. The song is available online, in various translations, and Canadians can learn it in advance of the day and create their own arrangements. On Music Monday, young Canadians perform a simultaneous concert of the song across the country.

A Collection of Chris Hadfield’s Pictures of Toronto From Space

This year’s partnership features Ed Robertson of the Barenaked Ladies. Commander Hadfield, will be participating from his post on the International Space Station.

Starting at 12 p.m. EDT on Monday, May 6, a live feed from the International Space Station will be broadcast at the Ontario Science Centrelive webcast, go to the Ontario Science Centre to participate with others who will be performing the song along with Hadfield, or learn the official song and perform along themselves at home or school.

Along with being an astronaut, Hadfield is a musician who has said that music helps him be better at his job. Nimmons hopes his partnership with Music Monday will highlight music education’s wide-ranging benefits. “Learning music is not a frill,” she said, “it’s an essential component of a well-rounded education.” There’s research that supports this notion.

Hadfield’s participation in Music Monday this year highlights the natural pairing of music and science, Nimmons said. “It’s such a remarkable way to teach other subjects.”

CORRECTION: 11:59 AM A quote that appeared in this article was originally mistranscribed. Holly Nimmons told us that “learning music is not a frill.” Our apologies for the error.

An image of Toronto as seen from the International Space Station, taken by Commander Chris Hadfield on January 19.

Look up in the sky! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s—it’s, well, it’s the sky. And tonight, people around the world are getting together to celebrate everything that’s in it, as part of Yuri’s Night.

Named after Yuri Gagarin, the Russian astronaut, Yuri’s Night is a evening devoted to celebrating accomplishments in space. It happens on April 12, which, this year, is the 52nd anniversary of the day Gagarin became the first human to orbit the Earth. The occasion is observed in places as diverse as Toronto (of course), Afghanistan, Antarctica, and even the International Space Station. In total, 60 countries will participate this year.

Party headquarters in Toronto will be Hotel Ocho, where there will be 1960s-themed cocktails, a Lego spaceship competition, lectures from space experts, space stand-up, and, naturally, space tunes. (Maybe they’ll play the recent duet between BNL’s Ed Robertson and Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield?) Tickets are $20 each, and can be purchased on the event’s website.

With all this fanfare over space exploration, we decided to see what other intergalactic/planetary action is happening right here in Toronto, throughout the year.

For starters, all three of Toronto’s major newspapers are out of this world. We’ve got the Sun, the Star, and the Globe (which more or less confirms that Toronto is the centre of the universe).

The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada is based in Toronto. Founded in 1868, it’s the largest astronomy society in Canada, and it has plenty of events going on, including trips to Algonquin Provincial Park for stargazing in September. It hosts monthly Dark Sky Star Parties and Clear Sky Star Parties, weather dependent.

Toronto has several planetariums and observatories, all of which are accessible to the public:

• The University of Toronto’s small planetarium does shows on the third Tuesday of every month for $5 (the next one is on April 18). There are also free tours the first Thursday of every month.
• York University has free viewing sessions at its observatory, as well as online viewing sessions and a radio show.
• Of course, the Ontario Science Centre not only has a planetarium, but a whole wing all about space.
• Up in Richmond Hill is the David Dunlap Observatory, the largest Canadian optical telescope in its class. It hosts viewings and lectures.

There are other planetariums and observatories that aren’t in use:

• The Royal Ontario Museum’s McLaughlin Planetarium closed in 1995 because of budget cuts.
• The University of Toronto’s Student Union building, just a few blocks from the ROM, is in what used to be the Toronto Magnetic and Meteorological Observatory. It was built back in 1840 and is considered the “birthplace of Canadian astronomy and the country’s oldest scientific institution.”

In May, Dr. John Percy will give a tour of Toronto’s astronomical heritage as part of Doors Open. If you can’t make it, he has another talk in June.

Think you’re cut out for NASA? Next weekend, the ROM hosts the NASA International Space Apps Challenge, which is a weekend hack-a-thon where teams complete NASA-designed challenges to do really, really complex space-science things. It’s free to participate, and teams from around the world are competing.

Looking for a crash course in astronomy? The Ontario Science Centre and RASC periodically offer an eight-week program for astronomy novices. It’s called NOVA.

At the end of May, the first-ever Canadian Astronomy Telescope Show hits Oakville. But if you can’t wait, you can head over to Khan Scope Centre, on Dufferin Street just south of the 401. (Its website points out that it is “located directly across from Aren’t We Naughty, and you cannot miss that!” No telescope necessary.)

Ever wonder what Canadians eat in space? Maple syrup cream cookies! We bet they taste great with astronaut ice cream.

If you’d like to visit space yourself, head over to the Intergalactic Travel Authority, on Bloor Street West. Grab yourself a planet-themed espresso drink to prepare for take off, before hopping through the space portal. Blast off!

CORRECTION: 3:53 PM This post originally identified Canada’s largest astronomy society as the Royal Canadian Aerospace Society; it is actually named the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. It also misspelled the name of the Dunlap Observatory.

Game On 2.0
Ontario Science Centre (770 Don Mills Road)
March 9 to September 2
$13-$22

By following the lure of the siren’s 8-bit chiptune song into the deepest bowels of the Ontario Science Centre, you’ll find your way to a place that may house a substantial part of your childhood.

If you can recall long, caffeine-fueled nights spent racing around Mario Kart tracks with friends, or epic battles with end bosses that finally culminated—after many frustrating hours—in gratifying triumph, then Game On 2.0, the OSC’s latest exhibition, is most definitely for you. The memorabilia and more than 150 playable games on hand would be enough to cause almost anyone to lose track of time. It’s all intended to convey a sense of the history of video games, as well as a peek at what future games may be like.

“We are about to explore a world that has changed the hard-wiring of our brains,” Ontario Science Centre CEO Lesley Lewis said to reporters at a media preview on Thursday. This idea is reinforced when walking through the exhibit’s first room, where a collection of primitive pinball machines and the grounbreaking Atari game Pong have been installed at the start of a long corridor with rows of increasingly modern games. This entire chronological progression is at your disposal to play as you will—from Computer Space, the first commercial arcade game produced, to the most cutting-edge in motion-capture technology.

Aside from all the nostalgic stuff, there’s helpful information about benchmark innovations that will serve as history lessons for those too young to know where Playstations came from. The efforts of pioneers like Ralph Baer, Nolan Bushnell, and Gunpei Yokoi are documented in detail, complete with a fascinating look at how the aesthetics of video game systems have changed over time.

The collection is staggering in its breadth, featuring some of the most popular games ever created and cult classics alike. Sections of rooms are dedicated to different genres. One of the most welcome features is that many of the stations have multiplayer capabilities, making the presence of party titles like GoldenEye, Super Smash Bros., and four different Street Fighter games (on four different consoles, no less) all the more exciting. Anyone who has sought out older games by downloading emulators will enjoy the opportunity to use the original controllers for consoles like the Neo-Geo or Sega Dreamcast.

Aside from the games themselves, there are also displays that deal with gaming culture. Hung on the walls are magazine covers, posters of movies adapted from games, and artwork showcasing popular characters like Sonic The Hedgehog, Pac-Man, and Super Mario (including original drawings by Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto). Elsewhere, there are plastic figurines of characters, including a life-size mannequin of everyone’s favourite tomb raider, Lara Croft.

The exhibition’s look at the future of gaming is best exemplified by the Virtusphere, a metal ball resembling something that would be pushed around by an American Gladiator. Inside is the latest in virtual reality technology. Visitors can climb inside, strap on a visor and walk around (the sphere spins in place). It’s not for the weak of stomach, but there’s an undeniable thrill in shooting hostile pumpkins. Or, if you don’t mind being the one waving your arms around wildly for all to see, you can always dispose of them using a meat cleaver or even, yes, a tea kettle.

Perhaps the true future of the industry, though, lies more in the exhibition’s partnership with triOS College as the presenting sponsor. The school’s president, Stuart Bentley, used the moment to remind reporters that the game industry is bigger than the movie business now. With the advent of indie games—which the exhibition covers—the next great game could come from any student.

Video games have come a long way, and a new generation of the initiated is ready to take it from here.

Circus! The Exhibition
Ontario Science Centre (770 Don Mills Road)
May 9–September 3
Free with admission ($20 adult/$16 student)

The Ontario Science Centre wants you to run away and join the circus. Or, at very least, explore the science of it. Today marks the opening of “Circus! The Exhibition,” which combines math, physics, and anatomy to educate visitors about both the illusion and the reality of circus arts.

While really more suited to the child with us than the child within us, adults too can have a good time exploring the 20 interactive exhibits. Donna Francis, a researcher and programmer with the Ontario Science Centre, says there’s something for everyone.

“For example, if you want to find out if you have what it takes to be a circus performer, there are things that you can try to learn about the key elements that make a tightrope walker successful,” Francis explains. “Being able to try this is pretty much a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing.”

According to Francis, mastering the high wire is all about balance, and a lot of practice. Your centre of balance must be over the wire and stay steady, and tightrope walkers must rely on their vision, hearing, and feet to get the feedback necessary to maintain that.

The high wire at the exhibit is made of the same material that circus performers walk across, and while the physical experience is very real, so is the safety. A harness ensures that your inner daredevil can be safely let loose while you live out your circus-joining fantasy. At just nine feet off the ground, it is unlikely that anything catastrophic could occur, but it is easy to get swept up in the spirit of the danger by gazing out the plate-glass window overlooking the Don River. Now it seems a little higher.

For those who prefer something a bit closer to the ground, a 20×20-inch contortionist’s box allows for a taste of the circus life without the heart palpitations. That is, unless you’re claustrophobic. An attempt to squeeze into the small space allows visitors to explore the art of packanatomicalization (fitting your body into very small spaces) and test their muscle flexibility and the elasticity of their collagen fibres.

The exhibition was developed, designed, and fabricated on-site by staff of the Ontario Science Centre, and has travelled to science centres, museums, and institutions throughout North America since its creation in 2001. It will be here throughout the summer.

Placemaking tells the stories behind the buildings that define the GTA, beyond the downtown core.

Photo by {a href=http://www.flickr.com/photos/trevorh/463586304/sizes/z/in/photostream/}Trevor Haldenby{/a} from the {a href=http://www.flickr.com/groups/torontoist/}Torontoist Flickr Pool{/a}.

Typewritten on six carefully preserved sheets of Ontario Science Centre letterhead is a press release dated September 27, 1969. “Using a Quasar radio signal from the far reaches of space coupled with a laser beam,” it says, “Ontario Premier John Robarts today officially opened the new $30 million Ontario Science Centre in Don Mills.” Two months after humans had set first footprints on the moon, Ontario was getting its own taste of space-age excitement. Robarts predicted that the complex would have more impact during the century to come than any other single project undertaken in Canada at the time.

While talk of building a science centre began as early as 1961, planning began in earnest three years later, when architect Raymond Moriyama was recruited to design the space, which he envisioned as a cluster of three connected buildings set to mimic the curves of the Don River ravine behind it. It was decided that the centre would open as a part of Toronto’s 1967 celebrations of the Canadian Centennial. Its name would be the Centennial Centre of Science and Technology.

But the Centennial tie-in was not to be. As Minister of Tourism and Information James A.C. Auld would note in his statement at the centre’s official opening, two years later than had been planned:

I have lived intimately with the Science Centre for more than five years—I might say five difficult years of conception and creation, five years of invention and, to me personally, years of some emotion, for nothing seemed to come with real ease. Yet I can only regard them as five years of satisfaction because of what we have today.

Photo by {a href=http://www.flickr.com/photos/casmium/}casmium{/a} from the {a href=http://www.flickr.com/groups/torontoist/}Torontoist Flickr Pool{/a}.

“What we have today” was one of the first interactive science museums in all of North America. And, of course, there was also the previously-mentioned Quasar signal, received by a radio telescope at the National Research Council at Lake Traverse and transmitted to the centre via Ottawa “through a special landline and microwave hookup” at the moment of opening. This was, for the time, a glimpse into the future.

But, amidst the hubbub surrounding Quasars and pioneering exhibition models was the site itself: 20 acres of densely-wooded ravine land flanked by the 180-acre Ernest Thompson Seton park, deemed “a perfect compliment” to the “mind-catching” exhibits within the centre. As the opening’s exuberant—and oh-so-lengthy—press release would proclaim: “Outdoor and indoor patios and rest areas provide a welcome break from the physical and mental demands of the exhibit halls.”

Either in spite of this nature-touting romanticism or as a result of it, the buildings themselves ended up as streamlined edifices of textured concrete—an “attractive and practical finish,” as the opening’s promotional notes would attest, that would compliment the centre’s rustic surroundings. Escalators connecting the two main buildings appear to “flow down the side of [the site's] 90-foot hill” like a modern architectural waterfall—a vision fit for lasers, Quasars, and trees alike.

Correction, March 7, 2012: The opening of the Ontario Science Centre occurred two months after the moon landing, not two months before. The correction has been made.

Before sending things to space, roboticists play with LEGO.

Robots sure do get around these days. They star in Bjork’s music videos, steal people’s jobs, vacuum, and haunt our dreams. It’s a classic “rapidly expanding field,” robotics is, with applications cropping up in more and more spheres from health care to household chores, manufacturing to space exploration. And though we’ve known the robots were coming for some time now, are we truly ready for them?

The Ontario Science Centre is doing its part. Over the weekend, the centre held its annual Robots Rule! event, bringing together local robots and their makers for an afternoon of inspiration and education (in a fun way). Since the year 2000, the Science Centre has been developing its robotics programs and events in preparation for what program coordinator Blair Clarkson says is essentially the impending robot invasion. “[Robotics] is increasingly important not just in all fields of science and technology but also in many, many more areas of people’s everyday lives, yet most still think robotics is too complex and that they’ll never be able to understand it,” Clarkson told us.

If there is only one thing we at Torontoist were clever enough to understand about robots at this event, it was this: start small. Before building the terrorbots of tomorrow (or, more likely, the Next-Generation Canadarm to perform orbit servicing like refuelling or repair of satellites), the roboticists we talked to started out with LEGO. Or Meccano. Or remote control cars.

First year students in U of T's robotics club a sumo robot.

“Kids are really good at getting the basic concepts. And then if they build a small, simple project, they gain the confidence, and it makes it easier to gradually move on to more and more complicated things,” says Paul Giambuzzi, who was there with the University of Toronto Robotics Association. He recommends kids get involved in these programs early, through summer camps and school programs.

Giambuzzi’s not the only one saying the sooner the better for kids and robots. Inspiring young minds is one of the major tenets of the FIRST robotics programs, one of the groups with demos and teams representing at the event. FIRST takes the LEGO training technique to heart, offering robotics programs—built around the brightly coloured Danish building blocks—in schools and communities for children as young as six. After graduating from the LEGO league, FIRST offers a robotics competition for high schoolers, with two FIRST teams also on hand for the demonstrations. The LEGO robots were LEGO sized, but by the time the high school program kicks in, the robots are growing faster than the kids. When fully extended, the robot that Oakville Trafalgar High School’s FIRST team put together was taller than any of the students (or parents).

In addition to the established robot lovers, a lot of the audience for the robot demos were kids and families who had just been spending a leisurely Sunday at the Science Centre seeing an IMAX movie or the da Vinci exhibit and happened upon the Robots Rule event—strategically set up right beside the gift shop. Rehman Merali, an aerospace engineering graduate student at U of T, says he was taken aback by how pumped the kids were to see the robots, and by the “really intelligent questions” they asked. He adds that despite the stereotype about boys and robots, the girls were just as into it. Andrew D’Souza was almost foiled on two separate attempts to demonstrate how his S.I.G.H.T.–equipped wheelchair can recognize faces and autonomously follow people (provided they don’t make any sharp turns) because kids kept jumping in the path of the chair to stare quizzically at the controls.

It’s that sort of early exposure that got D’Souza, a computer science graduate student at Ryerson, interested in the process of robotics and computing. “It’s about seeing what’s possible. One of the bigger problems is you don’t know what you can do or you don’t know what’s out there.” He points to a demo on the other side of the room in which a robot has to be programmed to follow a line. “As trivial as it sounds, actually sitting down and figuring out how to follow a line is huge. And a course like [robotics] teaches you how to think on that sort of level. Along with talking with classmates and encouraging teachers.”

And it was evident from the day’s events that great teams, great mentors, and starting small can spark a robot invasion. Or, you know, inspire a team of enthusiastic scientists and engineers to build some eminently practical robotic application that greatly improves humanity and is not scary at all.

So bow to the children, robot overlords of the future.

Photos by Dave Battersby.

Psychadelic rockers Dead Meadow play an in-store at Sonic Boom this afternoon, and a show tonight at Lee's Palace. Photo from the band's website.

DISCUSSION: With advances in technology—both hardware and software, particularly when it comes to social media—museums and public learning centres are under pressure to adapt and innovate. A panel of experts from the Art Gallery of Ontario, Ontario Science Centre, and Royal Ontario Museum will discuss how new technology is changing their institutions and others around the world, at The Social, Mobile, New Museum: Harnessing New Technologies in the Museum World, a panel discussion open to the public. Royal Ontario Museum (100 Queen’s Park), 3:30 p.m., FREE.

MUSIC: It’s appropriate that heavy rockers Dead Meadow are coming to town the week before Halloween; after all, the psychadelic outfit initially bonded in the DC grunge scene over their shared appreciation for fantasy author J.R.R. Tolkien and horror master H.P. Lovecraft. They’re playing Lee’s Palace tonight with the Black Angels and Spindrift, but first they’ll play an in-store set at Sonic Boom (782 Bathurst Street), 4 p.m., FREE.

TALK: Two Canadian entertainment veterans share their experiences in “the biz” on stage tonight, though the first talk, Kim Cattrall’s In Conversation With… at the Tiff Bell Lightbox (350 King Street West, 7 p.m., $18.75) is sold out. The other event with SCTV alum and comedy legend Eugene Levy, Conversations On The Green with Ralph Benmergui, still had a limited number of tickets available at press time, though they were going fast. St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts Jane Mallett Theatre (27 Front Street East), 7:30 p.m., $36.

IFOA: The weather is cold and miserable, so it’s time to let new books light up your world! The Harbourfront’s annual International Festival of Authors “brings together the best writers of contemporary world literature” and runs from October 19–30. Check out our preview of IFOA 2011 to strike the perfect balance between meeting your authorly idols and discovering new literary loves.

Urban Planner is Torontoist‘s guide to what’s on in Toronto, published every weekday morning, and in a weekend edition Friday afternoons. If you have an event you’d like considered, email all of its details—as well as images, if you’ve got any—to events@torontoist.com.

CORRECTION: DECEMBER 10, 2010, 2:54 PM This article originally mistakenly said that the “Missing Unicorn” posters were tied to the Ontario Science Centre’s Mythic Creatures exhibit, which had used unicorns as a marketing stunt in October. But the poster is actually the work of New York artist Camomile Hixon, as @felinefrauline pointed out to us. Reached this afternoon by phone, the Ontario Science Centre’s Anna Relyea confirmed to Torontoist that the posters weren’t theirs—but, she noted, “there are a lot of people that like unicorns.”