Oscar Peterson passes at 82. The great jazz musician was a Canadian hero and he did many amazing things, including spending the twilight of his career essentially playing jazz piano one-handed and doing it better than most people who had use of both their hands. Police catch 12-fingered man. Moral: if you have extra fingers, do not try to assault people. It's kind of a dead giveaway. Pope Benedict urges Catholics to "set aside time"......

Primate cloning a success. No, we don't have cloned monkeys yet, but we do have cloned monkey stem cells, which could in turn be used to generate human-compatible monkey organs. Man, it's fun just to type the word "monkey." Monkey. City to revamp Union Station. The plans involve teleporters, a spaceship landing port, monkeys, and geothermal power syst... What do you mean, "they're only going to build a mini-mall in the basement?" What the......

The late Paul Haines’ Secret Carnival Workers was launched at the end of last month, the occasion marked with a concert by his daughter, Emily (his other daughter is television journalist Avery Haines). Torontoist has been mulling over the book, comprised of poetry, fiction, jazz journalism and album liner notes, since then. This is not a book to be devoured quickly. It can be dense at times, but also immensely rewarding and full of......

Photo by Carrie Musgrave. After a brief hiatus due to NxNE and Bonnaroo, Live Baby Live is back! You're excited, aren't you? Don't deny it. As always, lots of recently announced shows. Interestingly, you'll notice that all of the horse bands will be through town over the next few months. We wonder what animal trend will be next? Not only that, but The Black Lips and Bloc Party must really love Toronto, since both......

Beginning Friday and running until July 1st, the TD Canada Trust Toronto Jazz Festival is smoothly bringing over 60 swingin' musicians to play in venues all across town in what apparently is Canada's best jazz festival. Take that, Montreal! So, catch up on some free music downtown at Nathan Phillips Square, or go chill at joints like The Rex and Lolita's Lust, open with an extended liquor license until 4 a.m. (which Torontoist thinks......

We're a little late with this week's music listing--blame the election! Er, okay, maybe someone just got immersed in learning a bit of Flash and let it slip. It won't happen again. If you're looking for some local flavour, you've got a few really good choices this week, including Melissa McClelland, Ohbijou, Elliott Brood, and the Great Lake Swimmers. All highly recommended, particularly Melissa--her voice is like honey. On the not-so-local side, Axl Rose......

If you read last week's Now you'll know all about cover girl Elizabeth Shepherd and her trio's recent swinging set at The Jazz Cafe in London. Now back on home turf, Elizabeth brings her amazing voice, killer chops and strong compositional skills for a set to celebrate the release of her debut album, Start To Move, at The Supermarket tonight, accompanied but of course by her trio. Tickets are $10 and the doors open......

A day late this week, but when you see the crazy number of new shows recently announced, you’ll understand why. With so much variety, there should be something for everyone coming up in the next month or so. Due to the large number of show listings, there will be no links this week (hey, it takes a LONG time to link up this stuff, my friends). As always, if there’s something we’ve missed and......

We're sooo confused by the actions of the Toronto Port Authority that we don't even know whether Jazz's decision not to resume service into the Island Airport is a good or bad thing anymore. All we know is that Jazz, which has used the Island Airport for over 16 years, has been denied service by the TPA. Nonetheless the TPA is still allowing Porter Air to start its raccoon-inspired service in the fall. We don't......

City election officials are having a hard time figuring out whether lots of people on the voting list are actually eligible to vote. This may have a direct affect on municipal campaign financing. Toronto Sun columnist Sue-Ann Levy can't spell Siemens but does uncover that TTC comissioners actually voted for an open bidding process for buying new subway cars. Somewhere along the line this was ignored in favour of the deal with Bombardier. The city......

There are a number of shows rolling through Toronto this week. If you're jonesing for some live music, here are a few shows that still have tickets available: July 25 Ozzfest (System of a Down, Disturbed, etc.) @ Molson Amphitheatre, $39.50-75.00 - No Ozzy. Wha?! July 26 ** The Futureheads w/ Tapes 'n Tapes @ The Phoenix, $15 Mission of Burma w/ Republic of Safety @ Horseshoe Tavern, $18.50 July 26-30 Beaches Jazz Festival......

This sounds like a potential teen flick, if it already hasn't been made. Four teenage girls case out and rob a west-end clothing boutique, the youngest of them is only 13. Hmmm, it seems that the city is only getting 14 days of public play out of the new lakefront stadium despite the huge amount of public funding going into the project. Seems like a rip-off to us. Jazz's announcement that it would restart service......

The City wants to allow you to add more items to your recycling bin. Proposals are in the works to allow polystyrene, spiral containers (ie. frozen juice concentrate cans) and even plastic bags. The problem is that the city's recycling capacity is maxed out and the City is desperately looking for more cash to increase capacity. Ok, which of you are hoarding green Steamwhistle bottles? The popular brewery is experiencing a bottle shortage and wants......

As a grand finale for the Toronto Downtown Jazz Festival, the Dave Brubeck Quartet performed an incredible set last night at Massey Hall. Although the group of four could have been called Dave Brubeck and the Geriatrics, these jazz cats were tighter than David Bowie's pants in Labyrinth. 85-year-old Brubeck was absolutely amazing. With Bobby Militello on alto sax/flute, Michael Moore on double bass (no, not THAT Michael Moore), and Randy Jones on drums, the......

Legendary musician Etta James brought her soulful voice to the Hummingbird Centre last night, as part of the Downtown Toronto Jazz Festival. The festival runs until July 2nd, so there's still time to catch plenty of great acts.......

Influential hip-hop artists De La Soul kept fans on their feet at Harbourfront Centre Friday night, as part of the Downtown Jazz Festival. They had one of the most engaged crowds I've seen at a concert in quite some time, and one only has to watch these guys perform to know why. Catch De La Soul in action if you have the chance.......

It's great when the Jazz Fest finally rolls around because it helps Torontoist justify paying all those banking fees. There are so many good shows that it'll be hard to catch them all, but hopefully this list will help you find your jazz beat. Aside from the acts listed below, music at 49 different venues around the city and the millions of tourist dollars the festival brings into the city, you can catch late......

Hey Toronto! Today is the launch event for the first ever Humanitas Festival, "A festival of what was, is and could be Toronto". Starting at 6pm at the Cooler By The Lake Tent at the foot of Yonge Street, at the water’s edge, you can come on down and Join Mayor David Miller, City of Toronto Poet Laureate Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, NOW Magazine’s Alice Klein and CBC Radio One 99.1 host Garvia Bailey......

SFist commeters pose for before and aftershocks when the mayor commemorates a 1906 earthquake...at 4:30 in the morning. A hot tip on the Chronicle vending machines comes in and the SFist war correspondent risks life and limb to post this dispatch from the frontlines. Houstonist announces their new Cops spinoff "World's Funniest Tazer Videos" and the possible cancellation of their pervs' "World's Grossest Bathroom Videos" and PBS trains cams on cows at, uhg, Mootube. Also,......

There are several concerts taking place this week to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich. Tonight at Roy Thomson Hall, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra (TSO) led by debuting conductor Stefan Sanderling will perform Shostakovich’s Piano Concerto No. 1 followed by Symphony No. 8 as part of the Shostakovich Remembered Festival. The featured performers for the evening are Alexander Toradze on piano and Andrew McCandless on trumpet. If you......

At right: The new CIBC Lobby in Accolade East is lovely...so why can't we stop thinking "red rum!"? Full disclosure: Torontoist is a former Yorkie, having graduated from the Fine Arts department several years ago with all the requisite loving hatred. But our curiousity about the Fine Arts department's brand spanking new Accolade Project overcame our lingering bitterness (not to mention our longtime dread of the 96A bus - at least it doesn't go along......

Like anyone else, Torontoist can't help but be occasionally overwhelmed by the traumatic events in other areas of the world. This week is obviously one of those occasions. Our thoughts are in Louisiana. DCist has copious links and information on Katrina relief efforts. We'll post a comprehensive list of Ist posts and information shortly. In Canada, efforts are underway across the country to send relief to New Orleans. Celine has donated $1 million to the......

What's a summer in the city without the Jazz Fest? Torontoist confidante Paolo has absolutely no answer to that question. He can, however, provide some details as to how this year's Fest went down. Here's his reportage: The Toronto Beaches International Jazz Festival once again closed down Queen St. East for three days over the weekend. Live bands were playing at every street corner. Thousands of people were dancing in the streets. And roasted corn......

Incongruous things are afoot in this town. Parking tickets are down and Ralph Benmergui is up! It must be Spring! Here are the links: - Gene Wilder will be interviewed by Jazz FM nasal nebbish Ralph Benmergui on Tuesday. Wilder's new book is Kiss Me Like a Stranger, and he'll tout it at the Bloor Cinema tomorrow at 8. - Parking ticket totals will go down this year, and Toronto Police Supt. Gary Ellis says......

We at the Torontoist would like to apologize for how repetitive our basketball reports are becoming. As sorry as we are, though, it appears that nothing is changing. Our “beloved” Dino’s lost yet another game Sunday afternoon, this time to Shaq-fu and the Miami Heat. It was the Raps seventh straight loss since they beat the same Heat in south Florida late last November. With games against T-wolves, Pacers, Nets, Rockets, Jazz, Suns, Lakers and......