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Urban Planner: May 24, 2011
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 [email protected].
Sarah Slean joins the Art of Time Ensemble in paying tribute to some big names in the history of music. Photo by Andrew MacNaughton.
Toronto’s Tuesday includes a talk from the City’s exiting arts advisor, the spring launch from those literary ruffians at BookThug, a tribute to some classic artists by Sarah Slean, and an ambitious new improv project from the National Theatre of the World.
TALK: Jeff Melanson barely had time to settle into his position as Mayor Rob Ford’s special advisor on arts and culture before he up and announced he was heading west to assume the mantle of CEO of the Banff Centre. Granted, it’s pretty understandable why anyone would jump ship to live in the paradise that is Banff, but the decision has left plenty of anxious artists wringing their hands over who will represent their voice down at City Hall. Hopefully Melanson will shed some light on that particular issue, as well as many others pertaining to the state of Canada’s art scene under its new majority government, at his LRC Presents discussion this evening. In case you can’t make it, the event will be webcast by TVO’s Big Ideas. Gardiner Museum (111 Queens Park), 7 p.m., FREE.
WORDS: The creative folks at BookThug will be presenting a promising new crop of poets and authors at their Spring Launch tonight, including Stephen Cain and Clelia Scala’s book of alternative nursery rhymes I Can Say Interpellation and a reprinting of Erin Moure’s collection of computer generated lesbian sex poems Pillage Laud. The Thugs have also teased about an exciting mystery guest… Supermarket (268 Augusta Avenue), 7:30 p.m., FREE.
MUSIC: The Art of Time Ensemble have proved musical and theatrical innovators over their twelve seasons. Tonight is the fifth installment of their Songbook Series, this time featuring Sarah Slean paying homage to such classical greats as Kurt Weill, Jacques Brel, and Leonard Cohen. The performance will also feature a new instrumental suite by composer Jonathan Goldsman, commissioned by the Ensemble. Enwave Theatre (231 Queens Quay West), 8 p.m., $25–$59.
COMEDY: The National Theatre of the World have invited ten playwrights to pen the first two pages of new scripts, which they will use as the foundation for improvised plays as The Script Tease Project. Watch them run with ideas spun by such storysmiths as John Patrick Shanley and Woody Harrelson for the next six days, including tonight’s kickoff show begun by Governor General Award-winning Judith Thompson. We don’t want to say it’s going to be hilarious, but the members of NTOW have been feeling pretty confident. Theatre Passe Muraille (16 Ryerson Avenue), 8 p.m., $20 regular, $15 students.