Heracles would have approved of the performances of the lyrically sensitive Lawrence Wiliford and the playful Suzie LeBlanc in the final concert of the Vancouver Early Music festival.

The young German group offered an ideal interpretation of Beethoven's third “Razumovsky” quartet, which begins with celestial tuning, swims in pools of unearthly beauty, and ends with a near-dissonant cavalry charge.

The young and energetic group set the bar high with a program featuring the world premiere of String Quartet No. 2 by Okanagan-based composer Imant Raminsh.

Music in the Hall of Mirrors: Entertaining the Duke of Mantua

Grupo de Canto Coral

The American mezzo-soprano may live in Paris, but her heart remains in Washington, D.C. The lucky Vancouver opera fans at her Festival Vancouver show on August 5 will hear a singer at the height of her considerable vocal powers.

It’s tempting to look for political intent in Constantinople’s choice of singer, but the group’s founder, Kiya Tabassian, says there isn’t any. Yes, he and his fellow instrumentalists were born in Iran, their vocalist of choice is Jewish, and religious tensions in the Middle East are at an all-time high. But, as Tabassian explains, the Quebec-based early-music ensemble is working with Françoise Atlan for musical reasons rather than to make any particular socio-political point.

On the line from Buenos Aires, Adrián Iaies confesses that our chat is his first-ever interview in English. But the Argentine pianist, whose trio makes its Vancouver debut at the Norman Rothstein Theatre on Friday (August 8), is warm and witty despite the language barrier, and his vigorous and imaginative modern jazz needs little translation.

As someone who glides easily between classical, world-music, and jazz settings, Sal Ferreras knows plenty of African players on the Canadian scene. But he was particularly struck by recent encounters with Guinean-born dancer and choreographer N’Nato Camara.

Brazil has long been a cornucopia of great guitarists. But even in the context of bossa nova, choro, and Afro-samba greats, Yamandú Costa stands out. Familiar to Brazilian musicians as a brilliant technician and an innovative melder of styles on the seven-string classical instrument unique to his part of the world, the 28-year-old was virtually unknown elsewhere until a couple of years ago.

To the untrained eye, the swan-bone fragment recovered during an archaeological dig at a 10th-century German castle might have been nothing more than kitchen refuse from the days when lords and ladies dined on roast cygnet. Someone noticed, however, that this bone had been modified, and someone else deduced that it had been used as a flute, and in time this news reached a craftsman in Boston, Massachusetts, who undertook to reproduce the ancient instrument.

The 31st Annual Vancouver Folk Festival was another great weekend of local and international musical artists. Check out some photos we've received and upload any of your own that you'd like to share.

Kris Klaasen makes no bones about the fact that when he joined the Vancouver Folk Music Festival board in 2005, the venerable organization was in trouble.

Some musicians are said to have sold their soul at a lonely crossroads in order to play the blues. Markus James had a gentler initiation: he was on his way to nursery school in Washington, DC, when he first encountered the music that’s become one of his two great loves.

Abigail Washburn didn’t set out to become a musician, but one thing led to another—and that’s led to a brilliant, if unconventional, career for the banjo player and singer.