The Toronto Traveler

Don’t let the casual look on the face of my friend to the left fool you; the Plaza Flamingo establishment is one of the hottest tickets in downtown Toronto.  It’s not exactly a nightclub, a dance hall or a restaurant, but it has elements of all three. 
Rather than forcing you to walk from place to place in order to get the full entertainment that you want your evening to have, the Plaza Flamingo provides it all.  Here’s just a small overview of the different things that you can do and have done when you dine at the Plaza …read more

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Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons, published under the GNUFDL
One of the things that continue to make Toronto an excellent place to visit is the city’s excellent musical tradition.  There are literally dozens of different musical groups that perform around the city all the time and while I don’t have the time to cover all of them here on The Toronto Traveler, I do try to get to the ones that I think will be of particular interest to you the readers.  This one is the Windermere String Quartet which happens to be just one of the many different smaller musical groups …read more

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Photo Credit: Pink Martini by Ryan Harveyon Flickr
Once referred to by The New Yorker as being “Beautiful and sophisticated,” the Pink Martini band has been touring all around North America with their interesting blend of musical styles and part of that tour includes a stop in Toronto at Massey Hall.  Pink Martini can be lovingly called an ultra-chic orchestra and they can play everything from a Cuban rumba all the way to a Hollywood musical and everything in between as well.  Listening to them is always a good time.
Details
Event: Pink Martini at Massey Hall
Cost: $30 – $50
Date: March 15, 2008
Time: …read more

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Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons, published under the GNUFDL
Looking for a good place in Toronto to find some music being played?  Well, here are some venues in Toronto that are dedicated solely to music or alternatively that host music events on a fairly regular basis:
1) The Air Canada Centre
2) Exhibition Place
3) The Four Seasons Centre
4) The Harbourfront Centre
5) The Sony Centre for the Arts
6) Massey Hall
7) The Phoenix Concert Theatre
The Rogers Centre
9) Roy Thomson Hall
10) The Toronto Centre for the Arts

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Photo Credit: Massey Hall by hobvias sudoneighm on Flickr
Many people have undoubtedly heard of Finger Eleven already, especially if you happen to be into the alternative rock genre of music.  Even if you’re not and you’re looking to expand your horizons a bit, the musical performance of Finger Eleven that’s coming up tomorrow is a pretty good way to do that.  They’re an all-Canadian band as well, which perhaps adds to the flavour of the performance for people that are viewing it from out of country.
Details
Event: Finger Eleven at Massey Hall
Date: March 8, 2008
Time: 8 PM
Cost: ~$35
Location: Massey Hall, 178 …read more

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One of the reasons that Toronto is such a great place to visit is that there are a lot of events that go on within the city that are free to attend.  Another reason that Toronto is such a great place to visit is that the culture of the city gives way to musical, artistic and theatrical presentations of great works that have a little flavour of the city in them as well.  These two things combine in the Noon Hour Choir event which will commemorate its 11th annual free recital at Roy Thomson Hall on Thursday.
Details
Event: 11th Annual FREE …read more

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Three great composers will be finding their place downtown in what is going to be one of the best concert events to be put on this year in Toronto.
Mozart

Mozart has a number of distinctions as a composer, not least of which is his ability to be consistently prolific throughout his whole life.  He actually put out over 600 different compositional works throughout his lifetime and many of them are still considered classics today, showing how influential he was in his classical compositional skin.
At one point in the year 1783, Mozart and his wife had stopped over in the town of …read more

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Mozart is an 18th century composer that was responsible for the creation of many well known and easily recognizable pieces, although of course some of them have been parodied to the extent that you might not initially realize that they were composed by him.  He’s also probably one of my favourite composers, which is quite naturally why I decided to blog about this upcoming event .
The Toronto Symphony Orchestra is going to be kicking off their Mozart Festival at Roy Thomson Hall through the performance of Symphony Number 40 by Mozart, with one of Canada’s best soprano opera singers …read more

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Aaron Davis is a composer and a keyboardist that has lots of years of experience in both of those fields as they relate to jazz blues and a person that can currently be seen regularly playing and arranging music for the singer Holly Cole.  Suzie Vinnick is a blues singer that has won a number of awards for her great talents and is also someone that has been credited with writing some of her own songs as well as playing some musical accompaniment on different instrumental recordings.
Together, the two of them are going to sound terrific and it is in …read more

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Whenever the holiday season is in full swing in Toronto you can expect one of the big parts of the holiday celebrations to be based on music.  Many of the schools in Toronto have music programs and many of those music programs have their annual concerts around this time.
One of the concerts that is going to happen on Sunday is a concert by the St. Michael’s Boys Choir with musical accompaniment to a concert that they are calling Christmas in Vienna.  This combines new world enthusiasm with old world charm in order to create a concert experience that few are …read more

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