// Workshops
Ashkenaz Parade Band Tune-Up
Wednesday August 29, 6-7pm, 918 Bathurst Centre, FREE
Monday September 3, 11am-12pm, South Orchard Tent, FREE
Calling all musicians! The Ashkenaz Parade band welcomes instrumentalists of every ability to be part of the Festival’s signature event. Working with Parade band leader Christian Dawid, participants will learn the tunes and the musical choreography to accompany the Ashkenaz Parade around the Harbourfront Centre site at 4pm on September 3.
Masterclass: Parade Production
Tuesday August 21, 6-9pm
Thursday August 23, 6-9pm
Tuesday August 28, 6-9pm
918 Bathurst, 918 Bathurst St • $25
Since the first Ashkenaz festival in 1995, Shadowland Theatre artists Anne Barber and Brad Harley have created the festival’s largest work of art involving hundreds of community participants. This processional performance will travel around Harbourfront Centre and adjacent Queens Quay locations on Monday, September 3, 2012 in the afternoon. The 2012 parade will be based on folkloric characters, superstitions, and stories from Jewish and Yiddish culture – with a radical new twist. The 2012 Festival Parade Masterclass offers a fun and dynamic experience for enthusiastic and creative people of all ages!
PAPERCUTTING WORKSHOP
Monday September 3, 5-7pm, South Orchard Tent, FREE
Last summer, Toronto-based friends of Ashkenaz Kosa Kolektiv had the opportunity to take part in a papercutting workshop at the Jewish Cultural Festival in Krakow, Poland. Combining techniques from the workshop in Krakow and their own process and style, Kosa brings this unique workshop for the first time to the 2012 Ashkenaz Festival.
Paper cutting is a traditional folk art used by many cultural communities, including Jewish, Polish, Mexican and Chinese. The craft of papercutting is used by many contemporary artists today and is accessible to all skill levels and ages. It’s a great and simple art form that yields beautiful results. Come share in the joy and the technique, meet like-minded craftspeople and enjoy some creative downtime before the big Festival Finale at 7pm.
For more info about kosa kolectiv please go to kosakolektiv.com
Masterclass: Fellowship of the Strings
Masterclasses: (all in Miss Lou’s Room, Harbourfront Centre)
Saturday, September 1, 4pm-6pm*
Sunday, September 2, 10am-12pm
Monday, September 3, 10am-12pm
Performance:
Monday, September 3, 6pm-7pm, Redpath Stage
$30
Before wind and brass instruments began appearing in klezmer ensembles of the late 19th and early 20th century, klezmer music was performed almost exclusively by fidl kapelyes (string orchestras) that featured all members of the violin family, the tsimbl (similar to a hammer dulcimer) and the poyk (percussion). Aiming to recreate the sound of these classic European klezmer ensembles, the Fellowship of the Strings Masterclass is a unique group of professional and amateur musicians assembled for the 2012 Ashkenaz Festival. This ensemble, under the expert tutelage of Veretski Pass, will learn Jewish, Ukrainian and Moldavian tunes known in the Carpathian mountain town of Cookie’s father, Nizhni Veretski, taught and refined with all three members, Cookie, Stu and Josh circulating around the participants, showing the fine points of creating heterophonic melody lines, specific harmonic dissonances, bass lines, fills, turnarounds and cadential variations that make the old style uniquely energetic. The ensemble will work with improvisation in the old style, isolating motivic cells and varying them immediately through the “Simon Says” method. Participants will learn the function of melodies and their accompaniments, ornamentation and variation, culminating in a multi-level suite.
