If you’re a pyrophobe, tonight might be the night to face your fear.
Carnivalissima — Harbourfront Centre’s multicultural grande fete — will have enough fire on hand to make every marshmallow in Toronto run screaming into the night.
It’s called FireWalk: Fire dancers. Fire eaters. Giant puppets. And, according the the Luminato publicity sheet, “the glimmering lights of a thousand lanterns.”
Bring some SPF 30. The event begins as soon as Mr. Sun goes below the horizon.
Categories: art · carnivalissima · harbourfront
In our ongoing quest to overbook your weekend, the Luminato Blog presents the schedule for the Harbourfront Centre’s Toronto Star Stage at Carnivalissima this weekend:
The Dirty Dozen Brass Band is one of the truly quintessential acts of our times. They’ve been the crown jewel of New Orleans music for 30 years and have thrilled audiences all over the world. (June 8, 9:30 p.m.)
COBA (Collective of Black Artists) performs Danse Belé a theatrical representation of the history of Caribbean Indigenous Folk dances from Trinidad and Tobago. They weave dance, spoken word, music, drumming, chants and period costumes to transport the audience through the life and times of plantation slaves. (June 9, 6:30 p.m.)
Olodum is a world-renowned cultural group of carnival ambassadors based in Bahia, Brazil. They have been performing since 1979 and are widely credited with developing the music style known as samba-reggae and for their active participation in Carnival each year. (June 9, 9:30 p.m.)
Machel Montano HD is the undisputed Soca King of Trinidad and Tobago who is edging his name among the elite in the music industry. Machel and his band HD have been the premier Soca band in the Caribbean for more than a decade and have established themselves as the leading draw at major events in New York City, Miami, Toronto, London and throughout the Caribbean. (June 10, 4:00 p.m.)
Categories: carnivalissima · harbourfront · music
So, here’s what we imagine the situation to be: You’ve got kids. You want to have a good time at Luminato absorbing some art and culture, but the kids tend to get squirmy when you take them to see opera or modern dance recitals. You’d take them to Speigeltent’ntavern, but you know that nobody ever won Parent of the Year for taking their kids to a burlesque show. Where’s a family to go?
We at the Luminato Blog feel your pain, and we’ve got an easy answer: Carnivalissima. It’s a celebration of the diversity and creativity of Toronto’s vastly multicultural population, featuring concerts, art, film, fashion, dance, jazz, international crafts and cuisine… we’re getting out of breath just listing it all.
Here’s the full schedule:
Masquerade Ball: June 8, 8 p.m., Carnivalissima Tent
The Masquerade Ball will start with a call to dance by Maracatu Nunca Antes and continue with music by Jay Douglas and the All Stars and dance lessons by Miko Sobreira and Company. Performances in the Venetian tradition will occur featuring commedia del’arte by MetaPhysical Theatre. Amazing fashion competitions and two fashion shows created by Len D. Henry of Fashcam Productions take place.
Carnival: The Spirit and the Soul: All Weekend, Marilyn Brewer Community Space
An exciting new art exhibition curated by Theodoro Dragoneri will examine tradition based on more contemporary aspects of the uses of theatrical narrative and masking. This three-part exhibition will include masks, photography and mixed media from Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas.
FireWalk: June 9, after dusk, Congo Square
When day turns to night, Carnivalissima ignites the Toronto waterfront with spectacles of swirling fire dancers, daring fire-eaters, majestic stilt performers, mythical giant puppets, and the glimmering lights of a thousand lanterns! Join in a dance procession of shadow and light and follow the sound of Samba, Steel Pan and Tassa Drums through Harbourfront Centre’s transformed boardwalk and streets.
Family Programming: June 9 & 10, Topsy Turvy Territory and Kid’s Hands-On Tent
A two-day carnival arts and crafts extravaganza will take place by the waterfront. Children of all ages, family and friends are invited to create dazzling carnival masks and costumes, bamboo and paper lanterns, and musical instruments from all over the world. Jump up and dance along to the beat of live steel-pan orchestras, chutney Soca, African drums, stilt-dancers, and hoop-dancers all performed by professional youth artists. Special dance workshops, mask theatre performances, aerial dance performances, and the aroma of live food demonstrations from the master chefs of Pier 4 Restaurant and Radisson Hotel will ignite the carnival spirit in kids and adults alike.
Carnivalissima happens entirely at the Harbourfront Centre.
Categories: art · carnivalissima · dance · film · food · harbourfront · music
This weekend Luminato is providing boatloads of free entertainment. And of course, plenty of photo opportunities. So make sure your camera’s memory card is as empty as your wallet, and head to either the Distillery District or Harbourfront Centre. Here are just a few of the things you’ll catch:
Canadian Idol Eva Avila getting a makeover. Head to the Distillery’s Fermenting Center at about 7 p.m. Friday night. Free makeovers will also be available to the public.
The Grand Masquerade Ball. Mysterious costumes. Mardi Gras beads. Tarot card readings. All at the Harbourfront Centre, starting at 8 p.m. Friday.
New Orleans is back, and it kicks. It would be enough for us to say that swamp-music master Buckwheat Zydeco is appearing at Harbourfront Centre Friday night. You’d say “Buckwheat Zydeco? Where do I get tickets to that?” (You don’t. It’s free.) But we’re feeling good, so we’ll let you know that The Dirty Dozen Brass Band is also going to be there. Put on your dancing pants — bands appear at 8 p.m. and 9:30, respectively.
Don’t forget — if you’re at either the Distillery or the Harbourfront, and you need to get to whichever of those places you’re not, take L’Art Boat — it runs back and forth between the two locations all day.
Categories: distillery · harbourfront · international · music
Go ahead, indulge your inner moth: Walk toward the light.
The light — those flashing, swooping searchlights you see at the southern end of downtown Toronto — is Pulse Front, the world’s largest interactive light sculpture. When you get there, you might be surprised. This weekend, Harbourfront Centre (the place Pulse Front calls home) will also host Carnivalissima, a celebration of the many separate and distinct world cultures that have made second homes in Toronto.
Today’s Luminato Podcast documents the reactions of people to seeing their biorhythms projected onto the night sky.
Categories: art · harbourfront · music · podcast · pulsefront
The following passage regarding Spiegeltent’ntavern was taken from the Rear Admiral’s journals, discovered in the possession of a thief in a Marrakesh opium den:
5 June, The Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Five and Twain
Not since my great-uncle Lord Thaddeus Hammerbotham, Royal Man of Science, created a mechanical-man composed of naught but a wax storefront-mannequin and an ape’s brain suspended in a mason-jar of men’s hair-pomade, have I seen such a pleasing sight as the gentleladies and comely house-boys of the Speigeltent’ntavern, a burlesque and circus attraction here in the City of To-ron-to, in Her Majesty’s Dominion of Canada.
Would but that I had eyes circling my head like a stone-crab or a house-fly, I would be able to take in the myriad of foreign wonders that surrounded me! Statuesque cigarette-girls strode through the night-time gas-light as it filtered through the stained-glass windows of the tavern, offering tobacco and confections. On the stage, a lovely young lass (named, I recall, Mina LaFleur — such a name!), removed garment after garment, revealing her be-tasselled bosom and a waist of a mere twenty-one inches. Later, an acrobat of the Greek Isles elicited gasps from an appreciative crowd as she suspended herself from the ceiling-beams with only a gossamer strip of silken-fabric as support. And the ale! Oh, how the ale did flow, like rivers in der Schwarzwald of the Empire of Germania!
I have taken a tramp steam-ship to the Orient and danced the Tarantella with the Queen of Siam. I have hunted the dodo and the marsupial-wolf on the veldt of Africa. I have been crowned King of the Hoboes while riding a locomotive across the plains of America. But never have I seen such a sight as this!
Speigeltent’ntavern runs nightly at the Harbourfront Centre until June 8, then again on June 10.
Categories: comedy · dance · harbourfront · music · speigentent'ntavern · theater
Joe White and Sandy Sayres saw the lights of Pulse Front and moved inexorably toward them, like moths to… well, to a light.
Just like they moved inexorably toward Ontario. They recently came to the Great White North from the United States just a few months ago, when White took a job transfer. Luminato is one of their first experiences as soon-to-be-Canadian citizens.
“We just moved here from western Massachusetts,” said White. “the closest thing the States have to a Canadian province.”
Tonight they had dinner, then came to the Harbourfront Centre to play with the lights of Pulse Front. Later on in the week they’ll check out Leonard Cohen’s Drawn to Words.
“I was like: Wow. This is just unbelievable. We should be here every day of the week. That’s my plan.”
Categories: art · harbourfront · pulsefront
Pulse Front: Relational Architecture 12 is a matrix of searchlights located at Harbourfront Centre; look toward the CN Tower from anywhere in the city after dusk and you’ll see the swooping and blinking skylights. Each light is connected to a sensor that, when grasped, reads the user’s pulse and flashes the light accordingly.
Monday night, as they waited for Hawksley Workman to begin his set, Jayme Selazek and Jaime Williams play around at one of the lights. Neither knew about Luminato beforehand; they walked to Harbourfront Centre for ice cream, and stayed for the festivities. Selazek held onto the sensors, and Williams watched the sky.
“My heart is kind of going fast,” Selazek said.
“Yeah,” replied Williams. “I think you might have a little heart murmur there.”
“Well,” said Selazek, “as long as I’m alive, that’s OK. I can deal with a murmur or two,”
Categories: art · harbourfront · music · pulsefront
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