Movies of War

1 of 1 2 of 1 Get the best of Vancouver in your inbox, every Tuesday and Thursday. Sign up for our free newsletter.SUBA TrioMarch 13 @ Chan Centre for the Performing ArtsWhat do you get when a four-time Grammy nominee from Cuba, a Senegalese kora master, and an Afro-Venezuelan percussionist get together? The answer, in this case, is SUBA Trio: a collaboration between Omar Sosa, Seckou Keita, and Gustavo Ovalles that celebrates African musical traditions as they have been filtered through different diasporas and genres. The trio take fusion to its adventurous extremes, mixing jazz, improvisation, and soul to create a transcendent experience.Sonic Boom Festival of New MusicMarch 20-21 @ Firehall Arts CentreVancouver Pro Musica is putting on this festival, but it’s not just the 604 that gets the spotlight. Across two days, the Sonic Boom Festival of New Music will highlight composers from across B.C., presenting a cavalcade of world premieres. Expect to hear 18 new pieces, demonstrating that our province’s musical landscape is as lush and varied as our physical topography.Brahms X RadioheadMarch 21 @ OrpheumIt sounds like an Edgar Allan Poe riddle: how is Radiohead’s OK Computer like Johannes Brahms’ first symphony? That, seemingly, is what composer Steve Hackman wanted to find out. The result is this sprawling epic that smashes the two pieces together in unlikely ways: embracing the orchestral instrumentation of Brahms, but weaving in melodies from Thom Yorke and co. through counterpoint, interpolation, or imposition. The result is strange but beautiful, with a full orchestra and three vocalists turning one of the most experimental alt-rock records of the ’90s into a rhapsodic experience. And hey, if it goes well, maybe Hackman will be back—he also produces Beethoven X Beyoncé and Stravinsky X Kendrick Lamar.Music for 18 MusiciansMarch 23 @ Vancouver PlayhouseMusic on Main is celebrating its 20th season in style: with Steve Reich’s iconic Music for 18 Musicians. The minimalist work, which premiered 50 years ago, centres around an 11-chord cycle, integrating human breath and impressively held notes to create unlikely harmonies and psychoacoustic effects. A collection of local musicians have assembled to stage the influential work—featuring clarinets, violin, cello, voice, piano, and percussion—that still resonates a half-century later.Folk Songs from Three CenturiesMarch 24 @ St. Mary’s KerrisdaleThe Salish Sea Early Music Festival isn’t concerned with such a thing as borders. The festival organizes events across both Canada and America, straddling the B.C.-Washington border with events across Vancouver Island, the Lower Mainland, and Seattle-Tacoma. In March, Oleg Timofeyev and Jeffrey Cohan embark on the local tour schedule, playing the 17th- to 19th-century equivalents of pop bangers. Expect a mix of Renaissance psalms, Celtic baroque songs, and folk music from the time of Beethoven—as performed on vintage instruments, such as eight-keyed flutes or an 18th century wire-strung English guitar. If The Earth Could SingMarch 28-29 @ Pacific Spirit United ChurchTreble-voice choir Elektra is no stranger to putting on moving, powerful concerts. This spring, the group is turning its attention to climate change, putting the planet at the heart of its performance. If The Earth Could Sing features works by Don MacDonald, Sarah Quartel, Mari Esabel Valverde, and Luke Wallace/Shawn Kirchner, as well as several firsts: the two-soprano, two-alto premiere of Gerda Blok-Wilson’s Dried Up River, and the Western Canada premiere of Katerina Gimon’s Unsung: If the Earth Could Sing. The most-anticipated piece, though, might be Andrew Staniland’s Songs from the Lytton Fire: a work which combines poetry from fire survivor Meghan Fandrich with haunting music, reminding us of the real impacts we see in our changing world.Amadine Beyer and Gli IncognitiApril 17 @ Christ Church CathedralIf you’re looking for Baroque music, it makes sense to look to France. That’s probably why Early Music Vancouver decided to bring French ensemble Gli Incogniti across the pond to show off European music. The ensemble, led by violinist Amandine Beyer, highlights Italian violinist Nicola Matteis, whose work in the late 17th and early 18th centuries was well-known in his lifetime but has since fallen into obscurity. A pre-show chat between Beyer and EMV artistic director Suzie LeBlanc adds more context to this little-known but lyrical composer.The FoxApril 17-19 @ AnnexOpera has a bit of a reputation of being set in its ways, staging and restaging texts that are largely centuries old. Opera Unbound is changing that, producing new works that try to push the limits of what opera can be. The Fox is an innovative new production that draws inspiration from D.H. Lawrence’s novella of the same name, following two women and a mysterious man on a poultry farm in the wake of the First World War. The text is tight and taut, focused on the relationships between the three characters—perfect for an intimate chamber opera.The Big RoarMay 8-9 @ Chan Centre for the Performing ArtsThe marquee event for Chor Leoni’s 2026 season returns louder than ever this year, as The Big Roar brings together a huge range of performances across two concerts. Chor Leoni’s classic low-voice choir will be on stage, with other highlights including rare performance from the Leonids, community involvement from MYVoice youth choirs, and two of the province’s best high school choirs. With pieces ranging from the classical (selections from Camille Saint-Saëns) to the contemporary (Sara Bareilles), to a world premiere from McKnight Composer Fellow Shruthi Rajasekar, The Big Roar will stand a testament to the choral power of Vancouver. Join the discussion Facebook comments not loading? Please check your browser settings to ensure that it is not blocking Facebook from running on straight.com