At Ottawa’s Music and Beyond classical music festival you can expect to see almost any coupling of fine music and other cultural art forms and disciplines in innovative presentations. The idea, says artistic director Julian Armour, is to “give people another way of hearing the music.”
The festival’s closing gala on July 17, which will pair Music and Beyond with circus artists from Montreal’s Cirque Fantastic, is testament to that. Armour worked with Marie-Josée Lévesque, artistic director of Cirque Fantastic, to prepare a show of à la carte acts just for the festival.
Armour is a distinguished cellist who has been playing and promoting classical music in Canada and Europe for over 20 years. He is the founder of Music and Beyond and has received numerous awards for making classical music more accessible to people. He also promotes the works of Canadian composers and has premiered over 200 of their works.
Lévesque is a veteran circus artist who began her career with Cirque du Soleil and has branched out to bring circus arts shows to audiences in diverse settings and venues. Each brought their expertise to design this year’s show.
“I suggested music, she suggested acts, and then we tried to put maximum variety in what we’re going to do to mix in acts with actual music that relates to circus,” Armour explains.
