Arts & Culture

Music to say thank you

photo - Anna Levy

Anna Levy  (photo from Yarilo Contemporary Music Society) My mother’s maiden name was Levy, my dad’s surname was also Levy. My story is about life. None of my family was killed during the Holocaust. I am alive because I grew up…

Filler doing it her way

photo - Deb Filler performs at the Chutzpah! Festival on March 4

Deb Filler performs at the Chutzpah! Festival on March 4. (photo from Chutzpah!) “I’ve performed all over the world, baked challah bread onstage, done shows everywhere, and this is the first time in all these years I am performing in…

Tensions trigger Insult

photo - Adel Karam as Toni, left, and Kamel El Basha as Yasser in The Insult

Adel Karam as Toni, left, and Kamel El Basha as Yasser in The Insult. (photo from Cohen Media Group) Ziad Doueiri was born in Lebanon, studied filmmaking at San Diego State and worked nonstop for more than a decade in…

A new foundational resource

image - The More I Know, the Less I Understand - book cover cropped

The book The More I Know, the Less I Understand (Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, 2017) summarizes the findings of University of British Columbia students in various fields of Holocaust research and the implications of Nazi German crimes committed in Central and…

Salomé’s rightful place

image - Salomé: Woman of Valor will have its world première at the Chutzpah! Festival March 8-10

Salomé: Woman of Valor will have its world première at the Chutzpah! Festival March 8-10. (image by Anya Ross, graphics by John Greenaway) There have been many interpretations of Salomé – thought to be the woman whose alluring dance persuaded…

Ventanas come to B.C.

photo - Tamar Ilana leads a Sephardi singing workshop Feb. 20 and she and her ensemble, Ventanas, have five shows in British Columbia

Tamar Ilana leads a Sephardi singing workshop Feb. 20 and she and her ensemble, Ventanas, have five shows in British Columbia. (photo by Zahra Saleki) Tamar Ilana and Ventanas wind up their Arrelumbre tour with six engagements in British Columbia,…

Musical tribute to dear friend

photo - Perla Batalla brings the music of Leonard Cohen to the Rothstein Theatre March 11

Perla Batalla brings the music of Leonard Cohen to the Rothstein Theatre March 11. (photo from Chutzpah!) I didn’t choose singing. It chose me,” Perla Batalla told the Independent in an email interview. Batalla brings her personal and moving tribute…

Bursting with colours and joy

photo - Artist Lauren Morris at the opening of her solo show, Dressed in Colour, at the Zack Gallery Jan. 25

Artist Lauren Morris at the opening of her solo show, Dressed in Colour, at the Zack Gallery Jan. 25. (photo from Lauren Morris) Dressed in Colour, Lauren Morris’s new solo exhibition at the Zack Gallery, perfectly reflects the artist’s relationship…

Peek behind the stage

photo - Left to right: Ryan Beil, Megan Leitch and James Fagan Tait in Jitters

Left to right: Ryan Beil, Megan Leitch and James Fagan Tait in Jitters. (photo by David Cooper) Let’s hear it for the play-within-a-play, the vehicle that takes the audience from front-of-house to backstage dressing room, into the psyche of live…

Chutzpah! opens with Open

photo - Ezralow Dance’s Open comprises many themes

Ezralow Dance’s Open comprises many themes. (photo by Angelo Redaelli) Los Angeles-based Ezralow Dance kicks off this year’s Chutzpah! Festival at the Rothstein Theatre Feb. 15 with, appropriately enough, a work called Open, for its embodiment of myriad ideas and…