On Thursday (May 16), The Banff Centre finally unveiled the lineup for its Summer Arts Festival, which spans June, July and August.
Headlining Shaw Amphitheatre events are Classified and Zeus, June 30; Blue Rodeo, July 6; Measha Brueggergosman, July 13; Brassfire, July 21; Feist and Snowblink, Aug. 7 and Whitehorse, Aug. 18.
Casey Prescott spoke on behalf of The Banff Centre.
“This, I feel in some ways, is the first full season of the Shaw Amphitheatre, which we’re really excited about, and we have eclectic programming around it,” he said. “The Canada Day long weekend is going to become the traditional start of the amphitheatre season.
“We’ve got hip hop star Classified sharing the stage with indie darlings Zeus and two local bands.”
In future years the centre hopes this weekend will grow into being more of an eclectic festival.
“We have old favourites Blue Rodeo as part of their 25th anniversary,” he said. “We’re always balancing new artists with our audience, but also bringing back artists that the community really loves, and the community has demonstrated time and time again that they really love Blue Rodeo.
“We purposefully did it this year, because as part of their 25th anniversary, they have been revisiting venues that are special to them, and The Banff Centre is really truly a place they wanted to play.”
Playing the indoor theatres are Cold Specks, July 18; Danny Michel, July 24; Ben Heppner, Aug. 4 and Shakey Graves, Aug. 11.
Mikhail Baryshnikov will speak with Ian Brown, July 27, and in the four days leading up to this conversation, The Banff Centre will present four days of Dance Masters on the Eric Harvie stage.
“We will have the iconic persona Mikhail Baryshnikov in conversation here with our correspondent Ian Brown, in a similar format to the Oliver Stone evening,” he said. “That will also include a special performance of an excerpt from a work we did last summer, co-developed between The Banff Centre and the Baryshnikov Arts Centre, which came at Baryshnikov’s request.”
In addition to music, the centre also presents two works of Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, July 3 and Romeo and Juliet, July 27.
“We’re rolling out theatre for the first time in the amphitheatre, doing Shakespeare in the Park with Romeo and Juliet,” said Prescott.
“Opera superstar Measha Brueggergosman will be here, and she’s actually not going to be singing opera, but a lot of popular tunes – Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen and other pop standards – it’ll be a nice mix, showing off her pop-pera side,” he added. “We also have Jens Lindemann with Brassfire, which is another potpourri of gems from the repertoire, and he’s bringing in a very killer three-piece brass band from L.A.”
Throughout July, there will be four presentations of literary arts, on July 3, 10, 22 and 25.
For three days, June 26, 27 and 29, the centre will present the return of the Roots & Rhizomes Percussion concerts, as well as 22 nights of Music For A Summer Evening classical music recitals throughout the summer, at the Rolston Recital Hall. Various other venues will present dozens of classical concerts over the course of the summer.
Diverse As This Land, an aboriginal-themed event, returns July 11-12 and Indigenous Dance will hit the stage Aug. 23-24.
The Walter Phillips Gallery will have one show, Pleinairism, running July 12 to September 15.
The Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival will have screenings July 16, 23 and 30, and Aug. 16.
And after all that, there will be more opera, with Philippe Sly, July 17; Adrian Thompson, July 31 and Owen Wingrave, Aug. 8-9.
As to why The Banff Centre does all this, Prescott stressed the summer arts festival is a way for the centre to share with the community a window into all the programs that happen there.
“A large measure of the presentations are all emanating out of programs,” he said. “For the music program, we have all these stars of tomorrow in the studio working on their craft, and the shows are a way for them to take the practise and the studio and put it on the stage.
“The artist on the stage, exchanging the energy with the audience, is the final culmination of all of the hard work.
“It’s an interdisciplinary environment, and we’re always curating for complimentary groups of artists to be here at the same time, to provoke and inspire one another. The bulk of our programming happens in summer.”
As a tease of things to come after the summer, The Banff Centre also announced a production with Christopher Plummer will arrive on Sept. 28.
