Fritz Lang’s classic film of 1927, Metropolis, began production 100 years ago, engaging with threats and opportunities of dramatic technological change. A century later, these themes are as relevant as ever. A short talk will precede the screening, offering insight into the production and themes in this pivotal work of cinematic futurism. Over the past century, the film has been scored with a variety of musical approaches, presented here with a live all-electric ensemble, featuring some of Halifax’s finest cinematic improvisors: Evan Syliboy, Geordie Haley, and Sam Wilson - electric guitars, Ali Enriquez and Shawnee Paul - electric violins, Ryan Gray - electronic percussion, and Lukas Pearse - electric double bass

In partnership with Scotia Festival and Everyseeker, we are delighted to bring you Cello Labyrinth. Internationally renowned Indigenous cellist and composer Cris Derksen teams up with three extraordinary cellists from the Maritimes, India Gailey, Leandra Gold and Blanche Israël, for a multi-cello, multi-media evening of exploration, sharing, and experiment.

Symphony Nova Scotia

Featuring: Karl Hirzer, conductor (Vancouver)

Soloists: Cris Derksen, Mark Morton, Charna Matsushige & Victoria Dubois, Eileen Walsh

Nova Scotia’s favourite orchestra will be featuring Cree cellist-composer Cris Derksen (Alberta), Amy Brandon (Truro, NS), and world premieres by emerging Halifax composers Garrett Niall and Ben Fraser, and Nicola Miller (Chester Basin NS) who was the recipient of the 2025 Paul Cram Creation Award. SNS and Upstream celebrate her orchestral debut at this extraordinary concert of new music. These pieces are contextualized by works from major 20th century Europeancomposers Sophia Gubaidalina and Arvo Pärt, alongside a work by one of Upstream’s founding composers, Bob Bauer (Halifax).

New Music Ensemble:

The New Music Ensemble (NME) at Dalhousie’s Fountain School of Performing Arts (FSPA) defies categorization by traditional standards. The NME blurs the boundaries between composition and performance, old and new ways of playing, acoustic and electronic music, classical and contemporary styles, notated and improvised music, and welcomes collaboration across disciplines.

This super creative group of FSPA student musicians explores the techniques, skills, and creative approaches of the 21st century contemporary classical musician and performs repertoire by living composers, brand new compositions by FSPA students, brand new group compositions co-created by NME members, as well as improvised music.

The NME is directed by FSPA faculty member, composer/performer Matthias McIntire.

L'Envers du monde (The reverse of the world) was created for a month-long residency at CEM in Chicoutimi, Québec. For this creation, the composer immersed herself in both acoustic and amplified sound, working on musical textures and atmospheres with talented musicians. They all gathered around the analog synthesizer to explore the themes of night, forgetting, and reminiscence that run through this 50-minute concert.

The source of inspiration for this creative residency found its setting in the poetry of Anne Hébert, particularly her poem “L’Envers du monde.”

The analog synthesizer allows the artist to create textures and atmospheres by working with slow frequency phasing, variations in intonation, and the interplay between “pure sound” and “noisy sound” made possible by the machine.

Settled and unsettling, hypnotic and surprising, from glacially slow to sinuously grooving, the voice and music of Doug Tielli trace a hidden line through a wide and subtle terrain. Filaments of classical, jazz, improvisation, folk and pop spin and wind around one another to weave a musical garment that is both warm and comfortable while also unfamiliar and amorphous. 

Borrowers is a collection of joyful, playful music, inspired by the warmth of sunshine, growing plants, and the simple, peaceful feeling that comes when everything seems to be going just right. Many of these pieces were written in the quiet moments between teaching kids, capturing the fleeting beauty of life’s smaller, yet profound, joys. The music is meant to evoke a sense of lightness and ease, like a sunlit afternoon when you have nothing to do but lay around on the grass. All of the musicians in Borrowers are long-time collaborators of Andew MacKelvie (saxophone) in one way or another. They include Sam Wilson on guitar, Ellen Gibling on harp, Gabriella Ciurcovich on bass, and Matt Gallant on drums. The compositions are sparse enough that they will never hit the same way twice and are generally composed by Andrew, with the exception of some melodies he is borrowing. 

Miller, Donnelly and D'Amato reshape the familiar contours of the jazz songbook into a form all its own. The ensemble approaches classic standards as open canvases, stretching and bending melodies into ever-evolving organisms. Their interplay is fluid and conversational—sometimes tender, sometimes explosive—guided by deep listening and a shared commitment to discovery. Expect revered tunes to surface in surprising fragments, dissolve into free-form improvisation, and re-emerge transformed. The songs will be viewed through a prism of experimentation: adventurous, intimate, and alive in the moment.

MY BAD, EUROPA

An Afro Futuristic, Greek Tragedy Opera for hip hop ensemble and 16 piece chamber orchestra.

Created by Aquakultre, DJ Uncle Fester, John Hargreaves and Jeff Reilly

My Bad, Europa is a story of a God, an omnipotent, but deeply flawed deity born within the structures and restrictions of Universal Royalty and power. His basket, gifted to him by his Mother Phoebe, harboured a dust that if sprinkled, could create or destroy anything he could think of. But Europa, his moon partner, tried to warn him: playing with life in this way could lead to miscalculation…..

Featuring a diverse collection of Halifax’s most accomplished musicians, the five songs that tell this story are interspersed with intense and dramatic orchestral interludes.

Featuring the Talent of

Aquakultre

Jon Hargreaves

Jeff Reilly

Uncle Fester

Mahalia Smith

Ibiko Pelle

Shuvanjan Karmaker

Mark Lee

Charna Matsushige

Matthias McIntire

India Gailey

Gabriella Ciurcovich

Andrew MacKelvie

Jackson Fairfax-Perry

Derek Charke

Eileen Walsh

Emily Bellman

Andrew Jackson

Tom Richards

Tim Crofts

Erin Donovan

Neural Synthesis No. 19
David Tudor (Realized by John D.S. Adams)
David Tudor (1926-1996) revolutionized electronic music through pioneering
feedback-based compositions. As a virtuoso pianist, he premiered iconic works
by Stockhausen, Feldman, Boulez, and Wolff while collaborating intimately with
John Cage.
Experience a rare performance of Tudor's Neural Synthesis No. 19, brought to life
by his friend and collaborator, John D. S. Adams. Using an intricate array of
modular analog electronics and immersive multi-channel sound, Adams
translates complex scores into sonic landscapes.
John worked closely with Tudor and John Cage from 1991 to 1996, with the
Merce Cunningham Dance Company, where he learned to interpret Tudor’s
intricate scores, build analogue instruments and realize multi-channel
performances in halls across Europe, Asia and the US.
Originally derived from Neural Network Plus—commissioned for Merce
Cunningham's dance Enter and unveiled at Paris's Opéra Garnier in 1992—this
piece pushes the boundaries of electronic sound exploration.

Presented by suddenlyLISTEN, SHAPEVILLE is an immersive, interactive performance that blends movement, virtual and physical environments, and sound. Through augmented reality, soft sculpture, and live performance, it creates a tactile, playful world where digital and material spaces overlap. Audiences are welcome to enter, observe, or participate as the piece unfolds in real time. With concept and choreographic direction by Jacinte Armstrong, and creation and performance by dance artists Gillian Seaward-Boone, Kate Holden, and Leah Skerry, SHAPEVILLE features audio design and performance by Brandon Auger and computational design by architect James Forren. Together they build an evolving landscape of gesture, texture, and sound - an imaginative, sensory exploration of how bodies move and perceive across virtual and real dimensions.

SHAPEVILLE runs Sunday afternoon and audiences can join at any time during its duration

Come and hear a new generation of composers — new contemporary solo, chamber and electronic works by Dalhousie and Mount Allison Composition students, performed by Dalhousie performance students. Students of Dalhousie faculty Dr. Jérôme Blais, Amy Brandon, Chris Mitchell and Matthias McIntire.

Barbara Pritchard, pianist, presents James Rolfe's Memoir, an hour-long exploration of the role that memory plays in how we hear music.  The work is unassumingly melodic and diatonic, navigating time in discrete sections, like journal entries. Rolfe writes, "Memoir was written at the request of Barbara Pritchard, to whom it is gratefully dedicated, in recognition of her bringing my music and that of so many other composers to the attention of curious ears across Canada."

            "... one of our finest interpreters of contemporary keyboard music ..."
                                                                                    (William Littler, The Toronto Star) 

Caroline’s Sweeper follows Caroline Herschel, 16th century comet huntress, as she discovers eight comets. Largely overshadowed by the success of her astronomer brother William Herschel, she was the first woman to receive a salary as a scientist and was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society. In this chamber opera, Caroline Herschel’s life and work is unfolded through a series of vignettes exploring her astronomical discoveries.

Composed by Michael Donovan with libretto by Monica Pearce, Caroline’s Sweeper was commissioned by Maureen Batt with support from the Canada Council for the Arts. 

Michael Cloud Duguay  is a Peterborough, Ontario-based musician, producer, and composer known for his prolific and far-reaching collaborative studio and performance projects as well as his singular and highly innovative approach to record production. Open Waters 2026 will present the premiere of ‘Song for Omar’, composed while MCD was artist in residence Gamli Skóli in Hrisey, Iceland in January, 2023, arranged by Andrew MacKelvie, and performed by members of Halifax-based ensemble, Many Worlds. ‘Song for Omar’ was composed as a promise to a Hrisey local in exchange for a secret recipe and inspired by the polar stratospheric clouds filling the sky above that island.