JOE TRIO HITS THREE-POINTER WITH SERIOUS, SEMI-CLASSICAL CONCERT

Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com

GRAVENHURST — It’s 17 years since Cameron Wilson, Allen Stiles and Charles Inkman last played for the Muskoka Concert Association.

While the Joe Trio hasn’t lost any of its delightful, whimsical air, nor have they lightened up on their progressive presentation of classical music.

“The mix and mash of all genres that makes Joe Trio,” violinist Wilson said last night as they played his arrangement of Freddy Mercury’s Bohemian Rhapsody as their final piece of a concert at Trinity United Church.

As if to put an exclamation point on that Queen anthem, Wilson and the trio wound up their two-hour show with the Orange Blossom Special, a fiddle tune he learned in the Ottawa Valley and dedicated to his father who he says still plays it the best.

Cameron Wilson, Allen Stiles and Charles Inkman did what they do best last night in “mixing and mashing” semi-classical music that was both accessible and serious at MCA’s Trinity United Church concert in Gravenhurst.

Making classical music accessible is explicit in their CV, so opening with another of Wilson’s arrangements of Sweet Georgia Brown set the tone for a pleasant evening of classical and pop favourites.

A telling Joe Trio arrangement of The Sad Story of Little Joe Who Played the Violin, along with Wilson’s further arrangements of Surf’s Up/Good Vibrations by Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys and his Classic TV Themes Meet Great Composers were well met with recognizable applause from more than 80 audience members.

But Joe Trio was much more than re-arranging Hogan’s Heroes into how Debussy would have played it — though several of those were clearly enjoyable.

And the grey haired set on hand Friday obviously knew and appreciated the difference for the band could only stump the crowd once with one of their five renditions.

Half-hearted and joking aside, behind that fanciful waggishness were three no-nonsense musicians who turned a big church with a vaulted ceiling and great acoustics into an intimate chamber music performance venue.

One listener marvelled at how fullfilling the sound was from the trio of violin, piano and cello.

A crowd of more than 80 appreciative grey hairs knew their classical music and were only stumped on of of five musical TV challenges by Joe Trio Friday night in Gravenhurst.

Once they had swished the hoop with the soaring theme of the Harlem Globetrotters, Joe Trio quickly rebounded with a piece by Johann Christian Bach (one of 18 children of the Bach).

Trio in C Opus 15 Number 1 set the real tone for a night not hooked on the hackneyed classics of K-Tel, but on pieces deep enough to resonate to the back of the balcony where a program of all Bach wouldn’t have gone un-noticed.

Equally for Astor Piazolla’s Summer from Four Seasons of Buenos Aires and Da Siocket Light by Tom Anderson and Stiles’ deft touches and end to end runs on Franz Schubert’s Piano Trio in E-flat, 2nd movement.

Still it was Wilson’s Jive in Blue Major, a commissioned piece that was big in American bravado, that touched most and got the heart of what Joe Trio is and stands for with its exuberant blend of the best of semi-classical music.

The Muskoka Concert Association returns in October with the Orillia Silver Band.

Gravenhurst singer Mike Church entertained during the pre-concert reception downstairs.
Denies Cooper, Elizabeth Chish-Graham and Gerry Flaherty enjoy finger foods before the show.
The Muskoka Concert Association wrapped up their 2022-23 concert series with an engaging performance by Joe Trio that filled the church with a chamber music sound that was both intimate and fullfilling.

 

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