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Concert reviews Music

Toronto finally gets the Carly Rae Jepsen E-MO-TION party we deserved

CARLY RAE JEPSEN with the TORONTO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA at Roy Thomson Hall, Saturday, June 17. Rating: NNNN


“This is the best unofficial Pride party of the year,” exclaimed one fan as we filed into Roy Thomson Hall on Saturday night, brimming with high expectations for the one-off Carly Rae Jepsen performance with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.

This was – finally! – the Carly Rae party we deserved. In 2015, Jepsen put out E-MO-TION, one of the best pop albums of 2016. But strangely, aside from a brief opening set for Hedley at the Air Canada Centre, she still hadn’t performed a full set of tracks from the album for a Toronto audience. Even with the humidity, the formality of the occasion – Roy Thomson Hall is a gorgeous, grown-up venue, after all – was perfectly fitting.

Jepsen arrived onstage dressed for it, too, shirking her usual edgy tailored suits for floor-length, shimmering gold formalwear. She launched into single Run Away With Me as Lucas Waldin furiously conducted the orchestra, made up of more than 50 players. She followed it up with Making The Most Of The Night, the horn section loosening up the slickly produced 80s-inspired pop track to make it more of a party jam.

But the most successful arrangements stuck with the string quartet formation that had inspired the show. (Jepsen performed Your Type with the TSO quartet at the Polaris Prize gala last year.) A stripped-down version of title track E-MO-TION was a clear standout, transformed from a sassy clap back to a heart-wrenching tune about a relationship’s potential and disappointment. Tug Of War, one of just two non-E-MO-TION tracks, lost its basic, chugging beat to transform into a more nuanced tale about a relationship in trouble.

Spirits were so high, fans let themselves be swept away by two Carly-free mini-sets designed to show non-TSO regulars what the orchestra is capable of. Some may have felt a little condescended to when Waldin explained that we’d recognize Clair De Lune from a pivotal scene in the movie Twilight – perhaps slightly miscalculating the audience demographic – but we laughed politely because Carly.

The most satisfying part of the night came during Boy Problems, when some restless folks couldn’t help but pop out of their seats to dance, with the rest of the crowd quickly following. The orchestra was all but drowned out as we sang our hearts out – but we needed this. We really did.

kater@nowtoronto.com | @katierowboat

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