54 Best Performing Arts in Quebec, Canada

A flurry of activity, mainly on the Plains of Abraham but also on several of the city's main drags, surrounds Carnaval de Québec, which occurs over three weekends every January and February. Snow and ice sculpture contests, dog sled relays, and canoe races on the icy St. Lawrence River chase away winter doldrums. Visitors brave the cold to get a glimpse of Bonhomme, the friendly Carnival Master, and tour his Ice Palace, which is rebuilt each year. Caribou, a strong mixture of red wine, hard liquor, and maple syrup, is a popular libation during the festivities.

A favorite of Montréal moviegoers for years, this theater focuses on first-run movies from around the world. Retrospectives based on interesting themes and prominent directors are also screened. Located inside the Galeries du Parc mall, near McGill University, it primarily caters to an Anglophone audience.  The cinema offers parking at C$3 for three hours. Just ask for your coupon at the box office.

This amazing circus is one of Montréal's great success stories. The company—founded in 1984 by a pair of street performers—has completely changed people's idea of what a circus can do. Its shows, now an international phenomenon, use no animals. Instead, colorful acrobatics flirt with the absurd through the use of music, humor, dance, and glorious (and often risqué) costumes. The Cirque has companies in Las Vegas and one each in Orlando and Los Angeles—but none in Montréal (though its HQ and a circus school are located in the northern part of the city). Nevertheless, every couple of years one of its international touring companies returns to where it all began, the Old Port, and sets up the familiar blue-and-yellow tent for a summer of sold-out shows.

An annual highlight in the first half of July is this exuberant Summer Festival, over seven days of rock, folk, hip-hop, and world music. The main concerts take place each evening on three outdoor stages in or near the Old City, including one holding up to 80,000 people on the Plains of Abraham. A pass (C$115) grants admission to all events throughout the festival. Some concerts at indoor theaters cost extra, but free music and activities, such as family concerts and street performers during the day, are also plentiful. At night rue St-Jean near the city gate turns into a free street theater, with drummers, dancers, and skits. Book accommodation several months in advance if you plan to attend.

Spread over five floors, Montréal's largest public library is a modern, light-filled, and spacious place to while away an afternoon perusing an impressive film collection. With 18 screening stations and new titles acquired monthly, they offer a wide range of genres to suit film buffs.

One of Canada's premier ballet companies, Les Grands have been moving audiences since 1957. Under the artistic direction of Ivan Cavallari, the company has continued to evolve a rich body of both classic and contemporary work. Its annual presentation of The Nutcracker, which often sells out, has become a Christmas tradition. Performances take place at the Place des Arts.

In the large plaza fronting city hall, as well as the little park across the street, neat rows of darling little wooden huts exactly like those you'd find in Germany offer stollen, steaming hot pretzels, gingerbread, mulled wine, roasted chestnuts, and other aromatic foods, while jewelry designers, wood sculptors, glassmakers, and other artisans chat animatedly with customers, as German Christmas carols play in the background. If you can’t get to Europe for the holidays, Québec City's German Christmas market is probably the most magical and most authentic you'll find in North America. The market opens in the third week of November and lasts until December 23rd.

Montréal's beloved OSM plays programs that include masterful renditions of the classics, with contemporary works thrown into the mix. The orchestra's home, the Maison symphonique de Montréal, is part of the Place des Arts complex.

Canada's oldest symphony orchestra, directed by the dynamic French conductor Fabien Gabel, performs mainly at Louis-Fréchette Hall in the Grand Théâtre de Québec.

Celebrating 70 years in 2021 on the Montréal theatre scene, the Théâtre du Nouveau Monde plans to expand its current space. A season's offerings at this renowned French-language theatre might include works by locals Michel Tremblay and Patrice Robitaille, as well as works by Shakespeare, Molière, Camus, Ibsen, Chekhov, and Arthur Miller.

More than just a performance space for contemporary dance, this center actively works in the dance community to encourage creativity and experimentation. Hosting acclaimed artists and companies from around the world, the company is also affiliated with the Université du Québec à Montréal dance faculty.

Tickets for most shows in town are sold through this company. There are outlets around town.

Under newly appointed (2021) French artistic director Alexandra Damiani, BJM Danse Montréal fuses contemporary music and visual arts with extraordinary technique. Performances are held at Place des Arts and Agora de la Danse, and there are free shows at Théâtre de Verdure in Parc Lafontaine during the summer months.

The only Black English-language company in Québec (and the longest-running in Canada) continues to support and nourish the careers of many prominent artists on the national scene. Expect innovative new productions performed alongside classic plays, such as A Raisin in the Sun. Shows take place at the Centaur Theatre and other venues around the city.

This international theatrical festival takes over several spaces in late May and early June: the Salle Albert-Rousseau, the Grand Théâtre de Québec, the Théâtre Périscope (near avenue Cartier), and Complexe Méduse. There are usually at least one or two productions in English or with English subtitles, and an outdoor show that takes over different parts of the Downtown area.

Montréal's best-known English-language theater company stages everything from frothy musical revues to serious works, and prominently features works by local playwrights. Its home is in the former stock-exchange building in Old Montréal.

Packed with intimate screening rooms, recording facilities, exhibition spaces, and a performance space, this center promotes artist-driven film, design, and music from locals as well as international artists. Films are in English and French.

This state-of-the-art arena opened in the fall of 2015, with the hope of attracting a National Hockey League franchise. For now, the hockey is from a junior league, but there are world-class concerts and popular acts playing here regularly.

This movie theater screens lots of interesting foreign and offbeat films, and it's the only one within easy reach of Old Québec. Many of the films are shown in English.

Recognized by the Québec government as a historical monument in 2001, this grand Renaissance-style movie theater, complete with ornate ceilings, decorative molding, and red-velvet seats, screens independent films, though on a somewhat irregular basis. It plays host to many cultural events, including the Montréal World Film Festival.

With more than 35,000 films in its collection, and a ticket price of just C$10, Montréal's Museum of the Moving Image is the best place in the city to catch a foreign flick in its original language (with subtitles), in addition to Québécois and other Canadian productions. The museum also stocks scripts, television shows, and various new media, with a permanent display of vintage cinema equipment.

This award-winning troop has been touring the globe since 1993, and with well over 4,000 performances under its belt, shows no signs of slowing down. Constantly evolving, Cirque Éloize uses artistic mediums like video and music to bring the circus arts to the masses.

This multidisciplinary arts center, built in a row of historic houses mixed with new structures, is a hub for local artists and presents edgy installations and live shows, including a modern dance series.

For two weeks every June, students of this circus school and others take to the trapeze to promote their art form through the Circus Days festival. Throughout the year, students and teachers put on various shows, training camps, and workshops, including a Christmas Cabaret, in the former church that now houses their school.

From France to Jamaica to Cabo Verde, from traditional to contemporary sounds, this eclectic two-week music and dance festival brings together over 700 artists from 30 countries, for the biggest world music gathering in the Americas. At the outdoor stages in the Quartier des Spectacles, you'll find an appealing selection of pop-up restaurants and bars, a family area, open-air workshops with master dancers and drummers, and a Timbuktu market. Check the website for concerts held year-round.

Promoting itself as a theater for all audiences, this accomplished English company has been delighting kids and adults since 1982. Most productions are performed at the Centaur Theatre.

Québec City's main theater has two stages for symphonic concerts, opera, plays, and touring companies of all sorts. The Grand Théâtre also presents a dance series with Canadian and international companies. Inside, a three-wall mural by the Québec sculptor Jordi Bonet depicts death, life, and liberty. Bonet wrote "La Liberté" on one wall to bring attention to the Québécois struggle for freedom and cultural distinction.

Arguably the best chamber orchestra in Canada, I Musici, under the direction of Jean-François Rivest, performs at several places around town, including the Salle Bourgie at the Musée des Beaux-Arts and the Place des Arts' Nouvelle Salle.

Margie Gillis, one of Canada's most exciting and innovative soloists, works with her own company and guest artists to stage performances at Place des Arts, Agora de la Danse, and other area venues.

Next to the Quartier des Spectacles theater district, la Vitrine Culturelle (literally: Cultural Window) is the perfect place to get information and buy tickets for just about every type of show in town. Great last-minute deals are often available.