Polaris Festival & Harbourfront Centre Present: Land of Talk, Begonia, and Charlotte Cornfield
Free No Registration Required | Sept 27 & 28, Oct 4, 2025 | Toronto | Toronto Music Garden | All Ages | Accessible
In celebration of 20 years of Polaris Music Prize, we’ve created the Polaris Festival presented by Sirius XM Canada. The Festival is happening throughout September with over 15 events like Salons, Concerts, Listening Sessions, and our Concert & Award Ceremony at Massey Hall. Browse Festival events here.
Join us on Toronto’s iconic waterfront at Harbourfront Centre in Toronto for free concerts featuring Polaris alumni, Land of Talk (long list 2009, 2011), Begonia (short list 2023, long list 2020), and Charlotte Cornfield (long list 2019). Polaris Music Prize has partnered with Harbourfront Centre to present these free concerts.
Concert Schedule
Land of Talk
Saturday, September 27, 2025, 1:00 PM-2:00 PM
Toronto Music Garden
Begonia
Sunday, September 28, 2025, 7:30-8:30 PM
Garden Pavilion, Toronto Music Garden
Charlotte Cornfield
October 4, 2025, 7:30-8:30 PM
Toronto Music Garden
Land of Talk | Saturday, September 27, 2025, 1:00 PM-2:00 PM
Lizzie Powell has always been a risk-taker. As the creative force behind Montreal’s Land of Talk, Powell has spent 15 years pushing indie rock’s boundaries across four acclaimed albums. With Performances, their fifth LP, Powell reinvents once more—trading muscular guitars for piano-led meditations that feel urgent, cathartic, and deeply personal.
The record began in 2021 during what Powell calls a period of “identity confusion.” Unsure if Land of Talk could exist without electric guitars, they leaned into instinct instead. Songs like “Your Beautiful Self” and “Marry It” became breakthroughs, balancing fragility and release, intimacy and memoir. Other pieces—like the sprawling closer “Pwintiques,” first written two decades ago—reclaim long-percolating ideas, now fully realized.
Recorded with engineer Rena Kozak and multi-instrumentalist Laurie Torres, Performances is Powell at their most honest and uncompromising. A bold return to roots and a forward leap, it cements Land of Talk as one of Canada’s essential voices. @LandofTalkMusic
Photo by Calvin Lee Joseph
Begonia | Sunday, September 28, 2025, 7:30-8:30 PM
Begonia is your best friend. She’s the whimsical fairy on your shoulder, making you feel totally at ease in your own skin while also making you wonder, wtf is this fairy doing here and what exactly is she wearing. With a voice that drags you deeper into feeling, she sings like she’s calling you into her world—a place bursting with flowers, colour, and light, but also shadows that don’t shy away. Her voice? Delicate sandpaper with iridescent grit. Her lyrics? They’ll make you laugh and cry in the same breath. She’s clunky, she’s graceful, she’s refreshing, she’s a secret whispered on a giant stage.
Begonia—Winnipeg’s Alexa Dirks—has been carving this space since 2017’s Lady in Mind. With Fear (2019), Powder Blue (2023), two JUNO nods, two Polaris nominations, and the surprise gem Open Swim (2024), she’s already beloved. And now, with Fantasy Life (Oct 2025), she’s riskier, freer, and more fantastical than ever. @HelloBegonia
Photo by Sara Melvin
Charlotte Cornfield | October 4, 2025, 7:30-8:30 PM
Charlotte Cornfield, described by Rolling Stone as “Canada’s best-kept secret”, is celebrated for her distinctive and influential songwriting voice. She has toured extensively in North America and Europe supporting a huge range of artists including Broken Social Scene, Bonny Light Horseman, and Julien Baker. Her 2023 album Could Have Done Anything received outstanding reviews in NPR, Pitchfork and Exclaim! and garnered high praise from the likes of Iggy Pop, Boygenius and Kurt Vile.
About Harbourfront Centre
Harbourfront Centre is Canada’s community waterfront, home of arts, culture and education, and a registered, charitable not-for-profit cultural organization operating a 10-acre campus on Toronto’s central waterfront.
Harbourfront Centre provides year-round programming 52 weeks a year, seven days a week, supporting a wide range of artists and communities. We inspire audiences and visitors with a breadth of bold, ambitious and engaging experiences. We champion Canadian artists throughout their careers, presenting them alongside international artists and fostering artistic exchanges between disciplines and cultures.
Harbourfront Centre acknowledges the generous support of: Government of Canada and the City of Toronto; Programming Partners: Government of Canada, Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Government of Ontario, Ontario Cultural Attractions Fund and the City of Toronto and its Corporate Site Partner, Labatt.
Polaris Music Prize
Polaris Music Prize is a Canadian charitable arts organization celebrating 20 years of honouring music as art. From June to September 2025, the new Polaris Music Prize Festival brings concerts, salons, and listening sessions to Toronto and across Ontario — culminating in the Polaris Concert & Award Ceremony on September 16 at Massey Hall. Through its Album, Song, and Heritage Prizes, Polaris amplifies Canadian artists based on artistic merit — not genre, sales, or algorithmic popularity. With 700+ artists championed, over $1.4M in prize and artist fees awarded, and a jury of over 200 music critics and curators, Polaris protects space for boundary-pushing music and fosters a deeper national music culture. Learn more at polarismusicprize.ca.
The event is part of the Polaris Music Prize Festival presented by SiriusXM Canada. CBC presents the 2025 Polaris Music Prize. This project is funded in part by FACTOR, the Government of Canada, and Canada’s private radio broadcasters. It is supported by SiriusXM Canada, Ontario Creates, the Government of Ontario, the Ontario Cultural Attractions Fund, and the Slaight Family Foundation.
