Recording: Charles Spearin

Artist: Charles Spearin

Song: unknown [last section]^*

Recorded in the CNE Bandshell (Ministry of Phonic Services' Back to School Field Trip — Waterfront), September 23, 2025.

Charles Spearin - unknown [last section]

This "waterfront" night out at the Field Trip festival was originally slated for Marilyn Bell Park, right on the shores of Lake Ontario. Rainy weather kept that from happening, but some organizational ingenuity meant the event still took place outside, and still lake-adjacent. Moving to the CNE Bandshell gave the night its own flavour, with performers and audience alike staying dry under the circular overhang, framing the performances from the opposite perspective one might expect. (And as an aside, let's note that this lovely heritage structure sits empty for most of the year, and ponder on what it would be like to live in a city where a really small allocation of resources could activate it in all kinds of inneresting ways.)

Showing off what can be accomplished with modern battery-powered speakers, Charles Spearin performed this piece for processed nyckelharpa through a four-channel surround sound system, echoes and sweeps of the strings moving across the space. (The set also lead off with a different sort of spacialization in a stripped-down version of his piece "Music For 32 Phones Played Simultaneously", creating a very cool participatory circle on the big stage.)

^* Does anyone know the title to this one? Please leave a comment!

Recording: The Imaginary Brass Band

Artist: The Imaginary Brass Band

Songs: Let It Roll + Saunter One

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), November 29, 2022.

The Imaginary Brass Band - Let It Roll

The Imaginary Brass Band - Saunter One

Rat-drifting meets marching band — although nominally a trio (Doug Tielli, Heather Saumer, Nick Fraser) on their just-released album, in the flesh the group expanded with Tania Gill, Charles Spearin, Emily Farrell and Colin Couch (and with Tom Richards sitting in for the bulk of the first set, to boot). A couple of Nick Fraser's sketches were essayed, but most of the material here is from Doug Tielli, showing off the most recent evidence of the contrasts and continuities with his "songwriter" work. There was some of the expected brass band brio at hand, but also, as the second piece here indicates, a willingness to explore melancholy beauty as well.

Recording: Ng/Crosby/Taylor/Spearin/Feist

Artist: Karen Ng/Ted Crosby/Paul Taylor/Charles Spearin/Leslie Feist

Songs: [excerpt, in two parts]

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), April 18, 2017.

Karen Ng/Ted Crosby/Paul Taylor/Charles Spearin/Leslie Feist - [excerpt, part 1]

Karen Ng/Ted Crosby/Paul Taylor/Charles Spearin/Leslie Feist - [excerpt, part 2]

When a musician's sudden unavailability caused a last-minute lineup change and Karen Ng would only say (with a cagey grin and no further details) that she'd found "some friends" to fill in, I knew something was up. And indeed, the old touring pals that came out to jam to a handful of people at The Tranzac were none other than Charles Spearin (armed with keyboard and nyckelharpa) and Leslie Feist. They joined visiting electroacoustic percussionist Paul Taylor as well as Ng and Ted Crosby on reeds for an ephemeral encounter, the sort of one-time-only band that winks into existence in the The Tranzac's protective environment.

After some foraging explorations, the group fell into the rustic soundscape heard here, with Crosby and Ng's clarinets dancing above the others' textures. (Feist showed herself to be a dab hand with her freeze pedal in that regard.) After that, the second set turned out to be an even more informal affair: Spearin had to split, Feist felt like playing the drums, and most of the remaining audience were invited to sit in for some casual meanderings.

Recording: Charles Spearin's Roadside Silhouettes

Artist: Charles Spearin's Roadside Silhouettes

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Jam Factory ("Feast in the East 47"), April 4, 2015.

Charles Spearin's Roadside Silhouettes - [excerpt]

Charles Spearin sounded a little defensive as he introduced this new new project, admitting it was "a little bit weird" and perhaps even somewhat pretentious. But that doesn't mean he wasn't prepared — in fact, the six-piece ensemble were armed with an 8½ × 17 sheet filled with cryptic visualizations and unanswerable questions. This was in the service of his concept of creative improvisations in a series of medieval modes rendered as postrock chamber drones. Playing lap steel and a double-necked guitar/bass, Spearin was joined by Ohad Benchetrit on guitar as well as an ensemble that included violin, bass clarinet, saxophone and harp. The music mostly hovered in a hazy soundfield that at times evoked a Khôra piece, swelling up and down as the group segued from one mode to another for nearly half and hour. Entirely pleasant to listen to, this can be counted as a successful first experiment, so it should be interesting to see how Spearin refines and extends the concept from here.

Album: Charles Spearin / The Happiness Project

Artist: Charles Spearin

Title: The Happiness Project

There's quite a lot going on here. While, at the most basic level, the music on this wouldn't surprise anyone with a passing knowledge of DMST (or even the more ambient side of BSS), it's the method that intrigues. Spearin sat down and talked to his neighbours about happiness, and used the sounds of their words as the basis of his music.

While I could try and make some informed observations about mimesis, I will leave that to those wiser than myself and merely observe that to me, the image created by this album is of a cartoon with a person speaking, their animated speech balloon suddenly popping as their voice turns into music.

The thing that interests me most, though, is that this album is rather radical, in a subtle kind of way. How often does the music I listen to choose to concentrate on dourness rather than happiness? How striking is it that it is unusual to think about people sitting around and talking about what makes them happy?

And perhaps, most surprising of all was how, after listening to this, I suddenly did hear music in the voices of people talking around me. Sometimes we need a reminder.

Track pick: 3 - "Vittoria"