Recording: saucering

Artist: saucering

Song: [1st piece, 1st section]

Recorded at Wenona Lodge (Track Could Bend #117), June 2, 2026.

saucering - [1st piece, 1st section]

This trio brings together spontaneous composers Tilman Lewis (cello), Nilan Perera (guitar), and Laura Swankey (voice). Announcing their presence with a cool album earlier this year, this set saw them exploring their instruments mostly without technological manipulations (both Swankey and Perera are dab hands with the effects pedals, but weren't deploying them here).

You can check out some more from this set over on youtube:

[saucering will be playing at The Tranzac on Monday, September 28th.]

Recording: Heraclitus Akimbo/Swankey/Zhu

Artist: Heraclitus Akimbo/Laura Swankey/Judy Zhu

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Array Space (Audiopollination), June 13, 2025.

Heraclitus Akimbo/Laura Swankey/Judy Zhu - [excerpt]

A poignant but celebratory chapter-closing season-ender at Audiopollination, with the community coming out to celebrate founding host Mike Lynn's last night at the helm. Two sets of effected vocals here, tied together by some synths and tape loops.

You can also check out the archived livestream from the night over on youtube:

[It's important to note that Audiopollination will continue, under enterprising new hands! In fact, the sign-up sheet for the fall run of shows (September through December) is already posted and starting to fill up, so now's the time to add yourself to the musical conversation!]

[image snagged from the livestream]

Recording: Swankey/Pitt/Pitt

Artist: Laura Swankey/Brittany Pitt/Dan Pitt

Song: [excerpt from first piece]

Recorded at Wenona Lodge (Track Could Bend #96), October 1, 2024.

Laura Swankey/Brittany Pitt/Dan Pitt - [excerpt from first piece]

There were pedals all around for this trio, with Dann Pitt (electric guitar) flanked by Brittany Pitt (baritone sax) and Laura Swankey (vox). There were some nice swirling sounds here and some outward-pushing adventures that, with the addition of a rhythm section, could turn this into a particularly cosmic psych band.

You can check out some more from this set over on youtube:

[Track Could Bend is back at Wenona on Tuesday (November 5th) with solo sets from visitors Darren Williams and Rebecca Bruton and an introductory duo from Marilyn + Apple. Meanwhile, Brittany Pitt, with her Reverie ensemble, will be holding down a November residency at The Rex, with shows every Tuesday in November from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.]

Recording: Laura Swankey & Patrick O'Reilly

Artist: Laura Swankey & Patrick O'Reilly

Song: Is there any such thing as a waste of time?

Recorded at Bar Orwell (TONE Festival), June 13, 2023.

Laura Swankey & Patrick O'Reilly - Is there any such thing as a waste of time?

The TONE Festival continued to do a nice job of mixing it up this year, presenting larger-scaled shows (including presenting the local return of the Sun Ra Arkestra) alongside smaller, more-experimental affairs such as this one in Bar Orwell's cozy livingroom-like space. The local openers at this one seemingly came prepared to get a little noisier than usual to get the crowd ready for the visiting headliners — Patrick O'Reilly's guitar effects were more spiky and distorted than they might be in this context. At one point I wasn't sure if one sound I was hearing was coming from the stage or if someone's car alarm was going off outside, although there was room for more shimmery, softer zones as well.

Monday Roundup #116

Concert announcements:

Musica Universalis (feat. SonoRa [Glen Hall/Alan Mackie/Tilman Lewis/Andrew Furlong]) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-04-14 (Friday)

%%30%30 presents ["fully acoustic, fully outdoors, all proceeds going to the West Lodge tenant-run food bank"] (feat. Output 1:1:1 / FEURA / Mark Ballyk / Kurt Newman / FuZzy / Psychosics) / Parkdale Provincial Park 2023-04-15 (Saturday). $PWYW, entry by donation, NOTAFLOF.

The Ossingtones [Glen Hall/Diane Roblin/Bruce Cassidy/Andrew Furlong/Lowell Whitty] / La Rev 2023-04-15 (Saturday)

Dan Pitt & Harry Bartlett / Sellers & Newel 2023-04-21 (Friday). Minimum donation $15. [FB event]

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Shows this week:

"We've Got Nothing" live album recording series (feat. Peripheral Vision / Aline's étoile magique) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-04-04 (Tuesday). $PWYC ($10 suggested).

Track Could Bend #78 (feat. Density Creep / Flip Side [Allison Cameron/Fahmid Nibesh] / James Bailey & %%30%30) / Wenona Lodge 2023-04-04 (Tuesday). $pwyc. [FB event]

The Allison Cameron Band [Allison Cameron/Kurt Newman/Thom Gill] / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-04-05 (Wednesday)

Cots (Alex Lukashevsky) / Tibet Street Records 2023-04-06 (Thursday). $20. [FB event]

Audiopollination (feat. Martin van de Ven/Grace Scheele/Mira Martin-Gray / James Bailey/Susanne Farkas/Nilan Perera / Daniel Field/Jack Brock/Shanika Maria / Tapocalypse Now [mkl32/fuZzy/Heraclitus Akimbo]) / Array Space 2023-04-07 (Friday). $10 (or PWYC). [FB event]

Ayal Senior & Friends (feat. Ayal Senior/Kurt Newman/Andrew Furlong / David Sait / Nick Flanagan / Jaz Tsui) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-04-09 (Sunday – 2:30 p.m.) [FB event]

Sundays in April Residency (feat. Eucalyptus) / Hirut Cafe and Restaurant 2023-04-09 (Sunday). Suggested $15 per person.

Caleb Klager/Stefan Hegerat/Michael Palumbo / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-04-09 (Sunday)

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Bandcamp corner:

• Good Friday is also Bandcamp Friday, so if you're lucky you'll have the day off to pick through the many, many wonderful artists you can support. Here's a couple things on my list:

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It happened this week...

• ...on April 7, 2017 at The Music Gallery (Emergents III).

Laura Swankey with Patrick O'Reilly - unknown

• ...on April 8, 2017 at Array Space (Audiopollination #53.1).

Abigail Trotsky/Chris Trotter/Mike Spears - [excerpt]

[Do remember that you can click on the tags below to go back and find the original posts (and often, more stuff) from these artists.]

Recording: Cameron/Liu/Swankey

Artist: Allison Cameron/Germaine Liu/Laura Swankey

Song: [edited excerpt from first piece]

Recorded at The Tranzac's Southern Cross Lounge (Octopus Presents), February 19, 2020.

Allison Cameron/Germaine Liu/Laura Swankey - [edited excerpt from first piece]

This instalment in the regular third-Wednesday-of-the-month Octopus Presents series saw Allison Cameron playing with two different trios. The second grouping saw her joined by vocalist Laura Swankey and percussionist Germaine Liu, the latter also making a rare synth outing. The output situated them as an off-kilter electro-pop combo, dream-drifting along before getting sidetracked by sputtering warbles.

Recording: S W A N H E R D S

Artist: S W A N H E R D S

Songs: Swanherds + The Turning Larch

Recorded at the Canadian Music Centre (CMC/Riparian Acoustics presents), January 23, 2020.

S W A N H E R D S - Swanherds

S W A N H E R D S - The Turning Larch

This set would have been worth seeing based just on the familiar local faces on stage, including Laura Swankey, Zoë Alexis-Abrams, Ryan Driver, D. Alex Meeks and Pete Johnston — maybe especially so as all were being credited with "whistling" alongside their usual instruments. But all expectations were detourned by the presence of Rebecca Bruton, who had assembled this group as the space-built-in unit S W A N H E R D S. The Banff-based Bruton is a composer, noise-maker and song-singer — all of which were hinted at here, though this set hewed toward the latter. Positing an avant-garde tradition on the same country path k.d. lang once trod down, the songs took in the birds, trees and horses observed in her local environment, brought to life with that aforementioned whistling, as well as singing saws and some occasional yodels.

[This season of CMC Presents concerts will be concluding at the Burdock on Thursday, March 5th with a special co-presentation with the Women From Space Festival featuring Elisa Thorn, Claire Yunjin Lee, Amy Brandon, and Susan Alcorn.]

Recording: Labikova/Merriam/Liu/Swankey

Artist: Bea Labikova/Kathryn Merriam/Germaine Liu/Laura Swankey

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), November 30, 2019.

Bea Labikova/Kathryn Merriam/Germaine Liu/Laura Swankey - [excerpt]

This evening started out with some harp-based songcraft from Kathryn Merriam before veering off into improvised realms. Re-assembling most of that group de-centered the harp, giving equal weight to Bea Labikova's sax and effects, Germaine Liu's percussive bricabrac and Laura Swankey's vocals.

Recording: Kathryn Merriam

Artist: Kathryn Merriam

Song: Lens

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), November 30, 2019.

Kathryn Merriam - Lens

This evening started out with some harp-based songcraft from Kathryn Merriam before veering off into improvised realms. The "song" set saw her accompanied by Patrick O'Reilly on guitar/effects, and on a few numbers they were embellished by Laura Swankey's vocalizations, Bea Labikova's winds, and Germaine Liu's picnic blanket of percussive implements, embroidering additional atmospheres to Merriam's evocative songs.

Recording: Laura Swankey & Heraclitus Akimbo

Artist: Laura Swankey & Heraclitus Akimbo

Song: [edited excerpt]

Recorded at The Tranzac's Southern Cross Lounge (Ayal Senior Presents), October 13, 2019.

Laura Swankey & Heraclitus Akimbo - [edited excerpt]

Once more, I guest-curated Ayal Senior's Sunday afternoon Southern Cross timeslot and was thrilled to set up a co-operative set of sounds with vocalist Laura Swankey. It always requires a bit of trust to let someone else manipulate one's voice, but hopefully it was done here in a sympathetic spirit, smearing out long tones (and adding the voice of Miku as a duet partner) and otherwise abstracting the sound-bursts.

[Laura Swankey will be back in the Southern Cross to improvise with Bea Labikova, Kathryn Merriam and Germaine Liu in an extra-early early set on Saturday (November 30th). Heraclitus Akimbo will be performing alongside Rory Hoy and Lapis Lion at Audiopollination on Sunday, December 14th. Ayal Senior will be back presenting some music in the Southern Cross on the afternoon of Sunday, December 8th.]

Recording: Laura Swankey & Elisa Thorn

Artist: Laura Swankey & Elisa Thorn

Songs: [two excerpts]^*

Recorded at Wenona Lodge (Furniture Music: Birthday Bash), April 23, 2019.

Laura Swankey & Elisa Thorn - [excerpt 1]

Laura Swankey & Elisa Thorn - [excerpt 2]

With the crowded ruckus of some sort of big Leafs game in progress upstairs (maybe they made the playoffs this year?) there was a more modest celebration in Wenona's basement, with Ashley Urquhart and Alex Fournier (who have settled in quite nicely downstairs on the fourth Tuesday of every month) celebrating their series' birthday. Also worth celebrating was a visit from Vancouver-based harpist Elisa Thorn, here playing in a duo with her fellow Jazz Bras Dot Com-ist Laura Swankey. In honour of one of the craft beers on tap upstairs, this duo may now be named "Sour Dreampop", which serendipitously encapsulated some of their interactions, with Thorn mixing doodlebugging, tap harmonics and lush reverse delay alongside Swankey's similarly pedal-enabled vocal manipulations.

[Laura Swankey will be participating in some "Music and Movement Improvisations" with Alex Samaras' GREX at Array Space tomorrow night (Sunday, July 14th). Furniture Music will be back in the basement at Wenona on Tuesday, July 23rd, celebrating Triio's CD Release, along with a synth-y set from Alexei Orechin, Chris Pruden and Casey MQ's Dream Number.]

^* The second selection here veers into a song-like section. Anyone know if there's a title to this? Please leave a comment!

Recording: Plastic Babies

Artist: Plastic Babies

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall (Women From Space Festival – Night 4), March 11, 2019.

Plastic Babies - [excerpt]

The first Women From Space Festival saw four excellent concerts take place over the course of the International Women's Day weekend. Organized by Bea Labikova and Kayla Milmine, the festival felt like a really savvy gathering, always more than the sum of its parts and showcasing the depth of talent in the city's various creative music streams in a women-centred environment.

This trio of vocalists Laura Swankey and Christine Duncan and guitarist Patrick O'Reilly has now been graced with a band name, but that hasn't changed their freewheeling approach. Rather than a verse-chorus-verse-bridge-chorus kind of structure, their sets work more like a church service in a hymn-homily-hymn-benediction mode.

[Duncan will be bringing her Element Choir to an event dubbed "Sung Ra" (Saturday, May 18th at The Tranzac's Main Hall), where Ottawa's Rakestar Arkestra will be "giving new voice and many voices to the wondrous compositions of jazz giant Sun Ra".]

Recording: Franche-Nolan/Ballyk

Artist: Franche-Nolan/Ballyk

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), February 23, 2019.

Franche-Nolan/Ballyk - [excerpt]

This project's core duo of Noah Franche-Nolan (piano) and Mark Ballyk (drums/electronics) was augmented by Laura Swankey (voice/electronics) and Dan Pitt (guitar) for a set of push/pull improvisations, moving from florid clomping and saloon-y tinkling to abstract close-mic'd cymbal feedback rumbles. The latter end of the spectrum was pushed even further when the members of drone/folk-gospel explorers Joyful Joyful (who'd opened up the evening) joined the quartet on stage for en extended coda to the set.

[Noah Franche-Nolan will be playing new compositions with a trio including Hayden Farrar and Nick Fraser at the Tranzac on Sunday night (April 28th).]

Recording: Patrick O'Reilly & Laura Swankey

Artist: Patrick O'Reilly & Laura Swankey

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at The Tranzac (Tiki Room), February 23, 2019.

Patrick O'Reilly & Laura Swankey - [excerpt]

This celebration of W/DRWN's first tape was also a preview of a forthcoming one, with Patrick O'Reilly & Laura Swankey preparing to record together. Based on the quality of the performance, this set was album-worthy on its own, through it'll be delightful to hear this duo rendered in something a bit less lo-fi. The pair had enough DD-7's on hand to delay a train, while Patrick O'Reilly also brought out one of his 4-track recorders along with some endless looping cassettes to quadruple the glitchy gloop from his 16 Second Delay.

Recording: Lender

Artist: Lender

Song: [first piece, part 1]

Recorded at Array Space (MFS 10th Anniversary Celebration: A Night of Improvised Music), February 10, 2019.

Lender - [first piece, part 1]

Every year around Valentine's Day, I tend to remember that it's this blog's anniversary. Then I check back to that first entry, see I'm already a day late, and go on with life. This year, I was thinking about it well ahead of time, and seeing that big, round (and mightily unexpected) tenth anniversary approaching, it seemed befitting to do something a little special. That ended up being a pair of shows, conceptually split into "improvised" and "rock" nights.

For the former, Somewhere There helped out by lending me their regular second Sunday of the month slot at Array, and from there, it was just a matter of winnowing it down from the dozens of people that I wanted to ask to play. It's also one of the perks of putting on a show like this that I could "curate" a set, and throw together a band — like this one — that didn't previously exist. Christine Duncan provided the band name along with her voice and she was joined by Laura Swankey (vox, electronics), Nilan Perera (guitar) and D. Alex Meeks (percussion). The whole thing gelled in a quite satisfactory way, moving from abstract soundscapes into an impromptu spoken word piece from Duncan describing her week's events (three words: Snowmageddon in Seattle). Now I might have to put on another show to make sure this group plays a second time!

[D. Alex Meeks will be one of five percussionists (simultaneously and separately) playing "The Exploded Kit" at Nilan Perera's SynapticCircus night tomorrow (Sunday, April 14th), and will also be joining the picnic blanket of percussionists at The Titillators' historic sixth show afterwards. Christine Duncan and Laura Swankey, as two-thirds of Plastic Babies, will be at The Tranzac on Saturday, April 20th, helping to welcome Finnish jazz pianist Anni Rorke to town.]

Recording: Laura Swankey & Friends

Artist: Laura Swankey & Friends - [first section, part 1]

Songs: [first section, in two parts]

Recorded at The Tranzac's Southern Cross Lounge (Music By & For Ken Aldcroft XXV), January 9, 2018.

Laura Swankey & Friends - [first section, part 1]

Laura Swankey & Friends - [first section, part 2]

What's in a name? The subsequent time I saw this trio, who have been playing together for a while now, they were called Plastic Babies. In any case, excellent work all around from Laura Swankey (vocals and pedals), Christine Duncan (voice and theremin) and Patrick O'Reilly (guitar and pedals). By mid-set, things would work up into the joyfully-frenzied sort of coffee break banter as personal opera that Duncan excels at, but here we find a more restrained soundfield calling itself into being, with some really tasty blips from Duncan's theremin chirping away in the mix.

Recording: Laura Swankey & Patrick O'Reilly

Artist: Laura Swankey & Patrick O'Reilly - [excerpt]

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at Array Space (Audiopollination 66), December 8, 2018.

Laura Swankey & Patrick O'Reilly - [excerpt]

The third party to sign up for this set didn't make it, leaving more space for these frequent collaborators to explore interactions for voice, pedals and guitar.

You can also watch this full set on youtube:

[The next Audiopollination will be at Array Space on Sunday February 3rd. Laura Swankey will be performing as part of the supergroup Lender (along with Christine Duncan, Nilan Perera and D. Alex Meeks) at Mechanical Forest Sound's 10th Anniversary Celebration, Sunday, February 10th at Array. Patrick O'Reilly will be playing guitar in the Nick Arseneau Sextet, tonight (Tuesday, January 22nd) at the Tranzac.]

Recording: Laura Swankey

Artist: Laura Swankey

Song: unknown^*

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall, October 4, 2018.

Laura Swankey - unknown

This night was in celebration of the release of Once More, Swankey's digital EP "for solo voice and electronics". Toiling over her pedal rack, she managed to create percussive backdrops and harmonic lattices to allow her voice to find its way through — like a plantshoot emerging from the soil and then carefully tended into something strong and powerful.

[Laura Swankey will be offering one of four solo sets (alongside Black Givre, Kee Avil and Patrick O'Reilly) at a Somewhere There show in Wenona Lodge's basement on Monday, December 3rd.]

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

Recording: Emily Denison Septet

Artist: Emily Denison Septet

Songs: Crazy [composer: Willie Nelson] + And So It Goes [composer: Billy Joel]

Recorded at The Emmet Ray, July 29, 2018.

Emily Denison Septet - Crazy

Emily Denison Septet - And So It Goes

Though currently based in Montréal, trumpeter Emily Denison makes fairly frequent forays to her old stomping grounds — and this busy Sunday saw a flurry of activity. This group — a fairly ambitious undertaking for a late afternoon slot at a quiet bar — was probably as much as anything a chance for Denison to flex her muscles as an arranger and have a chance to perform with some old comrades. Bringing soft lushness to both pop and jazz tunes meant that the likes of Sam Amidon and Thelonious Monk were rubbing shoulders and fit in equally in Denison's aesthetic of niceness ("only the most wholesome music that sounds as sweet as honey"). It was also a good opportunity to hear Laura Swankey as a song-singer, given most of the places we cross paths hew towards improvisation. The group also included Nelson Moneo (viola), Beth Silver (cello), Patrick O'Reilly (guitar), Victor Vrankulj (double bass), and Mark Ballyk (drums).

[Emily Denison will be back in town — and back at The Emmet Ray — as part of Nick Fraser's "new(ish)" quartet next week (Monday, September 24th) and the same group will be at The Tranzac the following night.]

Recording: Cosmic Homeostasis

Artist: Cosmic Homeostasis

Song: Drone Wish for Paul Newman [excerpt]

Recorded at The Tranzac's Southern Cross Lounge (Cosmic Homeostasis VII), July 29, 2018.

Cosmic Homeostasis - Drone Wish for Paul Newman [excerpt]

A robust group of old and new faces combined to generate some Sunday-afternoon electroacoustic space drones at The Tranzac. Frequent contributor Paul Newman was absent (in celebration of a joyous milestone) so the first set started with some manipulated sounds from one of his ace solo saxophone recordings before slowly lurching towards The Spider Nebula. The full cast for this excursion was: Patrick O'Reilly, Del Stephen, Mira Martin-Gray, Niamh Shiffra Girling, Rod Campbell, mkl32, Ronnie Blake, Laura Swankey, Emily Denison, and Heraclitus Akimbo (who was also designated as the namer-of-things).

You can listen to the afternoon's full proceedings over on Bandcamp:

[Cosmic Homeostasis will be back at The Tranzac on Sunday, September 30th in its customary 3 p.m. timeslot. Help us listen to whispers from space!]