Monday Roundup #128

Community notes:

• Pleased to see the formal announcement from The Tranzac that Jason Doell is taking over as the new Executive Director. It bodes well that the position is being carried forward with someone who has a genuine passion for the space and the sort of cultural engagement that The Tranzac allows/encourages.
• Word on the street is that The Concert Hall (a.k.a. The Masonic Temple) is back in business as a working concert venue. Because of the timing of its openings/closings it hasn't played a part in my show-going history and it's at the larger end of what I'd consider an interesting place to go to, but it's always a good thing to have more places for shows to happen. Looks like Collective Concerts is booking there, with a half-dozen shows listed already.
• I picked up that nugget from Airplane on the Highway, Michael Barclay's substack newsletter. For those who don't know, Barclay is a tireless documenter of independent Canadian music (and co-author of the utterly indispensable Have Not Been the Same, an essential source for a decade of pre-internet music history) and his weekly-ish dispatches have thoughtful music recommendations and very solid concert listings that hew further into "rock" shows that I might not be listing as much these days.

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Concert announcements:

Dopamine Dream (Olga / Psychic Weapons) / Monarch Tavern 2023-07-06 (Thursday). $13, 19+. [FB event]

Ayal Senior & Friends (feat. Ayal Senior & Kurt Newman / Marilyn Yogarajah / Del Stephen's Wurld of Xo '42 / Nick Flanagan) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-07-09 (Sunday – 2:30 p.m.) [FB event]

Sounds from the Tall House presents (feat. Eiyn Sof / Spruce Needles / M. Mucci) / Tibet Street Records 2023-07-14 (Friday). $10. [tickets/info]

Cindy Lee (Freak Heat Waves) / The Garrison 2023-08-12 (Saturday). $23.17, 19+. [FB event]

Beams [EP Release] (Burs / Flake) / The Baby G 2023-08-18 (Friday). $20.05, 19+. [FB event]

Is your show missing from this list? Submit it via this form!

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Shows this week:

Nick Fraser Presents (feat. Alexei Orechin [solo] / Chris Pruden [solo]) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-06-27 (Tuesday)

Toronto Jazz Fest (feat. Aline's étoile magique [Aline Homzy/Michael Davidson/Marito Marques/Dan Fortin/Thom Gill]) / [corporate name] Village Stage 2023-06-28 (Wednesday – 4:30 p.m.). $free, outdoors. [more info]

TONE Festival (feat. Sun Ra Arkestra) / The Great Hall 2023-06-28 (Wednesday). $44.39 advance/$50 door, 19+. [FB event]

Adrian Russouw Presents (feat. Sunlings [Adrian Russouw/Melissa Paju/Aidan McConnell/Garret Hildebrandt/Ben Rosistan] / Owen Kurtz) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-06-28 (Wednesday). $pwyc. [morfe info]

Summer Music in the Garden (feat. Tafelmusik) / Toronto Music Garden 2023-06-29 (Thursday). $free, outdoors. [more info]

CCMC [Al Mattes/Casey Sokol/Paul Dutton/John Oswald with guest Heather Saumer] / Array Space 2023-06-29 (Thursday). $pwyc, livestream available.

les formes mysterieuses [music for solo harpsichord – world premieres of works by Juro Kim Feliz, Linda Catlin Smith and Christina Volpini, as well as the live Canadian premiere of a piece by Anna Hostman and an old standard by Iannis Xenakis] (feat. Wesley Shen) / St. George by the Grange 2023-06-29 (Thursday). $pwyc (suggested 10-20$ range). [FB event]

Avalon Tassonyi [album release] (No Frills / The Royal Family) / Monarch Tavern 2023-06-29 (Thursday). $19.48, 19+. [FB event]

Karen Ng presents (feat. Marilyn Yogarajah/Kiran Mira/Kel Mansaray/Ananya Ganesh/Martin Heslop) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-06-29 (Thursday). $pwyc.

All-Set! Presents Music by Mike Smith (feat. Mike Smith/Jake Oelrichs/Laura Bates/Kayla Milmine/Brodie West) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-06-30 (Friday – early). $pwyc.

The Ryan Driver Quintet / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-06-30 (Friday). $pwyc. [FB event]

Unbleak Trio [Ananya Ganesh/Alex Fournier/Raphael Roter] / Annette Studios 2023-07-01 (Saturday). $10.

July Long Weekend (feat. OKAN) / Harbourfront Centre – Stage in the Park 2023-07-02 (Sunday). $free, outdoors. [more info]

Dave Clark presents (feat.. The Western Slang Band [Dave Clark/Lowell Whitty/Michael Herring/Paul Kolinski/Tania Gill and special guest Myk Freedman])/ The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-07-02 (Sunday – early) [more info]

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It happened this week...

• ...on June 27, 2013 at Holy Oak Café (Love Nation Night No. 2).

The Draperies - [excerpt from first piece]

• ...on June 30, 2013 at Harbourfront Centre.

Vieux Farka Touré - unknown

[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: Vieux Farka Touré

Artist: Vieux Farka Touré

Song: unknown^*

Recorded at Harbourfront Centre, June 30, 2013.

Vieux Farka Touré - unknown

Full review to follow. Ah, this is summer — a hot (but not too hot) evening down by the lake with one of the world's best guitar players up on stage. It looks so effortless when it's done this well.

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

Gig: Vieux Farka Touré

Vieux Farka Touré / Afrafranto

Phoenix Concert Theatre. Friday, July 10, 2009.

A ticketed kick-off event for Afrofest seemed more compelling to me than a free night down at Harbourfront watching Holy Fuck, so I shelled out the dough to see rising Malian star Vieux Farka Touré. The show had a decent turnout, but was by no means full. From my perspective, it was quite comfortable on the floor, with some room to groove around a bit without feeling empty. The crowd was, generally, older, whiter and more upper-middle-class than Afrofest itself, but still very keen for the music.

The opener was Afrafranto, a local (via Ghana) group playing in the palm-wine style. Generally mentioned as a precursor of highlife, the impression I gathered certainly brought the more genteel side of highlife to mind — perhaps a bit less punchy and without a horn section. Perhaps appropriately for a genre named after a type of liquor¹, the music had a sort of mellow party vibe, suitable for dancing but not leaping about. The band's name might at first suggest "frantic", but different cognates apply, and it in fact means "Butterfly" in the Akan language — something fluttering, seemingly lighter than air not being a bad metaphor for the sound. The six-man band included three members of African Guitar Summit including Theo Yaa Boakye (vox), Pa Joe (guit) and Kofi Ackah (drums), plus Ebenezer Agyekum (bass), Sam Donkor (balafon) and Kwame (percussion). Excellent musicians all, though Pa Joe's supple guitar lines — never rushed but never, ever lax — were the clincher as far as I was concerned. The band played their forty-five minute set pretty much without stopping — songs would segue straight from one to the next at a turnaround. The set included a winning, lively take of "Obaa Y Ewa"². If only every opening act could be so good! Information on Afrafranto seems a bit scanty of the web — not even a MySpace as far as I can see. So I don't know if these guys — all busy with other projects, I'm sure — play together all that much, but I'm keeping an eye out and would see them again in a flash.

Listen to a track from this set here.

After what might have been the quickest changeover I can remember at the Phoenix, Vieux Farka Touré, backed by an unembellished four-piece band (guit, bass, drums, percussion) took the stage, launching right into a spiraling instrumental, and establishing right off the bat the night's main attraction: Touré's amazing guitar work. I have seen some of the world's great guitarists — why, on that very same stage I've seen Television and I've seen Richard Thompson — and I think I can say Touré belongs right up there. It was fascinating to watch how completely effortless his technique looked. His right hand never seemed to even need to pick or strum the strings — just a gentle caress unleashed a torrent of notes. And though able to spin out rapid flurries of notes, the solos were never showy or losing track of the music's underpinnings.

Obviously aware of an angle when they see one, the PR types have been positioning Touré as an "African blues" player and invoking Eric Clapton. Which might serve as a useful tool to pull in some guitar geeks and members of the boomer demographic, but doesn't really throw a whole lot of light on what he's got going on. Obviously, it's part of the story, but it seems a bit reductionist. Regardless, he is virtuosic, and in playing for more than an hour-and-a-half, plus encore, it had the feeling of showstopper after showstopper.³ And at a youthful twenty-eight, he may be getting better yet. A very powerful live experience that went far beyond what was suggested on his rather good new Fondo album. Left the show feeling rather satisfied.

This concert was recorded for broadcast by CBC Radio2 — possibly on August 3 — so do keep your eye out for it.

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¹ This led me to put some thought into a list of other musical styles named after intoxicants. How many can you come up with? Put your list in the comments.

² You can find this one on the first African Guitar Summit album.

³ One of the guys at the streetcar stop afterwards confirmed that a couple tunes were from the songbook of his father, the legendary Ali Farka Touré's.