Monday Roundup #122

Community notes:

• Oh say, have you noticed the new Tranzac calendar?

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Contest corner:

• Just a reminder you have until tomorrow to enter to win a pair of tickets to Batuki Music Society's Rumba: Soul of Congo concert at The Paradise Theatre on Saturday. It should be an energetic and groovin' night. Just click on over here for all the details.

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Concert announcements:

Exit Points #38 (feat. magfoto/Delta-Sine/Kavi/Hrysovalanti/Sarah Imrisek / Youssef Bassit/Gayle Young/Astrolope/Spencer LeVon/Michael Palumbo / “Switchemups”) / Array Space 2023-05-26 (Friday). $20 at the door. [FB event]

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Shows this week:

Freesound presents: Music for Shō and Accordion [music written for the performers by Janet Sit, Andrew Hulse, Haotian Yu, Michele Foresi, and Sarah Peebles] (feat. Michael Murphy/Wesley Shen/Matti Pulkki) / Array Space 2023-05-15 (Monday). $15 general admission ($10 student/seniors/arts worker). [FB event]

The Powers (Bridget Moser / Man Made Hill) / The Tranzac (Main Hall) 2023-05-16 (Tuesday). $PWYC (recommended $20). [more info]

Kae Murphy and Stefan Hegaret With Dan Pitt / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-05-16 (Tuesday). $10/PWYC. [FB event]

Peter Zummo Octet [Peter Zummo/Hugh Marsh/Kurt Newman/Michael Davidson/Josh Cole/Blake Howard/Phil Melanson/Sandro Perri] (Dun-Dun Trio / Masahiro Takahashi) / The Tranzac (Main Hall) 2023-05-17 (Wednesday). $22.89. [FB event]

Aurealities Ensemble [Lina Allemano/Christine Duncan/Paul Dutton/Matthias Mainz/Albrecht Maurer/Tom Richards/Joe Sorbara/Laura Swankey/Emily Wittbrodt] [newly-composed musical settings of works by Paul Dutton performed by eight stellar German and Canadian musicians] / Annette Studios 2023-05-17 (Wednesday). $30 at the door, $25 advance/students. [FB event]

TONE Presents (feat. Michael Foster's The Ghost / Not The Wind, Not The Flag / Allison Cameron & Thom Gill) / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-05-18 (Thursday – 9:00 p.m.). $15 suggested or PWYC. [FB event]

Abigail Lapell (Richard Laviolette) / The Baby G 2023-05-18 (Thursday). $20.05, 19+. [FB event]

TaPIR Lab Composer in Residence Concert [new works by Nolan Hildebrand, Molly Jones, Steven Lewis, Reilly Spitzfaden. "each piece utilizes experimental computer music techniques, from computer vision and AI sound synthesis to multichannel audio processing and hardware hacking"] (feat. University of Toronto Percussion Ensemble) / Array Space 2023-05-19 (Friday). $free. [FB event]

Ronley Teper & the Lipliners / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-05-19 (Friday – early!). $pwyc.

The Titillators [That's The Night tape release!] / The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge) 2023-05-19 (Friday) [FB event]

The Tawoos Initiative and Small World Music present (feat. Fareed Ayaz & Abu Muhammad Qawwali) / St. Andrew's Church 2023-05-20 (Saturday). $43.93. [FB event]

Faster Presents (feat. Brian Abbott [solo] / Patrick O'Reilly/Kayla Milmine/Stefan Hegerat) / Gerrard Art Space 2023-05-20 (Saturday). $10 suggested donation. [FB event]

Batuki Music Society presents: Rumba: Soul of Congo in Toronto (feat. Olivier Tshimanga/Blandine Mbiya/Pecosse Animations/Noel Mpiaza/Dauphin Mbuyi/Jean-Claude Kamina a.k.a. R9/Samson Owandji/Walter Maclean) / Paradise Theatre 2023-05-20 (Saturday). $20. [FB event]

Ichi-Bons (bandcalledMAX) / Horseshoe Tavern 2023-05-20 (Saturday). $16.50, 19+. [FB event]

Array@50! Concert III: Percussion [solo and duo works by Linda Smith, Tim Parkinson, Michael Oesterle, Anne Southam, and more] (feat. Rick Sacks & David Schotzko) / Array Space 2023-05-20 (Saturday). $20 or Pay What You Want, livestream available. [more info]

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It happened this week...

• ...on May 21, 2009 at 6 Nassau St. (Over the Top Festival).

Timber Timbre - Trouble Comes Knockin'

Baby Dee - The Song of Self Acceptance

[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: Baby Dee

Artist: Baby Dee

Songs: Calvary + When I Get Home

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall, March 5, 2017.

Baby Dee - Calvary

Baby Dee - When I Get Home

"We are here to sing you fucked-up songs about our fucked-up family," Baby Dee reported near the outset of this set. There was no piano this time 'round, and no band, just Dee on accordion accompanied by her nephew Blake Norris on acoustic guitar. That left plenty of room for her singular voice and vision as a songwriter to shine through as she ranged throughout her catalogue of self-proclaimed "creepy" music.

Recording: Baby Dee & Little Annie

Artist: Baby Dee & Little Annie

Song: Pilgrim Traveler [Sister Wynona Carr cover]

Recorded at The Monarch Tavern, April 15, 2013.

Baby Dee & Little Annie - Pilgrim Traveler

Full review to follow. I was more familiar with Baby Dee than her touring partner, but Little Annie fit right into the same world of bent cabaret, presenting songs with twitchy swagger punctuated by the clomp of her cane-tip on the stage floor. For this show, they were augmented by locals Thom Gill and Mike Smith — or as they were dubbed by Baby Dee, "Mr. Nice Guitar" and "Mr. Nice Moustache".

Sunday Playlist #15

Sunday Playlist #15

Gowns - Marked

Erika M. Andersen has re-recorded this song for the just-released album by her EMA project.

Murder Ford Monument - Black Moon Lake

Pony Da Look - Wishstick

Baby Dee - The Song of Self Acceptance

The Homosexuals - Bruno Speaks / Unknown

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You can always click the tags below to see what I originally wrote about the shows these songs came from.

Recording: Baby Dee

Artist: Baby Dee

Song: The Robin's Tiny Throat

Recorded at The Music Gallery, April 13, 2010.

Baby Dee - The Robin's Tiny Throat

My notes for this set can be found here.

Gig: Baby Dee

Baby Dee (Josephine Foster)

The Music Gallery. Tuesday, April 13, 2010.

A double header at The Music Gallery of... what would you like to call it? Maybe operatic/sideshow avant-folk singer-songwriters. Whatever it was, there was a pretty full house of mostly devoted fans and the grand piano was set up at the front of the room.

I was a stranger to the first artist up, Colorado-born (via Chicago, and, more recently, via Spain) Josephine Foster. Accompanying herself mostly on guitar (though she'd switch to the piano for the set's closing three songs) she came across as a woman out of time with a pure voice and pure folk vision.

It took me some time to get into the headspace of this, with her vocal style more melodramatic and warbling than singers normally use nowadays. Almost an old-timey affectation — shades of opera (unsurprising, as Foster aspired in her youth to that profession) crossed with theramin-like trills — but for all the melodrama implicit in that, there was also a sort of reserved formality.

That said, Foster still had a warm, humble touch, whether in her performance or her somewhat enigmatic song introductions. Foster played songs from throughout her career (a half-dozen albums under her belt reaching back to 2004), including a couple from her recent Graphic as a Star, wherein she set to music some of Emily Dickenson's poems. There were even a couple that seemed to be fairly new and unrecorded songs. Ending on "Indelible Rainbows", she played eight songs before being called back for one more. A very appreciative response to her set, and during the intermission the place was buzzing with conversations wondering if the headliner could match that.

Listen to a song from this set here.

So a bit of a tall order for Baby Dee, who began with some effusive praise for Josephine Foster: "It strikes me so much how much her enjoyment of singing just shines as she does it. And I realized as I was listening to it that if I sang that good, I'd enjoy it too. With me it always like, 'aaaaugh'," she joked, giving a few examples her own efforts before concluding, "anyway, fun's over."

Everyone laughed like that was a punchline, but indeed it turned out to be a statement of purpose. Although it wasn't totally clear from opener "April Day", this wasn't going to be a light jaunt all the way through. On the whole, the vibe of the show couldn't have been more different than the last time I'd seen Baby Dee, which had a funhouse whimsicality throughout. Here we got, after "April Day", a mini-suite of songs from the new A Book of Songs for Anne Marie. "We're just getting started here," she said at the conclusion of that. "We have lots of dirges."

And dirge on the musicians would. Baby Dee played seated at the piano and was accompanied by Matthew Robinson (cello) and Sarah Alden (violin). Her combination of almost-exaggeratedly dramatic whispers and deliberate enunciations played with the same sort of sense of upended expectations that Foster had employed in her set, but Baby Dee was simultaneously less transporting and more affected. Which isn't a slight — she was working in her own style and doing well at it.

There were plenty of lovely musical moments, with a delicate interplay between the piano and strings. A couple instrumental preludes were very fine, as well as little moments like the quick pizzicato bursts in "A Compass Of The Light". Perhaps at the emotional core of the set was a stirring reading of "Safe Inside the Day". The closing pair of "As a Seal on Your Heart" and "As Morning Holds a Star", essentially combined into one song, closed the main set out strongly.

Although she played admirably and offered some levity between songs, it felt as if perhaps she was determined to play up to the church-y dignity of the Music Gallery.¹ Baby Dee projected a general sense of delicate insecurity throughout the set — of course, it's foolish to try and "read" such an expert performer so closely, and tempting to see too much of the persona that's being put into the songs. Coming back for an encore with a lighter touch, we were told, "I was nice all throughout the show, but now we're going to do a bad, nasty song". Launching into "The Earlie King", we got a quick sense of the other side of the coin, where the dirges give way to bawdiness and fairy-tale frightshows. That ended things on a lighter note. On the whole, a fairly transporting show.

Listen to a song from this set here.

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¹ "I think some of you might might have been here the last time I played in this place," Baby Dee told the crowd between songs. "I think I sang a song entitled 'You Must Not Pee in the House of God' [beat] 'Unless It's an Emergency'. And I'm not going to do that again."

Recording: Baby Dee

Artist: Baby Dee

Song: The Song of Self Acceptance

Recorded at 6 Nassau St. (Over the Top Festival), May 21, 2009.

Baby Dee - The Song of Self Acceptance

My notes for this gig are here.

Gig: Baby Dee / Timber Timbre / Ghost Bees

Baby Dee / Timber Timbre / Ghost Bees

Over the Top Festival. 6 Nassau St. Thursday, May 21, 2009.

I'd gone to a film last year, but had never attended a gig at the Over the Top festival. This year I was interested, but scanning through the list of gigs, it was pretty much all stuff I was unfamiliar with. Unsure of what to see, I took the plunge and bought a wristband and resolved to try and take in as many previously-unseen bands as I could. Decided to start off with this Baby Dee show, not only from some vaguely-remembered plaudit for her unique stagecraft, but also to check out Timber Timbre, recently in the news for having signed with Arts & Crafts.

So headed off to the mysterious 6 Nassau Street. The venue had a bit of the feel of a speakeasy, largely because of its hidden, look-in-the-alley entrance. A largely unfurnished room, maybe a dozen yards square, with the bands set up in one corner. And not a lot of air movement on what turned out to be the year's first hot day. This meant that once it began to fill up, it got a little stifling in the room. Fortunately it was a sit-on-the-floor and soak it in kind of show, so perhaps smoggy lassitude was contemplative observation's midwife.

First up and establishing this vibe well were Ghost Bees (now T.O-based, but via Halifax) a duo of twin sisters Sari and Romy Lightman (guitar and mandolin) backed by Maya Postepski (percussion — also of Katie Stelmanis' band). Ghost Bees' music is wide-eyed folk, two gorgeous voices intertwining in eerie mysterious-twin synchronicity. Throughout the performance, the sisters watched each other carefully as they unfurled stories about witches and tea-leaf readers, giving a sort of private world folie à deux vibe. In the wrong context, I think this could all come off as too precious, but live, in this room, it was quite lovely. For their last two songs, the musicians pushed away their microphones and unplugged their guitars, singing unamplified to the rapt crowd. A good start to the night.

During Ghost Bees' last song, someone from the venue opened the side door to let in some air, and once the set ended, much of the crowd staggered outside to cool off, a living diorama of hipster types in the alley watched over by the staff in a Spadina restaurant's back door with some wry curiosity. Soon it was back in and a fairly full house settled down to hear Timber Timbre.¹ The band began with a rising ambient wall sounding like bird calls before guitarist/vocalist Taylor Kirk began to weave tales of haunted dark places. The band — lap steel, saxophone, violin — was well-constructed to add colour and texture more than rhythm. The songs were like a gothic mansion, all stately and roomy enough to explore around in. And possibly occupied by ghosts. A sharp set was capped by "Trouble Comes Knockin'", the excellent final selection, which felt like it was built from a pile of bones dug up at that crossroads where Robert Johnson did some business. Not recommended for use while operating heavy equipment or while trying to inspire the hopes of a young generation, but surely worth hearing.

A recording from this set can be found here.

And then, after another cooling break in the alley, a fair amount of turnover in the crowd — the numbers were reduced a bit, and now it looked like several of the cohort from the previous night's Katie Stelmanis had come along. Meanwhile, the harp and organ were being pulled into place for Baby Dee. I'm staggered in attempting to reduce this force of nature to mere descriptions. Imagine circus-ground organ and a quivering croon but also soft, melodious fingers on harp strings — two sets of tunes that were a little far apart, yet totally synthesized somehow in a way that made sense. I tended to enjoy the organ songs more — they put me in mind of British Music Hall tunes, like a bawdy George Formby, and were filled with viciously witty lines.² The harp songs were less immediate, though lovely in their own way — and it's a relatively unusual experience to see a harp in action, especially in the hands of a singer. This was a totally singular experience and a great set. Overall, a very good night, making me feel good for having taken the plunge.

A recording from this set can be found here.

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¹ Pronounced timber TAMber.

² Most amusing moment of the evening: one of those cooks from across the alley stepped into the room to see what all the fuss was about and looked around slightly suspiciously, like he thought the crowd were all putting him on by sitting around and listening to Baby Dee. He departed and, a few minutes later, brought a co-worker in with him, as if to prove his point about how crazy we were.