Recording: Christine Bougie

Artist: Christine Bougie

Song: [2nd piece]

Recorded at Wenona Lodge (Kurt Newman presents: an evening of cool solos), July 16, 2024.

Christine Bougie - [2nd piece]

Some characteristically-excellent work from Christine Bougie here, both on a beatifully-tender ballad for electric guitar and this bit of gorgeousness for lap steel.

You can check out some more from this set (and the rest of the evening's first half) over on youtube:

Recording: TRYAL

Artist: TRYAL

Songs: He Needs Me [composer: Harry Nilsson] + Road Game

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall, November 13, 2018.

TRYAL - He Needs Me

TRYAL - Road Game

In the between-albums phase, Alex Samaras and his TRYAL crew are still mixing faves from the Companion album (celebrating its anniversary at this show!) with newer pieces (such as "Sister Talk" and "Alouette") and delightful novelties like the lovely little tune from the Popeye soundtrack heard here. Starting the set with half the band seated on the stage floor, this had the feeling of a pyjama party — and there was a bit more sonic tweaking as well, with Matthew Pencer pushing things further into electronic abstraction with some textured laptop bleepbloops.

[Alex Samaras will be the featured performer (alongside Lara Dodds-Eden and Bram Gielen) at the next Riparian Acoustics-curated CMC Presents show, Thursday, January 17th at Chalmers House.]

Recording: The Holy Oak Family Singers

Artist: The Holy Oak Family Singers

Songs: Stay Loose [vox by Ben Gunning] + Only Love Would Know [vox by Felicity Williams + Thom Gill] + If You Could Read My Mind [vox by Tamara Lindeman] + I'll Tag Along [vox by Luke Kuplowsky] [all songs composed by Gordon Lightfoot]

Recorded at The Burdock Music Hall, August 13, 2018.

The Holy Oak Family Singers - Stay Loose

The Holy Oak Family Singers - Only Love Would Know

The Holy Oak Family Singers - If You Could Read My Mind

The Holy Oak Family Singers - I'll Tag Along

You never know what you have 'til it's gone. When the beloved Holy Oak was in full swing, "family" events like this were a regular occurrence, with some of the locals who used it as their hub banding together to cover musicians ranging from Prince to Mary Margaret O'Hara. The bonds of comradeship have transcended the loss of the venue, but events like this are a bit rarer on the ground these days. It has to be said that this was entirely too good a show for a Monday night, but it just might be impossible to gather these busy pros together on any other night of the week.

The instrumental core — Evan Cartwright (drums), Ben Whiteley (bass), Christine Bougie (lap steel), Ben Gunning (electric guitar), Luke Kuplowsky (acoustic guitar) and Thom Gill (keyb) — served as session aces for an all-star team of vocalists, including the latter three instrumentalists plus Tamara Lindeman, Felicity Williams, Robin Dann and Alex Lukashevsky. There were plenty of hits essayed, from "Every Highway" to "Rainy Day People", but the group here dug deeper as well, showing a special affection for the less-popular 80's Gord, including his '86 East of Midnight album, and demonstrating that the craft and wisdom in those compositions is on par with the better-known stuff.

Recording: TRYAL

Artist: TRYAL

Song: Companion

Recorded at the Jam Factory, April 15, 2018.

TRYAL - Companion

Continuing to hone the sophisticated, layered pop found on the project's album, from the opening strains of "He Needs Me" (from the Popeye soundtrack), there was whimsy and meta-commentary layered into vocalist Alex Samaras' lamentations. The band this time included Johnny Spence (keyb), Josh Cole (bass), Christine Bougie (guitar) and Phil Melanson (percussion/electronics) and the crew was now incorporating the background vocals of Robin Dann and Felicity Williams and turning over the setlist with some brand-new tracks.

[TRYAL will be part of TONE's Saturday night show (June 9th at Burdock) alongside Jessica Moss and the recently-reactivated Manticore.]

Recording: TRYAL

Artist: TRYAL

Song: Come On

Recorded at Burdock Music Hall, November 12, 2017.

TRYAL - Come On

One of the city's best "pure" vocalists, Alex Samaras is known for his work in jazz interpretation and pop dabblings, but instead of being stuck in any boxes, his TRYAL project seems to be a way for him to approach songcraft without any preconceptions or genre limitations. Emerging first in album form, this semi-private show (packing the room full with friends and kindhearted well-wishers) was meant to extend that onto the stage. The ensemble was an all-star band that overlapped with the crew that had recorded the tracks and included Johnny Spence (keyb), Josh Cole (bass), Evan Cartwright (percussion) and Christine Bougie (guitar). Interestingly, it didn't include any of the amazing singers who shared the vocal space on the album with Samaras, but that leaves something to anticipate for the next time.

Recording: Cameron-Corbett-Abbott-Bougie

Artist: Allison Cameron/Aaron Corbett/Brian Abbott/Christine Bougie

Song: [excerpt]

Recorded at The Steady Café (Track Could Bend #25), April 4, 2017.

Allison Cameron/Aaron Corbett/Brian Abbott/Christine Bougie - [excerpt]

Continuing the tradition started a year ago, Track Could Bend celebrated its second anniversary by inviting back all of the previous year's performers for a celebration. There ended up being nineteen players on this night, all of whom put their names in a hat to be drawn to create spontaneous ensembles for a series of quick sets. The hat obliged with this extremely off-kilter stringband, mixing guitarists with three very different styles (Brian Abbott's standard axe, Christine Bougie's lap steel and Allison Cameron's mandolin) with some sound-warping from Aaron Corbett tying things together.

[Track Could Bend #27 will be at The Steady on Tuesday, June 6th, with sets from Processor, Steve Sladkowski & Joe Sorbara and Diane Roblin & Katie Jensen.]

Recording: Christine Bougie

Artist: Christine Bougie

Songs: Over The Line + Giant Things By The Side of The Highway [composer: Dafydd Hughes]^*

Recorded at The Steady Café (Track Could Bend #24), March 7, 2017.

Christine Bougie - Over The Line

Christine Bougie - Giant Things By The Side of The Highway

Master guitarist Christine Bougie has an equally deft touch on the lap steel, and has recently been experimenting with new textures and ways of shaping her solo performance with it. Layering atmospheric loops under expansively-hazy melodic drift, she brought a set of simply-beautiful music to close out the night.

^* Thanks to Christine for passing these titles to these along!

[Christine Bougie will be celebrating the formal release of her Whistle Up a World album with an early show at The Burdock on Wednesday, May 17th. Track Could Bend will be back at The Steady on Tuesday, May 2nd.]

Photo by @dccintdot

Recording: Aurochs with Christine Bougie

Artist: Aurochs with Christine Bougie

Song: [excerpt from first set]

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), March 8, 2016.

Aurochs with Christine Bougie - [excerpt from first set]

Aurochs have been known to spice up their regular Tranzac timeslot (second Tuesday of every month!) with an occasional guest performer. This night saw local master guitarist/lap steel player Christine Bougie sitting in to help the trio push beyond their regular zone — the results ranged from ambient swells (as heard here) to echoplexed songbursts.

Recording: This is Awesome

Artist: This is Awesome

Song: I Just Wasn't Made for These Times [The Beach Boys cover]

Recorded at The Tranzac (Southern Cross Lounge), January 20, 2016.

This is Awesome - I Just Wasn't Made for These Times

Headed by master guitarist Christine Bougie, this quartet (including Dafydd Hughes, wurlitzer; Julia Hambleton, clarinet; and Andrew Downing, cello) brought an absolutely packed crowd to the Southern Cross Lounge to hear their front-to-back instrumental re-interpretation of The Beach Boy's seminal Pet Sounds album. Stripping the concept of composer Brian Wilson's "teenage symphony to God" down to a chamber quartet, these arrangements brought out the underlying yearning melancholy, especially when, such as here, Bougie switched over to lap steel. The group has essayed the album before and promises to come back to it again — given the turnout for this, expect to see the next performance in a larger room. (It was also recorded direct to tape by the band, so keep an eye out for a chance to hear this in hi-fidelity.)

[Christine Bougie and Dafydd Hughes (along with Jessie Baird) will be back at The Tranzac tomorrow (Monday, January 25th in the early slot at the Southern Cross Lounge.]