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: Ways

Artist: Ways

Song: [excerpt]

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

Ways - [excerpt]

This pairing of Brodie West and Evan Cartwright was frequently spotted around town a few years back, but had gone to ground for a spell. With an album due in a couple months, the next phase is now opening up as the pair are putting themselves back in the mix. The time away has definitely lead to some refinements in the pair's sound, which on this showing was presented with a renewed sense of elegant restraint. Evan Cartwright's percussion was not so much propelling things along as keeping them aloft, while West's saxophone was more suggestive of a sphere expanding than a path taken.

[Ways will be back in action on Thursday, March 5th at the launch party for A Pigsty in a Single Grain of Rice, recent collages by Andrew Zukerman at Likely General, where they will be interpreting a graphic score by Zukerman. West and Cartwright will also be performing as members of Eucalyptus at the band's annual residency at Hirut restaurant, every Sunday in March (except the first Sunday). 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: chik white

Artist: chik white

Songs: [two pieces]

Recorded at the Canadian Music Centre (Riparian Acoustics/CMC Presents), November 21, 2019.

Chik White - [second piece]

Chik White - [last piece]

This edition of the CMC's Nick Storring-curated concert series presented two musicians drawing inspiration from nature and applying that to very different sonic realms. Darcy Spidle (who performs as chik white) has been sharing the sounds of West Chezzetcook via his field recordings, and his relationship with the ocean at his front door also deeply informs his performance practice with the jaw harp. Unlike the last time I saw him, Spidle has shifted to a standing pose, adding a sense of coiled energy to his performance — and possibly a hint of stand-up comedy as well, as he embraces the ludicrous sounds that his throat and mouth can generate even as he deals with the physical damage his chosen instrument can cause.

This webstream of this full concert is still available to peruse in the CMC's archive:

You can also revisit the talk that Spidle gave about his artistic practice — as well as the history of the jaw harp — on the day before this concert:

[The Riparian Acoustics/CMC Presents season continues on Thursday, January 23rd, featuring Rebecca Bruton & the return of Brodie West and Evan Cartwright's duo Ways.]

Recording: Gayle Young

Artist: Gayle Young

Song: Citrina Lichen

Recorded at the Canadian Music Centre (Riparian Acoustics/CMC Presents), November 21, 2019.

Gayle Young - Citrina Lichen

This edition of the CMC's Nick Storring-curated concert series presented two musicians drawing inspiration from nature and applying that to very different sonic realms. Gayle Yong's microtonally-scaled stringed instruments shared space with some field recordings — on two of the pieces with water sounds recorded through tuned resonators, and here on a 96-tone octave piano — her bows, mallets and sticks on stings creating enveloping, aqueous zones.

This webstream of this full concert is still available to peruse in the CMC's archive:

[The Riparian Acoustics/CMC Presents season continues on Thursday, January 23rd, featuring Rebecca Bruton & the return of Brodie West and Evan Cartwright's duo Ways.]

Recording: R. Andrew Lee

Artist: R. Andrew Lee

Song: Four Quiet Preludes [excerpt] [composer: Anthony Genge]

Recorded at Canadian Music Centre (Riparian Acoustics Presents), March 21, 2019.

R. Andrew Lee - Four Quiet Preludes [excerpt]

The final offering in the season of Nick Storring-curated CMC Presents concerts brought Denver-based pianist R. Andrew Lee to town. His selections often mixed Satie-esque spareness with formal complexity, and in honour of this show's location, Lee brought some works by Canadian composers such as Ann Southam and Cecilia Livingston — but it was this piece by Anthony Genge that captured me most.

As of this writing, the archived livestream of the show is still available for you to view:

[Riparian Acoustics will be returning to curate next season's CMC Presents concert series as well, so stay tuned for more announcements there. In the meantime, there will be two RA co-presentations at this year's TONE festival, including Beverly Glenn-Copeland and Dustiny at the Jam Factory on Wednesday, June 12th and CVN with Koeosaeme, Korea Town Acid and Kat Estacio at Burdock on Monday, June 24th.]

screenshot from CMC livestream

Recording: Alex Samaras

Artist: Alex Samaras

Songs: Everybody Says Don't [composer: Stephen Sondheim] + Show Me + Chinese Café [composer: Joni Mitchell]

Recorded at The Canadian Music Centre (Riparian Acoustics/CMC Presents), January 17, 2019.

Alex Samaras - Everybody Says Don't

Alex Samaras - Show Me

Alex Samaras - Chinese Café

Another astute booking from Nick Storring/Riparian Acoustics (whose curation of the CMC Presents series has recently been extended for a second season), giving vocalist Alex Samaras a chance to pull together a night of songs from the various musical worlds he spends time on. I've never seen one of Samaras' Sondheim/cabaret shows — well, except inasmuch as he brings some of that into everything he does — but this had that kind of vibe, albeit with music ranging from art-song to Meredith Monk to Morton Feldman to Thom Yorke to locals Bernice. Backing from Lara Dodds-Eden (piano) and Bram Gielen (double bass), as well as Samaras' story-telling, added to the cabaret feel, animated by Samaras' joyful presence throughout.

Recording: Thin Edge New Music Collective

Artist: Thin Edge New Music Collective

Piece: Shimmer, Tree (In Memoriam Jonathan Harvey): II. I count the fleeing hours [composer: Kotoka Suzuki]

Recorded at the Canadian Music Centre (Riparian Acoustics/CMC Presents), November 8, 2018.

Thin Edge New Music Collective - Shimmer, Tree [2nd mvt]

Following on the triumph of their live soundtracking of Sarah Hennies' experimental documentary Contralto, Thin Edge headed to the Canadian Music Centre for this more modest night of intimate compositions. Consisting of solo pieces, duos and one trio (Barbara Monk Feldman's defiantly un-urgent drift of "The Northern Shore") these were mostly small-scale but deep sonic explorations from pianist Cheryl Duvall, percussionist Nathan Petitpas and violinist Aysel Taghi-Zada. As is usually the case with the works that Thin Edge chooses to explore, there were some uncanny frissons in the pieces here, whether the flowerpot clonks of Chiyoko Szlavnics' "Her Teeth Were White" or the broken furniture music of Samuel Andreyev's "Piano Pieces".

As of this posting, you can still watch the archive of the livestream here (note that the Barbara Monk Feldman piece, embedded below, is in a separate video!):

[The Riparian Acoustics/CMC Presents series continues on Thursday, January 17th with a night of vocalisations from Alex Samaras (along with Lara Dodds-Eden and Bram Gielen). There's also an excellent-looking night coming on February 22nd with Lindsay Dobbin and Kat Estacio.]

Image screencapped from CMC livestream.

Recording: Elinor Frey

Artist: Elinor Frey

Song: With concord of sweet sounds [composer: Isiah Ceccrelli]

Recorded at The Canadian Music Centre (CMC Presents/Riparian Acoustics Presents), October 3, 2018.

Elinor Frey - With concord of sweet sounds

This first instalment in a new season of CMC presentations at Chalmers House celebrated new music for an old instrument, bringing together a series of compositions commissioned for Elinor Frey's 4- and 5-string baroque-style cellos. These pieces (including a première of a piece by David Jaeger at this performance) have been accumulating over the past few years, and Frey was sharing them here before heading into the studio to record them. The results of conversations and exchanges with her composers, the pieces both work within and against the instruments' traditions, sometimes hinting at "baroque" music, but just as often finding new ways to explore their unique qualities. This beautiful offering, for example, explores open strings and shifting fields of overtones, heading into a hypnotizing drone zone.

[There's plenty more in store in this series at the CMC, curated by the dependably-curious ears of Nick Storring. All the events are recommended, and you should definitely have the next couple — with Thin Edge New Music Collective (on November 8th) and Germaine Liu & Sarah Hennies (on December 6th) marked down in your calendars.]

Recording: Allison Cameron with Heraclitus Akimbo

Artist: Allison Cameron with Heraclitus Akimbo

Song: Pass Around The Happy Apple

Recorded at The Canadian Music Centre (Bridging Worlds), October 6, 2016.

Allison Cameron with Heraclitus Akimbo - Pass Around The Happy Apple, Part 1

Allison Cameron with Heraclitus Akimbo - Pass Around The Happy Apple, Part 2

A cool late-afternoon gathering at stately Chalmers House, home of the Canadian Music Centre. The joint has a somewhat stodgy rep in some of the circles I travel, so it's nice to see them willing to shake things up a little and engage with some weirder sounds. This was the season launch for a series of concerts curated by Music In The Barns' Carol Gimbel — and a re-appearance by Kristel Jax (who spoke with Norma Beecroft last year) in her capacity as interviewer. This time out, she was in conversation with Allison Cameron, and the pair spoke about her career as a composer and its relationship to her work as an improviser. Following that came a brief joint set with obscure ambient noodler Heraclitus Akimbo, attempting to match his keyboard loops, cassettes and Buddha Machines with Cameron's banjo, vintage crackle synth and Happy Apple (which was, indeed, passed around the crowd).

You can also check out a "remix" of the performance over on soundcloud:

[The "CMC Presents" series — all curated by Carol Gimbel — continues with three more gigs at the CMC as well as a very cool-looking season-closer next May at The Drake.]

Photo by Kristel Jax.