A member of the Anjunabeats collective, this 24-year-old Californian concocts progressive trance house that’s distinct from the array of current offerings, which is to be sure extremely vast. The aim is obviously to fill the dancefloor until the wee hours. Barely out of his teens, Spencer Brown turned heads with the EP Chalice on the LE7ELS label, before joining the Anjunabeats stable and releasing several recordings that won over electronic fans, including the album Illusion of Perfection (2018) and the very recent Stream of Consciousness, which will certainly be on the table at Espace SAT.
Seattle native Aaron Parks has an impressive track record. The New York-based pianist demonstrates superior technique and open-mindedness, leading him to the most creative projects in new American jazz. Accustomed to Montreal stages and close to his community of musicians, this excellent instrumentalist brings on board double bassist Ben Street and drummer Damion Reid, this time around. Some of the material on the program could be from his most recent album Little Big, released on Ropadope, recorded with a different band than the one on the program at Salle Bourgie.
Packed with palace intrigue, pirate attacks, white-knuckle chariot races and a cameo appearance by Christ himself, the 1925 silent-film version of Ben-Hur offers plenty for musicians to play around with. Accompanying a pristine 16mm film print (care of Montreal’s Cinéclub/The Film Society) of director Fred Niblo’s epic Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ are Zoé Dumais on violin, Guillaume Bourque on clarinet, Joanie Labelle handling percussion, and at the piano, Guillaume Martineau, leader of the cinematically suggestive Lucioles collective and bearer of bona fides in both classical and jazz. Strap your sandals on tight, this promises to be a musically memorable evening worthy of the Circus Maximus.
Montréal Guitare Trio and California Guitar Trio: « Six guitares au sommet! »
by Michel Rondeau
Photo Credit: I. Vadnais
A meeting of two guitar trios, one from Montreal and the other from California. For the past 10 years or so, the musicians of the sextet thus formed have been getting together periodically to jam, record or perform. The show at l’Outremont is part of a North American tour that will take them to six other cities in Quebec.
In a Landscape, their most recent album together, produced in a church in the township of Gore, a municipality in the Laurentians north of Lachute, gives a good idea of the repertoire expected on the tour. It features both original pieces by members of the sextet and rearranged covers, such as Radiohead’s “Weird Fishes”, David Bowie’s “Space Oddity”, “Perpetuum Mobile” by the Penguin Cafe Orchestra and the title track, composed by John Cage.
Like the 51tr4p Fr4p50 mixtape, Tizzo’s song “On fouette” was released in the spring of 2018, and won a SOCAN award in June 2019. The expression on fouette, by the way, magnifies the ambitions of Tizzo and his Afro-Montreal buddies, who didn’t have it easy before making a name for themselves in local hip hop. All involved in the crafting of this authentic jam, Tizzo (Teddy Laguerre), Shreez (Shawn Volcy), Soft (Marc Casseus) and 4590’z (Vladimir Methelus) were joint winners of the SOCAN prize. The fast and assured ascent of Tizzo and his gang has just begun, and the next step is scheduled to take place at Club Soda, as part of the Run It Fest event. Tizzo, Shreez and Soft will be on stage, along with other colleagues from the keb rap community — Kay Bandz, Soubillz, TK, Mike Shabb, Kevin Na$h, and DJ Crowd.
Norwegian songwriter Anna Lotterud is known publicly under the pseudonym Anna of the North – for obvious reasons. In this case, indie pop, synth pop, soul pop and dream pop all contribute to a resolutely… pop approach. Melodic accents, consonant harmonies, romantic themes… nothing could be more pop. For the moment, the economy of means and artifices confers upon this Scandinavian singer expressing herself in English (perfected during an extended stay in the Antipodes) a freshness and lightness beyond the apparent conformity of her songs. If all goes well for Anna of the North, the stopover at Ministère should be a step towards much larger venues – not a foregone conclusion, despite the esteemed success of the albums Lovers (2017) and Dream Girl (2019).
Winner of the 2019 Polaris Award, Toronto rapper Haviah Mighty now sets her sights on the Montreal audience, starting with those checking her out at the Belmont. Since the release of her excellent opus 13th Floor, there’s been little question of her eloquence, her impact, and the quality of the beats wrapped around her machine-gun verbiage. Haviah Mighty is a strong personality, an ego reinforced by multiple victories over adversity – her own condition as a black woman has become a formidable weapon, formidable material for her hip hop expression. She needs to be seen on stage! Sharing the bill are Louis-Philippe Célestin, alias Lou Phelps, younger brother of Kaytranada, and CJ Flemings, another Montreal rapper.
Salomé Leclerc undeniably found her path while exploring Les choses extérieures, by far the most conclusive recording of a career still in its early stages. Echoes of the concerts that followed were mostly enyhusiastic, and the cycle is not yet over. This abundantly talented lyricist, composer, multi-instrumentalist, director and performer, certainly one of the dominant figures in French-speaking North America at the turn of this decade, needs to be seen live. You’ll have to get off the couch to appreciate the more robust live versions of her excellent album’s tunes, to which are added her best works of earlier vintage. A must, without a doubt.
The eminence noire of experimental techno with industrial accents, the German artist SNTS arrives masked and hooded like the Grim Reaper, a spectral and fiercely anonymous figure. His music is darker than dark, dystopian, even apocalyptic. His rhythms are violently binary, his grooves tinged with finely chopped sounds, processed voices, symphonic fragments, mystical psalmodies and more. Needless to say, this darkness is accompanied by a cold, clinical, resolutely Germanic aesthetic. A great night, guaranteed! SNTS shares the program with Montrealer Softcoresoft, whose praises we sang in mention of a program presented earlier in February at the SAT.
Born to a Chinese mother and Armenian father, Montreal sisters Emily and Sarah Oulousian put their pianistic talent to work for Mozart, Chopin and Gershwin. This program is part of the series Les Mélodînes, presented by the Pro-Musica concert society. Since early childhood, the older sister has wowed her audiences. She was a champion on the show Virtuose, in fact, and continues her journey on the ivories. In concert with her younger sister Emily, Sarah Oulousian offers a program of classical, romantic and modern works, from Mozart to Gershwin, Schubert and Chopin.
PROGRAM Emily Oulousian: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Piano Sonata No. 14 in C minor, K. 457, I. Molto allegro and II. Adagio Frederic Chopin: Etude Op. 25 No. 4 in A minor Sarah Oulousian: Franz Schubert: Impromptu Op. 90 No. 3 in G-flat major Frederic Chopin: Scherzo Op. 39 No. 3 in C-sharp minor Duo: George Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue
The McGill Baroque Ensemble presents an original program in a concert called In Hoc Mundo (In This World). In residence at the university, the orchestra performs works by two European clergymen living in South America, as well as music by one of the few native Baroque composers of the New World. First comes the music of Juan Pérez Bocanegra (?-1645), a Franciscan monk of Spanish origin, who spent a good part of his life in Peru and participated in the development of religious music in the region. Then that of Domenico Zipoli (1688-1726), an Italian Jesuit who settled in Argentina in 1717, and then travelled to Brazil and Paraguay. The third composer will be the Mexican composer Juan Garcia de Zespedes (c.1619-1678), who was also a singer, viola player and teacher in the Puebla region of Mexico.
PROGRAM Hank Knox: Conductor Works by Juan Pérez Bocanegra, Domenico Zipoli, Juan Garcia de Zéspedes
Proof of the Swedish band’s success with Montreal audiences, the MTelus concert has been sold out since January 17. The tour, led by singer, guitarist and composer Mikael Åkerfeldt, follows the release of the album In Cauda Venenum last September. In an interview with Hop ‘N’ Music, an Italian publication dedicated to music and beer, keyboardist Joakim Svalberg mentions, among other things, that Opeth members didn’t know that Åkerfeldt had started composing their 13th album until he had finished. Since their debut in 1989, the progressive death metal band, which has steered into prog-rock metal since Heritage (2011), has been delivering its lyrics in English. On In Cauda Venenum, Åkerfeldt decided to write and sing in his native language. The musicians have also recorded an English version, but they consider the Swedish to be the original version. (Christine Fortier)
