Black History Month | An Afro-Indigenous Immersion

by Sandra Gasana

For its third edition, Immersion plunged us into a meeting between two African women artists, Dalie Dandala, from Congo-Brazzaville, and Lerie Sankofa, from Côte d’Ivoire, and an Atikamekw woman, Laura Niquay. Together, they shared with us the fruits of their 21-day artistic creation residency, during which they got to know each other, created together and sang in each other’s respective languages.

Under the direction of Fredy Massamba, himself a renowned artist, the art of staging had its place in this show. From dress to dance to the many instruments played by the three women, nothing was left to chance. Each woman took her turn to explain her songs, with the others participating in the chorus or playing an instrument. At times, it was hard to tell whether the language was African or native, as the boundaries were so porous.

Singing, dancing, instruments and their arrangement came naturally, allowing the artists to tell their own stories. Ngoma, percussion, guitar, handpan drum and ahoco: it was all there. Each artist sang in her mother tongue, with occasional bits of French.

“Nzobi, in my language, means ritual or prayer, a bit like vodou,” explains Dalie Dandala before intoning her song in Nyari. She is joined by Lerie on percussion and Laura on backing vocals before dancing away, all dressed in red.

In turn, Lerie shares a song in Avikam about women and their desire for freedom when mistreated by their husbands. Dalie and Laura accompany her, one on the ahoco and the other with poetry in the Atikamekw language, with a touch of French.

Despite a string coming loose on her guitar in the middle of the show, this didn’t stop Laura from playing it on the track “Stéréotype”, which denounces prejudices about the role of women, with Dalie and Lerie on backing vocals and percussion.

These women even got the audience involved on one track, when Fredy Massamba couldn’t hold back from dancing. Indeed, he did so at one point in the evening when he joined the trio on stage, quickly accompanied by Louise Abomba, a visual artist from Cameroon.

They closed the show with a tribute to twins, considered a blessing in many African cultures, in song, music and dance. The complicity was more palpable between the two African artists, of course, but Laura managed to carve out a niche for herself while giving them the space to create a stronger bond between themselves.
This was followed by a question-and-answer period, during which the audience had the opportunity to ask the three artists a few questions. The theme of women was central throughout the show, the power conferred on them, their role in society and the prejudices to be deconstructed about them.

To the question “What’s next?” from the audience, we learned that Laura, who is currently working on a blues album with an all-female band, has invited Dalie and Lerie to participate in her project. So we’ll have to wait for a follow-up to this artistic immersion that resulted in a cultural symbiosis between Africa and one of Canada’s aboriginal peoples.

musique contemporaine

Ali Zadeh @ Molinari: a visit that will live long in our memories

by Frédéric Cardin

The three-day event Le quatuor selon Ali Zadeh (The quartet according to Ali Zadeh), organized by the Molinari Quartet, reached its climax on Saturday evening, February 15, at the Salle du Conservatoire de Montréal. In the presence of the composer, a small, elegant woman of 78, we listened, probably for the very first time, to all her string quartets in one go. This was made all the more special by the fact that it included the premiere of a work written specifically for the Molinaris, her Farewell quartet.

WATCH THE INTERVIEW WITH OLGA RANZENHOFER FROM THE MOLINARI QUARTET (In French)

After a full and fast-paced introduction by multidisciplinary artist Nicolas Jobin, who is also a “specialist” in the work of Franghiz Ali Zadeh, the seven quartets by the Azerbaijani composer were launched in non-chronological order, contrary to the Molinari Quartet’s usual practice for this kind of event. An idea of Mrs. Ali Zadeh’s which, I think, turned out to be a happy one, as it favored an alternation between harmonically “modernist” works and those more openly “folkloric”.

I won’t summarize each piece here, but the final impression of the many listeners present is probably that of an authentic fusion, sophisticated without abstruse cerebralism, of Eastern and Western musical universes. The language of Azeri sacred chants, called mughams, is omnipresent in Ali Zadeh’s expressive palette, but with variations in intensity and explicitness depending on the quartet. While 2015’s Reqs (Dance), and especially 1993’s Mugham Sayagi, her most famous work (commissioned by Kronos), are strongly tinged with what Western ears perceive as obvious orientalism, others such as Dilogia (1974, rev. 1988), In Search Of… (2005), and even the premiere Farewell (2025) are more strongly in the wake of chromatic modernism, or even the Second Viennese School (Farewell is explicitly inspired by Alban Berg’s Violin Concerto). That said, even in these, the soul of an art music linked to Islamic sacred chant remains perceptible, for those who know how to listen.

Franghiz Ali Zadeh’s music is an authentic fusion, a brilliant syncretism, all the more natural as it has been personally experienced by the artist throughout her life (Nicolas Jobin’s lecture was very enlightening in this respect). This music is even more powerful in its expressiveness because Ms. Ali Zadeh possesses two additional major assets: firstly, she is an excellent musical narrator, who knows how to tell stories with sufficient focus to set a lively scene, but also to leave interpretative space, both for the musicians and for the listeners, so as to allow each and every one to immerse themselves with a certain freedom of perception. Secondly, Ali Zadeh is a fine colorist, using almost the entire palette of string techniques such as col legno battuto, tremolos, glissandos, pizzicatos, mutes and so on. Elsewhere, the musicians sing, or (in Mugham Sayagi) also play percussion, moving around the stage and playing backstage. The rhythms used by Ms. Ali Zadeh, often demanding but propulsive, endow her music with an infectious accessibility.

For this ease of reception, combined with an elaborate academic knowledge and structural complexity that is anything but obtuse, Franghiz Ali Zadeh’s musical proposal is one of the most inspiring of our time, and perhaps one of the most promising for the future of contemporary creation.

This kind of world-class event (which also included two previous days of conferences and discussions) is a landmark event. The Molinari Quartet gave us the kind of privilege that music lovers in Berlin, Vienna or Paris know so well. The ensemble has benefited from the support of a far-sighted and essential patronage (the Lupien Family Foundation), to which we are grateful.

I’ll end with an arrow aimed at a few media “competitors” (forgive me, but you’ll understand): to my knowledge, no one from Radio-Canada, La Presse or Le Devoir was present. This just goes to show the deplorable cultural state of the mainstream media, unable to grasp the unique and historic nature of this event.

expérimental / contemporain

M/NM | Saturday Night Ether…eal

by Alain Brunet

On Saturday, M/NM promised us a “unique immersive and meditative audiovisual experience” under the SAT (Society for Arts and Technology) Satosphere dome, with solo piano interpretations by Isak Goldschneider and Eve Egoyan, set to visuals by Elysha Poirier and David Rokeby. A calm, celestial immersion, we observed on site. Etherial ? Saturday night ether !

Isak Goldschneider was asked to play two related works, although composed at different times. First, a work by Quebecer Hans Martin, Variations sérielles, composed in 2024 and premiered before us on Saturday February 15. Video artist Elysha Poirier’s visual environment was conducive to this chromatic language slowly unfolding on the keyboard. Over the 7-minute duration of this new work, each note gently settles, spreading out these explorations of the 12 tones of the scale like a meditation. At first glance, this approach seems familiar, but it doesn’t stand out clearly. You need to listen very carefully to detect its singularity, particularly in the rhythmic ruptures, pedal effects and minimalist chords in a context of assertive serialism.

This was followed by the execution of Palais de Mari, imagined by Morton Feldman almost 40 years ago, a year before his death. The original inspiration lies in the idea of a virtual visit to the palace of King Zimri-Lim, who was the last to rule Mari, a city planted near the Euphrates 4000 years ago. The aesthetic here is similar to that chosen by Hans Martin, whose work dates back to 1986. The punctuations are sharper and the harmonic constructions atonal, typical of this period in contemporary music. Reverberation effects are very present in chords and sustained notes (tenuto), producing a sonic bond and reinforcing the impression that the notes are linked (legato), without apparent interruption. For 25 minutes, the imaginary visit continues in a post-modern, sometimes even futuristic evocation of this several-thousand-year-old palace, of which only shapeless ruins remain. Hence the minimalism of this work, in which motifs are repeated here and there.

Performed by Eve Egoyan, Simple Lines of Enquiry was composed by the late Ann Southam (1937-2010) and extends this ethereal, dreamlike, hypnotic proposition. Once again, note lapping generates reverberation between the slowly constructed motifs. The atonal choices and slowness of the pianistic execution encourage the viewing of David Rokeby’s video Machine for Taking Time. This art video projects almost still images of downtown Montreal, often the rooftops of Saint-Laurent Boulevard, many of which were taken a long time ago – as many buildings have since emerged from the ground. The same shots are repeated over the seasons, contemplating atmospheric changes, snow and/or greenery. Here again, this work is typical of contemporary composers of the previous century, as is the art video projected onto the concave screen, which was not designed for such immersion.
Other creative times, other creative morals…

Baroque / Classical / musique contemporaine / période romantique

Les Violons du Roy and Kerson Leong: A Time of Grace

by Alexandre Villemaire

Les Violons du Roy’s first concert of 2025 finally took place not in Quebec City, but in Montreal’s Salle Bourgie. The weather having forced the postponement of the February 13 performance at the Palais Montcalm to a later date, it was Montreal audiences who got to hear violinist Kerson Leong and the world premiere of Kelly-Marie Murphy’s Found in Lostness, to a full house.

The evening’s repertoire was structured around works by Johann Sebastian Bach and Felix Mendelssohn. Bringing together the figures of Bach and Mendelssohn in a program is not a new or innovative idea. As first guest conductor Nicolas Ellis, in charge for the evening, rightly reminded us in his introduction. Indeed, Mendelssohn made a major contribution to the rediscovery of the Leipzig cantor’s music, which had been somewhat forgotten in the 19th century, when he presented The St. Matthew Passion in Berlin in 1829. Mendelssohn, himself an organist, was greatly influenced by Bach, as were many other composers who saw him as a spiritual master.

The first work on the program was Mendelssohn’s Symphony for Strings No. 10 in B minor. A youthful composition – he was fourteen when he wrote it – the influences are clearly classical in the treatment of the strings, reminiscent of Haydn, but the conduct of the voices, particularly in the first movement, marked Adagio, is eminently Bachian. In fact, the choice of the key of B minor, the same as that of his famous Mass, is a nod to Bach. For the rest, the form remains classical, but is peppered with the lyricism and passionate dynamic changes characteristic of Romanticism. It is clear that this is a young Félix exploring musical language, who has not yet found his style.

This was followed by a sensitive, meditative interpretation of the organ chorale O Mensch, bewein’ dein Sünde groß [O man, weep for your great sin]. Nicolas Ellis guided the musicians into an intimate, pleading world. The arrangement for strings by German composer Max Reger (1873-1916) lends a hushed, more interior character where, right up to the last note, we are left in a state of suspension. It’s another nod to Bach’s legacy to include Reger, who is said to have said: “Bach is the beginning and the end of music”.

What an excellent idea to seamlessly link the arrangement for soloists and string orchestra of the aria “Erbarme Dich [Have mercy, my God]” from St. Matthew’s Passion, featuring the evening’s guest soloist Kerson Leong, with Canadian composer Kelly-Marie Murphy’s Found in Lostness. With a sound of purity, Leong is accompanied by violist Jean-Louis Blouin in this vocal duet that perpetuates the dynamics of the previous chorale. Seconds that rub against each other to create dissonance magnify the imitation of the Apostle Peter’s guilt-ridden weeping after denying Jesus.

The transition into Kelly-Marie Murphy’s world is a natural one, as the aesthetic of the piece explores the theme of loss. The piece opens with chilling high notes, following a double bass solo by Raphaël McNabney that exploits the unnatural treble of his instrument. The piece then takes off in an energetic burst, featuring vivid melodic lines, extended violin playing techniques imitating shrill cries, tense chords and constant dynamic changes. After this wild ride, calm returns with a harmonic string carpet over which Kerson Leong’s violin brushes a dissonant line that the rest of the orchestra lightly joins. This finale reminded us of Charles Ives’ The Unanswered Question. Coherent, accessible and engaging, it deserves to be heard and, above all, listened to!

After opening with the music of the young Mendelssohn, the concert concluded with his last work, the String Quartet in F minor, composed after the death of his sister. The language of maturity asserts an unabashed romanticism, where the development of ideas is more developed, personal and marked by emotionally charged orchestral lines and treatments.

Choral Music / Classical / Classical Period / Renaissance music

Beethoven’s 9th, Montreal, 200 Years Ago…

by Alexis Desrosiers-Michaud

On this Valentine’s Day, we were treated to a premiere at the concert by Ensemble Caprice and Ensemble ArtChoral: Beethoven’s 9ᵉ symphony on early instruments, conducted by Matthias Maute.

The original program was to have opened with the little-known cantata Hiob by Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel. Instead, we were treated to two Yiddish pieces, Ernst Bloch’s Yih’yu L’ratzon and a traditional aria calledOy dortn, as well as Gregorio Allegri’s famous Miserere.

The two Jewish pieces feature soprano Sharon Azrieli and her imposing vibrato. Acting as cantor, she announces psalmodies and the choir responds. We don’t know if it’s a microphone or projection problem, but she was barely audible from the back of the audience. All the same, it’s very pretty, and reminds us that this Jewish and Hebrew music is too rarely performed in our concert halls.

The Miserere is a jewel of musical genius that leaves no room for error. Unfortunately, there were mistakes. Firstly, the voices of the quartet perched high up in the Maison symphonique are not homogeneous; those of the men do not vibrate, whereas those of the women do. What’s more, it’s not always right. Then, there’s no change in volume throughout the piece, and as this piece is often repeated, it becomes redundant and loses all its intimacy. Then, in the psalmodies, different notes are accentuated by the choristers, instead of being lightly pressed, and it’s sometimes unclear in the cuts and consonants. In short, this is a fine work, but it would have deserved a more consistent rendering.

The real treat of the first half is Höre auf meine Stimme, written by William Kraushaar, also a chorister in the bass section. Maute warned us that the melody would stick in our heads, and for good reason. Simple without being kitschy, repeated often enough without our noticing it too much, it is supple and expressive. The accompaniment doesn’t impose itself, leaving the choir to sing along, acting as a harmonic carpet. Were it not for a few dissonant chords from the language of Morten Lauridsen and his contemporaries in the a cappella passages, we would have placed this work between the styles of Mendelssohn and Schubert, and on our first listen, this piece seems accessible to most amateur choirs. When will it be published?

According to conductor Maute, this is the first time in Montreal that Beethoven’s Ninth has been played on period instruments. It takes a few minutes to adapt to the new sound, but it’s very pleasant and successful, despite a few lapses in accuracy and precision. The sound isn’t fat, and the loud passages don’t give the impression that Obelix is lifting the Sphinx, but the tension is there. In the first movement, which Maute conducts at breakneck speed, you can hear all the elements of the musical dialogue, and the second really has the feel of a dance, something you don’t get from many other conductors. However, the middle section of this movement is too fast, and the winds don’t keep up. The third movement is certainly not adagio, but very cantabile. One enjoys the phrases without lingering or falling into the moon.

The last movement opens smoothly and lightly. Finally, the cello/bass recitatives are not too heavy! And all is exalted before the entrance of the chorus, with the recitative of bass Dominique Côté. But as soon as the chorus begins, something annoys us: a soprano pierces more than the rest of her section, especially in the high register, which is like saying almost all the time in Beethoven. Once this is targeted by the ear, it’s extremely difficult to ignore. My seatmate, who was also bothered by it, confided to me at the end of the evening that it wasn’t the first time it had happened to this tandem. If you don’t want one person’s work to unbalance a rare, high-level performance, this is something to be corrected.

photos: Tam Photography

Contemporary

New European Ensemble open the 12th edition of M / NM

by Vitta Morales

The Netherlands-based New European Ensemble kicked off this year’s 12th edition of the Montréal Nouvelles Musiques Festival. The opening concert titled “Dynamite Barrel” showcased the work of innovative contemporary composers whose pieces on the night would adhere to this year’s theme: the marriage of music and images.

Heading into this concert with little information, I assumed that this meant music that evokes imagery but that ultimately each listener was to be responsible for their own imaginations. As I would soon see, each of the featured composers would run with this theme slightly differently.

The pieces are set out to represent locations, sonic evolution, historical periods, or a mixture of the three. Sometimes this was done, as it routinely is when it comes to new chamber music, by pushing the limits of textures and timbre; meaning that they contained all the florid passages, extended techniques, mixed orchestration, and meterless moments you would expect. For those who found this fatiguing, the piece Cyan Saturn, inspired by Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew, provided some nice contrast as it contained some compositional conventions of jazz fusion which made for something a bit different.

Regardless, most of the pieces of the night would couple their music with images projected onto a screen and essentially require the players of the New European Ensemble to “score” the images live. In one piece this meant recontextualizing old Looney Tunes scenes; on another occasion, a Bollywood film; and at the very end, a surf rock piece superimposed with Thai music set to shadow puppetry.

When the musical scoring lapsed into what I would consider dense, pointillistic, or meterless soundscapes, I was much more tolerant of any shrieks and squeals when I could see they were in accordance with what was happening on the screen. The brain is funny that way. At other moments I felt some dense soundscapes overstayed their welcome. I can wholly admit that contemporary chamber music asks important questions of established practices when it goes down this route; my gripe is that it always seems to be the same questions. And they’ve been asked for more than a few decades at this point. Overall I would say the New European Ensemble interpreted for us some very interesting music, but I wasn’t about to rush to the merch

photos: Marie-Ève Labadie

Classical / Modern Classical

OSM | Payare and Weilerstein: Passion for Two From Prokofiev to Ravel

by Alexandre Villemaire

On the eve of Valentine’s Day, February 12 and 13, the setting couldn’t have been more propitious for the pairing of Rafael Payare and Alisa Weilerstein on the Maison Symphonique stage.

If Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé can be deliberately associated with the idyll of love, both in its subject matter and in its music, Sergei Prokofiev’s Symphony Concertante for Cello, with its eclecticism and biting, percussive sounds, could appear out of step with the program’s aesthetic. On the contrary, the works were highly complementary in terms of timbral language, dynamics and passionate playing.

Opening the evening, Sergei Prokofiev’s Symphonie concertante. Written between 1950 and 1952, this mature three-movement work by the Russian composer is a reworking of an earlier cello concerto that was roundly criticized. Prokofiev’s language is textured and composite, drawing on the full range of the cello’s sound, as well as orchestral and rhythmic sonorities and passages reminiscent of jazz. At the podium, Payare was as fiery as ever, but more restrained than usual in his gestures for this complex score, where the orchestral interventions are velocity-laden in terms of texture and technique. Payare’s direction was precise and the orchestra of great intensity.

The second and third movements (Allegro giusto and Andante con moto) particularly appealed to us, respectively for their virtuosity, their use of dynamic orchestral effects and their folk accent in the cadenza of the second movement, where Alisa Weilerstein demonstrates the full range of her technique and the possible interplay of her instrument with evocative ease. Even if what sounds false to the ear is in fact well calculated, written and conveyed with naturalness. The cello lines are as swift as the orchestral lines, blending with the different sections in a rich, inventive orchestration. On stage, Alisa Weilerstein transports us into a world of her own, where she doesn’t just play the music. She is the music. She embodies a character like an actress on a stage, where her facial expressions and gestures are as significant as the accompanying music. The audience gave her a standing ovation for several minutes.

The second part, dedicated to the music of the ballet Daphnis et Chloé, plunged us into a dreamlike, colorful world. Here, Payare becomes a painter before a blank canvas which he paints with precision. Even if we’re dealing with repertoire that’s all too familiar, it’s always a delight to see the dynamics and colors imagined by Ravel unfold. The arrangement of the choir, which was installed higher than usual due to the recording, was also interesting. It’s a nice touch, too, to have the rows of choristers enter successively during the introduction, to simulate the effect of voices arriving from afar and gaining in power. A minor criticism: the processional effect would have had even greater impact if this entrance had been sung without a score! For the rest, the choir’s interventions were excellent, delivered with fine control of nuances and dynamics. In the orchestra, Rafael Payare danced across the stage, instilling vigor and character into the various orchestral forces, both in the more diaphanous moments and in the thunderous, brassy passages reminiscent of the language of George Gershwin. The astonishingly complementary and passionate interpretation of the evening’s two works richly deserved the thunderous applause of a packed Maison symphonique, and gave the orchestra great material for their forthcoming album releases, which we look forward to discovering.

Photo Credit: Antoine Saito

Jazz

ONJ | Tirolien with Strings Brings Down the House

by Vitta Morales

I will waste no time in saying that Malika Tirolien with the ONJ was among the best concerts I’ve been assigned. It is only February, but I suspect it will go down as one of my favorite shows of the year. And the reason why it boils down to this: Tirolien and company treated us to fantastic performances of solidly crafted songs that were then elevated by great arranging from Jean-Nicolas Trottier.

Tirolien, armed with a rhythm section, three backup singers, a string orchestra, and horns, performed songs from her 2021 album Higher, in addition to a few other selections from a separate project called Gemini Crab. Already, the songs from Higher in their original form are groovy, synth heavy, and high energy. (Due in part, no doubt, to it being co-produced by Michael League of Snarky Puppy). In an interview with Tirolien, our colleague Varun Swarup quite astutely wondered how much more grandiose these songs could get. This would be answered immediately. These arrangements, and in particular their use of strings, equated to a lightness and floating quality in the more gentle moments of the music, but they were equally up to the task of adding a satisfying density and dissonance when required. As concerns the horns, they provided some heft and weight, making the groovier moments even more so. In the words of Tirolien herself, Jean-Nicolas “found a way to elevate the music without losing its core identity.”

Musically, the show and compositions had a bit of everything. Quintuplet grooves, 12/8 shuffle, synth lead solos, a saxophone battle, politically fueled rap, belted high notes, creative tempo changes, a shredding guitar solo, and even some light choreography were all seen before the night was over. And, most importantly, it all worked. It really worked. Going over my notes, I looked to see if there were any fair criticisms that were worth mentioning. In the end, I decided that including any nitpicks would feel a bit forced. And this is because my takeaway from the evening wasn’t “Wow, what a great show; but it would have been nice to clean up elements X, Y, and Z.” Rather, my takeaway was, “Wow, what an exceptional show from all involved.”

Electronic

IGLOOFEST | Continuation and End with Four Tet

by Léa Dieghi

After four weeks of music, thousands of dancers dragging their feet on the Jacques-Cartier Quay, and a program featuring electronic music in all its diversity, this Saturday sees the culmination of the Montreal season of Igloofest 2025. And what better way to close this incredible winter festival season than with Four Tet? Here’s a look back at an emotional evening. (At least, it was for me!)

SAPORO: Priori, Avalon Emerson and Fourtet

While most of the artists featured on the main stage this season were more in the electro-tech-house vein, this evening was a real opportunity to bring techno back to the fore.

For fans of techno music, many of whom criticized this year’s program as “not techno enough”, this was THE evening not to be missed.

We start with Priori (real name Francis Latreille), the OG of underground techno music in Quebec. Regulars will have seen his name on the billboards of Montreal’s somewhat more underground raves, alongside some of the biggest names in Canadian and international music. With his slightly more unstructured style, captivating textures and increased use of synthesizers, his set was the perfect opening for Avalon Emerson, who quickly turned up the heat – and the BPMs – a notch.

Hailing from the American desert (Arizona), the warmth of her birth state quickly fused with the coldness of the warehouses she frequented, creating this hybrid style, somewhere between industrial and dreamlike.

Her deep bass lines quickly percolated through the igloofest facilities, accompanied by equally striking hi-hat and high-pitched claps. As I wandered around the bonfires in the middle of the site, just to warm up a bit, I was quickly taken aback by the power of his set. And all around me, it was as if the audience, too, had been activated.

And after a 1h30 set, managed to perfection, Avalon Emerson faded away, not without a round of applause, to make way for the evening’s headliner – I’d even say of the entire 2025 program: Four Tet.

I must confess that my opinion on the matter is surely biased, given that I’ve been following FourTet religiously for several years now. He’s been in my headphones on a daily basis, and seeing him was truly one of my dreams.

And you know, sometimes reality isn’t as beautiful as fantasy, but… in the case of Four Tet, it was a slap in the face.

His music has managed to give me a happiness, and a high, that few artists have managed to give me in life. Accompanied by his analog machines and endowed with great musical precision, he delivers a set of impressive energy. It’s not everyone who can lead a crowd like this: and in this human ocean, it’s as if Four Tet has become a kind of Poseidon, controlling our movements like waves.

People jumped, shouted, applauded, and we could have gone on like this for hours. It would take more than two hours to truly appreciate such talent. But two hours was the time slot we had, and it was enough to appreciate Four Tet’s talent. A true genius, who almost made me shed a tear of appreciation.

VIDEOTRON: SISI Superstar, Princess Superstar and Awwful

To be honest, I didn’t spend as much time as I would have liked in front of the little Videotron stage on this last evening. Unfortunately, when there are two stages, you have to make choices!

However, the little time I spent dancing during these artists’ three sets gave me a good taste of what they had to offer: Hyperpop-infused techno, very cunty, and very much inspired by LGBTQIA++ culture.

People seemed to like it, and so did I: the next time their names appear on a program, I’ll definitely go and see a bit more of what they can do.

TAVERNE TOUR I The Drin at Le Ministère

by Helena Palmer

Taverne Tour weekend ended at Le Ministère. Everyone has been crushing Labatt 50s for three days straight and the room is brimming with energy on the heels of La Sécurité’s performance. We survived the festival, hopping over snow banks from venue to venue. Now, it’s time to party.

The Drin was the closing act, a noise rock band featuring a saxophone, a harmonica, and some morbid lyrics. This was an interesting choice for the festival closer. I would absolutely see this band again when I can pay attention to what is happening on the stage. Their sound is gritty and cool, and they are certainly captivating performers, just maybe not enough to hold the dwindling focus of the festival-goers on their last ounce of energy.

It was slightly surreal and disorientating to witness at 1 am; a man in dark sunglasses playing the sax quickly approaching through the crowd, as someone shoves a greasy slice of pizza into my hand. All the while the singer is asking: “do you want to watch yourself die?.” Honestly? No, I don’t. Right now I’m at the pizza party; I want to headbang and shake some ass. There is a time and place for considering my own mortality, and I’m just not sure this was it.

TAVERNE TOUR I Bad bitch vibes and hyperpop madness at O Patro Vys

by Amir Bakarov

O Patro Vys is a small venue above Billy Kun, a bar famous for having various ostrich heads over the walls. In reality, O Patro Vys doesn’t have many ostrich heads, but there was no lack of bad bitch vibes that snowy Friday night on the Day 2 of Montreal’s Taverne Tour. Public Appeal, Franki, Los3r, and Ura Star & Fireball Kid hyped up the dancefloor and made many girls (and me) scream. I guess that’s what FKA Twigs meant by “Eusexua”.

Public Appeal, a DJ and musician from France, has been destroying dance halls of rave floors in Montreal for last six years. That night they lit up O Patro Vys with a label-free pop set that blended rugged electroclash beats and sultry indie sleaze. It was pure slay energy, fueled by influences from Charli XCX to underground techno – people on the dancefloor around me were jumping and singing along, profoundly hooked on Public Appeal’s confident presence and dystopian-edge pop.

Public Appeal

Franki, a project by singer-songwriter Helena Palmer, brought to O Patro Vys a denim-inspired pop spectacle, bubbling around punchy rhythms and cheeky nostalgia for the Brat summer. Her soft guitar and intimate lyrics were backed by Julia Mela (from Gondola) on a bass and DJ Wiltbarn, an emerging local adept of juke, footwork, and girly-pop electronics —a perfect trio to match with cheerful songs about fabric, fashion, and everyday chaos. “You Look Good in Your Jeans” is still playing in my head while I’m writing this review a day later. And I don’t even wear jeans.

Franki

I went out for a smoke, and after I was back, I found that three bubbly girls on the stage turned into three boys with laptops, ready to rock their computer wizardry. But the shit they make ain’t no Silicon Valley Hackathon; the sugary vocals, blend of melancholic lyrics and brash electronic beats were not too far-fetched from the girly energy that dominated the night at O Patro Vys. Los3r, an electronic trio from Ottawa formed in late 2022 by longtime friends Noah Perkins (Geunf), Thomas Khalil (User), and Julien Martinet (dulien) – absolutely slayed.

The night was wrapped by real instruments from Ura Star & Fireball Kid, a six-piece sound presence, described on their Bandcamp as “music for good times, kitchen parties, barn burners and night drives.” Kids back then used to call it “easycore”—lots of jumping around, lot of guitars; bright, melodic textures and chants like “I love going out – we always have a good time / cold beer in my mouth reminds me of summertime, oh ya”; its pop, punk, synth-driven hooks and, honestly, I fuck with it. Boys made it to the Brat summer party and found a way to fit in the vibe. Nothing but respect.

TAVERNE TOUR I Motherhood is a cacophonus explosion of sounds

by Amir Bakarov

Motherhood took the stage with a whirlwind of experimental energy, celebrating their new album release, Thunder Perfect Mind, with a set that was as unpredictable as it was thrilling. Hailing from Fredericton, New Brunswick, this three-piece outfit has been honing its craft for a solid decade, and its seasoned stage presence was evident from the first note. Despite their small lineup, their sound felt massive, layered with guitar, synth, and a seemingly endless array of pedals. The result was a spacey, math-rock-inflected journey with jolting rhythms and a wry new wave edge reminiscent of early Talking Heads.

Musically, Motherhood flitted between funky grooves and angular breakdowns, embracing off-kilter time signatures and jumpy drum patterns. Their melodies—while often simple and catchy—were interjected with abrupt changes that kept the audience on high alert. One moment, you’d find yourself bobbing along to a buoyant riff, and the next, they’d swerve into a cacophonous explosion of sound. While this approach can be exhilarating, it sometimes felt like they were changing directions merely for the sake of switching things up, which made the set feel a bit scattershot in places.

Still, Motherhood’s eagerness to explore every musical nook and cranny was part of their charm. The lighting design, bathed in vibrant, shifting colors, complemented the band’s restless spirit, highlighting their dynamic interplay on stage. The crowd seemed to feed off this high-voltage atmosphere; arms flailed and feet stomped as the band barreled from one track to the next.