With autumn here and the temperature dropping by the day, any opportunity to store up some heat and light is worthwhile. Jazz bassist, composer and educator Summer Kodama splits her time between Montreal and Las Vegas, and will be bringing her Sun Warriors ensemble to the OFF Jazz Festival. PAN M 360 connected with Kodama to find out more about the Sun Warriors’ tactics and strategies, as well as her own active dedication to diversity in her musical realm and beyond.
PAN M 360: What is the guiding principle or intention of Sun Warriors?
Summer Kodama: This ensemble encourages vulnerable expression, risk-taking improvisations, the visibility of a diverse representation of artists, and the showcasing of original compositions. The guiding musical principle of this project is to encourage a sense of honesty and liberation through improvisation. The group explores creating compositions from narratives and guidelines together in real time–always with a sense of continuity, intention, and structure.
PAN M 360: You released a single this past spring, “Birds of a Feather, Free from a Tether”. The two sax players in the sextet, Montrealers Allison Burik and Claire Devlin, will also be with you on Oct. 8 at Resonance Café. Is this single a good indication of what listeners can expect that night?
Summer Kodama: Yes. The representation of the band that performed “Birds of a Feather, Free from a Tether” is something I wanted to replicate for OFF. From a compositional standpoint, some of my most recent works are inspired by poems and literature.
PAN M 360: You are involved in this performance as a bass player, but also as composer. What are your personal priorities as a composer? What makes you call a piece you’ve written a keeper?
Summer Kodama: I believe honesty is the most important component of self-expression. I try to convey this idea through my moments of playing and improvising as a bassist, and through being a composer–like Charles Mingus. I love that he was never apologizing for what he had to say, because I’ve been through stages of apologizing all the time for no reason in real life. I think if a composition accurately reflects a feeling, recollection, or moment in time, that’s the first step for me to realize that I have something to work with and expand upon.
PAN M 360: Inclusivity and diversity, making sure everyone has a voice in jazz (and elsewhere), is clearly of vital importance to you. What are your strategies for achieving that? You’ve been working with Nevada School of the Arts and Jazz Outreach Initiative to this purpose, and also founded the Healing Hearts Cooperative.
Summer Kodama: I recently wrote a grant proposal for an initiative. I also wrote an article recently about considering equity in alternative models of mentorship. My pursuits recently regarding the matter have been toward engaging the community. Actively creating the space and opportunity for underrepresented young musicians to succeed is crucial to initializing a culture of equity.
This has been said since the 1950s: the more demanding music tends to come together over time. Thus, the Western classical school is gradually opening up to other currents, and contemporary jazz is certainly on the shortlist of alliances. Except for the most narrow-minded, it is now common to appreciate a classical musician integrating themselves into a project involving improvisation, or to hear a jazz musician exploring the repertoire of written music of the Western tradition.
This is certainly the case with Philippe Côté, who takes the stage at the Off Festival de jazz de Montréal in concert with American pianist Marc Copland and the Saguenay Quartet. Chamber music and jazz go hand in hand in the imagination of the Montreal artist, as will be demonstrated on stage this Saturday, October 2, and on disc on November 5: the works Bell Tolls Variations and Fleurs Revisited will be performed during the festival.
Saxophonist, clarinetist, composer, arranger, conductor, Philippe Côté is currently completing a doctorate at McGill University under the direction of John Hollenbeck and is also the coordinator of the McGill Conservatory Jazz Program, which is part of the university’s community school. In addition, the Montreal musician has received numerous awards, including grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec. He has composed for orchestras and chamber ensembles such as the Orchestre national de Jazz de Montréal, the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra and the Ensemble Paramirabo.
All reasons to justify this exchange with PAN M 360.
Philippe Côté: The Bell Tolls, the piece by Marc Copland who I think is a great jazz pianist, was complete in itself before I worked on it—recorded in 2009 with drummer Bill Stewart and bassist Drew Gress. Originally played as a trio, then, this piece is very well constructed, super rich, very subtle. This is a respectful recomposition of this piece; I don’t transform it too much, I bring it a more classical dimension, very tonal even if contemporary. For Fleurs Revisited, my own piece, I allowed myself to explore jazz and contemporary music more, while remaining influenced by today’s popular trends. So the sound design is more contemporary.
PAN M 360: What about the choice of instrumentation?
Philippe Côté: The idea of this project was to compose and arrange for a string quartet, a piano and myself on bass clarinet and soprano saxophone. I didn’t choose a double bass or drums, this was intentional, these elements are nevertheless in the music. So I decided to make chamber music without denying my musical nature; I like jazz, rhythm, percussion, groove. The idea of this instrumentation is based on the idea that it can work acoustically in the context of chamber music built on jazz pieces. In contemporary jazz, piano trio and string quartet projects are often dominated by drums and bass, to the detriment of acoustic balance. In the case of these revisited works, the jazz side of the affair is represented more in the improvisational sequences and in some of the grooves than in the orchestral construction per se. The written material stimulates the improvisation, in fact.
PAN M 360: However, the strings don’t really improvise. What is their role?
Philippe Côté: The strings do not improvise but they are not relegated to the role of wallpaper at the service of the soloists, as is too often the case in jazz. Since there are no drums or bass, the strings are at the heart of the music, they are an integral part of it even if I don’t ask them to improvise or do other things they don’t master.
PAN M 360: You chose the Saguenay Quartet, why?
Philippe Côté: The Quatuor Saguenay is a very nice ensemble that has a very nice sound. Initially, the demo of the project was recorded with musicians from McGill, but then I wanted a permanent quartet that has a real sound. And I really liked the sound of the Saguenay Quartet, whose first violin has been replaced since the recording—Laura Andriani has been replaced by Marie Bégin. Luc Beauchemin, viola, Nathalie Camus, second violin and David Ellis, cello. Super nice people! This music was first recorded in a studio in 2016, I wasn’t happy with the result so I re-recorded it in a concert hall, at Domaine Forget in 2017, after which I led several other projects, the pandemic delayed the public release.
PAN M 360: What are your other projects?
Philippe Côté: I have another project in progress with François Bourassa (piano) and Jacques Kuba Séguin (trumpet), another in duo with François Bourassa and also a commissioned work for April with the Canadian National Jazz Orchestra in Calgary, which will be conducted by Christine Jensen. I am also a conductor for different ensembles. So… during some phases I play more, compose and conduct more during other phases. If I have to put a number one? I’m more of a composer than a player, but it’s all connected.
When a little-known or even unknown jazz musician takes the lead of an ensemble made up of seasoned musicians, it is worthwhile to take a first look. That’s why, for the 22nd Off Festival de jazz de Montréal (from September 30 to October 9) , PAN M 360 connected with the excellent pianist Kate Wyatt, who has no album, no Bandcamp page, a few videos online… and yet could be one of the top artists of Montreal, Quebec or even Canadian jazz.
PAN M 360: First, the basics. Where are you from? When did you settle in Montreal? Where were you trained as a piano player? With whom have you studied?
Kate Wyatt: I come from Victoria, BC originally. By chance I ended up going to a high school that had a Jazz Performance program. At that point, I had already taken piano lessons for seven years, but by the age of 14 was losing interest. However, the teacher of my band program was looking for someone to fill the piano chair in the school’s big band and I agreed to do it. As it turns out, that’s what sparked my career! Playing in the big band rekindled my love of piano and music, and I became heavily involved in the jazz program. It was a natural extension that after high school, I carried on with my jazz studies at McGill University. There I studied with Andre White and Tilden Webb, a great pianist now living in Vancouver, as well as composition with Joe Sullivan.
PAN M 360: You work in the Montreal scene for a while.
Kate Wyatt: Yes, in fact it’s over 20 years now! I graduated from McGill in 1998 and have been working professionally since then.
PAN M 360: Your approach is close to the acoustic modern or contemporary piano. Can we know a little more about it? What is your pianistic vision?
Kate Wyatt: I’m very much a piano player, as in I’m not really interested in keyboards, or gear, or anything like that. I love exploring the instrument, and the depths of sounds that can be created. I try to use the entire instrument, and not limit myself to conventional left-hand voicings with right-hand melodic lines.
PAN M 360: How do you see yourself in your pianistic personality? What is specifically Kate Wyatt music in your piano playing?
Kate Wyatt: Hmm… that’s a difficult question. I’ve come to believe over the years that all jazz musicians play their personality—you can hear who they are in how they play. So, perhaps what you would hear in my playing is my fun-loving nature and sense of humour, the importance I put in listening to others, my love of puzzles and problem solving. It is very hard to quantify.
PAN M 360: It may be a cliché but…. Do you sometimes think about being a female jazz musician in a musical genre where we don’t exactly see parity? Maybe it is not relevant for you, and maybe you do not think about a “female touch” in improvisation music. Or composition. Or performance. Please feel free in answering.
Kate Wyatt: Yeah, I think being a woman in jazz has greatly influenced my career, and quite possibly how I play as well. In my case, I had children when I was in my twenties, before I really had a chance to launch my career as a solo performer. I worked all those years mostly as a side person, accompanying others. Maybe it’s from that experience as an accompanist that I’ve come to place such an importance on listening to and supporting the other musicians I play with. It could also be that as women, we are socialized to take a back seat, and work in supporting roles. I guess it would be impossible to say, really. But overall I have to think that my career would look quite different if I weren’t a woman and a mother.
PAN M 360: Do you relate to specific piano players of the previous generations, or your own generation?
Kate Wyatt: There are so many piano players that I love to listen to, but I’m not sure that you’d necessarily hear them in my playing. There are some jazz musicians who, when you listen to them, you can really pin down their influences. I don’t think it’s as obvious in my playing. I place the most importance on developing my own voice on the instrument.
PAN M 360: Your ensemble is the same musicians as CODE Quartet except for Christine Jensen. Pure coincidence? Of course, the result is quite different because you play a harmonic instrument…
Kate Wyatt: I’ll tell you the story of how my quartet came about. It actually has a lot to do with the pandemic. Back in March 2020, it was right around the time when everything first shut down. Lex had a gig booked at Upstairs with Jim, Adrian and another piano player. People were all starting to get very nervous about this new virus, and the piano player decided that he wasn’t comfortable performing in a packed club, so Lex ended up calling me to sub in. It was the first time that we had played in this formation, with these band members, and the chemistry was fantastic. We had an amazing night!
So, following that, during the next period of lockdowns and various restrictions, the four of us got together to play as much as possible. We played in backyards, and later in our houses, when it was allowed. Because there were no gigs and limited teaching, we suddenly had as much time as we wanted to play and explore music. It was very freeing! I feel like we really developed a group sound.
So, I guess to summarize, it’s not like I set about hiring the musicians from CODE Quartet, minus Christine. We came together in a much more organic way, simply from the love of playing together. They are the obvious choice of who I want to have playing my music.
PAN M 360: You founded a jazz family with bassist Adrian Vedady. Jazz parents with kids, ideal mutual comprehension… It seems to be the perfect deal! Isn’t it?
Kate Wyatt: I have to say, that it’s pretty great! We love playing together, and have so much in common. All of our shared life experiences probably strengthen our musical connection as well.
PAN M 360: Are you also involved in other musical genres?
Kate Wyatt: I’ve played some other stuff in the past, but at this point I really just focus on jazz.
PAN M 360: Are you also teaching? What are you actually studying?
Kate Wyatt: Yes, I do a lot of teaching! I work at Marianopolis College, and I have many private students. In the summer I teach at a couple of different jazz camps.
PAN M 360: What are your next projects? Hope we hear to a lot more of your own music!
Kate Wyatt: Thanks! I actually received a Canada Council grant to write and record a new album of my music with the quartet. We recorded in July at Boutique de Son with George Doxas, and are in the process of mixing and mastering, and finishing the artwork and all of that. I plan on releasing it in the spring. It will be called Artifact.
Roland Pemberton, known in the hip hop world as Cadence Weapon, has been creating subversive bangers since 2005. He had humble beginnings in Edmonton, AB, and started rapping at the age of 13. He pursued journalism studies (he still writes for publications like Hazlit to this day) but then dropped out to focus on his music career.
Since then, he has become a force of nature in the rap world, using his wicked hot flow and experimental beats to change the minds of his generation. His latest album, Parallel World, nominated for the Polaris Music Prize, is his most politically conscious album yet, touching on themes of gentrification, systemic racism, inequality, and technological surveillance.
Roland took a moment to speak with PAN M 360 before his performance at POP Montreal, about the inspirations behind his new album and some of the tracks, his impact on social media. He also teased his upcoming book, Bedroom Rapper, which will be on shelves May of next year.
PAN M 360: One of the reasons I really enjoy your albums is because you can just throw them on and they’re banging hip hop songs, but if you really read into the lyrics, you’re like, ‘Holy shit, there’s so much thematic substance here.’ I mean, you’re obviously a well-read guy, a poet, and a journalist, and I guess you make what you could call, I don’t know, “thinking man’s rap”?
Roland Pemberton: (laughs)I’m glad you observed that because I love to have music that works on different levels. I wanted to have something that you can appreciate just on the surface level, if it’s like playing at a vintage clothing store or something, and you’re like, ‘Oh, this is cool.’ Then if you actually listen to the lyrics, I want there to be multiple levels that even go deeper. That’s a big thing for me—I want to have music that has a lot of depth. I feel like depth gives music longevity. I construct my albums similar to a book or something. I really want something that people could come back and listen to 10 years later and really enjoy it. PAN M 360: Gentrification, surveillance, and systemic racism have been themes in your music before, but with Parallel World, you just went hard with those themes. It’s definitely your most politically-charged album to date. Was that kind of your plan from the beginning with this one?
Roland Pemberton: Well, before I made this record, I wasn’t planning to put out an album or anything. I didn’t really have like a big concept in my mind, but it was really just during the pandemic—I was just reading a lot of books and doing more research—but also thinking about what was happening with the George Floyd protests last summer, and just the kind of systemic upheaval that we were all going through as a society. That really just spurred me on to really feel like, ‘okay, I’ve always made these different kind of connections between institutions, and I’ve always wanted to like dig deeper and learn more about these things.’ I find that the pandemic really just lit a spark. And that really made me feel like an urgency to release something that was really of the moment. I’ve always been kind of subversive about these things in the past. You know, briefly touched on them in a line here and there, but I really wanted to have a whole concept record talking about these subjects.
PAN M 360: And the George Floyd protests, while it was the whole world kind of recognizing, there are so many stories that just get no coverage or mention.
Roland Pemberton: Oh yeah, for sure. I think the really big thing about George Floyd was this was the first time in my life where something happened like that and people reached out to me. Like my friends, my white friends were all kind of like, ‘Oh, I am so sorry.’ I realized it wasn’t just me and my family having these discussions, it wasn’t just something that it’s like, ‘oh, here we go again.’ We kind of broke through the colour barrier. I’ve always thought about microaggressions and the kind of systemic racism that I experience every day, but I was just really amazed that it was being acknowledged on television—and being acknowledged on this large scale that is never had been before. It really emboldened to be like, ‘okay, now’s the time to really just go all in.’
PAN M 360: So it was kind of catalyst for you?
Roland Pemberton: Yeah. We’ve been going through different uprisings in recent years. There’s just so much inequality in our society and #metoo was a big thing like that. It’s happening. Racism, sexism, and these things are really starting to get broken down and deconstructed in a much more nuanced way than they used to be.
PAN M 360: There were protests here weekly in Montreal so I assume there were in Toronto? Were you a part of any of them or did you just kind of witness them?
Roland Pemberton: I couldn’t really watch the video—that repetitious cycle of Black death. It was kind of hard for me and obviously with the pandemic, there’s a lot of fear around that. So I wasn’t really physically at a lot of the protests. But I think the thing that happened with me is I realized what my role could be as an artist. So I got more into crowdfunding and signal boosting other people’s initiatives. I made some posts about Little Jamaica here in Toronto I made this one post, “The Tale of Two Torontos”—comparing the Adamson BBQ guy, his GoFundMe, with the GoFundMe for Black business grants and that went totally viral. And I posted the GoFundMe and got thousands of dollars for the Black business grants. That weirdly was a real turning point for me with what I was doing with my album because I was just like, ‘wow I really am so much more powerful than I thought.’ (laughs)
PAN M 360: You realized you had a voice and people listened.
Roland Pemberton: Yeah. I used to use Twitter kind of just for jokes. I didn’t really think of it as an organizing tool the way that I do now.
PAN M 360: I saw Questlove’s movie, Summer of Soul, recently and one of the things it talks about is all of these artists like Sly and the Family Stone, and The 5th Dimension, they had a message to promote through their music, and it kind of got me thinking, ‘What if these guys had Twitter back then?’
Roland Pemberton: (laughs) Yeah, totally. It’s funny ‘cause obviously they’re playing this crazy festival in Harlem and their message lives on through time in a different way, but I do feel like there’s something that’s really instantaneous about it. It’s the good side of groupthink. It’s the good side of crowdsourcing. It was about empowering people.
PAN M 360: And I mean Sly has the album There’s a Riot Goin’ On. All of the music is pretty feelgood, but back then, he had an agenda for sure.
Roland Pemberton: I love that record. It actually inspired this album. That was one of the records that I kind of studied as oneg of the great records that come from times of upheaval and come from a sociopolitical lens. The music is like really cool and it can very chill, but if you delve into it, there are some very dark themes. I love how its kind of subversive that way.
PAN M 360: “On Me” is one of my favourite tracks on Parallel World, but it’s truly terrifying with its truth about how normalized surveillance has become. After listening to it the second time, I was afraid to pick up my phone.
Roland Pemberton: (laughs) That’s funny. Sorry about that. I just started noticing how insidious surveillance has become in our society. We’re at a point where you can give your friend your login for the Find my iPhone thing, and they can know where you are, and be like ‘hey I see you’re over there. Are you hanging out with what’s-his-name?’ And that to me is like, ‘oh god, we’re beyond the pale.’ It really shows you that the true purpose of the phone is a tracking device.
PAN M 360: You mentioned that you kind of wrote this album and all your other albums as kind of a book, but you’re actually writing a book called Bedroom Rapper? Is it all finished?
Roland Pemberton: It’s in the final stages, but I am still writing it. It’s mostly chronological, like a memoir style, but there are also some detours and essays about other subjects. Now I have a whole chapter that’s just all about DJing. I have a chapter about trap music and how it took over the world and just like my perspective on it. I have a chapter about Canada, what I call the Myth of Canada, just kind of deconstructing the cliches and stereotypes around the country, and why they exist and how they’ve affected me and my career. So there’s a lot of stuff that people would expect, but also some stuff that maybe they wouldn’t expect.
PAN M 360: “Ghost” is another of my favourite tracks and I think it might be because I like I just saw Backxwash live for the first time recently. The song is just so dark. What was it like collaborating on that one?
Roland Pemberton: It just hit her up. I was such a big fan of their last record that won the Polaris. I get so excited when I hear weird rap coming from Canada—just something that’s a little bit different. I love to see it succeed. So one of the first things that I thought of for this record was, ‘I gotta get Backxwash on a track.’ “Ghost” is a trapped-out banger in some ways, but it’s also about African cultural memory. The idea that my ancestors live through me and it connects all the way back to the motherland. So I’m trying to tap into that, just be kind of proud of that history, and just thinking about the ghosts of my ancestors.
PAN M 360: Has the live show changed over the years? When I’ve seen you it was mostly a DJ and you rapping.
Roland Pemberton: Yeah, so for this show at POP, I have a band. So the first half of the set is electronic and triggering the tracks. And then the second half is with the band. So there’s gonna be different vibes for sure.
Cadence Weapon plays POP Montréal on Friday, September 24th at 8 p.m., at L’Entrepôt 77 with Nora Toutain (3:30 p.m.), MAGELLA (4:30 p.m.), Waahli (5:40 p.m.) and Leila Lanova (6:50 p.m.).
It’s not always difficult to know what to say. The problem is figuring out how to say it. For Fernie, an emerging Brazilian-Canadian artist who grew up on the West Island of Montreal, it’s certainly easier to express himself through his music. Through shimmering, enveloping R&B-soul sounds, Aurora opens the door to the intimate vulnerabilities of an artist for whom transparency is paramount.
While many point to the project’s similarity to artists such as Frank Ocean and Daniel Caesar, Fernie points out that Aurora‘s goal is not to be musically inspired, but to perpetuate the habit of not being afraid to pour out one’s heart, to bare one’s soul in the service of art. Aurora is therefore much more than sweet guitar melodies and perfectly executed falsetto vocals, it also embodies total self-acceptance.
Fernie quickly realized that people are used to wearing masks well beyond sanitary measures, that it is not always easy to feel accepted, especially when you are BIPOC or a member of the LGBTQIA+ community. While it is not easy for anyone to open their hearts, Fernie chooses to do so. For us, for him, for the music. And it’s a success all the way around.
Aurora is his first album. It will be presented by Fernie on September 24 and 26 (the two shows are sold out, our apologies to latecomers) as part of the POP Montreal festival.
That’s why PAN M 360 hastened to meet this sweet, sensitive and above all, talented human being.
PAN M 360: Your very first album will be available on September 24th! On this project, you talk about your own journey towards self-acceptance, the need to accept the past as it is, and most importantly, the discovery of a whole new version of yourself. What have you realized about yourself or your environment in the last few years?
FERNIE : Definitely, what was on my mind the most was to be more careful with myself and my mental health. In the midst of the pandemic, I kind of pushed music away for a little bit to really work on myself because it’s what I needed the most. And also, I realized the importance of friends and family, and that it’s the people around you who really matter. It’s this network who kind of allows you to really accept who you are. The people who aren’t afraid to challenge or criticize you despite the friendship are the ones who encourage you to grow. And I think that’s something that I really held on through the pandemic and even now.
PAN M 360 : Journalists often specify that you come from the West Island part of Montreal. How did living in that specific neighborhood impact your music?
FERNIE : I originally grew up in Lachine and I’m from adoptive parents. My mother is Brazilian, and my father is German. So we all lived in Lachine but since I went to a private German school, which was on the West Island, we all moved there. And as for the impact, I think it definitely did in the sense of what it meant. We often associate this part of the city with people who only care about appearances, so you feel pressured to be someone you’re not. So, I wanted to kind of break away from that to show more of the transparent and honest side of myself because I firmly believe that the world really needs those two values. And I think my album describes that through my self-reflections and I think that can open a dialogue.
PAN M 360 : Aurora is your debut album, but it isn’t your first project. Actually, the first thing you put out was an EP back in 2015 that is called The Acoustic EP. Why did you go from an acoustic sound to a R&B kind of vibe ?
FERNIE: I was always encouraged to be versatile in my music genres. My first EP was much more about a kind of emo vibe, Aurora is more about a sensible soul sound. So, I think the changes in my sound come from my personal growth. I’m also part of a collective that really impacted my music, it’s basically where I understood I wanted to do more R&B music. So, I’m glad I got to experience those two vibes, because I think it offers two completely different perspectives and lyrics and overall experience so… I’m glad I did both of those.
PAN M 360: And I think you said that you really were impacted by Frank Ocean and Daniel Caesar’s music. Why those two artists specifically?
FERNIE: I wouldn’t say that I look up to them in a sense but I certainly appreciate what they do as artists. Both of them write transparent and personal stuff, especially Frank Ocean. If you listen to the lyrics, you realize he’s really open about his life and how he truly feels… and not only that but he’s not scared to voice his worries about the future and what needs to change. And I think that’s what captivated so many people around the world. And I think that’s amazing. So, I wouldn’t say I want to do what they do, I think I just share those ideas.
PAN M 360 : You talked a little bit about it before but I quickly wanted to ask you this: you are part of a collective named Kids from the Underground. Can you talk a little more about what it is ?
FERNIE : Basically, we are a collective of like-minded artists who share the same vision. It’s more than just the music for us, we are a family. Everyone in the collective has a different story to tell and different music to share. Over the last three years, we really worked on our project and to reach new people as well. So, I’m kinda like a branch in a tree, you know ? We also come from the same area so it’s really easy to collaborate with one another. I guess destiny brought us together because it’s really working out for us.
PAN M 360: “September” is a beautiful song on Aurora that presents the perspective of a love story shared between two people of the same sex, escaping the sometime isolating heteronormative narrative of love songs. Why is it important to your to bring a queer perspective to your music ?
FERNIE : I think “September” isn’t just about the queer perspective, but also about the universal message it brings. In the song, I sing from a non-bineary stand-point to a cis man. But I beg people: when you listen to it, take it in as you please. It’s so limitless, it’s not just for a boy and a girl, or a boy and a boy… Inclusivity is a really big deal for me, so it’s not just about the queer perspective, but also for the BIPOC, everyone!
PAN M 360 : I think it’s safe to say that Aurora is very open and personal. Was it hard to kind of expose all of your vulnerabilities on a music project ? FERNIE : At first it was, but at the end of the end I was like ‘what do I have to lose?’ Because I think that this album to me is not a cry for validation but more of a ‘let me make these songs and let the people around the world share the same kind of vibes I have’. I think that if you really want to touch the heart of someone, you have to give all of yourself. I find it hard to express myself through words sometimes, but music is always there to allow my truth to get out.
Godspeed You! Black Emperor (GY!BE) and Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra, cult bands in which multi-instrumentalist Efrim Menuck plays a central role, have little to do with All Hands_Make Light, a new project being showcased this weekend at POP Montreal and coinciding with the official release of a first independent recording.
The same goes for Montreal singer/songwriter Ariel Engle, better known under the alias Laforce for her solo projects, not to mention her regular participation in the Toronto collective Broken Social Scene.
This brand new duo comes from the Anglo-Montreal musical movement of the last two decades, but the aesthetics of each did not suggest a common creation. But the meeting did take place during the months of quarantine and so here is a new creature, a superb creature, perfectly distinct from its progenitors.
All Hands_Make Light offers a game of contrasts where celestial airs and subterranean lava dialogue, where dark ambient is in harmony with ethereal wave, where electronic techniques and the human voice generate life.
Given the high quality of the sound results, PAN M 360 went to meet this excellent duo, reinforced on stage by Erika Angel (Thus Owls) and Jace Lacek (The Besnard Lakes).
PAN M 360: Don’t you think the adding up of the two of you makes a third character?
EFRIM MENUCK: Yeah! I feel something like that. We balanced each other well. We are very different, our senses and aesthetics are different. At the same time, we know each other, we respect each other. I feel we both bring different things out of the other person.
ARIEL ENGLE: I think we’ve managed to represent ourselves in the duo but yes, it’s very different from who we are artistically, each on our own. It’s like making a baby, different from its parents!
PAN M 360: How did it happen?
EFRIM MENUCK: I finished a rough tour, I remember I came home and I just felt deeply unsatisfied with what I was doing and then I started to think I should do a simple duo thing with someone singing. A collaboration. And I was too shy to phone Ariel because I didn’t have a clear idea… the extent of my idea was only what I just said: collaboration with someone else singing.
ARIEL ENGLE: I had run into Efrim on the street near Martha Wainwright’s Ursa club to hear Jennifer Castle. I’ve known Efrim for a long time and he put the idea of a project in my ear and we went to the concert. Then the lockdown started and I had this idea running around in my head. I wrote to Efrim to find out more about the idea. The ball started rolling, he sent me the music for “Lie Down in Roses Dear”, which is the first song, and then he sent me the lyrics and I sent him back the vocal melody. Really, it wasn’t complicated.
EFRIM MENUCK: Yeah, very easy. When things didn’t work, we both agreed to change it. Yeah, that was quick and easy, you know. So we bumped into each other and we vaguely planned a phone call. Then COVID happened, we both had tours cancelled and we were stuck at home… So why don’t we start now! And so all I know at that time about Ariel is that she has a beautiful voice, that she is a good improviser and can surf on top of anything. She has a deep musicality. Lot of people got hung up by perfect tone, perfect harmonies… not in her case. I know she wouldn’t be freaked out if the chord was distorted, turned upside down or a little detuned, she could find a way. So I just sent her some recordings that she could sing on top of it. And it sounded great. Yeah, it all happened very quickly. And after, it took a while to finish.
PAN M 360: Did you discuss your differences during the creative process?
ARIEL ENGLE: We didn’t talk about the aesthetic mixes. I thought the work was strong enough, quite marked, I just had to let myself go in there. I’ve always liked contexts in which I could be quite free. My music is a bit more pop, but I really like music that involves improvisation. Efrim and I share a lot of the same musical tastes, even though our respective projects don’t sound the same.
PAN M 360: The extremes are very beautiful in this music, heavenly and dark at the same time. Do you feel that way?
EFRIM MENUCK: Yeah, yeah! I agree. There’s something about Ariel’s voice that is very… I don’t know what adjective to use, it’s a beautiful voice but also there’s an earthiness in it that’s not just the song of an angel, you know what I mean? There’s an earthiness to it that is beautiful.
ARIEL ENGLE: Sometimes I felt overwhelmed by the sounds and sometimes there was this great delicacy. I love that contrast! In fact, I don’t know exactly how to describe this work, the roughness of which is not linked to any tradition. There’s something old and new about it. I like the opportunities where I can make music that can surprise me. And when I listen to music, I have to feel the truth of it, without knowing exactly what defines that truth. That’s what this project allows me to do.
PAN M 360: Efrim, what did you ask Ariel to do?
EFRIM MENUCK: Sometimes it takes a crazy amount of bars for a melody to resolve itself. And from the start we were talking about stuff like that, and because I was playing synthesizers too, I was interested in tones that sounded electronic but that did sound like reeds, strings, bringing that out of the instrument itself, raspy breath sound. So we have this rough conceptual idea, a sort of electronic breathing machine, and then using old melodies, and old ideas about what popular music is, which is a kind of folk music.
ARIEL ENGLE: All along the creation I was singing, I was finding the vocal melodies and Efrim was doing most of the music. Somewhat by accident, we recorded the songs in the order that we present them in the final recording.
PAN M 360: What was the gear?
EFRIM MENUCK: There was a modular synthesizer, which is very fussy, very hard to play live. Using a Moog keyboard with a few filters, the timbres are changing, it’s still the same idea, it’s still breathy but it’s different obviously because the equipment is different. But it’s cool.
PAN M 360: Surprisingly, or maybe not, there is no guitar in this music.
EFRIM MENUCK: Yeah, it’s cool to be in a nice space, different from a guitar-oriented space. The guitar is a stupid instrument. I love it but its a stupid instrument. It’s hard to keep in tune, it hurts to play it, it’s a tense physical engagement, even though I love playing it. But it’s also nice to play with other instruments that are not fighting with you all the time. So it’s nice to play long, fast melodies and not feel like your body is gonna break doing that.
PAN M 360: As for the lyrics, who wrote them?
ARIEL ENGLE: The lyrics are mine except for the first song, “Lie Down in Roses Dear”, and “To Raise a Child”, where we sing our respective lyrics.
PAN M 360: Did you work hard after the first takes?
EFRIM MENUCK: There hasn’t been much editing. Everything I gave her was already full of stuff. So instead of editing, we were removing things, you know? There are some things that took some time to figure out but most of it hung together well, even the first few attempts, which was great and surprising. After that it was a process of refinement, I’m still more used to like you record stuff and then you realise it doesn’t work, and then you have to figure out you gotta make this part work you know. You strip everything down, then you rebuild it back up again. In this case, there was none of that, that was very nice!
ARIEL ENGLE: We had only completed the work at Hotel 2 Tango. We did everything together without adding new musicians.
PAN M 360: Why then add some musicians live?
EFRIM MENUCK: Because there are too many tracks for voices and instruments to play in a live context. So Erika Angel and Jace Lasek will join us playing keyboards and singing.
PAN M 360: Do you plan to continue?
EFRIM MENUCK: Yeah, we’ll keep doing this as long as it makes sense. We really enjoyed playing together, even though it wasn’t the best circumstances. It’s a very different process, not being in the same room. So I’m excited to see what happens in the future, sitting down and working on stuff together.
ARIEL ENGLE: It could go on for a long time… Efrim is very busy and I have my project Laforce, which I’m finishing the second album. I’m also a member of Broken Social Scene–I’m married to one of the musicians in the band, Andrew Whiteman, who is also known in the band Apostle of Hustle. So that’s to be seen. But it went very well, we did this project with no expectations, no pressure, just fun. It would be great to continue, we still have things to explore together, other than by exchanging files. It would be very cool to see what we could do together.
Fanny is the unique story of sisters June and Jean Millington, born in Manila to a Filipina mother and an American military father, who ended up in California where they embraced their passion for music, forming small bands with girlfriends and eventually founding Fanny in 1969. The first all-female rock band to release a full-length album on a major label, Fanny was also the first such band to compete musically with their male peers, proving that girls could rock as well as, if not better than, boys—a major influence on bands such as the Runaways, the Bangles and many others.
Between 1970 and 1974, Fanny released five albums before dropping off the radar, just after scoring their biggest hit, “Butter Boy”, a song about David Bowie that peaked at #29 on the Billboard Hot 100 rock chart in 1975. As the Thin White Duke, with whom Jean Millington had a brief affair before marrying his guitarist Earl Slick, put it, “They were extraordinary: they wrote everything, they played like motherfuckers, they were just colossal and wonderful, and nobody’s ever mentioned them. They’re as important as anybody else who’s ever been, ever. It just wasn’t their time.”
But in recent years, it seems that their time has finally come, a rehabilitation and recognition due in large part to all those old concert clips circulating on YouTube, and the digital accessibility of their material, not so easy to find on wax.
The documentary The Right to Rock, which tells the story of the band’s unfinished dream, will be presented at the 20th edition of Pop Montreal. Montreal director Bobbi Jo Hart’s film should help to further build the band’s reputation, and shed light on their little-known journey. “Revivify Fanny. And my work is done,” added Bowie…
As a complement to the screening, the guitarist and co-founder of Fanny, June Millington, will be on hand to present the film, and then join incandescent rockers NOBRO on stage to play some of the key songs of the mythical Californian band, recently reunited under the name Fanny Walked The Earth but unfortunately hindered by the health problems of the Millington sisters.
Recovering well from a battle with cancer, guitarist June Millington recently gave PAN M 360 an interview in which she talks about Fanny’s journey and her involvement with young women musicians through the Institute for the Musical Arts, which she co-founded with her partner in 1986.
PAN M 360: Fanny recently returned to the fold, releasing the album Fanny Walked The Earth in 2018. Following this reunion, to which all former members were invited, there was a notable absence of keyboardist and vocalist Nickey Barclay, who was an important musician in the band at the time.
June Millington: She doesn’t want to be in public. I never really knew her real well, I must say. She doesn’t want to be involved in anything we do so, that’s it. You know, when we played at the Outfest in L.A. a few weeks ago, I didn’t miss her at all. The core part of the music really stands, whether or not Nickey plays. We proved that to my satisfaction. We proved it in LA, just feeling the music as it is. And I really like that. It’s just as powerful, because the songs are really good. The way we play them, there is a certain attack, a certain power.
PAN M 360: Actually, the core of the band was originally Brie Howard [also known as Brie Brandt, Brie Darling and Brie Berry, and also a Filipina-American), Jean and you. Then Brie left and was replaced on the drums by Alice De Buhr. Then Nickey Barclay was added on keyboards and vocals for the release of your first album, Fanny, in 1970. So Nickey wasn’t around when you started.
June Millington: Jean and I started our first band when we were in high school in late ’64, called The Svelts, and both Alice and Brie were in it at different times. Essentially, we learned how to play and we learned how to manage our own equipment before we got to L.A. I always tell people that if you want to understand Fanny, you have to understand The Svelts. The Svelts had it all essentially, no matter who was in it. The Svelts had the core of how we attacked the music. We were really fierce, but we developped that before we got to L.A. and played the Troubadour where we were spotted by producer Richard Perry’s secretary. That’s why we got signed with Richard Perry; you could feel that fierceness, you could feel it getting ready to explode in another way. Then Richard taught us how to record and write songs, and he taught us well. You could hear everything on our records, all our parts. Before that we didn’t know how to record and that’s why there aren’t any real good recordings of The Svelts. Before we got to L.A., our sound was very contained, we were learning the music, we were playing at dances. We weren’t trying to blow people’s minds because it wasn’t the right time for that. But after a while, here I was, jamming with Lowell George and Skunk Baxter and all these masters of sound. We would all play together and develop what is now known as classic rock. Of course others were developing that sound as well, but we were all part of a big piece. By the time 1970 came and we released our own music, a little bit of people opened up to what we were doing, little bit by little bit.
PAN M 360: You mentioned the word fierceness… Would you say that part of that strength comes from the fact that you and your sister, being Filipina-American, had to fight to fit in and be respected when you came to live in the U.S. and had to deal with racism? Perhaps your sexual orientation also gave you that willingness to fight for acceptance at that time?
June Millington: I became aware of my sexual orientation a little bit later, at around 20 years old, I would say. Before that I was way too young and shy to do anything with another woman. That strength, I developed it later, after The Svelts. But I think you can say that this strength that Jean and I have is perhaps unique to all Filipinos; they have an incredible sense of music and they are very talented. But most of all, I think that this strength we had in us, Jean and me, we felt it, it was very strong. We decided to form a band because her boyfriend was playing in a surf band. I let you imagine how far back we go. So we met two other girls who played guitar and we started a band. We must have been 15 or 16 years old. We got gigs but the boys wouldn’t let us play on their instruments, so we managed to get our own gear. Then we had to get shows. The Vietnam war wasn’t so bad for us because it allowed us to play at several Army bases. We played for the soldiers, it was pretty amazing. And then the teen clubs came along. We played a lot of shows there, around 1967. And then shows in junior high schools, high schools, clubs. That’s what made us strong, that was our training, the hard way. And you know what else gives me some of that energy? The smell of Fender tube amps. When I smell that, I get excited, I know it’s gonna happen and it’s going to be loud. I think Jean and I were born to do this.
PAN M 360: You’ve said that after your concerts, girls often came to you to ask you how to form a band. What did you tell them?
June Millington: First, to be very disciplined. If it doesn’t work out one night, if you mess up in a show, you have to have the strength to get back up and keep going. It takes guts and the strength to persevere. You can have a lot of talent but no courage. You have to know how to pick yourself up and keep going and keep learning. You have to rehearse a lot and do a lot of shows. You have to do that. It takes a lot of time and effort. It takes dedication.
PAN M 360: You are very involved with the women’s music movement, you have produced many albums for female musicians, with your partner you operate the Institute for the Musical Arts, a rock camp for young girls and teenagers… In short, you have long been at the forefront of women’s struggles in the music world. Would you say that the situation has evolved a lot for women in the rock and pop genres?
June Millington: Women are much more visible than they used to be, that’s for sure. They are free to create whatever they want, in many different styles. It’s not unusual for a group of women to get visibility. It’s not unusual for a women’s band to be visible. But a women’s band having a string of successes as big as those of men’s bands like the Stones, the Beatles, Led Zeppelin and so many others, that still hasn’t happened as far as I know, and that’s what I’m waiting for. I’m not talking about solo singers like all those R&B divas or pop stars, I’m talking about groups. There have been bands, but they’ve had limited success, there’s been no real consistency, nothing like the giants of rock. Who will make it? I don’t know…
Code Quartet brings together four key figures of Montreal jazz, as evidenced by the beautiful album Genealogy, released on the Justin Time label last spring. Four performers, improvisers and composers ready to pool their long experience, their great expertise and their insatiable passion for contemporary jazz in its most subtle forms.
Adrian Vedady, double bass, Jim Doxas, drums, Lex French, trumpet and Christine Jensen, saxophones. As a courtesy, Christine Jensen was interviewed by PAN M 360 on the day of their concert at the Montreal International Jazz Festival.
PAN M 360 :Among all your projects, what is the purpose of this quartet ?
Christine Jensen : This quartet allows me, as well as the other three members to play in the most intimate, liberated setting of 4 musicians with no piano or guitar. We are all about linear expression.
PAN M 360 :Can you tell our readers the circumstances of its foundation ?
Christine Jensen : This group came together through simpatico meeting of minds between the four of us. I met trumpeter Lex French in 2018, while he was working on his doctorate at McGill. I was teaching composition and performance at the same time. I was really impressed with his playing, full of expression and very versatile with his jazz language. I am very picky about trumpet players for some reason (haha) . We started playing sessions with Jim Doxas and Adrian Vedady, and knew we had a strong, personal sound with this group. The front line of Lex and myself could hold some power with the heavy hitting rhythm section of this team. Next thing, Lex brought us to New Zealand for the Wellington Jazz Festival, where he is from. We had such a great time with everything music that we knew we had to continue and headed into the recording studio. We recorded a few days before the lockdown, thinking we would really get things moving forward. During the pandemic, it was easy to get together as we were all in close proximity being in Montreal. It really was a positive event for me whenever we could get together and workshop ideas during that time. In fact it was quite healing, and made me think that music will move forward so strong because of this.
PAN M 360 : Is it for you guys a side-project or something on which you want to build for the next future?
Christine Jensen : We are very invested artistically in building on what we have started as a chord-less quartet, performing locally in 2019. Since then, every time we perform together we can’t wait to do more. It’s like a music drug, which is a good thing! It really makes performing easy, because of such equal energy being fed to each other in the most organic setting of acoustic quartet. We have all really committed to continuing on with exploring many corners, including building new repertoire and uncovering standard repertoire that works well with this formation.
PAN M 360 : Is there any leader in this band ?
Christine Jensen : No. We all tend to take on various roles in all of the many corners, including artistic direction, business, and recording. Each component is huge in terms of tasks, so it is really great when each of us take a bit on. I think that because we are so committed to this, we have been able to build a team behind us, including Heidi Fleming FAM group jumping on board with management and booking, and Justin-Time Records with this recording and one that we have coming up. We also all work on booking the band at various levels.
PAN M 360 : Who is composing what ?
Christine Jensen : The four of us equally bring in music, and we are all into the challenge of presenting music that is very vertical linear, and not heavily harmonized or full of harmony. We all try to bring in new music whenever we get the chance. We all work together on orchestrating the sounds we are going for, so there is a lot of workshop, which is SO fun!
PAN M 360 : What do you explore musically with those gentlemen ? Can you describe briefly the jazz styles involved ?
Christine Jensen : We work with anything really. We have even performed commissions by other composers for our group. We had a premiere of New Zealand composer Jasmine Lowell-Smith when we went to that festival.
PAN M 360 : How do you see the role and qualities of each member of this ensemble ?
Christine Jensen : That is the coolest part. We are all responsible for bringing in ideas equally, yet our instruments definitely define our roles in the performance. Strong time and great sound really are the key in this band really hitting hard. Lex and I weave the melodies, Adrian is in charge of laying down the bass, and Jimmy definitely gets to drive the ensemble with his expression as a drummer. We are all able to interchange with soloing and accompanying, as well as outlining any harmonic ideas vertically.
PAN M 360 : Should we receive this music as a “classic” form because it swings and the chord progressions are rooted in modern jazz idiom, from post-bop to ornettish style of the early 60’s (Genealogy theme) ?
Christine Jensen : I always think it is up to the listener. We are not completely free jazz and we are not completely original post-bop, but we can do all of that and everything in between. I think that is what gives the listener that feeling of something new, yet there is a classic jazz sound to it.
PAN M 360 : Above its apparent classicism, what are for you the original aspects of this quartet’s personality ?
Christine Jensen : I think the personality finds us at a certain point. We all equally bring our own game to the table and it somehow all merges together. I think the music can take so many dramatic turns because of our personalities. I know I always get surprised by the spontaneity that can occur on so many levels with our dialogue.
PAN M 360 : Are we going to hear new material (not recorded yet) at the FIJM concert on Saturday ?
Christine Jensen : Yes. I am adding a piece from my pandemic entitled TwentyTwenty Blues.
PAN M 360 :What will be the next steps for Code Quartet ?
Christine Jensen :We are performing at some Maison de la Culture’s in the fall, with more booked for next year. We have had really fun times working out our music at our favourite Montreal jazz clubs as well, including Upstairs and Diese Onze. More to come there in the future. We also have a showcase that has been postponed two years at JazzAhead in Bremen Germany in April. Hopefully we will get more of our sounds in Europe with this opportunity. Also, heading out on Canadian Jazz festival circuit once it gets up and running next summer.
PAN M 360 : Why CODE quartet ?
Christine Jensen : We worked on many names. When it came down to it, it really does feel like the four of us have a secret language, only because we are all equally enamoured with the same sounds of the masters who have influenced us as a whole in the linear language of jazz. They include Sonny Rollins, Bird and Diz, Lee Konitz, Ornette Coleman, Dave Douglas and Joe Lovano, Carla Bley and Steve Swallow, Billy Higgins, Charlie Haden….the list goes on, but I think those are some of our mutual ‘racines’ in this small group setting. We also have similar stances on the world in terms of politics and environment. For this reason I am certain that our music will continue to express those thoughts more deeply as we go forward in expanding our dialogue as a group.
Mashups, the bootleg jams blending two or more often incongruous tracks by name artists, were born in in 1994 when Evolution Control Committee dropped Public Enemy’s rhymes over Herb Alpert’s corny horns. Ten years later, Danger Mouse made his mark with a milestone of the mashup movement, blending the Beatles and Jay-Z for The Grey Album (though for fucking around with the Fab Four, you can’t beat the productions of Tom Caruana).
In 2011, Tennessee-born turntable trickster Amerigo Gazaway delivered a mashup album with staying power, parallel-parking the sounds of Nigerian Afrobeat godfather Fela Kuti and Golden Age rap icons De La Soul, the Native Tongues label’s “hippies of hip-hop”. The combination was potent, and Gazaway’s deft fusion and obvious affection for the source materials landed Fela Soul on numerous high-profile year-end best-of lists.
A decade later, it’s 2021, the year De La Soul finally regained ownership of their music. Also worthy of celebration is the tenth anniversary of Fela Soul, and Gazaway is marking the occasion with a free giveaway of a deluxe edition of the album, with some sweet bonus tracks tacked on. PAN M 360 checked in with Gazaway to look back at Fela Soul, and look forward to upcoming productions.
PAN M 360: What makes Fela Soul so memorable, from what we could call the golden era of mashups, is that unlike most of the rest, there’s no irony to it. It’s not ‘so wrong it’s right’, as much as I love that… It’s just 100% ‘this feels right’. Do you feel the same way about it?
Amerigo Gazaway: I would have to agree. I always try to ask myself the question “does this feel right?” while working on these projects, and Fela Soul was no exception. It was the first conceptual collaboration that I ever produced and for that reason it holds a very special place in my heart. I wanted to create something that sounded good sonically, first and foremost, but also provide further meaning and context for those familiar with the artists or willing to dive deeper into their catalogs.
PAN M 360: The words and music of De La Soul and Fela Kuti both carry a big charge of positive energy, De La in a more lighthearted way, Fela more militantly, agitating for positive change. Were you conscious of that dynamic while making Fela Soul?
Amerigo Gazaway: I was. That was actually one of the main reasons I chose to pair the two artists together. However, I do think my style has evolved over the years and I have become much more particular about which songs and artists to combine ,and why. For instance, on the original Fela Soul project I didn’t incorporate as much of Fela Kuti’s voice and political messages as I probably would have if I had created the album today. Which is why on the new Fela Soul track “More Than U Know”, you can hear Fela singing lyrics which directly correspond to what De La Soul is talking about in the chorus and verses. It’s those little nuances and connections that really bring these projects to life and make it feel as though the artists I’m combining are actually in conversation with one another.
PAN M 360: Which of the jams of Fela Soul are you most pleased with today, and why?
Amerigo Gazaway: “Breakadawn” is still one of my favourites, mainly because it utilizes Fela’s infamous “Water No Get Enemy” sample, but also because of the fact that it was the first seed that led to the creation of the whole Fela Soul project.
PAN M 360:Fela Soul is just the tip of the iceberg, as far as your productions go. Care to suggest another classic from your catalogue that newcomers might also appreciate?
Amerigo Gazaway: Yasiin Gaye is another Soul Mates project that I created back in 2014. It combines the music of soul singer Marvin Gaye with the lyrics of rapper/actor Yasiin Bey, formerly known as Mos Def. It’s another one of those projects that just felt “right” from the start, from the music to the lyrics to the overlapping themes. This two-part album is considered a classic among many of my fans, and also marks a pivotal turning point in my career and artistic growth. But there are others as well – A Common Wonder, The Miseducation of Eunice Waymon, The Trill Is Gone, The B.I.G. Payback and more.
PAN M 360: What are you working on right now? What’s next in the pipeline?
Amerigo Gazaway: I’m currently working on a handful of projects with various MCs and artists, such as Napoleon Da Legend (Berlin) and Petty (Nashville). In addition to that, I’m working on my next instrumental hip-hop project as well as several top-secret Soul Mates collaborations. Last but not least, I’ve recently started composing soundtracks for film, TV and video games, which is something I’ve always been passionate about.
Trained as a saxophonist and composer, Montrealer Jason Sharp has followed the curve of contemporary expression to arrive at a focal point where the rays the Western classical tradition, modern and contemporary jazz, and soaring electronics converge. All of this baggage is brought together in his recently released solo project The Turning Centre Of A Still World, his third album on the Constellation label.
Specializing in bass and baritone saxophones, Sharp invites us on a new episode of his creative life, a journey spread out in eight stations. At the confluence of the genres that have forged his compositional identity, Jason Sharp brings together the aesthetics of today and offers this inspired project.
Sharp deserves to be known by music lovers, which is precisely why PAN M 360 shares this first conversation with the musician.
PAN M 360: We’ve heard you playing in different contexts, not only “serious” music but also creative pop like Elisapie’s songs. So we want to know more about you, beyond this new album. Where are you from and what led you to Montreal ?
Jason Sharp: I was born in Edmonton, but I moved around. After my first music studies in Alberta, I went to school in Toronto, then I continued in Amsterdam in jazz composition. I have been based in Montreal since 13 years.
PAN M 360: You have a jazz background, but also an electronic background mixed with contemporary. So you switched progressively from jazz to live electronics, didn’t you?
Jason Sharp: Very much so. It all adds up to my background, that’s for sure. Hopefully my recent record explores all those experiences. From the very beginning, I started to study the classical saxophone. After high school, I started improvisation in the jazz context, and then years later I went to the University of Toronto to study jazz performance. Through that cycle I started composing, drawing a little more to my classical and contemporary music background in orchestration, and then into more a compositional focus, where the improvisation is also used with the instruments that I play. It led me towards live electronics in Amsterdam, and after coming out of that school experience, I left my own devices to discover my own sound, and I feel it’s just been a progression utilizing those different backgrounds of the music I’ve been making. So when I write for ensembles and film scores, I use all of them.
PAN M 360: How is the saxophone embedded in your compositional approach?
Jason Sharp: I play mainly baritone and bass saxophones. I started off with the alto sax, then I played in a saxophone quartet and I was lucky to play my own baritone sax at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. I found a voice playing baritone, and I was also playing tenor and baritone at University of Toronto. And then I ended up with the bass sax, which qualities are close to the baritone sax.
PAN M 360: The focus in your new music is not complex melodic patterns, but more textural and harmonic. What justifies that aesthetic?
Jason Sharp: Leaving the jazz lineage, I have been less interested in crafting melodic lines over harmonic progressions, and more interested in textures, timbres, evocative moods created out of the horns in more diverse orchestrations. I believe the baritone and bass saxophones are uniquely adapted for that, it can function in a bass role, also harmonically relevant in overtones. Its textures and timbres are rich, those horns fit very well in that language.
PAN M 360: What is your electronic gear?
Jason Sharp: Baritone and bass saxes are used 50/50. There are several microphones for the saxophones, I’m also playing bass pedal, and Moog Synthesizer for bass and the harmonic foundation. For most of the orchestration above and beyond, I built a modular synth around that setup, and then a harp monitor to provide a link for the synthesizer, So all the rhythmic elements are being clocked while I play. I’ve built a modular synth setup around that concept. Then I’ve got another sensor for my breath, to control the white noise and more textural elements of the synthesizer. All the orchestrations are handled between me playing the bass pedal while I’m playing sax or modular synth responding to my breath or harp monitor.
PAN M 360: Is there a danger of being compared to your colleague Colin Stetson, because he also plays baritone and bass saxes and uses electronic devices?
Jason Sharp: (laughs) Beyond Colin Stetson comparisons, it’s good being introduced to more diverse sounds on the saxophone in particular. If my music ends up being a gateway to discover people like Evan Parker, John Butcher, Ned Rothenberg, Anthony Braxton and others that could use the saxophones with extended techniques, that’s great. It’s always interesting for people to find gateways and discover new music, also in the electronic field. What is unique about my new record is that the saxophone is at the forefront. It’s considered to be an instrument within an orchestration and it’s not in that specific case. So if I can help people discover other saxophone players with contemporary ideas, that’s also great, and all part of the evolution of the instrument.
PAN M 360: Are you also involved in projects that could implicate a different approach than the one leading your solo projects?
Jason Sharp: Yes, for a concert performed live in Winnipeg this September, I wrote some music for two drummers, pedal steel guitar, two vocalists and saxophone. This project is called FYEAR. The writing is more harmonically and melodically driven, it’s written for an orchestration that’s not so electronic, a little more rooted in the jazz idiom.
PAN M 360: Are you going to perform your new solo album project soon?
Jason Sharp: Yeah! There are also films for each track done by Guillaume Vallée. The whole album in a visual form is also released by Constellation. There will be a short movie accompanying each piece. So the next step is a live concert at Phi Center, I will be solo while the filmmaker will be projecting the images. I will provide the same triggers to the film maker. It’s gonna be a live audiovisual performance of the film, that brings the audience to the heart of the project. Then you will be able to witness the physicality of the performance and this ability to improvise with myself.
Jason Sharp performs his solo project, with the images of Guillaume Vallée, at Phi Centre, November 20.
Naya Ali has become a major figure in Quebec and Canadian hip-hop, and is releasing her second album with the firm intention of reaching the next level: international influence. Backed by star beatmaker Adrian X (Drake, The Weeknd), who joins loyal collaborators Kevin Figs and Chase.Wav, the Ethiopian-born Montreal rapper releases Godspeed: Elevated, eight bright tracks charting the journey of transcendence.
This path has been forged since childhood, through early desires to assert herself on the rap planet, a cautious retreat to university studies and a reaffirmation of her creative identity. Her first album, Godspeed: Baptism (Prelude), confirmed his talent, and with the second chapter, an ascension that was slow and sure is now accelerating.
At the suggestion of PAN M 360, Naya Ali agrees to describe the eight tracks of this new opus on the Coyote Records label.
Naya Ali: “Air Ali” is the intro. It’s about the feeling I have of having one foot in the door and one foot out the back. That feeling leads to remembering where I came from, how I grow, what I gain and lose along the way. When you grow, not everyone can come with you.
PAN M 360: A paradoxical feeling?
Naya Ali: Yes, when you try to rise you have to change your mindset, you have to lighten up to take flight. The people you come in contact with then will not all do it like you do, everyone is not at the same stage of their development in life. So there is what I was used to and there is the new world, the newness, the possibilities that are opening up for me.
PAN M 360: Who’s the main beatmaker for this track?
Naya Ali: Kevin Figs, who I work with on a regular basis, and who did a few tracks on my first album. He’s from Montreal, works a lot in Los Angeles and Montreal, and has a very Atlanta sound but is also able to create other worlds. We have a great dynamic together.
PAN M 360: Let’s move on to “Stop Playin”.
Naya Ali: I did this piece in Toronto with Adrian X. It’s a middle finger, but very joyful. It suggests this: you may not like me, but respect me. It’s also the affirmation of the neglected one who comes in with all this energy.
PAN M 360: Well… is the underdog you think you are still a successful late bloomer?
Naya Ali: I have a clear vision of who I am. Sometimes I’m misunderstood by some people, they don’t always know where they stand with who I am. Anyway, that’s part of the process and it legitimizes the energy of this track. Musically, it’s a high-BPM song and it’s a straightforward rap. I can be melodic as well, some tracks have to be sung, but it’s also important for me to keep the rap up front.
PAN M 360: By the way, you clearly impose yourself among the female MCs in Montreal?
Naya Ali: Only women?
PAN M 360: Uh, sorry. Yes, we should no longer associate a rapper’s talent with their gender.
Naya Ali: I’m with you!
PAN M 360: One of these days, these considerations will be completely gone. Until then, we can talk about the song “Str8 Up”, ha ha!
Naya Ali: “Str8 Up” is the last track I did for this album. It has an energy that needed to emerge. I had this image in mind when I created this track: a door opens and you walk through a valley with snakes in it. To get to the next door, you have to cross this valley and its snakes. So you have to make peace with the idea that there will always be snakes, that is, you have to keep your focus on what really matters in order to rise above the obstacles, doubts and hard work. Its sounds are a bit drill-y, bouncy, but are sometimes more intimate and melodic.
PAN M 360: “Another One” is clean, minimalist and powerful. Big bass, little embellishments in the arrangements, and the voice in front.
Naya Ali: I was inspired by J Cole for this track, because his flow is clean and powerful. There is no superfluous ad lib in his rap.
PAN M 360: You are also like that, direct, without detours.
Naya Ali: That’s right, so the theme of “Another One” suggests that music is a bigger medium than me. Music to me is a movement, a paradigm shift, a way to speak and energize the world. “Another One” is pure rap, very culturally charged. We used some Ethio-jazz style piano tracks. The production is by Adrian X, Chase.Wav and myself. The mix is by Mixed by Gee and John Brown.
PAN M 360: Here we are at the stop for “102 Bus It”
Naya Ali: The number 102 is my neighbourhood bus that I used to ride as a child and teenager. We also inserted samples of Ethiopian spiritual music, because this track is about my origins and the culture passed on by my parents. So I’m talking about my DNA, about Montreal where I grew up, about summers spent in Virginia with my father who lives there, and that’s why we still use Ethiopian music samples like the lyre.
PAN M 360: “Toronto’s Gold” is next. What’s that about
Naya Ali: The first weekend I met producer Adrian X at his office, there were several shootings in Toronto. Violence is not what defines this city. For the past few years, however, there has been an unhealthy vibe, a poison that has taken hold in the minds of these armed, clannish, territorial kids. This insanity is taking root in the mentality of the young boys, but also of the girls who think it’s cool to keep such company. This culture of violence is no longer simply a question of economic poverty, it has become a way to show off one’s power. So these kids with guns are eliminating their chances of getting rich in Toronto by choosing this culture of violence. And it’s happening here now too, this song could very well be called “Montreal’s Gold”. So what can we do? Change this mindset by offering young people opportunities in art, sports, science, etc. The beat of “Toronto’s Gold” is heavy, the atmosphere is dark, the tone is direct and pure. For the music, Adrian X produced this track, we completed it in Montreal with Chase.Wav and John Brown.
PAN M 360: “King”… Who is King?
Naya Ali: It’s a universal feeling: that of loss and grief. For me, it’s a personal ordeal I went through when my dog Simba died last year. The text was written while he was sick, and I wanted to prolong his life forever through this song. On this album, by the way, this is the song where I open up the most. The music is by Adrian X, we went with a Frank Ocean vibe.
PAN M 360: The last track is called “Light Switch (outro)”
Naya Ali: The album starts out punchy and assertive, and ends with emotion and an openness on my part. There is a lot of emotion in me, I’m starting to open up. No, I’ve never been afraid to open up, but I do reveal things in myself at the right time. Opening up, however, does not mean talking about my personal life. I prefer to keep my private life private and keep it a mystery… while remaining open and accessible.
The Witness is the latest addition to the discography of Montreal’s internationally acclaimed Suuns – six albums and one EP, all of high quality, including a collaborative album with Jerusalem in my Heart.
The new album explores new avenues: the inclusion of acoustic, wind, and string instruments, and superb jazz-like arrangements punctuating the hybridization between avant-rock, electronic and experimental aesthetics that Suuns has been accustomed to since 2010.
The Witness poetically addresses various angles of our globalized voyeurism, planetary facts and gestures simultaneously observed daily by millions of humans.
Reached in Paris where he lives now with his partner, Ben Shemie played the game of track-by-track for this new album.
The Witness is released on Joyful Noise Recordings and Secret City Records, an excellent opus of which Shemie is the frontman and main composer. Suuns will perform the material on September 25, during Pop Montreal.
PAN M 360: There are obvious changes happening in the new Suuns music. There are differences from the previous records, mainly in the arrangements. There are even acoustic moments with reeds and brass, and also melodic hooks. What are, for you, the main changes?
Ben Shemie: It wasn’t conscious, we didn’t know we’re gonna go in a different direction. But it happens. It is an oversimplification of something new we wanted to do. And there is also more focus done in the lyrics, we’ve never been a lyric-driven band before. This time, the songwriting is more lyrical and definitely more melodic than the stuff we’ve been done in the past. Also I think it’s more ambitious, arrangement-wise. It’s kind of nice for all of us to not do the same kind of thing again, and push ahead. And be more ambitious.
PAN M 360: Let’s take the first song, “Third Stream”.
Ben Shemie: It is like a late-era Talk Talk kind of sound, closer to improvisation and contemporary music. I like to imagine a band as a general model of trajectory by which it can evolve, something more introspective and not pop music anymore. So because there is more contemporary music background in our world, we thought it would be cool to put some into the songs. For the writing of this record, I didn’t try to make it electronic as much, but I just tried to make something very beautiful and something broader, with saxophones and flutes – played by Eric Hove, who will come on tour with us – with bigger arrangements.
I was still trying to keep the guitar, which is always some kind of a challenge nowadays. Yeah, this kind of a big sweeping, really focusing on the lyrics without trying to beat it over your head, it is now more rock ’n’ roll in a way, kind of more traditional. There is this Talk Talk sound in the arrangements, but also this solo Paul McCartney vibe. So when that “Third Stream” song came out originally, there was no specific intention, that was a demo and we built it up, yeah, I think it is really fun to play it.
PAN M 360: Is the production aspect the result of a collective work?
Ben Shemie: Mostly the band is producing the songs that I write. Obviously a lot happens in the studio, it changes. For example, we played with the saxophone to get this kind of vibe, see what works and what doesn’t, translating this into arrangements, and training ourselves with those arrangements. This is what happens organically. At the very end we have the mix that changes the sound quite a bit, in terms of what becomes a priority in what you’re hearing. That is mostly done by John Congleton, our mixing engineer.
PAN M 360: “Witness Protection” is the next song, tell us about it.
Ben Shemie: This song sounds more what you would associate with our band, a kind of minimal, dancy song. There is a lot of focus on the lyrics and the melody, and I guess that song encapsulates the themes of the record. That is to say, look, that’s something that we have in common: we see a lot of the same things, now there’s an almost pornographic way of looking at the world. Today we all have this common denominator of experiencing a lot of the same things virtually but… There is also this desensitization to what we see and what we get used to witnessing all these things. The protagonist of the song says that he needs to be protected, he needs to be taken care of. And to a certain extent we all have this kind of oversaturated world.
This song is one of the first songs I wrote. Out of that the other songs were born, not because of that, but that song helps set the foundation of the album. It’s our first release, it may be the most accessible song of the record. It’s weird, of course, all our music is weird for indie music fans, for the kind of scene that we’re in. I don’t personally think that this is weird, but for the mainstream indie movement, it is weird. We have always been in between the indie scene and avant-garde scene, that’s where we always found ourselves. So that song is like our whole career: it starts off cool and just when you think you’re gonna get the payoff, it turns into something else.
PAN M 360: The third song is “C-Thru”. What can you say about it?
Ben Shemie: “C-Thru” is a kind of a banger. Originally it was a solo piece for myself. My solo music is more condensed songs, but it doesn’t have guitar and drums, so I needed that band to make it kind of big, more massive and also to be able to fuck with my voice. I think it is a good song. And in the old-fashioned setting, the third song of an album is where you get your energy going.
PAN M 360: The fourth piece is entitled “Time Bender”.
Ben Shemie: This is the most minimal song, and I thought it wasn’t gonna make it onto this record. I thought it was too minimal, we had a hard time to find out how the groove would be. But it came out very nicely, kind of soulful, a bit more funky than I was expecting. Yeah, again, the arrangement is kind of weird.
PAN M 360: And “Clarity”?
Ben Shemie: This is the soulful song of the record. This sounds a little bit like “Third Stream”, I mean a song with a bigger sound, much more melodic than what we did previously. There is also a lot of work in the lyrics. At the moment of composing, we don’t think about the influences, but some people told us it sounds like a Robert Wyatt song and… when I listen to this music, I say wow, it’s true! The chord progression is indeed in the same style of writing. Wyatt’s music is more political than ours, it carries more like a message, but I get that comparison and take it as a compliment. Robert Wyatt is a great artist, some kind of deep.
PAN M 360: “The Fix” is another very ambitious song. Can you explain the creative process for it?
Ben Shemie: This is an old song, its first demo was recorded almost seven years ago. I was really excited about it, and we were doing the Hold /Still album in Dallas at that time. We recorded that song, and then the crystal idea of the demo wasn’t there. So you can bring it to the band and you can lose the magic that the demo had. A demo is a singular vision of a song. When you produce as a band, it becomes a group effort, and electronic music is somewhat of an individual adventure. We recorded it a couple of times and I thought it wasn’t as cool as the demo, kind of diluted. It just sucked! We were about to say forget this song, we tried enough, and we finally recorded it again, thinking maybe if it’s cool we would make it as a bonus track. It’s more like a rhythmic idea and then makes sense being repeated so often. It’s very much like the identity of the band. It’s more like a groove and a piece than a song.So I loved this weird reinterpretation, and John Congleton really did a great job mixing it. To be honest I love the new version and I still think the demo is better (laughs), but the demo is too scrappy.
PAN M 360: There is a sad song next, and there are some guitars involved.
Ben Shemie: “Go to my Head” is the first sad song I wrote. I don’t know what it means exactly, but it’s in the same spirit as “Third Steam” and “Clarity”, very ambitious in its instrumentation, classical guitar, piano, horns, a funny intro like Fleetwood Mac in their song “Albatross”. Nowadays, I find it more and more difficult to integrate the guitar in a so-called rock ’n’ roll band. I’m a guitar player myself, I don’t want to play like Jimmy Page, we were able to walk that line between electric guitar music and electronic music but… The more the years go by, the more difficult I find it to integrate the guitar. It’s not as relevant an instrument as it used to be, but I still love it, I still love the sound, I still think guitar music by rock or punk bands is one of my favourite genres of music. But it’s not necessarily the kind of music I play. Joe plays guitar in the band and his guitar often sounds like a synthesizer. It’s far from a normal guitar.
In this song, at the beginning, one of my greatest joys in Suuns is to play guitar with Joe. So I wrote an intro and an outro where we play guitar in harmony with each other. A pure, classic electric guitar sound. In an almost strange way, it sounds like new again. It seems like nobody plays like that anymore! So that’s a good way to set the stage for the main part of this song, which is more of a linear composition at first but much more ambitious in its scope.
PAN M 360: And we come to the last song of The Witness.
Ben Shemie: As the title suggests, “Trilogy” is a song in three sections. Actually, the more I think about it retrospectively, other songs of this album are done in three parts. I don’t really know why that is, but it seems to be that way unconsciously. This specific song is much focused on the lyrics and the voice being very upfront in the mix. The loudest vocal mix ever being done on our songs. And again, it’s very much our style: the beat comes in after almost four minutes and it goes out again. So there is a lot of restraint in this song. I think it’s a beautiful track.
PAN M 360: Doesn’t The Witness, such a refined and thoughtful album, owe its depth in part to the confinement imposed by the pandemic?
Ben Shemie: I’m glad this album is finally out, we pushed it further during the pandemic because we couldn’t tour. It would have been weird then to put a record out knowing we couldn’t play it. Instead, we had time to think about it, which we had never really done before. Spin, spin, spin, produce a record, spin, spin. It was the first time we could think about it. In a way, I’m strangely happy about it.
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