Entries by Philip Turner

Three Fun Showcases for Great Canadian Acts at NYC’s CMJ Music Festival

During CMJ in NYC last week I attended showcases sponsored by Canadian Blast, Saskmusic.org, and M for Montreal. Good seeing Cara Wodnicki-Buckley; JP Ellson, Michael Scott Dawson; and Mikey Rishwain Bernard, respectively at the fine events they put on, Each organization put on terrific acts and provided a genial setting to listen to and enjoy great Canadian indie music. Among the bands I enjoyed was Kandle, a 5-piece from Montreal fronted by Kandle Osborne, a dynamic young female performer. Here’s a music video for Kandle’s new single, “Demon,” followed by pictures from the three showcases below.

Maple Leaf Decorated Pumpkin Pie to Mark Canadian Thanksgiving

Oct 13, 2014—Happy I can re-share this post for Canada Day 2014.

I’m sending out festive greetings to all my Canadian pals who have the good sense to celebrate Thanksgiving this day, instead of Columbus Day, which we’re observing here in the States. I have much personal gratitude for all the talented Canadian bands I’ve heard this past year, during my annual visit to Toronto for NXNE, when I loved hanging at Cameron House, and in NYC, listening to such acts as Ben Rough, Greg Ball, The Strumbellas, Shawn William Clark, Jill Barber; Elliott BROOD, and Elephant Stone; all the bold Canadian authors who’s books I’ve encountered, including Kathryn Kuitenbrower, Gill Deacon, Antonine Maillet, Howard Engel, and Jan Wong; and all the great Canadian friends I’ve met and re-met in Toronto and on CBC Radio 3’s keenly interactive daily blog. Until the next time we bump in to each other, here’s a pumpkin pie decorated with the maple leaf. Hope you’re having a celebratory day, and thanks for visiting Honourary Canadian!
Kyle's Pumpkin Pie


Oct 21, 2013

I rarely photograph food I’m about to eat but the pumpkin pie Kyle made this weekend, dotted with maple leafs made from her delicious and flaky crust, looked too special not to first make a visual record of it. It tasted as good as it looked, best I’ve ever eaten! As a belated observance of Canadian Thanksgiving last Monday, I’m glad I could share my photograph of the pie.

1st night CMJ Music Festival

 

Ben Caplan with collaborator Taryn played a stunning keyboard and vocal duet in his opening set at Canadian Blast‘s CMJ showcase Wednesday night in Manhattan. The piece had a theater-like quality with their voices soaring and plummeting, and keys clashing. It reminded me of a song I loved years ago, and haven’t re-listened to in ages. I told the talented Taryn about it when we spoke during the break after Ben’s set. That long-ago song was by Judy Collins, a long one (5-6 minutes) about a figure, I believe from the French Revolution, his name spelled something like Marat-Sade. I’ll look it up later, and see. I’ve been to two other full CMJ showcases this week (Saskmusic.org, and M for Montreal.) and still doing my usual book business, so too rushed to do it right now!  

All Hail Alice Munro, 1st* Canadian Nobel Laureate!

 

 

Great news for all readers that Alice Munro was named this morning as the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. As the tweets above chronicle, I’ve had a glancing professional acquaintanceship with Munro over the years. She is the first Canadian writer to win the Nobel,* and only the 13th women to receive it, among 110 total laureates. As a reader, I’ve also savored her work. Amid all the excited coverage this morning, I found this great quote in a Canadian Press article spoken by her some time ago:

I want to tell a story, in the old-fashioned way–what happens to somebody–but I want that ‘what happens’ to be delivered with quite a bit of interruption, turnarounds, and strangeness. I want the reader to feel something is astonishing–not the ‘what happens’ but the way everything happens. These long short story fictions do that best, for me.

Here are copies of two editions of Munro’s work from my own library. Munro photoRunawayCastle Rock

*I read a NY Times blog post by Adam Sternbergh later today reminding readers that Saul Bellow–Nobel Laureate in 1976–was born in Montreal, so he might qualify as the first Canadian writer to be awarded the Nobel Prize. And yet, he grew up in Chicago and more strongly identified with the US, and was often described as “the Canadian-born American writer.” Sternbergh concludes, “With Munro, however, there are no…caveats. There is no need for any asterisk.”

Great Show by Said the Whale at Mercury Lounge

7 Tyler, BenSaid the Whale from Vancouver, BC, was in town Tuesday night and having previously enjoyed their good energy live show, I was excited to see them again, this time at the Mercury Lounge on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. True to form, they played one of the best sets of music by any band in NYC over the past several months. They were tightly focused on steaming through their under 3-minute hook-laden tunes–drawn from all their prior albums, such as “Camillo,” and “Emerald Lake, Alberta,” and from their new album, “Hawaiii (with a third ‘i’) with its hit single, “I Love You,” a narrative about the discovery of a grown sibling heretofore unknown–yet they still had spontaneous fun on stage, making jokes with each other and relating to the audience. Drummer Spencer Schoening provided a resolute backbeat while also sounding some really great tone with his consistently interesting drumming; Nathan Shaw’s bass was full of creative thumping; Jacelyn Brown provided all the right accompaniment and back-up vocals (I do wish she’d sing lead on a song one of these days, as she does a great job in a duet on their song, “Loveless”); while Ben Worcester and Tyler Bancroft sang their hearts out and played tasty guitar licks. The band was even called back for an encore, a relative rarity in small Manhattan clubs where 40-minute sets, at the longest, are usually house rules. It was amazing. The Sadies are in town Friday night, and I hope to be there at Mercury Lounge for them, too. Meantime, here are pictures from Said the Whale’s great show, including a couple at the end I took of gig buddy Steve Conte with Tyler and then one Steve took of me with Ben. Click here to see all pictures.