Genre Archives
Tomoko Sauvage’s Waterbowls
Delicate clusters of tones sound and resonate. An orchestration of chimes and drips, they mix to form a potent brew of sullen melodies and serene reverberation. Adrift, immersed, submerged—there are many metaphors one might use to describe a close listening of Clepsydra, the opening track on Tomoko Sauvage’s latest album, Musique Hydromantique, and most ofContinue reading “Tomoko Sauvage’s Waterbowls”
The Warp and Weft of Kelly Ruth
In the history of musical instruments, the questions asked are pretty standard: Who played it? What did they play? How did it evolve? Kelly Ruth’s instrument, the weaving loom, carries an entirely different kind of history. It brings to mind mythology, solitary artisans, beautiful textiles, and the dangers and exploitations of mass production in “dark,Continue reading “The Warp and Weft of Kelly Ruth”
Sarah Hennies, Linguist in the Land of Noises
Identity is a deeply personal, elusive, and complex thing, and thus, a common source of creative fuel. Yet for the endless variety of discrete identities and individual perspectives on the topic, there is a dominant set of tropes around the way that identity is addressed artistically. The supposed concreteness of narrative is often turned to,Continue reading “Sarah Hennies, Linguist in the Land of Noises”
First-place Winner, Musicworks 2017 Sonic Geography Writing Contest
Childhood has no single place, no secret garden, no single carousel to ride on, nor tree branch to fall from: just hours, that slip away, so similar to music, which has no place either, just passing time it tries to keep up with. In playgrounds kids run in circles, sliding down, climbing up the imaginedContinue reading “First-place Winner, Musicworks 2017 Sonic Geography Writing Contest”
The Journey: Editor’s Note, Musicworks 130
In late 1977, somewhere in Toronto, the poet and noted arts programmer Victor Coleman, Music Gallery cofounders Peter Anson and Al Mattes, and music artists John Oswald and Andrew Timar convened to discuss establishing an artist-run print forum to serve the Canadian creative-music community. In early 1978, Musicworks made its debut as a section insideContinue reading “The Journey: Editor’s Note, Musicworks 130”
What’s Inside Musicworks 130?
Musicworks turns 40 this year. It’s been quite a journey from the DIY newsprint tabloid published in 1978 to Musicworks 130—our first-ever full-colour issue! Buy the print issue (or print+CD combo) from our shop, or start your subscription today. On the Cover Montreal guitarist, oud player, and composer Sam Shalabi has been active across a diversityContinue reading “What’s Inside Musicworks 130?”
Spring 2018
send+receive: a festival of sound, v.19
For a festival of any stripe to last until its nineteenth edition suggests a deep commitment by its organizers to maintaining the attention of their audience. crys cole, director of send+receive, builds the festival around a different theme every year, going with “outside of the box” for the 2017 edition. The result was a programContinue reading “send+receive: a festival of sound, v.19”
Amanda Dawn Christie’s Requiem for Radio
In 2012 the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) began to tear down its Radio-Canada International towers in Sackville, New Brunswick (home to some 6,000 people and best known as the locale of the beloved SappyFest). The dismantling of the towers wasn’t just another chapter in the public broadcaster’s ongoing fight to keep its funding, but somethingContinue reading “Amanda Dawn Christie’s Requiem for Radio”