Myk Freedman is best known as the lap-steel-wielding leader of the nonet St. Dirt Elementary School, whose idiosyncratically tuneful music (released on Rat Drifting and on Barnyard Records) is nestled in the crevice between whimsy, sentimentality, and ragtag experimentation. Ostensibly a jazz group, its diverse instrumentation, wonkiness, and the sweetly pithy character of Freedman’s tunes conjure the likes of Jerry Byrd, Sun Ra, the Penguin Café Orchestra, and Charles Mingus.
Freedman is also the name of a Toronto outfit (Justin Haynes, Ryan Driver, and Jean Martin) that has toured and recorded Freedman’s compositions with a suitably odd instrumentation of ukelele, street-sweeper-bristle bass, and suitcase (a drum-kit substitute). In 2009, the noted American label Porter records released Julu Twine, a pastoral album of woozy improvisations featuring Freedman in duet with legendary U.S. multi-instrumentalist Alan Sondheim. He’s also performed with John Zorn, William Parker, Elliot Sharp, and Cyro Baptista.
After completing studies at York University, Freedman moved in 2003 to New York, where he studied at the New School with William Parker and Mark Dresser. He later worked privately with Anthony Coleman. He’s been playing in Joey Weisenberg’s Hadar Ensemble (which blends traditional Jewish religious vocal music with contemporary Brooklyn jazz, soul, bluegrass and more) and in the ambient ensemble Bing & Ruth, in addition to leading his own group, Myk Freedman and the Myk Freedmans.
Recently, Freedman has been working daily to craft an album of solo (regular) guitar renditions of some of his many compositions.
Musicworks: What’s behind doing a solo guitar record?
Myk Freedman: A big part of why I’ve been working on guitar more now is that I’m looking after my kid full time during the day, and I’m able to play guitar with him around. Now that he walks, he just wants to jump on the lap-steel. Getting out regularly to play my music with other people is tricky; you can cover a lot of ground on the guitar, such that you’re capturing the energy or spirit of a large group by yourself.
READ THE FULL VERSION OF NICK STORRING’S INTERVIEW WITH MYK FREEDMAN IN THE PRINT EDITION OF MUSICWORKS #121 (SPRING 2015).
Audio: Deer Park United (2014), composed and performed by Myk Freedman (acoustic guitar). Photo of Myk Freedman by: Ilusha Tsinadze .
Nick Storring is a Toronto-based composer, musician, and writer, and a contributing editor to Musicworks. His music has been presented and performed by the Esprit Orchestra, Eve Egoyan, Quatuor Bozzini, Beijing’s Musicacoustica Festival, and Vancouver New Music. An avid collaborator, Storring has composed for films by Terrance Odette, Ingrid Veninger and, in collaboration with Dafydd Hughes, for the National Film Board’s award-winning Web documentary High Rise: Universe Within (2015), directed by Katerina Cizek. He’s also scored productions by Litmus Theatre and MT Space, worked with celebrated choreographers Yvonne Ng, Marie Josée Chartier, Brandy Leary, and Deepti Gupta, and created music for “ambient gaming environment” Tentacle, which was mounted at New York’s Museum of Modern Art in 2011. Storring’s writing has appeared in Exclaim!, The Wire, and AUX.tv. He also contributed liner notes to Alga Marghen’s reissue of the ’60s band Intersystems’ entire recorded output, as well as RVNG Intl.’s box of early psych trio Syrinx’s reissues and previously unreleased material Tumblers from the Vault.