Folk Canada conference recap: Friday (mostly) unofficial showcases

It was just before noon when I made my way to the ballroom for the High Noon Roots showcase, and I arrived in time to catch the end of a tribute to Cris Derksen that I had only found out about minutes before it started.

I was happy that people at the conference had made space to remember Cris, whose death in a car accident in May came as a devastating shock, even to those of us who didn’t really know her personally.

I was glad to have a few minutes to listen to her glorious music in reflective silence with others.

Cécile Doo-Kingue opened the showcase in the most classy way a person possibly could’ve under the circumstances: by dedicating a song to Cris – a song filled with optimism for humanity’s potential to come together across difference.

Cécile carries herself with a self-assurance and wisdom that makes a person impossibly cool.

And she’s an insane wizard on guitar, which was on full display during her set.

On stage today, she told us she’s just coming back from an extended illness and thanked her community for carrying her through.

She closed her set with a song called “Love Yourself Whole” from her very cleverly titled forthcoming album “Phoenix Envy,” which I cannot wait to hear.

Australia’s the Pierce Brothers

Next on the stage was Murray Drive, a pretty straight-ahead roots rock band with a female lead.

Then was onto the Pierce Brothers, an Australian duo that sounds as if it’s been listening to a lot of Mumford and Sons, which is a compliment considering they can approximate that sound with just two people, a drum kit, guitar, mandolin and what may have been the odd backing track.

Their energy was so frenetic, they were literally out of breath between songs, and I couldn’t stop moving as they played.

They closed the show by Ozzing things up for us with a digeridoo in the mix.

Tennyson King’s set got off to a rough start due to feedback. That sent a few people fleeing from the room. Which is too bad because Tennyson’s really coming into his own as a performer, incorporating Chinese instruments and language into his indie folk.

At the conference, he alternated between guitar and ruan, a Chinese lute, and was accompanied by a keyboardist, as opposed to guzheng player Lina Cao, who sometimes performs with him.

A round of Aclause

The North Sound followed Tennyson, and the Saskatchewan duo of Forrest and Nevada Eaglespeaker performed an unplugged set that included a lovely Gillean Welch cover.

Next was Ariel Posen, who performed solo on electric guitar and got the audience singing along on “Angeline.”

Then it was on to The Pairs.

This trio could just sing me right to sleep with their divine harmonies. But they are also charming and funny. At one point, Noelle tripped over her tongue saying “applause,” and it came out as “aclause.” For the rest of the set, calls for a round of “aclause” were made each time the band wanted to thank somebody.

The Pairs were playing all music from a forthcoming album, and they closed with a novel new single about how nobody should have more than a billion dollars.

Suffice to say, that was greeted with an enthusiastic round of aclause.

Showing new artists how it’s done

The Pairs brought to a close the High Noon Roots showcase, and that brought us to the Manitoba Music showcase, which was opened by Juno winner Keri Latimer of Nathan and Leaf Rapids fame.

Remember what I said yesterday about how veteran artists can show up in a competitive environment like this and make rising above the fray looking easy?

Well, Keri stood on stage alone with her guitar in a “Mars Attacks” T-shirt and opened the set with a song so heartrending and sweet, I could just weep.

Between songs, Keri was funny and down to earth and joked with the audience that she was serving as a mentor to young artists at this year’s conference and felt she had to up her game to kick their asses.

Hardly. She was the only artist I’d seen to that point who had earned a standing ovation.

Winnipeg singer-songwriters

After Keri’s set, I decide I needed to take a quick stroll to cleanse my aural palette, and of course, it wasn’t quite as quick as planned because you can’t go anywhere in a conference like this without meeting people you know.

But I made it back to the ballroom in time to watch Jacob Brodovsky, who told the audience he’s the new executive director of the West End Cultural Centre — making him possibly the only artist showcasing this weekend with the power to book himself (he didn’t say that part. I did). Actually, he’d be wise to book himself because his introspective folk, backed in this case by Dominique Adams and Madeleine Roger on harmony vocals, is really quite lovely and evocative.

Next to the stage was KC is Lazy — not a band but a solo singer-songwriter with an acoustic guitar.

It seems strange to say this at a folk conference, but it was nice to kick back for a few sets by acoustic singer-songwriters. The variety at this year’s conference is so incredible that singer-songwriters with acoustic guitars are actually kind of a rarity.

Dominique Adams closed out the Manitoba showcase, having just served as Jacob Brodovsky’s backing vocalist. Jacob returned the favour, adding acoustic guitar and harmonies to Dominique’s sweet, plaintive folk.

From Manitoba we moved to Ireland for another type of music central to folk conferences: Celtic.

Fiarock kicked off the Spotlight on Ireland showcase with a collection of songs and tunes on keys, concertina, accordion and bodhran – though we were told the accordion player was just filling in for the banjoist.

Of course, the band elicited loads of hoots from the audience when they tore into their high energy, lightning-fast medleys of reels and polkas.

But they also demonstrated their Mexican connections by closing the set with a fusion of both a plaintive Mexican folk song, beautifully sung by Nicolle Fig, and some Celtic music.

Bilingual singer-songwriter Padraig Jack was next up, bringing a rich, resonant voice and a nervous energy to the stage.

Then it was up to Rioghnach Connolly to close the showcase.

If Rioghnach didn’t exist, I swear somebody would need to invent this woman.

What a character!

After opening with a sweet vocal number, accompanied by her pianist, she told the audience, she’d lulled us into a false sense of security, then set up her next song, a traditional song in a now-extinct language sung in deep and throaty tones interspersed with flute passages.

Next, she described moving to England as an Irish Republican and said she believes monarchy is immoral and she puts that across in the nicest way possible.

The audience laughed heartily.

That was all to set up a jazzy number from the jazz band she formed once in the England.

She was then told she had time for one more song, and remarked, “This one is about cannibalism… But the good kind.”

Could somebody please hire this woman so I can listen to her talk for an hour and a half?  Please?

With that, the afternoon showcases wrapped for the day, and I officially wasn’t back on reviewing duty until the late-night spotlight showcases.

But I can’t not fill you in on what I saw during the official showcases if only because, for once, my predictions of who would be great have so far turned out to be correct.

I showed up just in time to catch a song by Jed and the Valentine, who didn’t quite make my top 10 picks but probably should’ve done. Their contemporary folk roots moves in interesting and unexpected directions and it turns out it works at least as well on stage as it does on record.

Quebec experimental folk band CHANCES was everything I hoped and expected they would be. They channelled Jane Siberry somewhat on “Diamond Doves,” Chloé Lacasse bowed her electric guitar for one song, and she joined Geneviève Toupin on front of the stage for an a capella closing number, which was greeted with a standing ovation from some audience members.

From there I was off to see Guatemalan artist Sara Curruchich, who sounds like Latin folk troubadour on record with her rich, deep voice.

But on stage, she is a rock star, radiating unbridled joy with a band that consisted of guitar, bass, drums, and a traditional vibraphone-like instrument. My money’s on her becoming a star on the festival circuit.

Speaking of which, I arrived back in the ballroom just after the start of Andy Rubal’s set, and the Cuban-born Montreal-based bandleader already had the party started and the entire audience on its feet.

This was music to feed the soul of everyone who ever loved the Buena Vista Social Club.

And it was performed by an artist with serious Cuban bona fides.

What a show!

I began my tour of the late-night spotlight showcases in the Alberta room, where AV and the Inner City, Emily Triggs and Leanne Lightfoot were performing in the round.

That was pretty much a dream lineup for me. Emily is one of my favourite singer-songwriters, and AV and the Inner City, fronted by incredible vocalist Ann Vriend, is a heavenly mixture of classic soul, gospel, RnB and pop.

The room was so small that the six-piece AV and the Inner City was performing a cappella, which was pretty freaking sweet. The five other members created vocal beds and harmonies around Ann’s glorious pipes. The audience also got in on the action, clapping and stomping out the rhythm for a song about poverty.

Emily Triggs sang Emily Triggs songs, and I don’t believe I’ve ever heard one I didn’t love. Today did not change that.

I had never heard Leanne Lightfoot before, but I’m now a convert. She is also a strong writer and vocalist who held her own in the midst of two other formidable talents.

A standout track was a piece that sought to empathize with a dog caught in a divorce.

Let’s face it, that’s nothing if not an original and very compelling idea for a song.

After the Alberta room set, I went to check out DijahSB for a few minutes. I can imagine it must be intimidating to be a hip hop artist playing a folk conference, wondering how you’ll be received. Dijah sounded great when rapping, but seemed a bit disengaged from the audience, and I wonder if discomfort with the environment contributed to that. I can say that the rest of the audience seemed to love her work as much as I do.

I moved from Dijah’s suite upstairs and caught a bit of Andrea Kuzmich of Ori Shalva leading her own ensemble, which consists of her, Shalva-Lucas Makharashvili and a brass player.

The music struck me as a mixture of influences from the traditional Georgian polyphonic singing she performs with Ori Shalva and contemporary folk and jazz.

Then I went over to the International Indigenous Music Summit showcase to watch a bit of Raye Zaragoza, a folk-pop artists from the U.S. who got attention around a decade ago for her song “In the River” about the Dakota Access Pipleline.

She writes songs that make you want to keep listening and wanting more. She has a gorgeous voice and vocal style that vaguely reminds me a little of Stevie Nicks. And she’s extremely comfortable and authentic on stage.

At one point, she told the audience she believes she’s one of only two Americans showcasing at Folk Canada, and she hoped she could change our mind about the U.S.

After Raye’s set I found myself in the strange position of having previously seen all of the artists getting ready to showcase next.

I’d need to stick around ’til around 1 a.m. for the next round of “new to me” acts.

I was on late night review duty tonight, but the truth is, I could barely stay awake. So I headed back to the hotel and called it a night.

There is another night of music tomorrow and I need to be ready.