White Lightning has struck with the release of Canadian folk-country rock artist Mary Garnett Edwards’ new album — available now.
Featuring lyrics seasoned by a life lived in the crooks and crannies of human experience, White Lightning lands with a raw intensity forged by the fire of hard times made manageable with wry wit and gratitude. “It offers a depth of practical knowledge from beyond the boundaries of the ordinary,” the singer/songwriter offers.
Born in 1957, some of Edwards’ earliest career moments included performing at Vancouver’s Soft Rock Cafe and Kits Hous, as well as recording at Psi Chord, Ocean Sound and Trebas Recording throughout the 70s, and in the rock band Breeze.
Then and now, Edwards has continued to draw inspiration from those around her; for example, when the founder of Psi Chord, Robin Spurgin, passed away in 2013, she felt called on to keep singing. “Robin had recorded all of my original songs in one night for future use,” she recalls.
White Lightning is Mary Garnett Edwards’ debut solo release; she’d previously released First Stone with her husband, the late, great musician and composer of the pop standard, “Wildflower,” Doug Edwards. “After Doug passed away from cancer in 2016, I found those old tracks recorded with Robin and believed it was time to sing them again. In 2019, I asked producer Andreas Schuld to help me make an album.”
The results, recorded at Studio Down Under with engineer Soren Lonnqvis, serve as both an unearthed archive and poignant fresh-read chapter in a near-five decade career in the making. Featuring a bevy of Edwards’ original material — including “Robin’s Song,” “penned for my dear, nurturing friend,” she says — the LP also includes three songs by Vancouver-area songwriter and videographer John Holbrook.
Winnipeg rockers BULLRIDER state their status loud and clear in this, their latest single and (literally) head-bobbing video, “Happy Where I Am” — available now.
They’ve got a lot going on to back up that claim: Together since 2012, the Winnipeg-based four-piece pooled together some serious talent in Bobby Desjarlais (The Bokononists, Attica Riots), Ben Ferguson (Ash Koley), Tom Sinnott and Chris Peluk (Alverstone, Mad Young Darlings) to bring their complete yet complex palate of sonic sojourns — from fun-loving to dark and heartbroken, haunting to near-psychedelic in its experience— to stages at The Forks Winnipeg, Harvest Moon Festival, Dauphin’s Country Fest, ManyFest, Hoot Owl, and more.
They delivered a 14-track debut LP, Hidden Gems And The Love Of Another, last year and, along with “Happy Where I Am,” the release’s previous singles deliver a similar, existential and observational theme of just… well, making the best of where you’re at. “Dying,” “Live My Life” and “The News” serve as prime examples of the band’s rebellious, tongue-in-cheek delivery; “We’re all about needing less to live and be happy,” Desjarlais says. “I just gotta breathe, sleep, eat, and feel… The rest? You can keep, thanks.”
Not a bad mantra to live by…. Hear for yourself: “Happy Where I Am” is available now.
With BLACKPINK feat. Selena Gomez’s latest track “Ice Cream” hitting Top 10 on both the Global and U.S. Billboard charts, Canada’s original and best-selling kid’s music group are serving their own scoop of the song in their signature family-friendly way! MINI POP KIDS’ version of BLACKPINK feat. Selena Gomez’s “Ice Cream” is available now!
“This song is one of our favourites of 2020,” the MINI POP KIDS say. “We’re HUGE fans of BLACKPINK.”
They’re not kidding; MINI POP KIDS also feature BLACKPINK’s “How You Like That” on this year’s hit release, MINI POP KIDS 18 — available now!
With over 40+ Million streams across platforms and counting, Canada’s original, best-selling kid’s music group MINI POP KIDS are back with a new album. MINI POP KIDS 18 is available now and includes two new and original songs!
The two-disc release features three throwback tracks, including a cover of “Lean On Me” by the late, great Bill Withers, as well as a veritable who’s who of today’s top charts and social algorithms. Some of the world’s hottest fan favourites from Jason Derulo, Harry Styles, Doja Cat, BLACKPINK, Tones And I, and more are paired with two new, all-original tracks from MINI POP KIDS — “Holiday” and “I Want 2.”
The 24-track collection includes the MINI POP KIDS’ much-loved style of family-friendly covers of Canadian artists including Justin Bieber, The Weeknd, and Drake, as well as a first for the group: their version of Dua Lipa’s “Don’t Start Now” as a fully produced acapella song. “There are no instruments on this track, just the voices of the kids,” K-Tel Vice President Samantha Kives says. “We had to get creative with the recent stay-home recommendations in place, so the music video for it was shot from their bedrooms.
“Some songs were also recorded this way, using their closets as makeshift sound booths.”
No small feat for the legacy group that continues to create top-quality music and content beloved by both parents and kids on tour, in the recording studio, and online, even now during challenging restrictions placed by COVID-19.
“This is an exciting release,” Kives says of MINI POP KIDS 18. “This is the largest assembly of voices we’ve had on an album in more than a decade.”
Among the 16 voices heard throughout the release are some newly welcomed members Kyra (Kingston, ON), Aliyah Rose (King City, ON), Julia (Whitby, ON), Liv (Brampton, ON), Camden (Innisfil, ON), and Noam (Vaughan, ON).
They are joined by returning cast members Abby (Etobicoke, ON), Vasili (Toronto, ON), Tre (Caledon, ON), and Leyonce (Toronto, ON).
MINI POP KIDS also made it possible this year for fans nationwide to dress and feel like a member with the launch of their exclusive clothing line with Walmart Canada. Available both online and in 325 select stores across the country, the MINI POP KIDS apparel and accessories collection features sizing for boys and girls 4 XS – 16 XL.
The ‘Back To School’ collection just launched, with new pieces being added weekly!
MINI POP KIDS 18 is available now.
MINI POP KIDS 18 — TRACK LISTING:
Disc 1:
“Dance Monkey” — Tones And I
“Savage Love” — Jason Derulo & Jawsh 685
“Watermelon Sugar” — Harry Styles
“Don’t Start Now” — Dua Lipa
“Say So” — Doja Cat
“Intentions” — Justin Bieber feat. Quavo
“Sunday Best” — Surfaces
“Holiday” — MINI POP KIDS ** ORIGINAL **
“Stuck With U” — Ariana Grande & Justin Bieber
“Stupid Love” — Lady Gaga
“Into The Unknown” — Idina Menzel & Aurora
“Lean On Me” — Bill Withers
Disc 2:
“Blinding Lights” — The Weeknd
“Break My Heart” — Dua Lipa
“Mamacita” — Black Eyed Peas, Ozuna & J. Rey Soul
“Supalonely” — BENEE feat. Gus Dapperton
“Toosie Slide” — Drake
“Rain On Me” — Lady Gaga & Ariana Grande
“I Want 2” — MINI POP KIDS ** ORIGINAL **
“How You Like That” — BLACKPINK
“I Love Me” — Demi Lovato
“10,000 Hours” — Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber
“Dynamite” — Taio Cruz
“Can’t Hold Us” — Macklemore & Ryan Lewis feat. Ray Dalton
Toronto singer/songwriter, pianist, producer, artist, and JazzFM radio producer/host Laura Fernandez is taking the time to “Breathe Life” in this, her new single — available now.
An intense, emotional ode to love, its recurrent line ‘you breathe life into me’ is fervent, and almost prayer-like; Alexander Brown shines with a beautiful, muted trumpet and the overall sense of the song is hushed and jazzy in a minor key.
“Breathe Life” lands ahead of Fernandez’s forthcoming album, Okay, Alright — a stunning baker’s dozen of deeply intimate lyrical sojourns available this October 2nd, 2020.
Blending pop, jazz and classical influences throughout the vibrant collection, Okay, Alright navigates Fernandez’s varied styles and grooves through an expert rhythm section, string accompaniment, guitar, trumpet, and mandolin — all corralled to create a sonic texture all her own. Shaped by a fluid, even feeling piano and a voice that’s richly warm and enigmatically expressive, the release will have audiences believing and reeling on every word she sings.
“This album was a labour of love in more ways than one,” Fernandez shares. “I wrote these songs over my 20-year career as a songwriter and performer, but hadn’t released them yet; these were songs I wanted to keep safe, and to have a home in a collection.”
Several of the songs, she reveals, were written in some of her earliest days and have stayed close to her heart ever since, “like a living memory.”
While Okay, Alright may be a collection of previously unrevealed songwriting, the notion is par for the course when it comes to Fernandez and her discography. With her phrasing described as “beautifully executed amid expression that, is at times aching and bleeding, and at other times soaring with joy,” Fernandez first debuted her songcraft in 2003 with the melodic folk, rock-pop release of The Other Side, a breakthrough offering that won her the Best Soft Rock Award at the New York International Independent Music Festival. Her sophomore follow-up, the exploratory pop-folk x Latin and jazz Un Solo Beso, arrived in 2010, and was produced by JUNO Award-winning Billy Bryans.
Born in Madrid, Spain, with time spent in Switzerland before moving to Canada (Alberta, then Ontario — Toronto, specifically), she completed piano studies at The Royal Conservatory of Music, is an official member of the Steinway Artist roster, and has spent her multifaceted career pursuing both music and visual arts; some of her commissioned portraits include Margaret Atwood, Bill Gates Sr., and Sir Richard Francis Burton for the permanent collection of the Royal Geographic Society, as well as brands such as Estée Lauder, Air Canada, Microsoft, and more.
Her extensive collection of works have garnered a Ruth Schwartz Award, a New York Art Directors Club Award of Excellence, an Amelia Frances Howard-Gibbon Award, as well as a gold medal from the Canadian Library Association, multiple Toronto Art Directors Awards, and four Communication Arts Magazine Awards of Excellence.
The extension of her masterful artistry into music and production were decidedly natural, she shares. “Painting, and especially illustrating, for 25 years had become limiting for me. It wasn’t answering all my creative questions.
“Music has become a voyage of self-discovery for me,” she adds. “There are no rules here, and this is exciting and liberating to me. I love the social aspects of making music, as well as the fact it’s a more direct route to the heart.”
In return, Okay, Alright is the most direct route to Fernandez’s; the 12 original tracks — plus one cover — that made the cut from 29 options feel more like an intimate conversation among kindred kinds. “These songs have lived inside me like a secret whisper, never fading from my heart,” she muses. “This album is a musical diary and, for me, a soundtrack of my life over the past 20 years, and I hope the listener can feel what I felt when I wrote them.
“Yes, these songs are a study in emotion, honesty, and pain,” she continues. “There is self-doubt and longing, but there is also joy, imagination, courage, and wonder. Some of the songs have come from a place of understanding, and none of the songs are from the same relationship experience. It’s a journey through life and the struggles of intimacy and love, and one that you could also feel hope in.
“In the end, we make our own choices; we learn from them, and we grow, so there is deep feeling and there is acceptance. We experience what it is to be human, and we come to accept who we are.
After months of waiting to hit the road again due to the pandemic, The Legendary Downchild Blues Band are bring LIVE BLUES back to their fans with a REAL LIVE PERFORMANCE in front of a LIVE AUDIENCE of 50 lucky fans at the Empire Theatre in Belleville, ON on Friday, October 16, 2020 at 8:00 Pm (ET). The show will be STREAMED WORLDWIDE to fans around the globe in real time, with no overdubs or tape delays, as a live ONE-DAY-ONLY pay per view concert to celebrate the international release of their acclaimed new 50th Anniversary album.
Downchild will be joined by some special guests to be announced shortly, for this their final live performance of 2020.
Tickets go ON SALE this Friday, September 25, 2020 at 10:00 Am (ET) at www.theempiretheatre.com or by calling the Empire Theatre box office at 613-969-0099 between 11AM and 1PM, Monday to Friday.
Downchild will donate $1.00 for every ticket sold to the Jane Vasey Memorial Fund at her Alma Mater, Brandon University in Brandon, Manitoba, in support budding keyboard students.
Downchild’s 50th Anniversary Live At The Toronto Jazz Festival release is getting rave reviews from Australia to Holland, the UK., Canada and the U.S., where the album made its debut at # 11 on the respected Living Blues Charts in August.
The band is releasing their first vinyl album in over 30 years when Live At The Toronto Jazz Festival hits record stores across Canada alongside the CD, through Diesel Management Productions/Fontana North on October 16, 2020, to coincide with the international release date.
2018 Juno Award winners, Downchild, include some of the most well-respected musicians in the country, who have performed together for over 25 years. Guitarist, harmonica player, leader and co-founder of the band, DONNIE “Mr. Downchild” WALSH, lead singer and harmonica player CHUCK JACKSON, PAT CAREY on tenor sax, MIKE FITZPATRICK on drums, GARY KENDALL on bass, and former American super-group rocker MICHAEL FONFARA (of Rhinoceros/Lou Reed fame) on keyboards.
Award-winning Canadian singer/songwriter Michael Vincent Quattro has seen it all between his late-90s chart-topping hit “Fallen For Your Love” to this year’s half-million and rising hit release of “Save Our World.”
It’s this life-library of experiences that had the artist observe the world’s situation in his new song — one that’s connecting with fans big time; the track has 500,000+ engagements across platforms, and rising.
“One evening as I sat at the piano to write for my new album, I started pondering the impact of the global pandemic and the effect it’s understandably having on people of any status and background,” Michael Vincent says. “I became very emotional as I began to put my thoughts together.
“I’m so grateful for the beautiful reception ‘Save Our World,’ has received so far,” he continues. “When I wrote this song, I dreamed of reaching as many people as possible with it; I wanted to send a message of hope, prayer, unity, and love for not only today, but tomorrow as well.
“As emotional as I was writing the song, I’m just as emotional now learning how it has inspired others.”
Michael Vincent first rose to pop-rock prominence with the Top 10 RPM-charting hit “Fallen For Your Love” in the late ‘90s. Since then he’s won a Voce D’oro (Golden Voice) Award and the Song Festival Toronto, and released a series of critically acclaimed singles, including the 2018 holiday hit “A Christmas Gift of Love.”
Personal tragedies including the untimely loss of his beloved mother, sister and father have inspired other deeply personal song work, including “Up to Heaven.”
A compassionate creative, Michael Vincent’s newest song amplifies his intentions to inspire and connect the community, especially through troubling times.
“I think connecting spiritually is first and foremost the answer to getting through this time in our lives,” he considers. “It is the foundation of working together along with worldwide cooperative measures to overcome this unprecedented challenge.
“As I said in the song, ‘the life we all knew will be forever changed, but with faith and new heroes hope is unchanged.”
While its two-decade-plus tradition of seeing music lovers fill the streets of historic Unionville this summer was dearly missed, the TD Markham Jazz Festival is set to keep jazz fans connected through this Fall and Winter. The legendary Canadian event will celebrate its 23rd annual season with a special series of live-streamed concerts September 2020 through March 2021.
Some of Canada’s best known and loved jazz stars will perform in select venues around Markham on the last Sunday of the month; the shows will then be broadcast in real-time to MarkhamJazzFestival.com and uploaded for future viewing to TD Markham Jazz Festival’s YouTube channel.
JUNO Award-nominated trumpet phenom Alexis Baro will kick off the series with a quintet of award-winning talent this Sunday, September 27th.
First taking to the instrument at age eight, the Havana, Cuba-born artist was playing lead trumpet for Cuba’s National Radio and Television Orchestra by 19, and has taken the stage with or to open for the likes of Nikky Yanofsky, David Foster, Michael Bublé, Paquito d’Rivera, Hilario Duran, Robi Botos, Andrea Boccelli, Horacio ‘el negro’ Hernandez, Herbie Hancock, and more.
In Toronto as of 2001, Baro flourished as a writer and member of Kollage, earning not one, but three esteemed nominations for ‘Best Jazz Trumpeter’ from the Canadian National Jazz Awards in addition to his JUNO Award nomination for Jazz Album of the Year: Solo.
// TD Markham Jazz Fest Live-Stream Line-Up
Sunday, September 27th @ 2:00 pm EST
Alexis Baro
Sunday, October 25th @ 2:00 pm EST
Spy Jazz w/ June Garber & Irene Torres
Featuring: Eric St. Laurent, George Koller, Great Bob Scott, Attila Fias, & Alison Young
Hosted by: Jaymz Bee
Sunday, November 29th @ 2:00 pm EST
Donovan Locke
While it may look a little different this year, its mission remains the same. First launched in 1998 thanks to a team of volunteers acting under the leadership and invention of local residents, Hal Hill— a well-known broadcaster, concert producer, author (Jazz Canadiana), and all-around jazz genre authority — and his wife Chris, the TD Markham Jazz Festival prides itself on presenting a diverse and eclectic selection of jazz performers from Canada and around the world within a range of sub-styles, including blues, soul, Latin, fusion, world and contemporary.
Previous years have featured Internationally renowned and award-winning artists such as Michael Kaeshammer, Brandi Disterheft, Alison Young, David Clayton-Thomas, Maceo Parker, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Bruce Cockburn, Jack De Keyzer, John Pizzarelli, Marc Jordan, Dr Lonnie Smith, Molly Johnson, Barbra Lica, Carol Welsman, Oliver Jones, Rob McConnell, Jeff Healey, and many more.
The 23rd TD Annual Markham Jazz Festival begins this Sunday, September 27th at 2:00pm EST and will continue on the last Sunday of each month through March 2021.
One-of-its-kind Canadian musical duo Q&A — as in JUNO Award-winning Tony Quarrington and his esteemed counterpart Zoey Adams — deliver the second release in their multi-genre triple EP offering, One More FOLK Thing, including lead single “How Do I Love You?” — available now!
Following this summer’s big band-to-ballad exploration that is One More JAZZ Thing, One More FOLK Thing falls in line with another five tracks that span from old-timey upbeats to slow-folk styles, and everything in between.
“Clap along with this happy, little bluegrass love song,” Adams says of the album’s first preview, “How Do I Love You?” — a lively duet spotlighting sounds of the fiddle, banjo, and guitar.
“Redbird” lands as another bluegrass-based tune, while “Hold On” and “Last One In Love” slow the pace as an intimate, personal anthem and a whimsical yet poignant look at love, respectively.
“This is a cautionary tale about paying it forward,” Quarrington reveals about the album’s closer, “Big Bump (At The End Of The Road).” “The track has a gospel feel to it, including a killer Hammond organ solo.”
One More FOLK Thing is the second in this year’s three-part EP project released via Sonic Peach Music that focuses on specific genres of music through the lens of this spectacularly diverse and uniquely talented pair.
The journeys within the genres are deftly traversed by the accomplished co-writers and artists; with Quarrington and Adams — the former an acclaimed jazz guitarist, composer, and songwriter with hundreds of multi-genre credits to his name, and the latter an artist long-lauded for her work in theatre, movies, radio, and corporate entertainment.
The duo have been making music together in some form or another for the better part of two decades; Q&A quite literally holds 100 years of professional experience between them; the results have included but are not limited to a long-held run as Paper Moon, a nostalgic jazz duo, and their first extended work together took place in 2005 when Stuart McLean commissioned Quarrington to compose what would become Vinyl Cafe: The Musical — Quarrington sang the role of ‘Dave’ and Adams ‘Morley,’ ‘Stephanie,’ and ‘Sam.’
“The pleasure we took in that project convinced us to work together even more,” they recall.
That pleasure is now ours with the release of One More JAZZ Thing, One More FOLK Thing, and One More POP Thing.
Canadian folk rock singer/songwriter Shane Cloutier sets down the weight of emotional baggage in his new single, “Catching Up” — available now.
“This song is one that many, if not all, people can relate to,” the Collingwood-based artist considers. “The human element of emotion can be both tragic and beautiful, and I believe that even the darker side of it can sometimes bring out the best of who we are if we fight hard enough.
“‘Catching Up’ is an expression of trying to move on in life but having emotional baggage weighing me down,” he continues. “It’s hard to keep up when certain shades of sunlight and certain smells in the air pull me back into my past.
“I wrote ‘Catching Up’ in one day — mostly because I compulsively felt I needed to finish it. It also came together naturally; I could feel in my gut when I had the right chord.”
Also in line with his instinct is ushering in the right team for the track; “Catching Up” features Mike Olsen on cello and Alyssa Joline on backup vocals. “As always, I worked with Adam Fair at Villa Sound,” Cloutier adds. “He has a really great understanding of what I’m trying to do, and is great for keeping me relaxed and on-track. Adam, who’s many skills amaze me, also did the video; the concept is to visually portray how we all drag baggage and luggage around throughout our lives, and how it keeps us moving as far and as quickly as we might want.”
As a follow up to this year’s earlier release, “Rain Check,” “Catching Up” lands as an early preview to Cloutier’s forthcoming album, one that promises to further embody the artist’s emotive voice and unique approach — complete with signature heavy metal influence, a sojourn into programmed beats, and a nod to collaborations with multi-award winning blues drummer Tom Bona and legendary guitarist Frank Marino and Mahogany Rush.
“I wasn’t planning on recording again this soon,” Cloutier marvels, noting his most recent 2019 album release, Red Wagon. “But everything came out more naturally because I didn’t have time to overthink anything. Everything felt very organic.
“The material for it feels really good to me. I am in a great place in my life and, because of this, I was able to branch out lyrically to more topics and feelings that are important to me. I feel the isolation we have all been in has really pulled some different topics and feelings out.
“The album Red Wagon was very much a prequel and sequel to In Light,” Cloutier continues, referring to his debut release. “When I wrote In Light, it was very much a cathartic response to some traumatic events in my life, facing the death of my wife and mother of my children. It is very much an album of perseverance and strength, as well as surrendering to vulnerability.
“When I wrote Red Wagon, I was in a much happier place, and I feel I had a much more enlightened perspective. Both albums helped me emotionally, physically, and spiritually move forward. They tethered me to real life, sort of, and didn’t allow me to sink — which was exactly where I felt like I was heading.”
Sinking has never ultimately been an option for Cloutier, who was once told he’d never ‘make it.’ “My grade 12 music teacher was a narrow-minded, mediocre teacher who only listened to classical music,” Cloutier recalls. “He told me at the end of grade 12 that I’m a great student, but I’d never make it as a musician for a living.
“Every day being a full-time, professional musician is me giving him the proverbial finger… Especially being asked to join Mahogany Rush and playing for Frank Marino, who is my guitar idol. It still doesn’t feel real, and might never feel completely real to me.
“This is important to me to hold onto because, in life, we are continuously met by individuals who doubt us.
“I believe everybody has an outlet that they have found — or need to find — and this is mine.”
Toronto native and UK-based singer/songwriter Blaise Moore surprises fans with the release of “Best Next Ex” her brand new single out today via 21 Entertainment/Universal Music Canada, the country’s leading music company. Produced and co-written by Jon Levine (Alessia Cara, Bebe Rexha, Dua Lipa, Drake), Midi Jones (Kiesza, Matt and Kim), and Sebastian Cole (Alicia Keys, Fifth Harmony), “Best Next Ex” tells a story of a relationship destined for failure, but with the passion and chemistry that will never be repeated. “I could be your best next ex ever, what are you scared of?” – sings Moore, as she chides her love interest, while ironically foreshadowing their destined demise.
“Best Next Ex” captures the signature emotional depth and honesty woven throughout Moore’s music, possessing an incisive ability to wind its way into the hearts and minds of listeners. The infectious electronica and the accompanying trance-like rhythms, combined with the soulful and complex vocals of Moore herself – sometimes plaintive, other times fierce – mark her as an artist who has so much more to say, about so many other aspects of life.
On the new single, Moore says, “After the release of Laurence, I moved from Toronto to LA for a fresh start after feeling creatively stagnant and to immerse myself in new experiences. I was by myself, in a new place, meeting and working with new people and feeling a lot of pressure to make new music that would exceed my past work. All of those emotions paired with other life events had me in a bad place emotionally, which ensued a heavy writer’s block and self-sabotaging behaviour. I didn’t have anything to write about other than the dark thoughts I was experiencing.
I’m really grateful for that whole experience in a way. It taught me a lot about myself as a person and an artist. I’m inspired again and finally without writer’s block. Going head-first into this new music with a new attitude, feeling more excited and hungry I’ve ever been.”
Prior to the release of “Best Next Ex”, Blaise Moore released the 2017 seven-song EP on Interscope Records to critical acclaim, named for the object of her artistic invective, Laurence. The EP was steeped in the raw, bitter, revelatory spirit of a person scorned, but also captured the overall theme of a person who is aware that in many instances, is the author of her own misfortune when it comes to relationships.
The release of “Best Next Ex” signals Moore’s perpetual growth as a world-class artist, ever evolving and voicing her lived truth through captivating rhythms and emotionally raw lyrics.
