When you meet her, Jenie Thai is composed, pleasant, amiable, friendly, and — she won’t like the word but you have to live with it — sweet. She has an open face, long blonde hair, a ready smile and an easy laugh. And she is also tough, and gritty, and plays barrelhouse piano steeped in the blues — and if …
Al Lerman
Bluesman AL LERMAN is a multi-instrumentalist, singer and songwriter. He was founder and leader of the 2X Juno Award winning band FATHEAD, and along the way built a solid career touring as an acoustic solo act, accompanying himself on guitar and rack harmonica. An engaging and skilled artist, his shows often feature humorous anecdotes interspersed between great blues songs. He …
Jack de Keyzer
Guitarist, Singer, Song Writer Jack de Keyzer plays the blues world wide, from Alert, Arctic Circle to Puerto Escondido, Mexico; from Athens, Greece to Hornby Island, BC and many points between. One of Canada’s most awarded and in demand live performers and session guitarists, Jack has released 10 CD’s and 1 DVD. He has also played on hundreds of recordings …
Sue Foley
Sue Foley is a multi-award-winning musician and one of the finest blues and roots artists working today. She’s a triple-threat as a lead guitarist, songwriter and vocalist. Foley has a long history of defying convention, and being a positive role model for aspiring, young female musicians. She began her recording career in Austin, TX with Antone’s, the esteemed blues label …
Mercy Funk
Mercy Funk, an Edmonton based band, was formed from an impulsively sown seed by bassist, Angela Proulx, who in her early teen years experienced what she calls a “funk revelation.” Upon the discovery of this infectious music, she set out to form a band centred around the likes of Parliament Funkadelic style hooks and mid-tempo slimey bass lines. The bands vocalist, …
Danny Michel
The only good thing about NOT shopping in record stores like the good ol’ days is you won’t have to figure out what genre to look for Danny under. If that WERE the case, you could try looking under, rock/pop, folk, world or (recently) even classical. His own self-described musical A.D.D. has kept his music fresh for decades now. Thoughtful lyrics …
Andrew Collins Trio
Mando maestro Andrew Collins finds himself – through no actual fault of his own – at the epicentre of Canada’s burgeoning acoustic/roots music scene. He didn’t invent it – but he’s certainly been a contributor, having co-founded seriously noteworthy Canadian bands like the Creaking Tree String Quartet, the Foggy Hogtown Boys and, more recently, his namesake Trio. That’s not to …
The Garifuna Collective
The Garifuna Collective promises to carry the torch of cultural innovation and promotion passed on by Andy Palacio far into the future and expands on the story of this fascinating community, which is struggling to retain its unique language, music, and traditions in the face of globalization. The band consists of the best musicians in the fertile Garifuna music scene. …
Birds of Chicago
Birds of Chicago have been riding a swell of good mojo in the Americana scene since their inception in late 2012. With their new album, Love in Wartime, they are set to both confirm that roots world buzz, and break on through to a much wider audience. Recorded in Chicago against a backdrop of bewilderment, deep divide and dread, Love …
The Hamiltones
Last summer Ry Cooder returned to festival stages with an astoundingly great band, The Hamiltones. The group has travelled the world, dazzling audiences from Africa to Australia. Prior to hooking up with Cooder, The Hamiltones had been joking around one day , and they put an old-school spin on a popular rap song. No one thought much of it at …
Valdy
Paul Valdemar Horsdal, CM (born 1 September 1945 in Ottawa, Ontario, commonly known as Valdy, is a Canadian folk and country musician whose solo career began in the early 1970s. He is known for “Rock and Roll Song”, his first mainstream single. Valdy is the winner of two Juno Awards for Folk Singer of the Year and Folk Entertainer of …
Mile Twelve
It is a commitment to the music, above all else, that fuels Mile Twelve’s continued march forward. The band was formed by five young musicians in Boston in the winter of 2014, each one looking for a vehicle that would take them straight to the heart of American roots music. Mile Twelve took their name from the road marker at …
Tal National
By the time Tal National reached international acclaim with 2013’s ‘Kaani’, the band’s first release outside of Niger, they had spent more than a decade crisscrossing their native country, usually on dirt pathways through the Sahara, playing epic five-hour sets, seven days a week, selling their CDs on street corners and roundabouts. In the process, they became Niger’s most popular …
Jack Semple
Semple grew up on a farm north of Regina, Saskatchewan. He started his musical career playing with various Regina-based bands, and later relocated to Toronto in the late 1980s to become the lead guitarist of The Lincolns, a popular funk and rhythm and blues band. He left the band after two years and returned to Regina to pursue a solo …
Tristan le Govic
Originally from Brittany, Tristan Govic was only six years old when he began learning the Celtic harp at the Conservatoire of Traditional Music of Soye (Plœmeur). The attraction to music will never leave him. During his studies he gained numerous prizes and nominations that emphasize the recognition of a talented and accomplished musician. Performing on international stages, critics pronounce him …
Jim Cuddy
For over 35 years, Jim Cuddy has written songs that have become indelible in the soundtrack of Canadian lives. With the release of his fourth solo album, Constellation, he adds ten songs to that extraordinary songbook. As one of the founding members and creative forces behind Blue Rodeo, Cuddy has received nearly every accolade Canada can bestow upon a musician, from …
IRISH MYTHEN
Irish Mythen was born in Ireland and now resides in Charlottetown Prince Edward Island Canada. “This Island creates music and musicians, art and artists. I found a shift to take things more seriously when I moved here.” And she did just that. Her latest release, the self titled Irish Mythen, gained her recognition around the globe with nominations and wins …
The Harpoonist & the Axe Murderer
There once was an era when records were made in castles, abandoned airplane hangars, barns, or on a yacht off the coast of the Bahamas, its passengers as high as paper kites. This is not that record! It is an album that came together from the desire for companionship, the endless pursuit of tone, the strength and glue of family, …