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Le Vent du Nord concert sneak peek

March 2, 2012 in Music | Permalink

The full extended play by play concert blog post is on the way, O Internets, but until I get back to my computer and can write it up properly (with pics because OH MY YES userinfosolarbird got some), let me share with you some prominent highlights!

  1. Dara being stunned to be able to use the phrase “bitchin’ metal hurdy-gurdy solo”
  2. Serious La Danse Verticale once the second set started and the show’s host and the band themselves started encouraging people to come up and dance
  3. Dancing with my girl, and singing along, while Simon Beaudry sang “Écris-moi”!
  4. I had a Cunning Plan come to fruition when the band came back out for the encore, and sang “Vive l’amour” for me and Dara and userinfomaellenkleth and userinfosiestabear! And Dara was all “what did you do?!” and I chirped “Surprise!” and then OMG champagne showed up, because fellow Le Vent fan Susan is made ENTIRELY OF AWESOME.
  5. And because M. Olivier Demers is also made entirely of awesome from his mighty fiddling hands down to his stompy, stompy feet, I made a point of going over to thank him to his face for the band’s participation in the aforementioned Cunning Plan! And he gave me and Dara and maellenkleth all hugs and the very French air kiss to each cheek!

Stand by for the full report in technicolor glory on Sunday!

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Album review: N2, by Norouet

February 10, 2012 in Music | Permalink

Here’s something I’ve come to learn in my explorations of current Quebecois trad bands: Éric Beaudry is apparently in half of them, or at least so it seems! And given my rapidly growing respect for Monsieur Beaudry’s musical prowess, this is as far as I’m concerned all to the awesome.

I’ve found references to him being in four bands to date. La Bottine Souriante and De Temps Antan I’ve already found and fallen in love with, but M. Beaudry is also involved with the bands Norouet and Ni Sarpe Ni Branche. Those two groups aren’t as high profile as La Bottine and De Temps Antan, so their music is harder for us in the States to find–but happily, Norouet’s album N2 is on iTunes and CD Baby.

“Norouet”, or so the Googles inform me, is slang for a northwesterly gale. It’s an excellent word, very much capturing the energy of the band while falling delicately upon the ear. This seeming contradiction of a gale and delicacy captures my overall impression of N2 as an album, as well.

N2 slants heavily instrumental, with over half the tracks being entirely without vocals. This is not a bad thing, though initially I found it a bit odd that their overall (instrumental, at least) sound reminds me a lot more of Solas or Altan from Celtic/Irish music than other Quebecois bands that boast M. Beaudry among their members. The distinct lack of footwork on several of the tracks throws me off, since I’ve trained my ear to listen for that now!

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Let me sing for you the songs of my people

February 10, 2012 in Music | 4 comments

I’ve mentioned before that something I ardently respond to in both Quebecois and Newfoundland trad music is how many of the bands and singers I’m following have learned their music from their parents, who learned it from their parents, etc. I.e., they grew up with this music, and it was woven into their lives so deeply that it made them who they are. Their love for it shines through brilliantly in their performances.

Devon Léger quite correctly pointed out to me that Americans are not without such traditions–you just need to know where to look for them. Certainly many American Celtic or folk or country performers are fortunate enough to have that same sort of background, too, and classical performers as well. Those of us in the science fiction folk music community, filk, have some small rumblings of this too. Filk hasn’t really quite been around long enough to have songs handed down from one generation to the next, but I have met people who are doing it, and it’s really cool of them. (I am thinking specifically of you, userinfomdlbear!)

In the bigger picture of American society, though, people getting together and making music just for the joy of making music is not so much of a thing. This is why I’m so very delighted to have discovered both Irish and Quebecois sessions, and it’s why I linger on the edges of filk circles as well; it’s all part of the same idea.

I had a delightful little epiphany last night, too: all that Elvis Presley music my dad played for me on the stereo when I was a kid is absolutely generational handing down of music. And I’ve actually done it too–playing Great Big Sea songs for userinfokathrynt and userinfollachglin‘s kid Lillian!

So the next time you hear me say “Let me sing for you the song of my people”, I’ll be about to belt out “Hound Dog”. Or “Ordinary Day”. Or maybe now also “Dans le ville de Paris”, or “Re: Your Brains”.

Because no matter where you’re from, Quebec or Newfoundland or Kentucky or any filk circle in any science fiction convention in the world, if you love music, and you get up and you share it with those around you, you are my people. And I will sing your songs.

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My first Quebecois session: Incroyable!

February 8, 2012 in Music | 4 comments

Tonight, O Internets, I participated in my very first “Chanson et langue” group and Quebecois session at the home of La Famille Léger. And I am here to tell you that that was unmitigated, 100%, home-grown organic AWESOME!

(This post is long, so clickie on the cut link for the evening’s adventures!) (And I need, NEED I TELL YOU, a suitable podorythmie icon now for Quebecois music posts, at least the mirrored ones y’all on Dreamwidth and LJ are seeing. It needs to say My Fandom Wears the Smiling Boots on it. I need this icon like the BURNING OF A THOUSAND FIERY SUNS! Until I have it, I will have to make do with hugely grinning Elvis!)

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Language epiphanies ROCK

February 7, 2012 in Music | Permalink

Here’s one of the biggest reasons I have fallen so passionately in love with Quebecois music: part of me has latched onto it with an unconscious reaction of holy crap! There’s a whole extra LANGUAGE over here for music to be awesome in!

Which is really pretty silly of me, given that I already had some decent representation of non-English-speaking music in my collection–not only my early wave of Quebec trad with La Bottine’s Rock and Reel, but also Angelique Kidjo, Habib Koite, and the huge pile of Celtic music I’ve got that’s sung in both Irish and Scots Gaelic. Spanish shows up periodically in my playlists as well; a couple of the tracks by the Paperboys are sung in that. Norwegian is represented by Morten Harket, and although it hasn’t made it into iTunes yet because I haven’t bought an electronic copy of the album, German is represented by Falco (yes, folks, I do in fact have at least a cassette copy of the album that brought the world “Rock Me Amadeus”) and by the German translations of the Beatles songs “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “She Loves You”. Even Elvis has a couple of non-English or partly non-English songs, with “Santa Lucia” in Italian and the German bridge of “Wooden Heart”.

And all of this, mind you, is music I’ve loved quite well over the years. But something about Quebecois trad–and the music being sung in French–has excited me in a way that other non-Anglophone music hasn’t managed to do yet.

It may simply be the joie de vivre of the music in general, since as you know, O Internets, I respond very ardently to the entire Quebecois trad genre. Podorythmie as a physical expression of music, and the language-transcending, machine-gun fire of a turlutte, seize me in a way that very little other music in my collection does–and yes, this includes even my beloved B’ys and Elvis, an assertion that I do not make lightly.

But part of it is, I think, also just the sheer awesomeness of words. Which, yeah yeah yeah, I’m a writer, words are what we do. I’ve always liked tinkering around with other languages, though, and when I couple this with music that appeals to me so greatly, suddenly French becomes much, much more relevant to my interests! (And man, if I’d known about this music when I was taking French in college, I think I’d have done a lot better on that course!)

I have been thrilled to find and join a mailing list for fans of Quebecois music in the Pacific Northwest to indulge these interests. And starting tomorrow night, in fact, I’ll be participating in a newly forming group to learn French specifically by learning Quebecois songs. Much to my massive delight, the first song we’re going to be working with is “C’est une jeune mariée” by Le Vent du Nord!

This is going to be fun. :D

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Great Big Sea vs. Le Vent du Nord: FIGHT!

December 10, 2011 in Music | Permalink

Ladies and gentlemen, I gotta tell you, the fight for my playlist loyalties these past few months has been tremendous. I never thought that I would encounter any kind of music that could yank my attention for more than a few days running off of Great Big Sea–but apparently the entire genre of Quebecois traditional music, spearheaded by Le Vent du Nord but with generous help from Les Charbonniers de l’Enfer, De Temps Antan, and La Bottine Souriante, is giving my beloved B’ys a massive, massive run for their money.

In many ways, Le Vent have kind of become my Quebecois Great Big Sea. There are four of them, and certainly with the exception of the hurdy gurdy of M. Boulerice and the flying feet of M. Demers, the instrument lineup is very similar–fiddle, accordion, guitar, and bouzouki. (And as I think we’ve established at this point, I am extremely partial to pretty bouzouki players!) Vocal-wise, there are very, very few things on this planet that can make me swoon like the voices of The Doyle and The McCann, but the boys of Le Vent are coming close. Tight harmony will get me every time, especially on shanties–and Le Vent have got a couple in their arsenal that are laying down strong returning fire against “General Taylor” and “River Driver”.

But here’s the real challenge. How are they LIVE?

I have had it strongly suggested to me that Le Vent, in fact, gives better show than Great Big Sea. That, my friends, is a STRONG CLAIM INDEED. As any of you out there who have read my copious collection of GBS show writeups knows, I have a long, honorable, and passionate history of fangirling the hell out of Great Big Sea concerts. So Le Vent du Nord? They have an EXTREMELY HIGH BAR TO TOP.

March 1, 2012, O Internets, is the day I get to find out if they can do it.

I have secured for myself and userinfosolarbird tickets to our very first Le Vent du Nord concert, up in Vancouver BC. The venue is here, a community center, which suggests strongly to me that this is actually going to be a tinier show than I’ve been used to for a while ever since GBS started playing the Moore here in Seattle. I’m ALL FOR THAT. A great deal will depend, however, on the crowd! Don’t get me wrong, when I go to a GBS show the attraction is of course the B’ys, but a huge part of the fun is also the passionate response of the crowd. GBS fandom’s battle cry isn’t VERTICAL MOVEMENT! for nothing, after all.

Now, if this were a show in Montreal, I would absolutely expect a Le Vent crowd to go nuts–e.g., like the crowd in this video, going delightfully berserk for “Cre-mardi”! The critical question will be whether a Vancouver crowd will get similarly excited, and whether this will be a sit-in-chairs show, or a General Admission show.

So it is ON. Le Vent du Nord, your challenge is laid. You have the tools. You have the talent. But do you have the thermonuclear stage charisma that can magnetically pull me to my feet, get me clapping and stomping, and singing at the top of my lungs despite the fact that you’re singing in a language I don’t even speak? Because if you can pull that off, messieurs, I will happily make my concert battle cry bilingual, and will be crying “La danse verticale!”

Can you do it? I look very, very forward to finding out!

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Tune work tonight

December 2, 2011 in Music | Permalink

With two brand new flutes to break in, I’ve found myself wanting to practice as well as write for the last couple of nights, and so tonight I’m doing active tune work. This means trying out all previously learned tunes on both the new instruments, as well as seeing which of the next ones work better on which instrument.

Here are an assortment of things I have thus learned.

One, there is a certain pure, clear tone that a properly played piccolo can make. I’m NOT good enough to do it consistently, but I can get there. It requires not only a good embouchure, but also that you make sure and drink enough water, which is a problem in our fairly dry, cold house! I’m learning from Chirp, though, that if I play Chirp correctly, I can in fact approach a piccolo-like tone on it. Which is pretty impressive given that Chirp is made of applewood.

Two, I like the Lisdoonvarna/Swallow Tail Jig/Morrison’s set better on Chirp than I do on the new big flute. But I like Blarney Pilgrim better on the big flute, and will probably also like Da Slockit Light and Si Bheag Si Mhor better on that one as well.

Three, I am more nimble on Chirp, unsurprisingly, since Chirp is piccolo-sized. Even though the big flute is intended for “small hands”, it’s still a bigger instrument than I’ve been used to playing for a while, and it’ll take me a bit to work back up into it. I cannot yet achieve that purity of tone I was talking about above on the big flute, not yet, not while I’m trying to also play quickly.

Four, I’m playing with Apples in Winter and Cliffs of Moher tonight, and am learning from both of these tunes that I’m trying to punch their primary beats too hard. They both want to flow better than I’m letting them do. I need to work on that. I can pick out both tunes fairly easily on the sheet music, but that’s not the same thing. Reading off the sheet music is for purposes of just learning the tunes. Finding their music, i.e., making them actually sound good, is another question entirely. I’m still working on a lot of that with all of these tunes I’m trying to learn.

Fifth, I’m also playing with Jig of Slurs, in no small part due to my interest in the “Fortierville” set on La Volée d’Castors’ so very awesome live album–and while I’m starting to get Jig of Slurs down at least as a tune, again, it’s going to be a bit before I can whip through this thing as music. Especially if I want to play along with the La Volée recording. Which I DO. Relatedly, I have also observed that at least based on comparison to that recording, I’ve been playing Chirp kind of flat.

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The naming of instruments is a Serious Matter

December 1, 2011 in Music | Permalink

My new applewood fife and mopane flute have now been officially broken in at session, to the satisfaction of all parties involved. Those who attended session along with userinfosolarbird and me last night (which would be userinfosutures1, Matt, and Marilyn) expressed their approval in particular over the voice on the flute, which was very nice indeed in the pub. :D

I learned pretty quickly though that I’m not quite up to speed with my known tunes on these instruments yet. This is in no small part due to the fingerings on keyless flutes. The fife and flute both are in D, which means that the good part is, the fingerings are therefore very close to my piccolo. All fingers down means D on these instruments and on Shine alike, for example.

The bad part is, however, that the fingerings are not exactly like the fingerings on the piccolo! Shine being a concert C instrument (kicked up an octave) of course means that it’s oriented around the C scale, NOT around the D scale. So one finger down on Shine means C, not C#. I therefore will have to get the cross-fingerings for accidentals into my muscle memory on the fife and the flute in order to make these tunes work properly. Relatedly, I’ve also discovered that “Da Slockit Light” requires a G# and THAT in particular is going to be amusing to finger on these instruments.

Likewise I have learned that while the new instruments are going to be in regular session rotation, this does NOT mean Shine gets to stay home. I discovered VERY fast that if I’m trying to follow the others by finding sheet music for tunes in TunePal, I will be much, much more able to play on Shine than on either of the new guys. This is very clearly because when I see sheet music, my visual association with those notes is still solidly attached to the fingerings on keyed flutes. So next time, Shine comes to session along with the new ones.

On a much easier note though I have also discovered that the “Road to Lisdoonvarna / Swallow Tail Jig / Morrison’s” set we’ve been doing is surprisingly easier to play on the fife than it is on the piccolo. No half-holing is required for any of these tunes, and I seem to actually have an easier time playing Chirp, the fife, than I do Shine! The required embouchure is not as intense.

Which of course leads me to report that the fife is well and officially Chirp, now. The jury is still out on what to call the mopane flute, though. Ellen has opined (and I am inclined to agree) that this instrument should be named something Irish, since I am after all intending to use it primarily for Irish music, even if it’s made out of African mopane! She has proposed ‘Selkie’, which I must consider with due consideration–since this flute’s got a deep, rich voice and a deep golden brown color, both of which I could see being evocative of a selkie. I need to commune with the flute some more though and see if it agrees with me on this important matter.

Dara and I were discussing instrument names last night, too, and I shot down naming the flute either Herp OR Derp, pointing out that if any instruments in the world would be named those, they would clearly be kazoos. Dara now wants kazoos for the express purpose of naming them Herp and Derp.

And for that matter, I further opined that an accordion is too complex an instrument to be named Herp or Derp. To which Dara immediately replied that an accordion is NOT too complex to be named PAMCAKES!

I think her squeezebox has a name now.

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La Bottine Souriante album review!

November 22, 2011 in Music | 2 comments

I’ve been anticipating the new album by La Bottine Souriante for weeks now, and WOO! It’s finally out! The album’s called Appellation D’Origine Contrôlée, and I yoinked that thing right down from iTunes as soon as I saw it go up.

For my first exposure to the band’s current lineup, it performed splendidly. I had an undeniable initial “buh?” reaction to several of the tracks–because I have of course imprinted on a lot of the earlier La Bottine albums as my example of what they should sound like, and that’s not entirely fair to the newer members. Yes, vintage La Bottine is a POWERHOUSE OF AWESOME, and those are mighty large (smiling, aheh) boots to fill. I’m now quite prepared to state that the newer members are also awesome, but you have to go in with an open mind and open ear. Since there are so many new people in the lineup, the overall flavor and chemistry of the band is not the same, and so it’s necessary to judge the current lineup on their own merits and less on how much they sound like all the people that came before them (though I’m not discounting that, either).

On the whole I do quite like this album. After the first listen, I was a bit dubious. But after two more, I found it growing on me considerably. Granted, I was predisposed to like it anyway just because Éric Beaudry sings many of the songs–but on the other hand, his presence in the vocals was actually also kind of confusing to my ear! I’ve gotten used to hearing him as part of De Temps Antan as well as on his album with his brother Simon, so hearing him in this context is something I’m not quite used to yet.

There are two other gentlemen singing lead on the album as well, for whom I do not yet have names, and both of them did a fine job. The presence of so many backup singers makes for nice round vocals on many of the tracks.

Instrumentally, overall, the horns are sometimes more subdued than I might like–but again, a good chunk of that is coming out of my exposure to vintage La Bottine. When I cut back on that reaction and judge the blend of the horns with the rest of the instruments they’re playing with, I feel much better about them.

And now, track by track reactions!

Cette Bouteille-Là – I really like this one, which was the first of the free tracks the band was offering for download just before the album came out. This has an excellent blend of all the instruments and voices, and some jaunty energy to it. This is a great track for showing how the current membership of the band are inheriting from the older members.

Mon Père – Ah and here we have Éric Beaudry’s first lead song on the album! This has strong vocals in general, not only M. Beaudry’s, but also all the backup vocals. Some great deep vocals in the background, and all of the voices are set off nicely against the percussion. I particularly groove on M. Beaudry hitting his high notes in the background on the very last few bars of the song.

Reel à Roland – This is an instrumental, and starts off sounding fairly standard until the horns start coming in on the second iteration of the A part. Once the horns and piano build up, you start thinking, okay yeah, this is La Bottine Souriante.

Le Gourmand – Back to M. Beaudry on the lead vocals, which is always a good thing, though this is one of the songs on the album that kept making me think “wait wait this isn’t a De Temps Antan song”? Mais non, because there are horns here, and a lot more backup vocals! Also, M. Beaudry is rather more expressive on his vocals here than I’ve heard him be with De Temps Antan so far, possibly because he’s doing more lead singing here.

Chus Chatouilleux – Good strong punch from the horns to start this one up. I don’t know who’s singing here since I don’t know all of the current lineup of the band yet, but the singing’s good. It’s a bit weird for me though since whoever’s doing this singing has an accent similar to the lead singer over in Mes Aieux, so I’m once again having to remind myself that this is in fact a La Bottine Souriante album. When in doubt, listen for the horns.

André Alain en sol majeur – Another instrumental. It sounds like there’s a keyboard in here, which is another thing I’m not used to yet with the current La Bottine lineup. There’s a bridge in the middle with a keyboard solo, which gives this piece an almost jazzy feel. I find myself wishing that the horns were doing more than just backing up the keyboard, though; I really want to hear some trumpet love on the melody line.

Au Rang D’aimer – Back to Éric! A more plaintive ditty, this one, but nice full vocals.

Intsusadi – This is a good one! I don’t know what’s doing the main percussive line here–a steel drum? It’s a new sound for me in my La Bottine experience, regardless, and it makes this one the most interesting instrumental on the album for me.

Reel Calgary – While the previous was perhaps the most interesting instrumental, this one is nonetheless very appealing to me. Nice fiddle and footwork. As with track 3, the horns are pretty subdued–more than I might perhaps like. But on the other hand, they’re coming in at a good balance with the rest of the instruments and the overall somewhat wistful flavor of the piece.

On Va Barrer Les Portes – The other La Bottine singer I don’t know yet, but this is the same gent who sings lead on track 1. This song’s primarily vocal call-and-response, with just piano and footwork on the verses, until the horns and fiddle come in on a nice jaunty bridge. That bridge? That’s what I listen to La Bottine Souriante FOR.

Pèle-Mèle – One more Éric song! Good big fat bridge from the horns and keyboard.

Le Baillard – The album’s final track is one more instrumental, and a good long, strong one as well, layering in all the various instruments and letting them build power at a good pace. By the time you’re three minutes into the track, oh yeah, there’s excellent muscle to the horns here. And about halfway through, an excellent stomping bit! This one reassures me that while I may miss the powerhouse of awesome that was vintage La Bottine, modern La Bottine can bring it too.

Long story short, if you’re into Quebecois music or think you might want to be, yes, you should buy this album. I was delighted to see it go live on iTunes AND on the Amazon MP3 downloads store for purchase, which means it’s readily available to US customers. Their record label also has it available for purchase right over here!

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Meet my new flutes!

November 20, 2011 in Music | 2 comments

Dara and I went out on a quest today: to see about getting me my first proper Irish flute!

This was actually a two-stop operation, as it turned out. Our first stop was to visit a guy named Tom in Greenlake who had some flutes for sale, to check them out and see whether they would be appropriate for me. The flutes he’s selling are Skip Healy flutes, and while they sounded lovely, it turned out that the hole placement on them was difficult for my fingers. Dara and I did have a lovely conversation about flutes and about music in general with Tom, though, and he was approving of me wanting to try different flutes before I committed to one.

Also, he had a lovely friendly black cat named Midnight, who after giving me the obligatory kitty inspection, parked right in my lap right before I was trying to take my leave. Apparently my lap? CAT MAGNET. And if anybody in the Seattle environs is in the market for a Skip Healy flute, I’ll be happy to point you in Tom’s direction.

After that, though, we went to plan B, which of course meant going to Dusty Strings. My original intent was to simply walk in and try a few flutes, just to see if any of them liked me; I wasn’t really actively expecting to find one I really liked. But then we got there and I announced what I was looking for to the nice older gentleman at the counter, and he showed me a few of the Casey Burns Folk Flutes. These were all well within my budget, and it turned out that the one made out of Mopane had a really strong voice on him. I also tried one in Boxwood, but wasn’t nearly as impressed with the sound quality of that one. Neither was Dara–and since I had her along for a second opinion, the choice was clear!

Since Dara and I can’t get out of Dusty Strings without the obligatory WOO KIDS IN CANDY MUSIC STORE run through everything, Dara played with the bouzoukis while I went and got a copy of the Mel Bay Essential Guide to Irish Flute and Tin Whistle, which I’ve been hearing is awesome from multiple directions. I also grabbed a CD by Capercaillie that was on my To Get list, as well as an assortment of various interesting picks (you can never have too many interesting picks), and last but not least, a cute little Renaissance Fife made by Ralph Sweet. The fife’s in applewood, which won out over a couple others for best clarity of tone. And even though this little guy’s really more of a toy, he’s a lot closer in size to my piccolo and therefore quite comfortable to my hands.

The big flute came with a nifty padded cloth case, but the fife didn’t come with anything, and so Dara very kindly agreed to whip together a small padded sleeve for me! She’s got a sewing machine and plenty of material, so it turned out to be very easy.

And now I give you PICS. The fife is shown next to the sleeve Dara made, as well as next to the big flute for scale. Both of these instruments are in D, and I’ve already started trying to work through the various tunes I’ve already practiced, just to figure out where all the fingerings are and to get familiar with their individual voices. Sooner or later, too, these guys will have NAMES.

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