Friday, January 30, 2009

February 2009 Newsletter

January was unquestionably the busiest month that Somewhere There has seen. This fact is attributable not only to the increase to six active nights each week, but also to the surprisingly large crowds we’ve had this past month (in relative terms, of course). CoexisDance, which has been presented at Somewhere There bi-monthly for about a year, drew a record audience, for instance, and Christine Duncan’s Element Choir drew record numbers of performers during the choir’s Sunday residency with choir size at close to forty nearly every week.

February will be busy as well, with the key event being AIMToronto’s Interface Series with British saxophonist, Evan Parker, on 13, 14, and 15 February (bring your Valentine!) Nilan Perera has done curator work on this one, and has placed Parker in six thematically related groups of Toronto players that will challenge and provoke him. Simply put, it’s a great honour to have Evan at Somewhere There.

The Wednesday-night residency by Odradek continues until the end of February, and has already featured two CD release concerts. Andy Yue, Jim Bailey, and Michelangelo Iaffaldano have put together some fine programs that go from strength to strength (and, sometimes, from strange to strange), a trend that will no doubt continue this month. The Element Choir also continues their Sunday-evening romps, and I have to say that it would be a real shame if listeners miss the astonishing sound of forty voices in Somewhere There’s intimate confines!

Thursday nights in February and March feature the wonderful drummer and all-around charmer, Nick Fraser. Originally, Nick had hoped that Drumheller, the wonderful jazz quintet that he convenes, would be on hand every week but he has since intimated that schedules are making that plan next to impossible to execute. As I’m writing, I don’t know exactly what’s on tap, but hope that at least some of Nick’s Thursdays will feature the full band (with Eric Chenaux, Rob Clutton, Doug Tielli, and Brodie West).

Click here to see the entire month's programming.

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