Well, the hurricanes swirling over the Atlantic and bringing heavy rains and high winds to our little Island is a signal of the changing seasons. One of the highlights of the summer was traveling to Saint John, New Brunswick, where my video piece “Music for the End of Airports” was installed at the Third Shift Festival. Thanks to all the organizers for all their hard work to put on a stellar weekend of art all over the city. And later this fall, I’m thrilled that my video piece “How the Ocean Dreamed Breakers” will get a similar public arts festival treatment at the Lumiere Festival in Sydney, Nova Scotia.

There’s plenty of musical performances on the horizon too! Atlantic String Machine kicks off our 2021-22 season on October 30 with a special Halloween show before hitting the road for a couple shows in Nova Scotia. Check out the EVENTS page for all the details…

“Music is liquid architecture; architecture is frozen music.” – Johann Goethe

Atlantic String Machine is half-way through our 20-21 season, which we’ve named The Harris Project. All the concerts this season explore the life and work of reknowned PEI architect William Critchlow Harris through music and sound. And I’m excited to share an excerpt of the premiere performance of my new work A Single Juniper Post, which we debuted in January. The piece is a meditation on resonant spaces and it addresses the way that Harris approached acoustics in his building design. If you’ve never been inside Charlottetown’s St. Paul’s Anglican, it may be hard to fully appreciate the acoustics of the space through video. But even if you have been there, you may not know that Harris designed this building like an instrument. Beneath the very place where we are standing is a resonant chamber, and the vibrations of the floor are transferred to the bottom of the box by a sound post, a single length of juniper wood.

And Atlantic String Machine kicked off our 20-21 season (The Harris Project — a series of four concerts celebrating the life and work of esteemed PEI architect William Critchlow Harris) recently with a pair of sold out concerts. Thanks to all the responsibly masked and distanced folks who came out to support the returning life of live music in our community. Keep your eyes posted to the Events page to find out what else is around the corner…

Sounds of spring: rubber boots sloshing through the mud, the buzzing of the first insects, goldfinches cracking seeds at the feeder, a patter of raindrops on the cold frame, the radio from an open car window, hedge clippers across the way.

Colours of spring: an ochre sludge in the drainage ditch, viridian new growth in the lawn, claret cedar shingles on the house down the hill, amarinthine blooms, cerulean sky.

I wasn’t able to travel to St. John’s, Newfoundland this spring to celebrate our East Coast Music Award nomination for Atlantic String Machine’s Bayfield Sessions, but I did get to chronicle my quarantined spring jaunts around Charlottetown through video and music. I hope that you enjoy the musical journey through my world, and I hope that everything is your world is safe and sound and colorful!

As the nights get shorter and the winter magic melts away, there’ll be some fun things on the horizon. A trip to Newfoundland for the ECMAs, a visit to the Confed Centre stage with Rose Cousins, and the premieres of a couple new exciting videos (that I can’t quite share the details of yet!). Keep your eye on the events page for all the dotted i’s and crossed t’s.

After days and weeks and months and years of hard work my new album, Water in the Draw, is finally launched. There are so many wonderful people who contributed to this thing, and I have so much gratitude for everyone involved. Andy Schichter mixed the heck out of my recordings and Philip Shaw Bova polished them up all nice in the mastering. Amy Leggin painted a stunning image of Brush Creek Ranch, where the album was recorded. And Bren Simmers made it look all fresh and clean with the design work. And a great big thanks to the Charlottetown community who came out celebrate with me at the Release Party.

Physical copies are going out into the world soon, and you’ll be able to pick up your very own copy of the disc at CDBaby when they arrive. You can, of course, stream the album on Spotify or any of the many other places to find musical bits and bytes on the interweb. Happy listening!

Well it’s that time of year when all the efforts of the last little while start to pay off. I’ve been hard at work on a new project for some time now, and I’m so excited to share the first track off my upcoming record, Water in the Draw. The video features footage from the 10,000 acre cattle ranch in southeastern Wyoming where the album was recorded. And the snowy scene really sets the stage for the sounds of shattering ice that I used as percussion throughout the track. The whole album will be released on November 15 through all physical and online platforms. And if you’re in PEI, we’ll be celebrating the release with a concert at the Beaconsfield Carriage House. I’ll be putting together a three-piece band for the event and am thrilled to have Chris Corrigan and Sid Acharya joining me on guitar and piano. Check out the EVENTS page for all the details.

It’s been a busy season all around. Plenty of dates with Atlantic String Machine, and that group has even released its own new album. Thanks to everyone who came out to the Mack Theatre in Charlottetown to help bring The Bayfield Sessions into the world. Now to get ready for the winter…

So the trees are starting to leaf out around here, and there are some sure signs that the living is gonna get pretty easy pretty soon. This particular season is going to be jam packed full of tour dates with Atlantic String Machine. We’ll be joining Rachel Beck at a handful of festivals and theatres throughout the Maritimes over the next couple months; and, we’ll be headed out on tour through Quebec and Ontario to visit Owen Sound’s Summerfolk festival towards the hottest part of the season. Check out the EVENTS page for all the details.

We also had the pleasure of celebrating all the great music being made in Atlantic Canada recently by joining Lennie Gallant at the Gala concert of the East Coast Music Awards. With all the talent in town for the event, we couldn’t help but get some great friends into the studio with us to make a few recordings, so be on the lookout for new news about that later in the year.

And in the meantime, keep the stereo cranked and the garden growing…