ECMA VICTORY
Brueggergosman, Cousins also repeat winners at Sunday ECMA ceremony
More hardware for Minglewood.
After a beautiful opening night concert on the Halifax waterfront, a splashy awards gala at Scotiabank Centre and four days of showcases and schmoozing, the 30th anniversary edition of the East Coast Music Awards wrapped up with its Music and Industry Awards celebration on Sunday night.
The ceremony held in the Halifax Marriott Harbourfront Hotel’s Nova Scotia Ballroom was to feature performances by Halifax-based P.E.I. natives Lennie Gallant and pop recording of the year winner Jenn Grant, Nova Scotia singer and ECMA veteran Heather Rankin and Newfoundland & Labrador’s sax-powered funk meisters Ouroboros.
Following the 13 awards handed out on Thursday night, the 12 music categories honoured on Sunday were fairly evenly split between male and female artists, most notably with singer-songwriter Rose Cousins turning her ECMA 2018 weekend into a hat trick, picking up a third award for her acclaimed Natural Conclusion, this time as folk recording of the year. On Thursday, the Grammy Awardnominated record also earned album of the year and song of the year for the ethereal track Grace, which Cousins also performed to close out that night’s ceremonies.
Also making a return trip to the podium was New Brunswickborn, Falmouth-based soprano Measha Brueggergosman, who also turned in an impassioned performance at Thursday night’s gala, where she was presented with the Bucky Adams Memorial Award. On Sunday, her collection of spirituals linked to the civil rights struggle, Songs of Freedom, was named gospel recording of the year.
“The work is ongoing, and my ambition is unquenched,” said Brueggergosman after her earlier win on Thursday. “I am inspired by Bucky and his legacy to go at the next 40 (years) just as hard. I’ll keep it close to home, though.
“I can only be as huge worldwide as I am at home, and in my heart, as I serve my children and my church and my community. It’s that kind of fervour; if we can be found faithful in the small things, the big things will gravitate towards us, I believe that wholeheartedly.”
Big things were also happening for 16-year-old country singer — and Rolling Stone artist to watch — Makayla Lynn, whose On a Dare and a Prayer was named country recording of the year, after previously winning the country category at the 2017 Music Nova Scotia Awards. Women in rock were also honoured as Wednesday night kickoff concert performer Mo Kenny won solo recording of the year for her expansive third album The Details, which she co-produced with longtime cohort Joel Plaskett, and Jessie Brown’s gutsy and
soulful Keeping Appearances was named rock recording of the year.
A pair of awards are also heading home across the Canso Causeway today as Cape Breton artists won ECMA trophies in the instrumental and roots/ traditional categories. Violinist Rosie MacKenzie’s Dingle, Ireland-recorded Atlantic was chosen in the former category, for its trans-oceanic collection of original compositions. In the latter category, Celtic supergroup Coig—fiddlers Rachel Davis and Chrissy Crowley, pianist Jason Roach and mainlander multiinstrumentalist Darren McMullen—saw its album Rove jig its way to the top of the class after also earning the quartet its first Juno Award nomination.
Another double winner of the weekend also hails from Cape Breton, the original East Coast blues rocker Matt Minglewood, whose Fly Like Desperados tied with New Brunswick songwriter Mike Biggar’s Go All In for blues recording of the year. On Thursday
night, Minglewood received a standing ovation in absentia at Scotiabank Centre when he was named the Fans’ Choice Entertainer of the Year. “He’s probably playing a gig in Fort McMurray as we speak,” quipped presenter Ashley MacIsaac as he accepted the fan-voted award on Minglewood’s behalf.
One of the best-known songs about Cape Breton, Allister MacGillivray’s Song for the Mira, was also honoured Sunday night as part of a new partnership between ECMA and the Canadian
Songwriters’ Hall of Fame. The famous ode to Marion Bridge and the pleasure it brings, sung at the awards by Rankin, is the first to be recognized in an annual ongoing celebration of the legacy of East Coast songwriters.
The late king of Cape Breton fiddlers, Winston (Scotty) Fitzgerald, also received his due with a previously announced Stompin’ Tom Award, which annually honours music pioneers from each Atlantic region. Halifax R&B/ hip-hop duo James McQuaid and Richard Gray, better known as 1990s EMI Music Canada artists MCJ & Cool G also received a Stompin’ Tom Award as one of the first major acts to bring attention to the Maritimes’ African Canadian music community.
On the cutting edge of things, Nova Scotia producer CR aymak picked up dance recording of the year for his collaboration with Thursday gala performers Neon Dreams, Play With Fire, while Pineo & Loeb’s Lifeblood was named electronic recording of the year. Moncton doom rock duo Zaum’s Eidolon was the 2018 ECMA choice for loud recording of the year, and trumpeter and St. F.X. University instructor Paul Tynan’s collaboration with California saxophonist Aaron Lington, Bicoastal Collective: Chapter 5 is this year’s jazz recording of the year.
Members of the music industry who keep the songs flowing by booking the gigs, running the soundboards, hosting the shows and promoting the projects were also recognized in the industry awards, with notable wins by the long-running Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival as event of the year, the performer-friendly Carleton Music Bar & Grill as venue of the year amidst its 10th anniversary celebration, and 2018 songwriter of the year winner Joel Plaskett’s New Scotland Yard as studio of the year.
Behind the board, Plaskett’s tech Steve (Snickers) Smith was named live sound engineer of the year, Jamie Foulds at Sydney’s Sound Park Studio earned engineer of the year, and Lake Echo’s Dan Ledwell is the 2018 producer of the year, for his work on records like his wife Jenn Grant’s Paradise, Gabrielle Papillon’s Keep the Fire and many others.
Honorary awards included an East Coast Music Association Directors’ Special Achievement Award for the late Cutting Crew co-founder and Robert Plant band member Kevin Macmichael, the Dr. Helen Creighton Lifetime Achievement Award for veteran music manager and publicist Lynn Horne, the Musicians’ Achievement Award for drummer/songwriter/artist Geoff Arsenault and the Industry Builder Award for Louis Thomas, whose Sonic Entertainment Group was also named manager of the year.
After this year’s 30th anniversary blow-out, it falls on Prince Edward Island to step up to the plate and host the next edition of the East Coast Music Awards, taking place in Charlottetown, May 1-5, 2019.