LOCAL MUSIC FEST GURU IN THE MAKING RELEASES LIVE RETROSPECTIVE ALBUM
When Ben Sures first came up to me around 20 years ago, he asked how to bust into the local scene.
“I still feel like an outsider,” he said with a laugh the other day — but listening to his latest CD, a live retrospective called Poema Poematis recorded at the Yardbird with a sharp jazz ensemble — it’s striking how many of its songs feel like a secret soundtrack of our region.
Onstage at North Country Fair decades back, Sures played In a Perfect World — a series of hilarious fantasy snapshots — and rolled out Used to Have a Raygun many times at venues from the Sidetrack to the airwaves of CKUA. Without getting too nostalgic, between his banter and the crisp recordings, it’s officially worth seeking out when he plays Beaumont Blues and Roots Festival on June 17 and on cdbaby. com thereafter.
Sures, who has been booking and looking after The Works street stage for the last five years, has a mandate for the music to “be diverse, to represent a cross-section of music and performance, multicultural, multigenre, collaborative … within my budget.
“I invite artists to do things out of their comfort zone or collaborate with others they normally would not have the opportunity to. I am not concerned with popularity, universal appeal or beer sales — the festival appreciates and relies on beer revenue, but it doesn’t dictate the stage.”
He’s especially excited to have booked NDP MLA David Shepherd at noon July 3 as one of this year’s musicians, and Sures goes into manifesto mode declaring some of the indie highlights.
“Give me Borscht — all body shapes and sizes in crazy-fununique outfits I have never seen before, having genuine original inspired chaotic fun and rocking it out in a way that comes from their core beings!
“Give me the Chubby Creek all women’s powwow hand drum group!
“Give me the Chinese flautist Jiajia Li cajoling the modern dancer into esoteric contortions!
“Give me Keri Lynn Zwicker playing harp music from Veracruz!
“Give me already weird acts doing something that is weird for them.”
“Basically, I try to bring as wide a cross-section as I can, within my means, that will not cause hearing damage to children or have them ask their parents what certain words were.”
Running June 21–July 3, The Works stage is at Capital Plaza on the legislature grounds this year, with live, free music every day. Look for the guides around town or check out the schedule at theworks.ab.ca.
The Lieutenant-governor of Alberta Arts Awards Foundation has announced its annual Emerging Artist Award winners, including three locals: theatre artist Emily Marisabel, writer Lizzie Derksen and composer Royden Tse.
Ten recipients from across the
I am not concerned with popularity, universal appeal or beer sales — the festival appreciates and relies on beer revenue, but it doesn’t dictate the stage.
province are awarded $10,000 apiece, selected from 147 applicants. Foundation chair Ken Regan noted: “We are so pleased to be able to invest in advancing the careers of these outstanding young artists who truly will make a difference across Alberta — and Canada.”
Back in 2016, Michael Maxxis brought in L.A.-based artist Cleon Peterson to Old Strathcona to create one of Edmonton’s greatest outdoor artworks, a monochromatic battle scene facing the Old Strathcona Farmers’ Market. As Maxxis notes, “I’ve been able to feel the impact that large-scale art and high-quality public art has on people. It’s inspiring.”
Local artist Jill Stanton, who appeared in this column last week, noted how excited she is that the Varscona Theatre mural she’s working on is so close to Peterson’s.
For the past few months, I’ve been helping Maxxis, co-owner of El Cortez, Have Mercy and The Holy Roller, with a new, large-scale mural project he’s commissioned.
On a six-storey wall just to the west of the Peterson mural, we imagined something to really complement that bold black-andwhite piece — something really colourful for all seasons — and narrowed it down to one of our favourite muralists on the planet, Madrid’s Okuda San Miguel.
“His work can been seen in the streets and galleries of some of the most progressive cities in the world,” says Maxxis.
The artist’s resume includes a skate park made out of a converted church in Llanera, Spain, and murals around the world.
Okuda never quite sticks to one look, but usually uses faceted shapes to build human and animal figures. His flat paintings often look three-dimensional.
To pay for the $40,000 artwork, Maxxis has launched a GoFundMe campaign, Imagine Okuda, which will reveal a “pixel” of the final design for every $50 donated.
“One hundred per cent of the money we raise over the next few weeks will be contributed to public art in Edmonton,” he says.
The first fundraiser event at Holy Roller is the Imagine Okuda 6 Chef Dinner on June 27, a sixstage dinner inspired by global cuisine, with each course cooked by a different local chef. The chefs are Rafael D’Alcazar from Holy Roller, Shane Chartrand from -SC- at River Cree, Lindsay Porter from London Local, Jason Barton Brownie from Hayloft, Eric Hanson from Prairie Noodle House, and Chef Medi from Buco.
Incidentally, anything over that amount raised goes to the brilliant initiative that has literally changed the look of Edmonton over the past two years — Rust Magic International Street Mural Festival — which is indeed a go this year, for the record.