SMART MUSIC FROM HANNAH EPPERSON
5 things to know about vocalist/violinist’s new album
Hannah Epperson recently played the local release of her new album Slowdown at the New York Theatre on Commercial Drive. It was a triumphant return for this unique solo artist who called Vancouver home before pulling up stakes and establishing herself in New York City’s fertile art scene.
One of three finalists in the 2013 Peak Performance Project, along with BESTiE and Rykka, Epperson took second place for her distinctive mixing of voice, violin and assorted electronic effects such as the liberal use of looping pedals. At the time, her music was somewhat more pop oriented than what is heard on her latest 10 tune release.
The Salt Lake City-born musician has performed as a member of the Four on the Floor String Quartet, with assorted dance and theatre groups around Canada and the U.S. and assorted European tours. As if her artistic output weren’t enough, Epperson has represented Canada at the Ultimate Frisbee World Championships in 2015 and 2017.
Here are five things flying at the listener from Slowdown:
1. Appalachian folk: The opening voice and fiddle verse of 20/20, the first song on the album, will immediately expose a love of folk and bluegrass idioms that underpins a lot of her writing. Sure, at the 90 second point on the song, massive electronic beats crank up and her multitracked vocals start veering off into space as she bows intensely. But the backwoods old time influence is unmistakable.
2. Amelia/Iris: There are two distinct personalities on Slowdown and each gets their version of five songs each. With the exception of a slight variation on Tell the Kids (Amelia) and Tell the Kids It’s Gonna Be Alright (Iris), all the song titles mesh up in such an order that you could listen beginning to end and back again and keep the same order. Not quite a palindromic arrangement, but clearly intended to invoke select moods. Both of the characters are cinematic in their expression.
3. Movies: It’s no surprise that Epperson has scored a few art film soundtracks. Like Agnes Obel, her songs are filled with space and time that bonds with moving images so well. This is music made for the silver screen, or backing some dark and freaky Netflix psycho-spiritual thriller.
4. 40 Numbers (Amelia): As mentioned before, Epperson likes to work with dancers and you can see the results of her collaborations in the video for this song. Shot on a rooftop, a pair of modern dancers perform a duet that flows along with the song in one of those spot-on pairings that enhance both the sound and the vision. Nice.
5. Glad, not sad: On her blog, Epperson discusses the “miraculousness of being alive” as well as grief, misery, fear and anxiety in life and living. But it would be a mistake to see her art as melancholy or down. That generalization is too often assigned to female artists who make thoughtful and intelligent music that doesn’t cling to the totally tired male ideals of what women should write about. Perhaps it’s a generational thing, as Epperson herself notes in Tell the Kids It’s Gonna Be Alright (Iris) “the kids these days are smarter than you’ll ever give them credit for.” Point made.