Featured Articles

2018 Spring & Summer Festival Preview     The usual anticipation for nice weather has been feeling like more like desperation—a longing for warmth, good vibes, and the freedom to explore everything under the sun.   I am planning to fill my[...] Read more

Featured Article

Qikiqtaaluk, Nunavut Mount Thor   Sometimes the Arctic sun never goes down, never rises. Today though, in the middle of the Akshayuk Pass, I wake up just before the sunrays reach the thin layer of ice on my tent. It is early, dark, and cold. The wind is tirelessly beating against everything that[...] Read more

Sound Notes Bea Labikova Issue 135

Backward Music What function do record labels fulfill in an era of streaming and algorithmic music discovery? What do labels offer artists and listeners when the means of music access and distribution are changing at a rapid clip?   Kyle Cunjak, who is a musician and the owner-operator of[...] Read more

Label Profile Brennan McCracken Issue 141

HEAT UP YOUR SUMMER WITH SIZZLING SONICS! Check out the 2023 Musicworks Festival Preview Our annual guide to late Spring and Summer festivals and sonic events is a snapshot of musical adventures set to unfold in Canadian intersections, fields, and venues. Check out the 2023 Musicworks Festival Preview!   PAID ADVERTISEMENTS[...] Read more

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Adam Basanta “I’ve always been interested in perception and apperception,” writes Montreal-based composer Adam Basanta in a recent e-mail correspondence. “This has led me, as a musician and composer, to centre my work on listening as a perceptual and psychological experience.[...] Read more

Sound Bite Nick Storring Issue 111

Carmen Braden Raises the Volume on the Subarctic “I'M JUST GOING TO TOUCH IT ON THE TOP," SAYS CARMEN BRADEN, LOOKING AT A BLACKENED PORCUPINE-LIKE LUMP OF ICE. "WHAT I THINK WILL HAPPEN: IT'S JUST GOING TO FALL APART. READY?"   It’s May 2014, and she’s talking to a camera. Her now-[...] Read more

Profile Samia Madwar Issue 126

A Few More Words About Times Square Max Neuhaus’ permanent sound installation, Times Square (1977–1992; 2002–present), has become a place that I visit every time I find myself in New York City. There is something about revisiting it, spending some time standing on the pedestrian traffic island between Forty-[...] Read more

Sonic Geography Sean Peuquet Issue 114

What's Inside Musicworks 148?   ON THE COVER                Stefana Fratila is a Toronto-based, Romania-born composer and sound designer whose work in sound and love of sci-fi led her to wonder: “If each planet in our solar system were a different room, what[...] Read more

Featured Article STAFF Issue 148

Saw-whet Records: Prairie Experimentalists Unite For Saw-whet Records’ Ethan Bokma, putting an album together means exactly that: a new release requires not only great music and a cover design, but also blank, unassembled album jackets, glue, spray paint, and several types of adhesive tape. A prominent bass clarinetist on the Edmonton[...] Read more

Sound Notes Ian Crutchley Issue 136

Casa Da Música Builds A Home For Experimental Music FULL-TEXT AVAILABLE IN PRINT EDITION ONLY   1497. Lisbon, Portugal. Navigator Vasco da Gama commands the first ship to sail from Europe to India. During the fifteenth century Portugal’s navigators are at the cutting edge of innovation and world discovery, their travel[...] Read more

Profile Richard Simas Issue 110

Giorgio Magnanensi in the Sonic Playground Admirers of Giorgio Magnanensi—composer, conductor, teacher, and the artistic director of Vancouver New Music Society—tend to be lavish in their praise of him. “Giorgio is singularly the best conductor of modern music, period,” says composer and Capilano University[...] Read more

Featured Article Nancy Lanthier Issue 117

Bekah Simms’ Skinscape and Elliott Lupp’s Hinge Bekah Simms’ Skinscape received an honourable mention from the jury of Musicworks’ 2018 Electronic Music Composition Contest.   Skinscape is a work for flute and fixed media inspired by the transformation of something intimately familiar into something processed[...] Read more

Featured Article STAFF