ON THE COVER: SIMONE SCHMIDT
Simone Schmidt is a visionary artist who consistently finds new possibilities for the country song form. In the Toronto psychedelic country bands One Hundred Dollars and The Highest Order and as Fiver, Schmidt has created some of the most original and vibrant music of the last decade. More recently, in radical projects that combine intensive historical research and compositional processes, they have boldly reconfigured the possibilities of left-wing musicmaking, crafting a breathtakingly effective response to the history of carceral politics and the Canadian settler colonial state. Schmidt talks to writer Kurt Newman about these projects and the arc of their musical trajectory.
 
Levy Lorenzo
Romania-born, New York-based Filipino American percussionist Levy Lorenzo wears many hats as a percussionist, electronic arts consultant, and instrument builder. Embodying presence and sense of life with electronics, his instruments maximize the “algorithms” humans are already programmed to be as performers. Writer Juro Kim Feliz attended Lorenzo’s debut solo performance with the New York Philharmonic in October 2022, where a minor disturbance by an audience member sparked a conversation about how technology pursuits speak on issues of accessibility. Lorenzo discusses his instrument building practice, his performance practice in using them, and reflections on accessibility with electronics, tying aspects of his artistic practice to his personal narrative as an immigrant.
 
Nicole Mitchell & Coco Elysses
In an afterword to their standing-room-only performance at the 2023 edition of Women From Space, a four-day festival that celebrates and creates space for women’s innovation over the International Women’s Day weekend, internationally renowned creative music trailblazers Nicole Mitchell and Coco Elysses speak with writer Patrick O’Reilly, who interweaves their conversation with background on the pair, moments from the concert, and WFS co-founder Bea Labikova’s reflections on the initial sparks that eventually culminated in this first ever duo performance from the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) leaders at Toronto’s 918 Bathurst.
 
Wayne Lavallee
Wayne Lavallee has taken an adventurous creative path to reach his latest milestone: writing music for filmmaker Marie Clements’ Bones of Crows, one of the largest Indigenous-led production in Canadian screen history.
 
Meet Leah Reid, the first-place winner of the 2022 Musicworks Electronic Music Composition Contest.
 
Adam Kinner pens a poetic eulogy to Montreal's Café Resonance.
 
Lina Choi explores fluid sound spaces, and electronic-folk duo You Can Can discovers tonal possibilities.
 
Kranky founder Bruce Adams talks up Chicago's 1990s music scene in a new book.
 
We check out the film adaptation of opera / dance Sweat at its premiere at the Kingston Canadian Film Festival, and the debut of Sarah Jerrom’s multimedia jazz work Magpie in Toronto. 
 
 
On the CD: 10 tracks of new and recently released music from artists featured in the Summer 2023 issue, including a dazzling excerpt from the world premiere duo performance of Mitchell and Elysses!
 
MUSICWORKS 145 CD 
 
Leah Reid
1> Reverie 10:30
 
Lina Choi
2> Water and Dreams 6:23
 
Levy Lorenzo
3> Modified 4:38
4> The Stone Cauldron 4:08
 
You Can Can
5>  Everything in Time 8:13
 
Wayne Lavallee
6> I Hold My Hands Up To You 4:08
 
 Simone Schmidt
7> Yeah But Uhh Hey! 5:56
8> Sacco & Vanzetti 1:39
9> Wallace Goes To Russia 3:02
 
Nicole Mitchell and Coco Elysses
10> Nicole Mitchell and Coco Elysses at Women From Space, excerpt 7:17
 
PHOTO BY MAGALI CHARRON
 
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