A Midsummer Night's MUSE with The Tiki Collective

Everything that there was to shake was shaken, and everything that could be stirred was stirred at the launch for the MUSE CD by Toronto's The Tiki Collective on a recent balmy August night. Florid songstresses and torrid musicians (the always exploratory Ernie Tollar, above, was especially smooth) generated a lounge-y tropical atmosphere under a waxing moon in an air-conditioned harbour of song, courtesy of Vesuvius Records and host Jaymz Bee.

 Jocelyn Barth (left) brought her subtle skills to bear on the classic "All Too Soon", then came back to add elegance and impromptu choreography to Genevieve Marentette's "I've Never Left Your Arms".

 In true Tiki tradition, a musical torch was lit and brandished wantonly when Irene Torres stepped out of bounds to blaze through "Quizas Quizas Quizas" and brought the dance floor into the center aisle.

Fashion summits were being maintained all night throughout Berkeley Church Field House, amongst guests and performers alike, but Jessica Lalonde significantly rocked a garden of cotton colour as she performed "I'll Be Seeing You" (above, with special guest John MacMurchy), and Lily Frost's slit mini-kimono shone roses through her rendition of "Mountain High Valley Low".

 Recent outstanding top-of-the-class grad, Mingjia Chen (left), already making waves in the real world, brought an emotional brilliance to Billy Strayhorn's "Chelsea Bridge" without singing a word. The real lowdown was provided by bassist George Koller, (right, above) who spent his evening alternating between the doghouse and a vintage Hofner Beatle bass.

Tyra Jutai (below) ignited a pulsing Ellingtonian swing on her darkly inflammatory pass at "Mood Indigo"  

The ever-harmonious Willows were in high demand, contributing a swoon factor to Paget's Sade homage, "Sweetest Taboo" (above), and Heather Luckhart's dreamy "Hypnotized" (middle above), as well as adding honey to the mix on Melissa Lauren's mellowed out makeover of "Don't Fear The Reaper" (top) and ended up going above and beyond to bring the "Caravan / Bali Hai" finale across the goal line.

As this soirée trés soignée drew to a close, Denielle Bassels, had a "Happy Birthday" sung to her in three-part harmony by the audience (including brother Jay, above). She was in a sufficiently celebratory mood by then to deliver album closer "The Wanderer", an original tune with a contagious bounce that affected the dancers like a windstorm in a flower garden (see evidence below).

 The album "MUSE" by The Tiki Collective will be available at Vesuvius Records and on all platforms on August 31st.

info at:

www.thetikicollective.com

Playlist For Show Of 17 August with Mingjia Chen and Aretha Franklin Theme Park

                                                                 Illustration by Michael De Adder

Commissioner of Selection: Paul Corby 

(Brought to you by The Natural Woman, Unchained From Fools & Aretha Yes P-E-C-T)

5-7 p.m. Fridays online http://www.radioregent.com/ and at tunein.com .  

Podcast here https://www.mixcloud.com/paul-corby/

Canadians in Asterisk’d RED. 

Guest: Mingjia Chen

Click on photos to enlarge.

5:00 Bouquet Voice

Aretha Franklin (March 25, 1942 – August 16, 2018) 

"The most important, identifiable and influential female voice in black music."
~ (Soul - The Essential Guide)  

That's The Way I Feel About Cha ~ Hey Now Hey (The Other Side Of The Sky) / Money Won't Change You ~ Lady Soul / Soul Serenade ~ Aretha In Paris / Bridge Over Troubled Water ~ Live At The Fillmore West / Why I Sing The Blues ~ Spirit In The Dark / Brand New Me ~ Young Gifted & Black / Don't Play That Song ~ Live At The Fillmore West / Border Song ~ Young Gifted & Black / Somewhere ~ Hey Now Hey (The Other Side Of The Sky)/ One Way Ticket ~ Spirit In The Dark / Young Gifted & Black





5:45 Drum Dream

Naghmeh Farahmand ~ Sounds Of Persia ~ @ Harbourfront Saturday with Sahba Motallebi for Small World Music Festival 6:00 - 7:30 p.m. 

Freddie McGregor ~ Africa Here I Come ~ Studio One Roots (Soul Jazz 2001)

* Laura Repo ~ College Street ~ Mountain Of Me ~ @ The Local tonight

6:10 Turbo Mingjia 

* Mingjia Chen ~ Floatwalking / Friends / Friend ~ Feel Seen NEW DISK / Interview / Chelsea Bridge ~ MUSE NEW DISK ~ Double EP Release  (with Kohen Hammond) @ Heliconian Hall Thursday 23 August

6:30 Pleasure Chest

* Basement Revolver ~ Dancing ~ Heavy Eyes NEW DISK @ Supercrawl Hamilton 14 September

Beach House ~ Turtle Island ~ Devotion ~ @ Sony Center Monday 20 August 

* Charlotte Day Wilson ~ After All ~ @ Nathan Phillips Square tonight for Manifesto Festival

Dawes ~ As If By Design ~ We're All Gonna Die ~ @ Scotia Bank Arena Saturday

6:45 Illumination Round   

University Of Toronto 12Tet ~ Radiohead's Ocean Bloom ~ When Day Slips Into Night NEW DISK / Toronto Music Listings

Jim Kweskin Jug Band ~ Storybook Ball ~ The Best Of... ~ Jim Kweskin @ Hugh's Room Live tonight

Reprint: Review of Aretha Franklin in Toronto at the Downtown Jazz Fest 24 June 2011

I saw the Queen last night and she is, as is said, all that, and extra ... PLUS ... (and then some). Toronto Downtown Jazz caringly curated her majesty to about 6000 people to celebrate the opening of their 25th Festival. (Actually, the Festival began a half hour earlier with the immaculate opener, Jordan John, singing "When You Wish Upon A Star"). 

She sang Cherokee as her opening number, along with a team of pink-faced horn players, a churchy rhythm section and a four piece choir. She sang A Natural Woman and Think perfunctorily, even briefly slipped into the "You need me" middle eight instead of the "Freedom" bridge in the latter...and then, sometime during Curtis Mayfield's Something He Can Feel, she actually began to sing. Daydreaming followed (hey, Aretha likes the same Aretha songs I like!), with intense harmony work by  her backup vocal quartet.  I Say A Little Prayer was delivered lightly and delightfully, allowing the crowd to echo "Forever" for her.

Time for a little break. She gathered up her foamy white train and stiffly step-walked offstage.  Because Aretha broke her toe falling on a pile of Jimmy Choo shoes last week, she now has an even bigger pile. "Jimmy Choo is good", she joked, " they sent them over and said now don't fall on them all." A few perfunctorally funky pink-faced solos were passed around.

She came back after about five minutes and offered some music from her new record, A Woman Falling Out Of Love. B.B. King's Sweet Sixteen gave her the chance to sing the blues and I heard intervals and embellishments that I've never heard any other singer deliver, not even Aretha. When she sat down at the piano, everything clicked into place. "Don't trouble the water", chanted the ladies. And Aretha told us what to ask for when we're down and out, when we're on the street. And the ladies sang "Glory Hallelujah" and I looked around at all the women holding cameras over their heads and Muslim families and gay men hugging and dowagers and teenagers and the noisy Haitians and the old pastel jazz fans, and I thought "Here it comes", and then she improvised some church dialogue, and some testimony, and she shook her head, and closed her eyes and shook her head again so that long Wonder Woman wig shimmered under the spotlight, and she ran up the piano keyboard with some Ray Charles filigrees and then she sang that word she'd been waiting all night long to sing: so high it was hard to even distinguish it from the choir-of-four's overflowing melismatic decorations: and she sang it: "Jeeeeeee - he - su -huss".

After that she was in high gear. She ran the opening piano motif of her classic version of Sam Cooke's You Send Me; the horns took it up, the Haitians started talking excitedly about "Sam Kook", and at this point I noticed a cop was dancing. Aretha announced Freeway of Love, complimented the crowd, and commenced her exit from the stage, which lasted in all about 15 minutes. I walked away in a blue surge of happy people in a proud city on the first Friday of summer. The true effects of the presence authentic royalty were everywhere abundant. Send her victorious, happy and glorious, long to reign over us. You know the rest.

Orbital Edibles and Almost Audible Comestibles

The complex blending of the appetites of the senses is a major characteristic of musical enjoyment. How many meals, how many movies, how many trysts have been ameliorated by perfect notes and rhythms? We touch and taste beauty as much with our eyes and skin as with our ears when we are experiencing music thoroughly. 

Every so often an image can almost make you taste something delicious. Here  are a few that can provide your imagination with a sumptuous basis to accommodate your good taste with some extra-musical enjoyment.

Playlist For Corby's Orbit Show of 10 August with Jocelyn Barth

Commissioner of Selection: Paul Corby 

(Brought to you by Fried Day, Slaughtered Day and Stunned Day)

5-7 p.m. Fridays online http://www.radioregent.com/ and at tunein.com .  

 Guest: Jocelyn Barth of The Tiki Collective

Podcast here https://www.mixcloud.com/paul-corby/

Canadians in Asterisk’d RED. 

Click on photos to enlarge.

5:00 Nomenclaturism 

Toots & The Maytals ~ My New Name ~ @ Danforth Music Hall tonight

Jon Brooks ~ Because We're Free ~ Delicate Cages ~ @ Hugh's Room Live Tuesday 12 August for Songwriter Session (round robin style)

* Dayna Manning ~ Gold (The Fire Song) ~ Volume 1 ~ @ Hugh's Room Live Tuesday 12 August  for Songwriter Session

Rod Stewart ~ Tomorrow Is Such A Long Time ~ Every Picture Tells A Story ~ @ Budweiser Stage tonight

Cyndi Lauper ~ Money Changes Everything (live) ~ The Best Remixes ~ @ Budweiser Stage tonight

5:25 Love / Tiki - O

* The Tiki Collective ~ Dreaming (Avery Raquel) / All Too Soon (Jocelyn Barth / Interview with Jocelyn Barth / The Wanderer (Denielle Bassels) / Harlem Nocturne (Joanna Majoko) ~ Muse NEW DISK ~ @ Berkley Church Fieldhouse Thursday 16 August

Patti Austin (born August 10, 1948) ~ Stars In Your Eyes / Captivated ~ That Secret Place 

6:00 Spirit Lamps

* Maryem & Ernie Tollar feat. Alfred Gamil ~ Gigue ~ Cairo To Toronto ~ @ Small World Music Center tonight & Saturday for Al Qahwa Ensemble with Majd Sekkar and Dr. Alfred Gamil

J. Moss ~ Just James ~ Just James

* The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer ~ Are You Listening Lord? ~ Checkered Past ~ @ Dundas Square tonight

6:20 Traditions And Transitions

Tortoise ~ Blackjack ~ Standards 

Melissa Payne ~ Don't Say ~ Melissa Payne

Miranda Lambert ~ That's The Way That The World Goes Round ~ Revolution ~ @ Budweiser Stage Thursday 23 August

Hot Tuna ~ True Religion ~ Live At The New Orleans House Berkeley

6:40 Oracles & Tentacles

Percy Mayfield ~ The Big Question ~ My Blues

Great Lake Swimmers ~ Unmaking The Bed ~ The Waves, The Wake NEW DISK

Dave Koz ~ Shakin' The Shack / Toronto Music Listings

* Lido Pimienta ~ Fornicarte Es Un Arte (feat. Melody Mckiver) ~  La Papessa

Hannah Sanders & Ben Savage ~ Santa Fe Trail ~ Awake

Corby's Orbit Playlist for Show Of 3 August

Commissioner of Selection: Paul Corby 

(Brought to you by Compiled Islands, Archipelagian Architecture and No Trouble Atolls)

5-7 p.m. Fridays online http://www.radioregent.com/ and at tunein.com .  

Podcast here https://www.mixcloud.com/paul-corby/

Canadians in Asterisk’d RED. 

Click on photos to enlarge.

5:00 Bold-Timers

* Heather Luckheart with The Willows ~ Hypnotized ~ The Tiki Collective ~ Muse NEW DISK

Shirley Bassey ~ Where Do I Begin? ~ Etage 3 ~ Costes

Kate Bush ~ The Red Shoes ~ The Red Shoes 

* Moscow Apartment ~ The Things You Do ~ EP ~@ Union Station Saturday 12 p.m.

Jenny Lewis ~ You Can't Outrun "Em ~ The Voyage ~ @ Fort York Saturday

* Ian & Sylvia ~ Katy Dear ~ Vanguard Visionaries ~ Sylvia Tyson @ Hugh's Room Live Tuesday 7 August

5:20 Torontodad

Lord Composer & The Silver Seas Orchestra ~ Hill And Gully Rider ~ Mento Madness

Count Owen ~ The Sound Of Music ~ Rock Steady Calypso (Kalypso 1968)

Hubert Porter with George Moxey's Calypso Orchestra ~ Monkey Talk ~ Mento Madness

Buster's All-Stars ~ Cast Your Fate To The Wind

5:40 Oblong Songs

Doc Watson ~ Life Gets Teejus, Don't It / Lost John ~ Doc Watson On Stage (Vanguard)

Garland Jeffreys ~ Coney Island Winter ~ The King Of In-Between 

The Supremes ~ Joni Mitchell's All I Want ~ ... Produced & Arranged by Jimmy Webb

* Judy Brown ~ I Dream ~ Say It NEW DISK

Ry Cooder ~ Tattler ~ Paradise & Lunch

6:00 Non Combos Mentis

Ahmad Jamal ~ The Tube ~ Live In Paris 1992

Funky 4 + 1 ~ That's The Joint ~ Roots Of Hip Hop 

* Alex St. Kitts feat. J.P. Saxe ~ Love Sick ~ The Projektor lll ~ @ Union Station Thursday 8 August

Shakti feat. John McLaughlin ~ Lotus Feet  ~ @ 

* Al Qahwa ~ Il Helwa Di ~ @ Small World Music Center Friday & Saturday, 10 & 11 August

6:30 Happenstance Handstands

The Apples In Stereo ~ The Rainbow ~ The Discovery Of A World Inside The Moon

Nicole Atkins ~ Solano Avenue ~ Here Lies Love

David Byrne & Shara Warden ~ Seven Years ~ Here Lies Love ~  David Byrne at Sony Center tonight & Saturday

Jim Bryson ~ One Cigarette ~ The Occasionals

Warren Hill ~ Another Goodbye / Toronto Music Listings

B.B. King ~  I`ll Survive ~ Blues On The Bayou

The Sweet Old Religion Of Pharis & Jason Romero

  The best harmony in music traditionally comes from siblings and lovers. It is an intimately personal sharing experience for the performers and for the listener. When pure harmony happens it elicits grace. As a temporary alignment with perfection, it is a religious experience without the obligation of worship.

Sweet Old Religion, the new record by Pharis & Jason Romero, investigates that common cohesive quality of song, community and family, which is also often referred to as love.

The album was composed during a chaotic time in the couple’s life. A disastrous fire took away their banjo manufacturing workshop while they were building a new house and adjusting to life with a new baby.

“We put out a record in 2015, and we just thought we’d take a year off the road, and suddenly the shop burned down. We weren’t doing any music or writing any songs. It just wasn’t a big part of our life. We got focussed on rebuilding the banjo shop,” recalled Pharis. “It threw this creepy element of chaos into what was already a pretty chaotic world. We were so focused on building the house and rebuilding the banjo shop, and our house was in lockup, and in October, about two weeks after everyone left, all these songs started coming – some days two or three of them. The outpouring of support and kindness, it was just an incredible experience to be on the receiving end of. So when the first song came, it was about love and gratitude. From that evolved this album.”

“The over-arching themes are about light and love and resilience and a sense of just how truly amazing this world is,” Pharis said. “The feelings that came after the fire, the very, very large feelings, were more of what I needed to process, and that’s more what came out in the songs. There’s a lot of light in the lyrics. That’s constantly on my mind these days.”

Translating their drastic and vivid life experiences somehow became music that is effervescent, with an awareness of the positive and beneficent streams of worldly existence. Carefully-engineered and recorded, the effects of their harrowing year reach out to the heart for any listener who may be going through their own catalogue of catastrophes.

“If you can find a way to see the lightness in life,” Pharis explained, “I find that helps me to get through times when I’m questioning or doubting or just feeling stressed, if I can see the lightness and the goodness and just the overall picture that life is good.”

Much of the medicine that helps to produce this philosophy is the environment of Horsefly, British Columbia where Pharis and Jason live and work.

“Yeah we carry that with us all the time. We always need to take time to climb in the mountains and swim in the lake. We live out in the big open spaces, and it’s quiet and beautiful.”

Sweet Old Religion is Pharis and Jason’s first all-original collection of songs, and it contains the familiar clarity and warmth of their former work. But the songs have sparks of joy and hope that carry from the title tune throughout the heart-swelling testimonies of “You Are a Shining Light,” “Come On Love” and “You Are The Best Thing,” to the wistfully metaphoric “Age Old Dream” and “The Salesman” and on until the final shimmer of “Babes Mothers & Fathers,” which is filled with parental adoration and guidance. “Shine all the way,” they sing, reaching into a new future.

Originally published at Roots Music Canada.