The debut of Vancouver & Montreal violinist Joshua Zubot's string ensemble with fellow violinists Jesse Zubot & Meredith Bates, cellist Peggy Lee and acoustic bassist James Meger, performing ten Zubot compositions informed by his involvement in diverse musical styles, each allowing room for improvisation as he takes the string ensemble into unique and unorthodox territory.
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Sample The Album:
Joshua Zubot-violin
Jesse Zubot-violin
James Meger-acoustic bass
Meredith Bates-violin
Peggy Lee-cello
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UPC: 875531024203
Label: Drip Audio
Catalog ID: DA02420
Squidco Product Code: 34172
Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2023
Country: Canada
Packaging: Digipack
Recorded at Afterlife Studios, in Vancouver, BC, Canada, in November, 2021, by John Raham.
"Josh Zubot Strings is the debut self-titled album from this extraordinary string ensemble based out of Vancouver, BC (Canada). Over his lifetime, Josh Zubot has been journeying through many realms of string music. In Montreal, he worked under the wings of legendary composer/violinist Malcolm Goldstein and toured with the trio, 'In the Sea', with bassist Nicolas Caloia and the late great cellist Tristan Honsinger. After recently moving to Vancouver, Josh formed his newest avant-garde string quintet involving the city's finest string musicians Meredith Bates, Peggy Lee, James Meger and his brother Jesse Zubot.
This album is a culmination of stylistic motifs that have passed through Josh's mind in blurred moments. Through his extensive experience performing traditional/graphic scores and ripping free-jazz, Josh brings his own unique compositional process to this album.
Josh Zubot Strings is not your conventional string album. Each piece has elements of subtle yet dense improvising around in-depth written material. 'It 5 Plank' starts off the album with an energetic group melody, in the lines of a jazz head, then immediately takes off into an intense sporadic violin solo with synchronized background punches. The 2nd track 'Rapid From Gone Thy Whisp' is a grooved based piece where the strings morph together in counter punctual short rhythmic motifs and does not lose momentum. Other compositions such as his 'Exploration' pieces are true adventures into soundscapes and extended technical sonic realms. The beginning of 'Auger 44' references a piece of machinery that Josh grew up with around the farm in Southwest Saskatchewan, that pulls grain through metal tubes. You could imagine a piece of grain travelling through this tube and all the music it encounters along its journey."-Drip Audio
The Squid's Ear!
Artist Biographies
• Show Bio for Joshua Zubot "Joshua Zubot is a musician who spent his younger years honing his skills in the West. Gaining ground internationally, Josh toured with the former Barrage group from 1997-2002. Moving to Montreal in 2003, Josh finished his BFA in Electroacoustic Studies after 4 years. In 2005, he produced his first solo album, Crouched Head, on the Drip Audio Label. He now freelances full-time as a violinist. Mainly, Josh is a performer/composer fusing many means of styles through his violin. These styles range from somewhere in the middle of jazz, free jazz, avant garde, contemporary classical, folk, improvisational, rock and electronic. Since then he has developped through the avant-garde scene in Montreal producing his own albums: Subtle Lip Can, Mendham, and Land of Marigold. Over the last decade, Josh has played with numerous different groups and individuals. Some collaborations were with Chad VanGaalen, Lori Freedman, Patrick Watson, William Parker, Pierre-Yves Martel, Michael Blake, Bernard Falaise, Rainer Wiens, Michel F Coté, Sam Shalabi, Miles Perkin, Myra Melford, Marshall Allen, Fred Frith, Matana Roberts, Jean Derome, Malcom Goldstein, Pierre Tanguay, Martha Wainwright, John Butcher, to name a few. Josh performed in the Mozg Festival (Poland),International Festival de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville, Guelph Jazz Festival, X Avant New Music Festival L'Off Festival de Jazz de Montreal, Suoni Per Il Popolo, Sound Travels (Sound Art Festival in Toronto), Guelph Jazz Festival, Osheaga, Pop Montreal, NXNE, as well as numerous festival circuits in Europe." ^ Hide Bio for Joshua Zubot • Show Bio for Jesse Zubot "Jesse Zubot is one of those unique musicians/producers whose praxis spans multiple genres and transcends contextualization into an idiom. Between moments of impassioned, visceral outburst and quite emotive sensitivies, Zubot exposes the full range of affects through a pristine sonic architecture. Zubot a 3-time Juno Award winning musician/producer with avant-rock band Fond of Tigers (2011), chamber folk-jazz ensemble The Great Uncles of the Revolution (2004) and roots instrumentalists Zubot & Dawson (2003). Zubot produced the Polaris Music Prize winning album 'ANIMISM' by Tanya Tagaq which was released in 2014. This album also garnered Zubot a nomination for 'Producer of the Year' at the 2015's Juno Awards. In the fall of 2010 Jesse won the 'Multimedia' award for his work on the score for Tungijuq (w/ Tanya Tagaq) at the 2010 Western Canadian Music Awards. Tungijuq was produced by Isuma (Atanarjuat) and was selected for Sundance, The Toronto Film Festival and the ImagineNATIVE film festival where it won for Best Short. Zubot has also composed extensively for modern dance. A recent highlight was the presentation of Body Scan (Choreographed by Benoit Lachambre & Su-Feh Lee : Score by Jesse Zubot) at the prestigious Centre Pompidou in Paris, France. In the past decade Jesse has delved heavily into the world of improvised and creative music having worked with the likes of Francois Houle, Tanya Tagaq, Peggy Lee, Evan Parker, Eugene Chadbourne, Mats Gustafsson, Matthew Bourne, Dylan van der Schyff, Joe Fonda, Fred Frith, Eyvind Kang and Nels Cline and many others. In 2005 Zubot started Drip Audio ("...one of the most original musical operations in the country." - CBC Arts Online), a record label dedicated to creative music. Drip Audio now has 35 albums under it's umbrella by musicians from Vancouver, Montreal, Los Angeles, New York and the UK. Zubot is also sought after in the contemporary/commercial music world and has been a guest musician working with artists such as Dan Mangan, Destroyer, Mira Calix, Hawksley Workman, Kelly Joe Phelps, Veda Hille, Amy Millan, Alpha Yaya Diallo, Mother Mother and Stars. J Zubot was named 'Violinist of the Year' at Canada's National Jazz Awards in '03, '08 and '09 and has also been commissioned by the CBC to write symphonies & arrangements for the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra and Symphony Nova Scotia. In 2014 Jesse premiered his first full string quartet at the Vancouver East Cultural Centre in conjuction with Vancouver's Western Front for the Rio Tinto Alcan Performing Arts Award. 2014 also saw the release of 'Hector and the Search for Happiness', a feature film starring Simon Pegg, Christopher Plummer, Stellan Skarsgard and Rosamund Pike in which Jesse did the score for with Vancouver's Dan Mangan. Jesse composed and arranged music for the film that was performed by the German Film Orchestra Babelsberg (Potsdam, Germany). This score was nominated for a Canadian Screen Award in January 2015. Some of Jesse's performance highlights in the past few years include ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum (Aarhus, Denmark), Time-Based Arts Festival (Portand, OR), Luminato Festival (Toronto, ON), Festival International du Film Insulaire de Groix (Iles de Groix, France), End of the Road Festival (Wiltshire, UK), Expo (Shanghai, China), WOMAD (Australia / New Zealand), Druga Godba (Ljubljana, Slovenia), WOMAD (Wiltshire, UK), Festival of World Cultures (Dublin, Ireland), Centre Pompidou (Paris, France), Kronos in Glasgow (Glasgow, UK), London International Festival of Exporatory Music (London, UK), The Monterey Jazz Festival (Monterey, CA), The Winnipeg New Music Festival, Festival International de Musique Actuelle (Victoriavillle, Quebec), The Mulhouse Music Festival (Mulhouse, France), Era Jazzu (Poland), The Montreal International Jazz Festival, the New York Guitar Festival, The Guelph Jazz Festival, Traz & Folk Fest (Rudolstadt, Germany), The Vancouver International Jazz Festival, The Calgary Folk Festival, Spilimbergo Folkfest (Italy) and The Atlantic Jazz Festival (Halifax, NS)." ^ Hide Bio for Jesse Zubot • Show Bio for James Meger "James Meger was born and raised in Surrey, British Columbia. He began playing the electric bass in early high school and took up the double bass upon entering post-secondary. After a brief stint studying music and Capilano College in North Vancouver, James moved to Montreal where he earned his Bachelors in Jazz Studies from McGill University and studied with drummer/composer Chris McCann. Despite working and studying primarily in the fields of jazz and improvised music, James' experience on the bass spans many different areas of music. In his late teens he was a member of the acclaimed Vancouver based indie-roots band, The Sumner Brothers, with which he recorded two studio albums over 3 years. Later he went on to tour Eastern Europe with art-rock band, Dark Blue World, as well as tour all over Canada with Vancouver folk act, The Fugitives. While attending McGill University, James helped form the collective saxophone trio, Braveheart. They have toured several times around Canada and self-released one album of original music entitled Acoustic Music. James currently resides in Vancouver, where he is an active member of many diverse groups including: The Bruno Hubert Trio, Squareheart, 4=4, O.A.B., Tom Wherrett Trio, Proud Animal, The Jaclyn Guillou Band and Cow Trance." ^ Hide Bio for James Meger • Show Bio for Meredith Bates "JUNO Award-winning violinist, Meredith Bates was surrounded by music throughout her childhood. Because of this, she developed an incomparable love and dedication to her practice, winning yearly merit scholarships at The Delta Youth Orchestra, The Harry Gomez Memorial Award for excellence in music, and various Kiwanis Festival and Music Fest Canada achievements. Meredith was the youngest musician to be awarded the principal second violin chair in the BC Honours Orchestra in 1994 and took part in a youth initiative project initiated by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra that year, incorporating gifted high school string players into a professional symphony experience. Pursuing a career in music, Ms. Bates moved across the country to Halifax, Nova Scotia to study on scholarship with Philippe Djokic at Dalhousie University. Meredith graduated with distinction from Dalhousie in 2004, earning her Bachelor of Music degree. Additional teachers and mentors included Isabelle Fournier, Anne Simons, Wallace Leung, Lorraine Grescoe and Angela Cavadas. Meredith has performed and taught extensively over the past fifteen years in both Vancouver and Halifax. While in university, she was awarded numerous scholarships from the Music Department, sat concertmaster with the Dalhousie Symphony Orchestra, and performed concertos with several orchestras in the community. In Halifax, Meredith also performed and recorded with hip-hop artists Buck 65 and Kunga 219 (of The Goods) and pop bands Matt Mayes and El Torpedo, The Heavy Blinkers, The Guthries, Gabe and Ruth Minnikin, and Tyler Mesick and The Museum Pieces, to name a few. Meredith is a founding member of Halifax-based 'hot jazz' ensemble Gypsophilia, one of the most popular swing groups at the 2004 Atlantic Jazz Festival. She also performed regularly and composed for Paul Cram's free-jazz ensemble, The Upstream Orchestra, before leaving Halifax for Vancouver in the Summer of 2004. For the past eleven years, Meredith has been pursuing a career as a freelance violinist and violist, experienced in a wide variety of musical genres, from classical music to jazz, and encompassing many folk idioms. She has been performing and recording extensively with a number of ensembles, some of which include Pugs and Crows, the Kamloops Symphony, Ford Pier and Strength of Materials String Quartet, Gentle Party, C.R. Avery and the Legal Tender String Quartet, Sean Cronin's Very Good, the Prince George Symphony, Sound Circus, and Dixie's Death Pool. Meredith has also performed and recorded in the past with musicians such as Annie Lou, Joseph Blood, The Vancouver Island Symphony, The Luscious, The Contemporary Lovers, The Shannon Scott Quintet, The Vancouver Metropolitan Orchestra, Dyad, Mark Berube, The Fugitives, Debra Jean and The Means, Rodney Decroo, Rae Spoon, and Ivan Coyote, to name a few. Adept in several schools of violin pedagogy, Meredith has been teaching violin to students of all ages and levels of expertise for the past fifteen years. Meredith has taught both individual Suzuki Violin lessons and Suzuki Violin group classes at the prestigious Vancouver Academy of Music, where she apprenticed under Rosalind O'Keefe. Meredith has also garnered teaching experience at The Halifax Conservatory in Nova Scotia, The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, Prussin Music, The West Vancouver Community Centre, The Delta Community Music School, and Vintage Violins in British Columbia. In addition to her work at these conservatories, Meredith has maintained a steadfast roster of private violin students throughout her teaching career and conducted several violin and fiddle workshops at festivals across Canada. Meredith has put her extensive musical training to use by taking on private and group rudimentary theory classes for young students preparing for their Royal Conservatory of Music exams. As a trained Orff-Schulwerk instructor, Meredith has also taught music for young children in a group setting. Building on her love of chamber music and strong performance background in small ensembles, she enjoys working with both youth and adult group classes wishing to learn all genres of music, such as Celtic and jazz, Eastern European 'gypsy' music, and classical string quartet repertoire." ^ Hide Bio for Meredith Bates • Show Bio for Peggy Lee "Cellist, improviser, composer Peggy Lee was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario. She studied classical cello, completing a bachelors degree in performance at the University of Toronto as a student of Vladimir Orloff and Denis Brott. She furthered her studies on the cello with lessons with Martha Gerschefski in Atlanta Georgia. In the fall of 1988 Peggy began a year residency with a string quartet at the Banff Centre in Banff, Alberta. It was here that she first became interested in collaborating with artists from different mediums and in veering away from the classical path. This led to a decision to move away from the known and thus to her relocating to Vancouver, B.C. where she now makes her home. Peggy's first forays into improvisation in Vancouver happened with dancers at the EDAM (experimental dance and music) studio at the Western Front and eventually led to her meeting and joining guitarists Ron Samworth and Tony Wilson in their respective bands; as well as becoming a member of the New Orchestra Workshop, which went on to have interesting and fruitful collaborations with Butch Morris, Wadada Leo Smith, René Lussier, Barry Guy and George Lewis. Peggy continues to collaborate frequently with Ron and Tony and with her husband, drummer Dylan van der Schyff, as well as with many other longtime musical associates including Dave Douglas, Wayne Horvitz, Robin Holcomb, Veda Hille and Lisa Miller. She also leads or co-leads a number of musical projects: The Peggy Lee Band, Film in Music, Waxwing (with Tony Wilson and Jon Bentley) and Beautiful Tool (with Mary Margaret O'Hara). She has also collaborated extensively in theatre and dance with companies and artists such as Ruby Slippers, Rumble Theatre, Presentation House, David Hudgins, Peter Bingham and Delia Brett. In 2005, Peggy received the Freddie Stone Award for integrity and innovation in music and in 2010 she was awarded a Jesse Richardson Theatre Award for outstanding composition." ^ Hide Bio for Peggy Lee
10/2/2024
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10/2/2024
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10/2/2024
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10/2/2024
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10/2/2024
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Track Listing:
1. It 5 Plank 5:50
2. Rapid From Gone Thy Whisp 4:37
3. Beach and Car 6:27
4. Exploration 2 5:52
5. Auger 44 12:01
6. Night Time 3:30
7. Exploration 1 4:17
8. Park of Chupert 5:50
9. Sitting Down and Chasing 5:48
10. Leaf and Water 4:23
Compositional Forms
Stringed Instruments
Chamber Rock
Improvised Music
Quintet Recordings
Canadian Composition & Improvisation
Vancouver and Western Canada
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