Volume 23 Issue 5 - February 2018

CARI FLAMMIA
Music Society to present
Ruth Mathiang
its BHM-themed
concert,” Kaia Kater and
Waleed Kush African
Jazz Ensemble,” at the
Museum. In an exploration
of “Black/African
diasporic cultural expression
in all its many forms,”
this concert draws on
traditional and contemporary
instruments, genres
and performance styles.
The music ranges from
“Nubia to Harlem via
Appalachia, New Orleans
and Mississauga.”
The double bill brings
together Waleed Kush Jazz
Ensemble with guest singer Ruth Mathiang, and banjo player, singersongwriter
Kaia Kater, to explore musical expressions of the African-
Canadian experience.
Of African-Caribbean descent, the Quebec born Kaia Kater grew
up between two worlds. In her Toronto home she experienced her
family’s ties to Canadian folk music firsthand; in West Virginia on the
other hand, she immersed herself in the deeply rooted musical traditions
of Appalachia. Her debut album Sorrow Bound (2015) referenced
this divide. Kater’s second album, Nine Pin (2016), delves even
further into the realities faced by people of colour in North America.
Her restrained but idiomatically spot-on banjo finger picking provides
an elegant support for her expressive voice.
The Waleed Kush African Jazz Ensemble combines African rhythms
and melodies, melding them with jazz harmonies and song forms.
Led by the Sudan-born Toronto multi-instrumentalist, composer and
vocalist Abdulhamid, band members include local musicians Aaron
Ferrera, John Ebata and Cory Sitek. The group writes that “just as
Toronto is a harmonious mix of culture and people … [so] the inspiration
for our music … is the harmonious mixing of rhythm and
harmony.” Poet and singer-songwriter Ruth Mathiang, also born in
Sudan but commencing her musical career in Kenya, is the group’s
guest vocalist.
Angélique Kidjo
We wind up our non-definitive look at BHM (for many more
concerts please check The WholeNote’s listings) with Angélique
Kidjo’s concert at Koerner Hall on March 3.
Three-time Grammy Award winner, dancer, songwriter, author
and social activist, Angélique Kidjo is among the top tier of international
singers today, a creative force with some 15 album credits. I
was immediately struck by her powerful voice and commanding stage
presence when I saw her perform live at Toronto’s Harbourfront at the
beginning of her very active touring career. Time magazine has since
acclaimed her “Africa’s premier diva.”
As well as performing her original songs Kidjo’s music ranges
across ethnicities, boundaries and genres, cross-pollinating the West
African music of her native Benin with R&B, soul, gospel, jazz, French
Caribbean zouk, Congolese rumba and Latin music. She does it all
with “irresistible energy and joie de vivre.” (Los Angeles Times)
Though for many years unconvinced of the value of European classical
music, Kidjo has however maintained a lifelong curiosity and
transcultural ambition. It’s a trait she says she learned from her father.
2014 marked the beginning of her work with European symphony
orchestras with the release of her Grammy Award-winning album
Eve. It included Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg among
many other top collaborators. The same year she collaborated on a
song cycle based on Yoruba poems with American composer Philip
Glass. The result was Ifé, Three Yorùbá Songs, scored for orchestra
and Kidjo’s eloquently impassioned vocals. For its 2015 American
premiere performance with the San Francisco Symphony, Philip Glass
thewholenote.com February 2018 | 21