This past Wednesday I attended opening night in Vancouver of The Alberta Ballet’s The Nutcracker at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. This time I had the pleasure of sharing this experience with my mom. It brought back fond memories and I now have new memories to hold dear. My mom and I both enjoyed ourselves immensely. She loved the music and dancing. She adored the dance of the Sugarplum Fairy. I, of course, enjoyed the music and dancing as well, but my favourite part by far was the costumes and sets. They were designed by Emmy Award-winning designer Zack Brown and they were absolutely amazing! A must see.

Something that makes this production so wonderful is that it’s one the whole family can enjoy. I look forward to the day that I can share the magic of The Nutcracker with my son. I highly recommend adding The Alberta Ballet’s The Nutcracker to your list of things to do this holiday season. Share it with your loved ones and end this year with some extra special memories to cherish for a lifetime.

Alberta Ballet’s The Nutcracker
with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre

Wednesday, Thursday & Friday, December 28-30 at 7:30 pm
Friday & Saturday, December 30 & 31 at 2 pm

Summer’s over in case you didn’t notice. 6 weeks of sun this summer was a bummer but seems like there is always tons of action going on this time of year. Olio, VIFF, yada. I checked out the 11th annual New Forms Festival on Sep. 9 and also was at the Concrete Park jam at the Woodwards’ atrium on Wednesday night. New Forms really should be higher on the radar in the city. I think for doing what they do and combining what they combine together they are not worth missing. The media art and electronic music festival has been doing it up for over a decade which of course is no joke in this town. And as we sadly are missing the Livestock block party this year (though they had that thing at Strathcona park earlier this summer), the Hastings Set and W2‘s Concrete Park jam in the Woodward’s atrium could turn out to be a cool replacement. It was in the spirit of the old school hip hop park jams with the soundsystem, bboying and best of all, a free event in a nice public space.

Check out the review and tons of pics below.

The Waldorf Hotel has been delivering on its’ hype to be one of the city’s art/music/and beyond hubs. Doing New Forms was a straight up perfect match. As the New Forms Festival’s mandate is “exploring the convergence of media arts and electronic music,” the versatile multi-room Waldorf housed this festival like a glove. There were 4 rooms set up for music performances (both the Leeteg room and Tiki Bar upstairs and the Cabaret and Hideaway downstairs) and the individual hotel rooms acted as the art exhibition space. There were also a WHOLE lot of visuals everywhere as you can see in the pics below including projections on the hotel’s outside walls and even to the building across the street. And another art exhibition in a trailer outside the cabaret and last, but dam not least, a BBQ set up outside serving Argentinian style sausages (last pic below).

So…..your experience was being able to check out 4 different music sets, cruising upstairs to the see the hotel rooms all decked out in creative ways, visuals at every turn (inside and out) and topping it off with a hearty ass hot dog, Buenos Aires style. It was so unexpectedly good, my jaw was sore from stretching to chomp it down so far fast.

As stated by Malcolm Levy, the festival director: “This year we are completely excited about having the entire festival at the Waldorf.. Under the thematic of Public Domain, we are creating a festival concept that will include installations in the rooms, lobby, and facades of the building, as well as different music in each room of the building. On Sunday we are doing our first outdoor show in the parking lot with Sun Araw Band, Deadbeat, No Gold, Tyger Dhula and Danuel Tate and V Vecker Orchestra. Each night will be completely different so we encourage people to come down and experience the entire narrative…”

I only checked it out on the Friday night but that one night packed a whole lot of an experience for a single outing. There were a lot of sick beats and soundscapes but I think I’ve walked away intrigued most by singer Evy Jane who I saw perform with Erica Dee sometime back at Fortune. She does not seem to have an official site up yet but her voice caught me off guard as I walked into the Leeteg Room as she was performing with a voice that reminded me of Yukimi Nagano of Little Dragon or Esthero.

One of the hardest working men in our music scene, Jeff Herrera and the Hastings Set along with W2 threw a little jam called Concrete Park this past Wednesday night at the Woordward’s atrium area (the space between Nesters, London Drugs and now the new W2 media cafe and event space). With husband and wife DJ tandem, Hedspin and Bles-sed providing the beats, the event goers plus curious onlookers checked out the bboy battle taking place.

It was cool to see these curious onlookers passing by checking out how hip hop did it early on, with DJs and Bboys representing the true elements of the art. The event also was supported by and brought out many of the like-minded heads from the shops in the gastown area like Rose from Queens and Savage from Beats & Bikes.

L-R: Jeff from the Hastings Set, Savage from Beats & Bikes

Rose from Queens

If you think there is someone or something that needs coverage in this city in regards to the Hip Hop / Electronic community then get in touch with us.

On Saturday July 2nd was the 10 year anniversary of the Vancouver breakdance crew Filthee Feet. To celebrate the event Famous Circle, a breakdance event promotion company, decided to host a 4 versus 4 battle at The Russian Hall in Strathcona. As well as the 4 on 4 battle there was a 1 versus 1 IBE qualifier. The IBE qualifier was to see who will go on to be a spectator at the international event in Holland. Canada does not yet have a team that represents them in the IBE competition, hosted every year in Rotterdam, but the attendance of Canadians at this years event will hopefully motivate the hosts to invite a team for future events.

Photos: Joel Levy

The event on Saturday had a preliminary round which decided the final eight teams. By the time the  spectators had arrived the final eight had been chosen and 4 battles of 4v4 could commence. Crews from across the city and as far as the Yukon and Montréal were in attendance. Vancouver notables were members of Now or Never crew, O Mighty and of course Filthee Feet. After 4 battles consisting of 5 rounds each the winners, O’ Mighty, came out on top over co-finalists Dance Moves. O’Mighty’s Reflex also took home the IBE qualifier.

Famous Circle which was started out of the crew Filthee Feet looks to throw events that the whole family can enjoy. This event had one family of one of the organizers prepare pupusas. a traditional Salvadoran dish, for people to snack down on during the event. “We are looking to throw a summer even every year if we can” says Famous Circle rep Rory. “Events have to be done a certain way to be worthwhile. It takes a lot of planning and organization. The hardest part is being able to find affordable venues to host the events so if you know any make sure you let us know.”

To follow famous circle and check up on what is new with them you can visit their website at www.famouscircle.com or follow them on twitter @famouscircle.

Former Mad Pudding bandmates (l-r) Boris Favre, Amy Stephen and Allan Dionne will be performing with some of Vancouver’s best African musicians at the Edgewater Casino on Friday. (Photo courtesy of CelticFest.)”

Albano said that the AfroCeltic dance party, which goes down Friday night at the Edgewater Casino, was inspired by 2009′s combination of salsa and Celtic music.

“It’s a collaboration that the festival tries to encourage every year, to fuse Celtic music with other ethnocultural communities. In 2009, we did an event called Celtic Salsa,” she said. “We decided based on that success, and based on the fact that people liked it and like to dance, we wanted to find a new prospect this year.”

Amy Stephen, formerly of the Celtic dance band Mad Pudding, helped select the music for the event. She’ll be performing along with former Mad Pudding bandmates Allan Dionne and Boris Favre,  fiddler Stephanie Cadman, African musicians Yoro Noukoussi and Alpha Yaya Diallo and dancer N’ato Camera.

She said that she’s always loved world music.

“It’s always been a love of mine, different grooves from different parts of the world. Especially based in traditional music, because everyone has their own traditional styles that are so rich in themselves, but at the same time, you can put things together with other cultures,” she said. “As long as it’s organic and you find stuff that actually works musically, then it always produces this really fantastically rich kind of mix.”

West African music is based on the same time structure as Celtic music, so Stephen said the two styles were a natural fit.

“Even though it’s not the same feel, they work in the same musical time, so that’s an interesting thing for us to explore. And they’re both dance rhythms,” she said. “There’s a lot of joy, and I think that joy is a huge theme running through the Celtic and the African tunes that we are choosing to play.”

Stephen said that cultural fusion is healthy for musicians and audiences, and she hopes that the performers will be able to share the positive energy that they created in rehearsals with the audience.

Juno Award-winning Guinean musician Alpha Yaya Diallo will be performing at CelticFest Vancouver’s AfroCeltic Dance Party this Friday. (Photo courtesy of CelticFest.)

Alpha Yaya Diallo, who won a Juno for his last album, agreed.

He took inspiration for his Juno-winning album from an English group that fused African and Celtic styles, so, for him, performing at the Celtic fest was “fluid, easy.”

Diallo said that music is all about learning.

“Lots of people, like Peter Gabriel…a lot of western musicians play with African musicians. We like to share,” he said. “We all learn. It’s giving and learning.”

He said that the AfroCeltic dance party is an opportunity to bring two “very exciting styles” of music together.

It’s a great opportunity for Vancouverites to see some of the city’s most talented musicians all on one stage.

“It’s a huge celebration, you can only experience it live when it happens.” Amy Stephen said of the event.

“In a world where there’s so much conflict going on, this really highlights that music and joy are always with us, and it doesn’t matter where we’re from.”

The AfroCeltic Dance party is Friday at the Edgewater Casino. Doors are at 7 p.m., show starts at 8 p.m.  www.celticfestvancouver.com for more info. Check back here for photos and audio from the event!

The Tomahawk BBQ located in North Vancouver, BC, Canada is my favourite place in the world to eat. When I first started to go regularly to the Hawk with my Dad, the servers always recommended for me NOT to order the Skookum Chief Burger because it was “too big” for a little boy such as myself. Of course this made me want it even more, the burger with three meals in one! Sandwiched between two slabs of bun are; bacon and egg, representing breakfast; weiner, representing lunch; and meat and cheese, representing dinner! Add lettuce, tomato, relish, onion, mayonnaise plus a dill pickle and this is what comprises a Skookum Chief Burger! Check out what happened when I took the rock band Southern Culture on the Skids to taste not only the Skookum Chief, but the massive MIxed Grill ( Nine generous slices of Yukon style bacon, two country fresh fried farm eggs, two slices of Klondike toast, hamburger pattie, cheese, weiner, onions and fresh sliced onions, hashbrowns, salad, served on a 14″ platter!):

Nardwuar vs. Southern Culture on the Skids:

Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand , Nardwuar and the Cribs feasting at the Tomahawk BBQ in North Vancouver, BC, Canada!

Stay tuned for another interview next week and if you can’t wait then head over to NARDWUAR.COM, FACEBOOK.COM/NARDWUAR or TWITTER.COM/NARDWUAR!

Boombox Saints

Enspire Foundation booth

Sammie Jo @ the Enspire Foundation booth

Lechon stew @ the new Goldilocks on Main & 12th