May 13, 2012
Sparrow Songs
I will be participating in a very unique event on Saturday, May 19 at Hugh’s Room in Toronto. It is called Sparrow Songs: A Country Song String. You can get more information here. Or read below to get a gist of what the night will hold. I will be one of four vocalists performing songs from a recently discovered sheaf of documents which included lyrics to a mysterious collection of interconnected tunes. We will be backed by a crack band for this one-of-a-kind event, so be sure not to miss it!
“The Sparrow Songs is taken from a collection of lyrics housed in the archives of the State of Washington University at Tacoma. Ethnomusicologists believe that these songs are the only known remnants of what was once known as a “song-string” – an extinct musical form of the American west. The Sparrow Songs have never before been performed publicly.
Song-strings were an after dinner entertainment in which neighbours and families would gather with their instruments and set about to make a string of songs. The participants would take turns adding songs; the challenge being that each song would have to – in some way – relate to the previous song in tone or subject. Ideally, the songs would eventually form a narrative. Sometimes song-strings would develop over a period of years, and achieve great lengths”
For more information, click here.
