🎶🎵🎸Laila Biali Captures The Magic Of Winter With Her New Original Chamber Album “Wintersongs”

Thursday, 19 September 2024 10:02.AM

Three years in the making, the new album from multi-award-winning vocalist, pianist and composer Laila Biali offers a cinematic set of winter-themed original songs that feature JUNO-winner & GRAMMY-nominee Jane Bunnett, the Venuti String Quartet and chamber orchestra.

Release Date: November 1, 2024 (Independent Release)
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Following the release of her critically acclaimed and JUNO-nominated jazz standards album, Your Requests, Laila Biali returns with an entirely fresh and original offering composed from a serene cabin surrounded by snow-capped mountains during a writing retreat in the heart of Canada’s Rocky Mountains. Wintersongs, Biali’s 10th recording as a bandleader and her first release in almost 2 years, is best described as a musical love letter to winter.

For more than 10 years, Alberta’s Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity has been a creative haven for Biali, who expresses deep gratitude for the intensive independent residencies that have allowed space for the genesis of new work:

“The Banff Centre is where I go to meet my muse. I have been fortunate to spend time there in every season, but I was especially surprised at how much I loved winter. I was offered a 2-week residency as part of their Fleck Fellowship and arrived on campus in late November of 2021. Every day from dawn to dusk, all I could see and hear was music – in the awe-inspiring sunrises and sunsets behind mountain silhouettes, in the wind as it rose up through towering trees, and in snow that constantly shape-shifted from stillness to storm. Those images and that experience fill this suite of songs.”

With funding support from Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council and Toronto Arts Council, Biali and her team moved this ambitious project from concept to realization. As new production ideas emerged, the vision for Wintersongs expanded to include not only Biali’s usual collaborators – like her longtime co-producer, drummer and husband Ben Wittman – but also one of the most in-demand orchestrators, Rob Mathes (Sting, Bruce Springsteen).

Biali comments, “Rob Mathes has been on my dream-list since I first heard his early work.. There was magic in his writing. He and (GRAMMY nominee) Drew Jurecka really brought grandeur and a spirit of play to Wintersongs through their string treatments.”

Another fresh collaborator for Biali is the highly-decorated flutist and soprano saxophonist Jane Bunnett, who will join Biali on an extensive tour in support of the album’s launch this November and December. Bunnett sparkles as she adds sweeping improvisational phrases and solos to both Rocky Mountain Lullaby, Biali’s ode to the majestic peaks of Banff National Park, and Dance of the Pines, a sonic journey inspired by flora, fauna and the aurora borealis. Other guests include the acclaimed trumpeter Kevin Turcotte, organ wizard Sam Yahel and the Detroit-born singer Wade O. Brown.

Together, they elevate one of the album’s more epic tracks, Outside (a Biali original) with such irresistibly hooky melodies, romantic imagery and opulent orchestration it could well become a contemporary seasonal classic.

The spirited original romp, Keep on Moving, takes off with soaring vocals from Joanna Majoko, Genevieve Marentette, and Jackson Welchner. Here the Venuti String Quartet (Rebekah Wolkstein, Drew Jurecka, Shannon Knights & Amahl Arulanandam) add their trademark virtuosity to George Koller’s formidable bass, Ben Wittman’s dynamic drums and Biali’s blistering piano. It is a stunning contrast to the album’s tender opening number, Drifting Down Ice, a warm invitation into a world of winter wonders as Biali’s vocalise floats overtop shimmering strings and Lori Gemmel’s lilting harp.

Gemmel makes an enchanting reappearance ensconced by Mathes’ ornate orchestral voicings on the
lyrical ballad, Snow.

Winter Waltz is a charming instrumental version of the French chanson she co-wrote with Sonia Johnson, released last year as Belle nuit de Noël. It’s a whimsical nod to Vince Guaraldi (A Charlie Brown Christmas) that shines a spotlight on the Venuti String Quartet, with a masterful arrangement and bandoneon playing from Drew Jurecka. The album concludes with Jesus, He is Born (Iesous ahatonnia’), a 17th-century carol first attributed to Jean de Brébeuf that most listeners will recognize as “The Huron Carol.” Following extensive conversations with the Wendat artist, Andrée Lévesque Sioui, who is decolonizing this traditional song with her own brilliant re-written verses, Biali felt it was crucial to strip away John Middleton’s English lyrics, to offer an instrumental arrangement she hopes will help create space and open up dialogue about Lévesque Sioui’s important work.

Tracklist:

1 Drifting Down Ice 4:16
2 Rocky Mountain Lullaby 4:53
3 Prelude to Outside 1:00
4 Outside 5:17
5 Keep on Moving 2:26
6 Snow 3:57
7 Dance of the Pines 6:55
8 Winter Waltz (Belle nuit de Noël, instrumental) 3:20
9 Jesus, He Is Born (Iesous ahatonnia’, instrumental) 4:34

Laila Biali - vocals, piano George Koller - bass
Ben Wittman - drums, percussion
Jane Bunnett - flute (2), soprano sax (7) Kevin Turcotte - trumpet (4, 9)
Lori Gemmell - harp (1, 6, 9)
Sam Yahel - Hammond B3 organ (4) Wade O. Brown - vocals (4)
Joanna Majoko, Genevieve Marentette, Jackson Welchner - background vocals (5)
Venuti String Quartet (1, 5, 7, 8)
Drew Jurecka - violin, bandoneon (8), quartet arrangements Rebekah Wolkstein - violin
Shannon Knights - viola Amahl Arulanandam - cello

Chamber Orchestra (2, 3, 4, 6)
Violins: Rebekah Wolkstein, Drew Jurecka, Shane Kim, Boris Kupesic, Sydney Chun, Bethany Bergman, William Lamoureux, Nancy Kershaw, Aya Miyagawa, Erika Raum, Stephen Sitarski
Violas: Shannon Knights, Diane Leung, Rory McLeod, Nicholaos Papadakis Cellos: Amahl Arulanandam, Naomi Barron, Lydia Munchinsky, Kevin Fox

Rob Mathes - string orchestrations, conducting Scott Good - harp arrangement (6)

Upcoming Performances

Oct 19 Vernon, BC @ Vernon Jazz Club
Oct 20 Penticton, BC @ The Dream Cafe
Oct 22 Nelson, BC @ The Capitol Theatre
Nov 15 Tweed, ON @ Marble Arts Centre
Nov 16 Bancroft, ON @ The Village Playhouse
Nov 25 London, UK @ Ronnie Scott's
Nov 30 Toronto, ON @ Tyndale University (2 shows)
Dec 04 Bellingham, WA @ Jazz Center
Dec 05 North Vancouver, BC @ BlueShore Financial Centre
Dec 06 Canmore, AB @ artsPlace
Dec 07 Edmonton, AB @ Yardbird Suite
Dec 08 Duncan, BC @ Cowichan PAC
Dec 11 Medicine Hat, AB @ Esplanade Arts & Heritage Centre
Dec 12 Saskatoon, SK @ The Bassment
Dec 14 Aurora, ON @ Aurora’s ATC
Dec 15 Cobourg, ON @ The Concert Hall at Victoria Hall
Dec 19 London, ON @ The Aeolian

About Laila Biali

Multi award-winning Canadian singer-songwriter, pianist and CBC Music national radio host Laila Biali has headlined festivals and venues spanning five continents from New York City's Carnegie Hall to Beijing's National Centre for the Performing Arts, and supported international icon Sting. She has received several JUNO Award nominations (Canada’s GRAMMY) – for her albums Tracing Light (2011), Out of Dust (2020), and most recently Your Requests (2023). In 2019, Biali’s eponymous release won her a JUNO for "Vocal Jazz Album of the Year.” The year prior, she was awarded top prize at the Canadian Songwriting Competition (Jazz) and, in 2020, Biali was honoured once again with the Hagood Hardy Award for Excellence in Songwriting (SOCAN MUSIC). Biali also became the youngest-ever double winner at Canada’s National Jazz Awards when she was named "SOCAN Composer of the Year" and "Keyboardist of the Year.” This September, she celebrated 8 years as the host of CBC Music's national radio show, Saturday Night Jazz, a weekly program broadcast to millions of listeners across Canada.

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