Jen Hodge had just spent five hectic days in Asheville, North Carolina, rehearsing every day and performing late into every night as part of the massive celebration of swing music known as Lindy Focus XVI. Despite the grinding schedule, the Vancouver jazz bassist and singer considered the Christmas-week event “a really incredible experience” that allowed her …
Any discussion of the Yukon School of Visual Arts begins with a couple of questions: What is it? Why is it in Dawson? The first question is easily answered: the Yukon SOVA is a post-secondary art school with excellent facilities and dedicated staff, offering a foundation year (first year) of a Bachelor of Fine Arts …
The cupboard behind Dan Sokolowski’s head is still covered with the multi-coloured Post-it notes he’s been using to assign the 86 short films in this year’s Dawson City International Short Film Festival to various categories for Friday, Saturday and Sunday screenings that will fill up this Easter Weekend. The films were selected by a group …
Regardless of what else may be happening, on 1st Saturday of the month during a school year, these open mic events are a regular occurrence.
Basia Bulat is returning to the Yukon. Bulat is a multi-instrumentalist – she plays guitar, autoharp, banjo, ukulele, charango, hammered dulcimer, saxophone and flute – and has a powerful voice. She comes by her musical interests naturally, having a mother who was a music teacher who taught both piano and guitar. She has said the …
Scott Wilson doesn’t credit either ’50s TV host Arthur Godfrey or campy falsetto Tiny Tim with the current popularity of the humble ukulele. Instead, the Whitehorse musician thinks it likely stems from a few years back, when Hawaiian singer Israel Kamakawiwo’ole’s hauntingly beautiful medley of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and “What a Wonderful World” became …
On Easter weekend the ballroom of the Oddfellows Hall will be filled with hundreds of short film fans celebrating the 17th edition of the Dawson City International Short Film Festival (DCISFF) and cramming in as much as they can of the 500 hours of screen time that will fill up the days. This is the …
Year 17 sees an abundance of Yukon Films at the Festival Read More »
November 7 turned out to be an incredibly busy evening for anyone involved in community events in Dawson. There was the closing banquet for the Youth Art Enrichment program, which I mentioned here a few weeks ago. There was an outdoor art installation on the dyke and waterfront called The Deep Dark, involving contrasts of …
Students in rural schools can miss out on a number of things in terms of course offerings and opportunities. There are specialty programs in the city that attract a number of rural students to spend time in Whitehorse. Our daughter, for instance, spent half of her Grade 11 year attending the Music Arts and Drama …
Dawson City has created a filmmaker out of a doctor. So says Suzanne Crocker, creator of All the Time in the World, a full-length feature film that is making waves around the country. It will be screened in Dawson City at the Odd Fellows Hall on Thursday, April 2 at 7:30 p.m.The film documents the …
I’ve been the opening act at the last two monthly coffee houses. We meet on the first Saturday of every month in the Odd Fellows Hall ballroom. We’ve been doing these evenings for the better part of a decade. I know because I was still teaching during the first couple of years, and this month …
Barnacle Bob Hilliard is ubiquitous on the Dawson City music scene. Since arriving in the early 1990s he’s been a fixture in the bars around town, starting at the Westminster, and also playing in the bars of the Eldorado and Downtown Hotels. Dawson has two annual parades, Canada Day and Discovery Days, and Bob can …
While Martha Wainwright began her current tour a year ago to promote her latest CD, Come Home to Mama, she says the North American portion of the tour has evolved into something a little more wide-ranging. “At this point we’ve moved from promoting the latest album to doing songs from the previous two or three …
A Subversive Singer-Songwriter Comes to the Yukon Read More »
Supporting the Economy Through the Arts You could expect a 10-years lifespan from mining projects, and Hakonson is well aware that placer miners have been roaming the creeks since 1898 and show no signs of stopping, but the short life of Viceroy’s Brewery Creek Mine and the short lived Clinton Creek asbestos mine tend to …
Jazz Yukon had already told Brandi Disterheft what “On The Wing” means, and she is looking forward to it. “It is definitely one of my favourite types of venues,” says the stand-up bass player of her upcoming visit to the cozy stage of the Yukon Arts Centre Sunday, March 1. “You can really interact and …
The community that sings together … My personal songbook is getting bigger every month. That’s thanks to the energy of a departed Dawsonite educator, named Nijen Holland (or just, Nijen, as everybody called him), who thought up the idea of having monthly coffee houses at various locations around town and encouraging local musicians to contribute …
The first Youth Art Enrichment (YAC) week in Dawson City was inspired in the early years of the Klondike Institute of Art and Culture (KIAC) by the long-running Youth Authors’ Conference that takes place in Whitehorse. It’s so successful in its own write – so to speak – that now it seems it’s just the …
The last of the monthly winter coffee house and open mic nights at the Odd Fellows Hall ballroom occurred on May 5. They are a tradition that goes back five or six years now, having been started by an educational assistant at the Robert Service School who wanted a place for the student band he …
You might not expect to have to worry too much about falling snow in the Klondike in April. After all, this is not Alberta, where blizzards in the middle of April are common events. Yes, it snowed on the morning of Easter Sunday here in Dawson, but it had turned to drizzle by noon when …
Get myself ready for the October edition of the monthly Coffee House/Open Mic evening in the Oddfellows Hall ballroom.
Thaw di Gras (sometimes misspelled Thaw di Graw, especially in Manitoba) is the peculiar name Dawson City gives its spring carnival. The event will be held from March 15 to 18. The name is, of course, a reference to the Mardi Gras, which actually took place on February 21, the Tuesday before the Christian religious …
Last night I attended the delightful Dawson City showing of the David Mamet play, Boston Marriage. Two days earlier the KIAC Christmas Art and Craft Extravaganza filled a room with handicrafts and artwork. On the same date there was a Karaoke Night with visiting artist-in-residence Curtis Grahauer. Two nights before that Grahauer offered a showing …
The last two times Eliana Cuevas visited the Yukon, audiences were huge. She liked the big rooms of the Yukon Storytelling Festival in 2003 and the Yukon Arts Centre in 2006 because she feels the energy from the audience. However, in Haines Junction on Aug. 20 and in Dawson City on Aug. 22, she will …
