Ottawa Xpress

Partying like it's 1967

Local Folkies Gain Prestige at This Year's Conference

October 19, 2006

Andrea Simms-Karp

    Ottawa may not have known it, but this past weekend the city hosted the best of Canada's song writing royalty. The Ontario Council of Folk Festivals (OCFF) hosts a yearly conference where musicians gather to showcase their work and take in a workshop or two.  While the name maybe a mouthful, the organization attracts Canada's best songwriters and musicians to its fold.  This year Ottawa was the location of choice for the conference - a word I take lightly, because I learned quickly that i was really just an excuse for a wild party.

    I should clarify my role in all of this.  I went to the conference to peek around on behalf of the XPress and get a sense of how these things work. But I am also a songwriter, which proved to be useful, because I could pick out a the musical giants as they swaggered (or tiptoed) into the room.  I spent most of the weekend poking my friend, geeking out, and squealing things like "Oooh, you should see the way he plays a slide guitar!" Since folk music is an all-encompassing term, genres like jazz, blues, world music, soul and indie were all represented.

    This year's gathering was unique for a few reasons.  Perhaps most obviously because it was being held in Ottawa, which meant the city ogt treated to an unusually high star ratio for a few days. tit was also the 20th anniversary of the OCFF conference, which is a celebration in itself. 

    Especially impressive, though, is the unusually high number of Ottawa artists being showcased and given awards this year.  Ana Miura took home the prize in the English category of Songs from the Heart, while Philippe Lafreniere took home the same honour in French.  Also in Songs from the Heart, Melissa Laveaux won in the wolrd music category.  I was spotting out local talent everywhere I went, and people at the conference ate them up with gusto. 

    Lafreniere, also a drummer with Ottawa's Souljazz Orchestra, was thrilled with his award.  "Everything has just been so great,' he said, grinning ear to ear, literally squeezing through crowds of admirers.  "If there's anything I like more than music, it's people."

    Lafreniere is certainly keeping himself busy around town.  Souljazz Orchestra just released their second album in September, and they continue their hugely popular weekly Thursday gigs at the Babylon Nightclub.  His other group, a Mexican/Canadian collective called People Project, is having a CD release party at the Mercury Lounge on Friday, October 27, and will be playing weekly gigs every Tuesday at Cafe Nostalgica. 

    Laveaux, well known in the city as a unique and talented songwriter, had her own theories on the unusually high number of Ottawa musicians being showcased.

     "I can reconcile it with the fact that the conference is in Ottawa this year, and maybe someone realized that Ottawa artists have been forgotten in the past," she said.

    It's probably important to note that the conference during the day was an entirely different beast than the conference at night.

    By night, everyone migrated to a few specified "music" floors at the Crowne Plaza Hotel.  Equipped with a small sound system, each room was packed to the gills with people who sat cross-legged, cradled beers and sang along to a host of folkies, including Craig Cardiff, Lori Cullen, Les Chauffeurs a Pieds, Treasa Levasseur, Hungry Hill, Harmony Trowbridge and David Myles.

    I learned two things from the OCFF: Never again will I miss one of these conferences and never again will I doubt Ottawa as a hub for some of the country's finest music.