The Banff Summer Arts Festival
Indie Band groups

Banff Indie Band Residency

The Shows · The Bands · Faculty · Media · Past Program

From October 19 to 31, Music & Sound at The Banff Centre held the second installment of the Banff Indie Band Residency, a unique opportunity for four of Canada’s top emerging young bands to rehearse, write and record new work, perform, and mix with recording engineers, faculty, and other young musicians.

The bands chosen by faculty and directors for this program were selected from over 100 applications — selections were based on recent recordings, professional and performing experience, and planned goals for the two-week residency. Each band will have a dedicated rehearsal space and production support to assist in the creation of new material, and will have four full days in the Telus recording studios with full audio technical support. The studio sessions will be under the guidance of faculty producers including Steve Albini, Howard Bilerman, Husky Höskulds, Claudio Vena, and Graham Lessard, and will have one full day of mixing in the studio.

“I am so incredibly excited for this year’s residency: excited to work with the four bands that were chosen, and to help facilitate their creative processes, excited to be able to get out of the city, and work in the near-paradise that is The Banff Centre, and excited to be immersed in such a remarkably creative & inspired environment. If this residency is anything like the first one, I know I will be leaving with enough inspiration to carry me through the next few months.”

Howard Bilerman, Faculty Producer

The Shows

Each of the four participating bands will have opportunities to perform on and off campus. One showcase performance is scheduled for Wild Bill’s Saloon in Banff on October 25 and a Halloween performance is scheduled on campus.

The Bands

Analog Bell Service

Analog Bell Service

Vancouver’s Analog Bell Service is made up of five guys who first started making music together in an artists’ studio, accessible only by ringing a bell. The band is in their first year together and released their debut EP this past June. BeatRoute magazine describes their music as “a high voltage dose of up-tempo, poppy art-rock with dense three-part vocal harmonies, pockets of ambience, and fanciful lyrics grooving you to a far off land.”

Listen to Analog Bell Service on MySpace

Basia Bulat

Basia Bulat

A nominee for the 2008 Polaris Music Prize, Basia Bulat has been fascinated by music since she was a child. Her first EP, Oh My Darling, which was recorded in Howard Bilerman’s Montreal Hotel2Tango studio, was released to critical acclaim in 2007. Her sophomore album, Heart of My Own, is set for release in January 2010. Basia lives and writes with her band in London, Ontario.

Listen to Basia Bulat on MySpace

The Witchies

The Witchies

Montreal’s Chad Jones, Jonah Fortune, and Nadia Moss banded together in 2008 to form The Witchies. The band released their first EP, A Perfect Hand, earlier this year. Since their formation, they have opened for A Silver Mount Zion, Wolf Parade, and the Handsome Furs. The band recently played at Northside Festival in Brooklyn, NY.

Listen to The Witchies on MySpace

Woodpigeon

Woodpigeon

Longlisted for the 2009 Polaris Music Prize, Calgary’s Woodpigeon lists their secret weapons as “cordiality, evasion, argyle, fanciful thoughts, and deadly metaphor-to-metaphor judo.” Since being founded in 2005, the band has recorded a rock opera, three full-length albums, and four EPs. The band has performed at NXNE, SXSW, End of the Road, Sled Island, and Rifflandia music festivals

Listen to Woodpigeon on MySpace

“The Indie Residency at The Banff Centre is a uniquely exhilarating experience for anyone who participates. Last year, I was lucky enough to have been invited, and though I was ostensibly there to mentor and guide young musicians through the recording process, I left feeling I must have been the luckiest one there. I met a community of inspired — and inspiring — young artists who were as impressive for their work ethic as they were for their talent. For any serious music producer, there is no better reward than the interaction with curious, motivated musicians. Exactly the kind of artists The Banff Centre attracts.”

Tony Berg

The Faculty

Steve Albini

Steve Albini is an influential singer, songwriter, guitarist, audio engineer, and music journalist. He is founder, owner, and engineer of Electrical Audio, a recording studio complex located in Chicago. Albini estimates that he has engineered the recording of 1,500 to 2,000 albums, mostly by rather obscure musicians. More prominent artists that Albini has worked with include Pixies, Nirvana, Whitehouse, Superchunk, PJ Harvey, Mono, 54-71, Om, Bush, Joanna Newsom, Nina Nastasia, Cheap Trick, Page and Plant, Neurosis, and The Stooges.

Howard Bilerman

A Grammy-nominated musician and producer, Howard Bilerman is co-owner and head engineer of the hotel2tango recording studio in Montreal. At the centre of Montreal's independent music scene, Bilerman has recorded music for bands including The Arcade Fire, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, the Dears, Vic Chesnutt, and Jordy Rosen, which he co-produced with Rufus Wainwright.

Husky Höskulds

Husky Höskulds is a gifted engineer, mixer, and sound designer. This two-time Grammy Award winner was born in Iceland, studied audio engineering at the University of California in Los Angeles, and worked as an assistant engineer at several top LA studios. For a number of years, he assisted the producer/engineer team of Mitchell Froom and Tchad Blake at LA’s Sound Factory. Höskulds has worked with artists such as Sheryl Crow, Los Lobos, The Wallflowers, Peeping Tom, Gipsy Kings, Fantomas, Tom Waits, and Joe Henry. Of special note, he recorded and mixed the critically acclaimed The River in Reverse by Elvis Costello and Allen Toussaint.

Claudio Vena

Claudio Vena could easily be called one of Canada’s most versatile, accomplished musicians. As a conductor, composer-arranger, and recording artist, Mr. Vena has delighted audiences and critics alike. Claudio has held conducting posts with the Toronto production of Miss Saigon, the Huronia Symphony, and the Hart House Orchestra (University of Toronto). In addition, he has made numerous conducting appearances with orchestras across Canada, working with such artists as internationally acclaimed baritone Louis Quilico, Canadian guitarist Norbert Kraft, lyric tenor John McDermott, and violinist Barry Shiffman of the St. Lawrence String Quartet.

Graham Lessard

Graham Lessard has worked for the last five years as a freelance recording engineer in Edmonton, Alberta. Although he specializes in indie rock and electronic music, he has also engineered and assisted on numerous jazz, classical, and folk music recordings for CBC Radio. Recent credits include producing and engineering albums by Faunts, the Whitsundays, and Electricity for Everybody. In 2007, he received a CARAS award for outstanding achievement in music recording.

Image: Analog Bell Service; Basia Bulat; The Witchies; Woodpigeon