Sound Seekers by Fateema Sayani is published weekly at OttawaMagazine.com. Read Fateema Sayani’s culture column in Ottawa Magazine and follow her on Twitter @fateemasayani
In this video, self-produced by Shannon Rose and her guitarist/husband Steve Matylewicz, the Ottawa songwriter heads down Bank Street and approaches passersby with an offer of a smile and a polka-dot balloon. The video, released in November, is for the song “Wild Wind.”
Rose says the song is about taking one’s lumps. “Life can be tough, and we thought it would be nice to show that it doesn’t take a lot to help make it a little sweeter for each other. Something as simple as handing out balloons made people smile.”
And smile they did as Rose accosted them with balloons to great delight (is that songwriter Andre Bluteau at 2:07 looking surprised?)
That sense of warmth can be heard throughout Rose’s new double disc called Seasons. It’s a compilation of four albums she released over the past two years covering feelings and ideas from spring, summer, winter, and fall.
“Writing and recording within each season seemed to provide a distinct feeling for each set of songs,” Rose says, noting that the spring songs are more fresh and hopeful than the melancholy songs of fall. “We live with some amazing and beautiful seasonal extremes here in Ottawa, and I think it’s inevitable that they will influence who we are and what we make.”
(Ottawa Magazine explored the capital’s weatherly influence in this column called “Brand Ottawa”).
The song “Wild Wind” appears in the spring section of the album. The summer tune “Under the Moon” appeared on Ottawa Magazine’s recently released mix tape.
Rose began her performing career at the Ottawa Ex in 2007 and she released her debut, Sing Me A Song, in 2008. Her new album was crowd-funded by an Indiegogo campaign that netted $2,210, surpassing the $2,000 goal. The album features Matylewicz, Dean Watson (bass), Tim Watson (drums), Michael Schultz (piano, horns), and Adam Fogo (strings), along with guest artists Stuart Lee (strings), Matt Ouimet, and Brian Patrick Simms (slide guitar), Dave Norris and Megan Watson (vocals), Frankie Leclair (handclaps), and Dave Edwards (percussion).
Shannon Rose & The Thorns play a CD release show Sunday, January 13, at 4 p.m. at the Black Sheep Inn (753 Riverside Dr., Wakefield, Que.), with special guests including jazz trumpeter Craig Pedersen and opening act cellist Raphael Weinroth-Browne. $10.