Get your groove on when Gallery Vertigo presents a group of like-minded musicians with acoustic song writing and percussive leanings.
Mikkal Waters, The Sunlit, Tereza Tomer and the Expression World Music Collective are taking the stage in Vernon’s artist-run studio gallery Wednesday.
The all-ages concert has been organized by Waters, of Frequency Events. The local singer/songwriter, producer and promoter will also perform.
Waters recently partook in the Arts Wells Festival up in the Cariboo, and has a rich and heartfelt voice. His music, he says, draws from the depth of his experiences with an all-encompassing world view.
Waters has invited B.C.-based singer/songwriter Tomek, whose lifelong fascination with animals and nature led her to pursue a life as a biologist and eventually music.
One summer while taking a marine biology field course, Tomek started a seaweed-themed musical project called The Phycs with several other bio-musically inclined students.
“Before long our romantic tribute to red algae, Oh Rhodophyta, could be heard hummed all across the boardwalk. It was very nerdy, and very successful in this small, seaside science community,” she said.
It was after this experience that Tomek realized she might be better suited with a guitar in her hand than a microscope slide.
In the past year, Tomek has performed regularly in various venues throughout Vancouver as well as toured through Mexico and Central America. She is currently in fellow musician Corwin Fox’s Cumberland studio on Vancouver Island recording a bunch of vocals and guitar for her first full-length album, Cryptozoology, expected to be released in December.
Vernon’s Expression World Music Collective is also joining the foray.
Led by vocalist/percussionist Angela Roy, the collective performs French fusion songs and world music chants blended with three-part harmonies and upbeat arrangements.
“The intention is to share indigenous music from around the globe with messages of peace, social-cultural acceptance and unity,” said Roy who is also an early childhood educator and facilitator of Vernon’s Kamp Kindness. “Each song both brings you new musical roots to experience, as well as the cultural origins from which the songs were born.”
The collective has spread its word of unity at the Salmon Arm Roots and Blues and Komasket music festivals, Kelowna’s Parks Alive, Kamloops’ Rainbow’s Roost and Cherryville’s One Big Tree festival.
Suggested donation for Wednesday’s concert is $10. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. and the show starts at 7 p.m. Gallery Vertigo is located at #1-3001 31st Street (upstairs) in downtown Vernon.
