The 37th annual Ontario Folk music awards took place at the elegant Living Arts Centre in Mississauga this past Sunday. This was also the first time Blast Toronto had a chance to witness what it was all about. So here is a short description of my time there.
I walked into the large foyer of the Living Arts Centre where musicians, promoters, media, behind the scenes people who work hard to let these musicians shine and of course the volunteers, who made everything run smoothly.
It felt like one large family reunion as I was photographing everyone on the red carpet. It didn’t matter who you were. If you were part of this community, you belonged on the red carpet. That is the open way Folk music has always been.
As we all gathered around the podium to begin the event, I learned that this organization just unveiled their new logo. The O in Folk had a colourful playfulness to it. It represented a kaleidoscope. This had multiple meanings to it. It represented the diversity of the artists. Today’s folk music has grown with their sound which includes the earthly delights from around the world and has made our land their home. When you see the live movement of this “O”, that represents the sounds waves of all music.
There were two lifetime achievement awards given out. I am just going to cut and paste the words that were used for these special people, because I cannot express it better.
2024 Estelle Klein Award Recipients: Samir Baijal & Pat O’Gorman and Julie Schryer
Sam Baijal has been an advocate, supporter, and champion of the Ontario Folk music community throughout his career, and is in particular an advocate of a more diverse, more welcoming, and more inclusive Folk and independent music community. Sam is the Artistic Director of Hillside Festival (a role he has served in for 26 years) and the Coordinator of Programming at the University Centre at the University of Guelph. He has been a board member with FMO (and previously, OCFF) and the Canada Live Music Association, has participated in panels on multicultural and multi-disciplinary practices in music and festival programming at numerous conferences including FMO and Folk Alliance, and has served on numerous juries and award panels including The Junos, East Coast Music Awards, Canada Council for the Arts, and Ontario Arts Council. Sam has dedicated his career to advocacy for live music programming and is recognized as one of the foremost pioneers in creating programming for a major Canadian music festival inclusive of racialized, gender-diverse, and Indigenous artists, well ahead of its time.
Pat O’Gorman and Julie Schryer are recognized as both musicians and through their work with AlgomaTrad, their charitable organization dedicated to building community through the celebration, sharing, and learning of traditional music, dance, arts, and heritage craft. In addition to musicians based in Celtic traditions from Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba and the Maritimes, they have brought Indigenous, African, and Klezmer musicians to share their traditions. They have worked tirelessly for 20 years to bring the absolute best in traditional music to northern Ontario in the form of concerts, dances, workshops, festivals, a summer camp devoted to teaching, and now they are currently developing the year-round, environmentally-sustainable AlgomaTrad Centre on St. Joseph Island.
Janice Jo Lee hosted this award show with a quick-witted sense of humour that really fit with the relaxed crowd. Janice rolled with everything that was thrown at her and even brought along one of her characters to add to the fun nature of this ceremony.
The live performances were all worthy of an award and I will make it Blast Toronto’s duty to see these artists when they are in town. The participants of the live part of the show were: Sultans of String, Payadora Tango Ensemble with Lenka Lichtenberg and Aviva Chernick, OKAN, Mimi O’Botsawin, Jessica and the East Wind, Adrian Sutherland and The Angelique Francis Band.
Here are the Performers:
And now for the moment you have all been waiting for, the Winners of the 37th Annual Ontario Folk Music awards.
CMMRA- Song of the year- Annie’s Daughters- The Pairs
Album of the Year- ACTRA RACS Recording artist of the Year- The Payadora Tango Ensemble- Silent Tears: The last Yiddish waltz
Performing artist of the Year- The Angelique Francis Band
Colleen Peterson Award- Leah Holton
Estelle Kleinman Lifetime Achievement Award- Samir Bajal
Estelle Kleinman Community Builder Award- Pat O’Gorman and Julie Schryer
The Taylor Mitchell Bursary- All the developing Artist Program participants at this year’s Folk Music Ontario conference
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