Musical Activism and Agency: Contestations and Confluences

The local arrangements committee for SEM 2020 organized the pre-conference symposium, concerts, and workshops for conference delegates, while members of the Canadian Society for Traditional Music/Société canadienne pour les traditions musicales (CSTM/SCTM) programmed roundtables and keynotes within the SEM program to highlight music discourse and ethnomusicological scholarship in Canada. Funds and in-kind support were secured through the Canadian Museum of History, Carleton University, and Queen's University, allowing for the programming of concerts that featured a wide range of musics and traditions, and the ability to hire graduate students to assist with event planning and logistics. Performances included full concerts by Ottawa-based Silla and Rise, a fusion ensemble that features Inuit throat singing and contemporary beats; the Angelique Francis Quartet, an Ottawa-based ensemble that brings elements of blues, soul, jazz, gospel, folk, and rock into their music; and Le Vent du Nord, a contemporary Québecois ensemble that engages original composition and traditional sources to create new sounds within Quebec's francophone folk movement. Shorter concerts featured Bangladeshi Baul music performed by Golam Rabbani; Ghanaian popular dance by Benedictus Mattson; Chinese fusion music featuring Mei Han and Randy Raine-Reusch; virtuosic balafon works shared by Lassana Diabaté; spoken word poetry by Jamal Jackson Rogers; Anishinaabe musician and composer Melody McKiver's viola-based sound art; and songs from Quebec, Morocco, Turkey, Greece, Spain, and Portugal performed by Judith Cohen; a pre-recorded workshop about traditional Haudenosaunee social song and dance was also prepared by members of the Native North American Traveling College, enabling delegates to participate despite geographic distance.