Vancouver's Songbird North #122

Tickets

Cost: $23.34
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SongBird North continues its 27th season in Vancouver on November 16, with producer Shari Ulrich hosting Helen Austin, T. Buckley, and Abigail Lapell on the Roundhouse stage. For almost three decades now, SongBird North has been beloved by audiences for the rich variety of songwriting styles that are on display at each show, and the magical alchemy that happens when talented artists take turns sharing songs and stories about their work. It’s a one-of-a-kind evening of live music – an opportunity to get up close and personal with the music and the artists who create and perform it.

SongBird North: Where Writers Sing and Tell is produced by Shari Ulrich for the Songwriters Association of Canada. The SAC gratefully acknowledges the support of the SOCAN Foundation. For more information on the SAC’s mandate, activities and membership programs, please visit songwriters.ca.

BACKGROUND: Since 1995, SongBird North (formerly Bluebird North) has been a mainstay in Vancouver for songwriters from across the continent, as a bi-monthly showcase that features four talented singer/songwriters of widely varying styles, on stage together, taking turns playing their original songs and sharing stories with one another and the audience about their work. While the series began in Toronto and has toured nationally, Vancouver remains its longest-standing host city.

ABOUT THE PERFORMERS
Helen Austin After years of writing songs while making a living as a musical stand-up comedian in the UK, Helen Austin’s move to Canada in 2002 was the catalyst for her musical career. While most of her time is focussed on folk-pop duo Big Little Lions, she also writes for Riptide Music Publishers and has had countless placements on TV, ads and film. Her music, both solo and with Big Little Lions, has won many awards including a JUNO Award, John Lennon Songwriting Competition Song of the Year and two Canadian Folk Music Awards. You can hear her music regularly on CBC. helenaustin.com

T. Buckley (the T stands for Tim; no relation to the late Tim Buckley) is an award-winning Canadian songwriter from Calgary who has written with with John Wort Hannam and Don Henry (Ray Charles, Kathy Mattea), to name a few. Buckley’s influences run from traditional folk to rock to various music movements worldwide, like Laurel Canyon in the ‘70s or Greenwich NY café days in the ‘60s. He has been honoured as a nominee at the Western Canadian Music Awards (Songwriter of the Year, 2022) and Canadian Folk Music Awards (Emerging Artist of the Year in 2020 and Songwriter of the Year in 2023), and won a Calgary Music Award for Male Artist (Folk Recording) and Songwriter of the Year in 2019. He released his latest album, Frame By Frame, in 2021. tbuckley.ca

Abigail Lapell Abigail Lapell is a Toronto-based singer-songwriter who has garnered two Canadian Folk Music Awards (English Songwriter of the Year in 2020 and Contemporary Album of the Year in 2017), hit number one on Canadian folk radio and accrued a staggering 20 million+ Spotify streams while touring widely across Canada, the U.S. and Europe. Her third release, Stolen Time, was produced by Howard Bilerman at Montreal’s Hotel2Tango. A theme of recovery runs through the album, with songs about becoming sober, or a partner’s sudden illness, exploring the cycle of rehabilitation and relapse. The title comes from tempo rubato, a music term referring to the loose push and pull of expressive phrasing—a fitting metaphor for the shifting rhythm of uncertain times. abigaillapell.com

Shari Ulrich (Host / Producer) began writing songs at the end of the reign of The Hometown Band in 1977. Her first song “Feel Good” was a hit for the band. Her solo career followed from 1978 with radio hits with “She Remembers”, “Bad Bad Girl”, “Romeo”, “Every Road” and others. Since then, she has released nine albums of original material along with another 16 in collaborations with Pied Pumkin, UHF (Bill Henderson & Roy Forbes) and BTU (Barney Bentall & Tom Taylor) Her work has garnered two Juno Awards and several nominations, an induction into the BC Entertainment Hall of Fame, and a 2014 Canadian Folk Music Award (CFMA) for English Songwriter of the Year. She has been producing and hosting Bluebird North / SongBird North both nationally and locally since 1996 and at the Roundhouse since 2005. shariulrich.com
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