Kyle Brenders (ON) (President, 2014–16; Board Member, 2013–14)

Over the past 18 months, I have been on the CNMN board as an inter­im replace­ment for Jer­ry Per­gole­si. My time on the board has shown me some of the strengths and weak­ness­es of the orga­ni­za­tion. We are strong because no mat­ter what your musi­cal prac­tice there are like-mind­ed indi­vid­u­als that share your pas­sions who are con­nect­ed through our net­work. CNMN’s FORUM 2014 in Cal­gary demon­strat­ed that we each have sim­i­lar goals and hopes for our music and by com­ing togeth­er we are able to sup­port each oth­er to keep push­ing the lim­its of music in Cana­da. Though in say­ing this, it is clear that we need to broad­en our own def­i­n­i­tion, become more inclu­sive, and pro­vide sup­port for a wider swath of explorato­ry music with­in Canada.

The CNMN is poised to have an impact on the cul­tur­al per­cep­tion of unheard and under rec­og­nized musics through­out the coun­try. We are strong because of our mem­ber­ship, which includes rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the old guard that has expe­ri­ences to share, and the ris­ing lead­ers that are doing things with­in a new par­a­digm. Each has some­thing to learn from the oth­er and only by bring­ing peo­ple togeth­er in an envi­ron­ment of open­ness and acces­si­bil­i­ty will we be able move for­ward as a nation­al musi­cal cul­ture. We are only weak if we priv­i­lege one over the oth­er. The future of the net­work is the grass­roots effort that is redefin­ing how music is being cre­at­ed in this coun­try in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the estab­lished insti­tu­tions. If we ignore this, we will lose the pos­si­bil­i­ty of expand­ing our net­work to rep­re­sent the true diver­si­ty of our country’s musi­cal culture.

Kyle Bren­ders is a Toron­to based mul­ti-instru­men­tal­ist, com­pos­er, impro­vis­er and arts admin­is­tra­tor. Bren­ders’ work attempts to fuse the var­i­ous musi­cal expe­ri­ences that have shaped him as a cre­ative artist. His inter­est in music that falls with­in gener­ic and idiomat­ic cracks has allowed him to devel­op his own per­son­al style. Bren­ders has stud­ied and played with Ab Baars, Antho­ny Brax­ton, Lori Freed­man, David Mott, Alvin Luci­er, Tay­lor Ho Bynum, Jean Derome, Gor­don Allen, The Aus­tralian Art Orches­tra, Mal­colm Gold­stein, Dan Snaith (Cari­bou), Evan Park­er, Mar­shal Allen, and Mary Halver­son. Bren­ders cur­rent group, the Kyle Bren­ders Quar­tet, plays music that explores the idea of a jazz quar­tet through expand­ing approach­es to com­po­si­tion and impro­vi­sa­tion. Bren­ders also acts as Artis­tic Asso­ciate with Sound­streams curat­ing the Salon21 series, pro­vid­ing art direc­tion for the con­cert livestreams and Soundmakers.ca, as well as numer­ous oth­er tasks that sup­port the pre­sen­ta­tion of con­tem­po­rary music on a nation­al and inter­na­tion­al scale.

www.kylebrenders.ca