Sarah Albu (QC) (Board Member, 2016–2018)

2016 10 28 -

As an artist who has often walked the line between aca­d­e­m­ic train­ing insti­tu­tions and DIY set­tings, I am thrilled to be able, as a CNMN board mem­ber, to lis­ten to the needs of artists and to help make space for the evolv­ing def­i­n­i­tion of New Music in Cana­da. I am par­tic­u­lar­ly inter­est­ed in what this means for the inclu­sion of diverse forms of cre­ation across the coun­try, and the ways we can con­nect togeth­er through love for the act of lis­ten­ing, which is what brought so many of us to the field of music/sound in the first place. I firm­ly believe that despite com­ing from var­ied back­grounds, the artists, ensem­bles and orga­ni­za­tions that we strive to bring togeth­er under the umbrel­la of the CNMN are unit­ed through an engage­ment and gen­uine curios­i­ty towards the act(s) of mak­ing and expe­ri­enc­ing sound. As a board mem­ber, I strive to facil­i­tate com­mu­ni­ca­tion and part­ner­ship, both with­in “New Music” and out­wards — in our greater com­mu­ni­ties and with our col­leagues prac­tic­ing in oth­er disciplines.

Sarah Albu is a Mon­tre­al-based singer, actress, and mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary artist spe­cial­iz­ing in vocal per­for­mance at the inter­sec­tion of music and the­atre. High­ly sought after as a soloist per­form­ing con­tem­po­rary and exper­i­men­tal work, she col­lab­o­rates exten­sive­ly with many musi­cians, ensem­bles, com­posers, film-and-the­atre-mak­ers, and artists work­ing across dis­ci­plines. She record­ed and self-pro­duced her first solo album in 2013.

Also active as an impro­vi­sor, sound design­er, exper­i­men­tal noise­mak­er, choral singer and yoga musi­cian, Sarah’s per­for­ma­tive and com­po­si­tion­al pur­suits take inspi­ra­tion from a vari­ety of styles and his­tor­i­cal tra­di­tions. A native of Wind­sor, Ontario, her intro­duc­tion to musi­cal life includ­ed com­ing of age as a self-taught elec­tric bassist on the punk scene, singing in church and cham­ber choirs and per­form­ing and teach­ing musi­cal the­atre. High­lights include a cen­ten­ni­al per­for­mance of Schoen­berg’s Pier­rot Lunaire at the Banff Cen­tre for the Arts, Peter Maxwell Davies’ Miss Don­nithorne’s Mag­got and Georges Aperghis’ Les Sept Crimes d’Amour with Mon­tre­al’s Ensem­ble Paramirabo, two roles in Voca­lypse Pro­duc­tions’ immer­sive opera Miss For­tune’s Port­man­teau (Hal­i­fax), a the­atri­cal and spa­tial­ized solo voice and elec­tron­ics pro­gram pre­sent­ed by Codes d’Ac­cès, a series of musi­cal inter­ven­tions and per­for­ma­tive artist talks inves­ti­gat­ing voice and posi­tion­al­i­ty with Ruby Kato Attwood, and a dark­ly comedic cabaret con­cert — Songs and Niaseries — with vocal impro­vi­sors Gabriel Dhar­moo and Eliz­a­beth Lima. She stud­ied clas­si­cal voice and theatre/performance art at Con­cor­dia Uni­ver­si­ty and began grad­u­ate work at the Con­ser­va­to­ry of the Hague in Sep­tem­ber 2016.

http://www.sarahalbu.com/