Awesome April music part 1: Basia Bulat returns to Leeds

Two years on from her last visit, Basia Bulat returned to Leeds touring her new album Good Advice. On Record Store Day no less (16th April). Yet another good beer venue - this time she played Headrow House. Good Advice is a bigger sounding album, in many ways, than Tall Tall Shadow, so understandably Basia wanted to tour it with a band. The efficient option, as it transpired, was to have her support band as her backing band.

The Weather Station (trio led by Tamara Lindeman) played a 30 minute set to a small and rather chilly audience (maybe Headrow House had forgotten the heating....). The Weather Station has a big-open-space instrumental sound (I definitely heard the soundscapes reminding me of looking at Ontario's landscape from the train); whilst Tamara seems to be a pretty respected songsmith, 30 minutes was too short a time to get into her lyrics. They were, however, much more engaging than the support from 2014.

Basia and backing musicians played a shorter set than in her 2014 trip. Whilst the musicianship was all excellent, with a good vibe (plenty of laughing and joking between songs) we felt that the balance was a bit off-kilter: Basia's vocals seemed a bit swamped by the instrument set-up. Maybe it was calculated for a larger space than Headrow House - I wonder if it feels odd or weird to go from playing sell-out halls in Canada (such as Toronto's Massey Hall) to playing for 100 people?

In possession of a spangly gold cape (containing her magic powers!) Basia and co started with a selection of big-sounding songs: Let Me In, Long Goodbye, La La Lie, Heart Of My Own, Five/Four.

The second section of the set was my favourite: Basia along with her autoharp. The treats in store were: Paris or Amsterdam, Gold Rush, In The Night. In comparison to the foot-stomping album version of Gold Rush, the solo autoharp rendition was amazing - I was almost in tears. None on this evening, but apparently In The Night had been the impetus for the only mosh pit so far a a Basia Bulat gig....

Rounding off the evening we heard Good Advice, Wires, Someday Soon and Infamous. No encore - but having heard a few quips about the excellence of the NHS, there were a few illnesses and injuries.

A pretty fun evening, but for all the magic capes, this show didn't have the spellbinding-ness of Basia's 2014 solo show.

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Pigeon Funk

Notes on a very random purchase. Earlier today I acquired Venetian Snares 'Rossz Csillag Alatt Sz ü letett ' purely on the basis of the language and artwork. Its certainly something different - and most definitely not pop. After a bit of searching: Venetial Snares is, according to Wikipedia, the performing name of Aaron Funk, who seems to specialise in experimental tracks in odd time signatures. Article here . The sleeve notes for this album (whose title is Hungarian for 'Born under a bad star') poses the question: what if, for just a day, we could both be pigeons? Interessant. Apparently this concept (a day in the life of a Hungarian pigeon) is non-typical of Venetian Snares sound, but one could ask, does Mr Funk do 'typical'? On first listening, the sound of this CD mixes classical/traditional Hungarian sounds and breakbeats. but aside from that? Definitely a 'listen for yourself' artist; try the website , fan site or myspace .

Lang Lang: a little bit of stardust in Southam Hall

Lang Lang with Anita Pari Like many National Arts Centre regulars, the idea of a Lang Lang concert sounded fantastic... except that for me the Gala tickets are rather too expensive. As a result the turnout for today's masterclass with young artists Anita Pari (Ottawa), Alexander Malikov (Calgary), and Tina Chong (Banff) in Southam Hall was pretty good. No surprises that there were photographers and a TV camera all over the stage... so much so that during Lang's analysis of Malikov's rendition of Transcendental Étude No 8 'Wild Hunt' (Liszt), someone shouted at the cameraman to move. To my mind they seemed a little intrusive on the performances, but none of the artists seemed to take any notice. Lang Lang with Tina Chong Up first and for me the best performance was Anita Pari with the captivating Ballade No 1 by Chopin. In comparison, Malikov's performance did not have anywhere near as much projection. Final performer Tina Chong seemed

New talent at Southminster

As a follow-on from last weekend's excellent Chopin concert, there is an afternoon of New Artists from the NAC's Summer Music Institute at Southminster United Church on 17th June. Entitled 'Dover Beach and other works for summertime', the concert features new artists Katarzyna Sadej , Emily Nenninger , Drew Santini, Hannah Min, Paul Casey , Karen Kang and Bryan Wagorn. I had the chance to hear Bryan Wagorn at one of University of Ottawa's Concerts at the NAC 4th Stage concerts back in February and thoroughly enjoyed his performance. The proposed programme is very enticing: MENDELSSOHN String Quartet No. 2 in A minor, Op. 13 MONIUSZKO Sen (The Dream) Prząśniczka (Spinner Girl) SZYMANOWSKI Lecioły Zórazie (The Swans Were Flying) Ściani Dumbek (The Dark Forest) CHOPIN Piosnka Litewska (Lithuanian Folksong) Moja Pieszczotka

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