WJO’s popularity has grown steadily over the course of the band’s history, from small, informal events in 1997 to a multi-concert season and sold-out performances at various venues around Winnipeg and in outlying communities. Today, the orchestra roster boasts 16 to 25 Winnipeg-based musicians whose combined resumes touch every corner of performance jazz locally, nationally, and around the world. Their familiarity with the Winnipeg music environment (the key players, the marketplace, and the community’s appetite for jazz) gave them confidence in the capabilities of local musicians and out of that natural savvy and inherent enthusiasm, the WJO was born.Ĭommissioning new works and connecting with and inspiring students and young musicians is an integral part of the WJO vision. Gillis and Boychouk were the right people at the right time, but the WJO also owes its roots to the collective efforts of many passionate stakeholders including the musicians, board members, volunteers and administrators who sensed a potential audience that was not being served.
Richard Gillis and Sasha Boychouk founded the Winnipeg Jazz Orchestra (WJO) in 1997, inspired by a vision of forming a professional big band with the best emerging and veteran musicians in Winnipeg.
But it wasn't until the 1980s, after four years spent performing with an avant-garde theatre company in Toronto, that Connie turned to music full time and was welcomed with open arms by the folk scene.ĭr. Like many prairie girls in the 50s and 60s, Connie grew up singing in the church choir and listening to Patsy Cline and The Beatles on her record player. From Beijing to New Delhi to Saskatoon to Washington, Connie has triumphed with a mix of song and spoken word honed in pacing and tone by the many years she spent performing. She has traveled prairie backroads to visit modest community centers and sold out concert halls in major cities. What she says between songs is as intriguing as the lyrics she sings. It is also about the power of personality. People come back to see her again and again because a Connie Kaldor performance is about more than just the power of music. Her live performances are legendary and her fan base broad and fiercely loyal. She has recorded nine albums, sold tens of thou- sands of copies, but has never had a commercial hit. She is a fearless chronicler of the human experience without the folksong angst. She is an artist of substance without pretension, witty and urbane without condescension. She is a Juno Award-winning singer who has flourished on the folk music scene for over two decades, yet her repertoire of original material blurs musical boundaries, embracing elements of gospel, rock, country and western, folk, blue grass and adult contemporary. Music pundits have tried to define the essence of the prairie-born acoustic performer for over two decades, but even the most eloquent have fallen short of perfection.įact is, Connie Kaldor is a performer without borders. She could well be writing about her personal artistic complexities. "Just when you think you've got it all figured out, something roars in and it turns you about."Ĭonnie Kaldor writes this and more about the unexpected twists and turns of life and love.