Roxanne Potvin and Christine Bougie perform at Ringo’s Thursday May 26.
It’s been a few years now since Roxanne Potvin last performed to a Fredericton audience. She was a guest musician at the Harvest Jazz and Blues Festival back in 2007 and was through again in 2011 supporting her last album, Play. Five years later, she’s back with a new album and will definitely deliver one of the must-see shows at this year’s Living Roots Music Festival.
Potvin’s new album For Dreaming, is the result of inspiration she’s accumulated over the past five years. In that time, Potvin returned to school to study sound engineering and took a chance invitation to be a guest performer on Canadian Pacific’s Holiday Train from Montreal to Calgary, with Vancouver power pop favourites, The Odds. According to Potvin, her time spent playing music on the train gave her the creative spark she needed.
“When I came back in January, I started furiously writing,” she said. “Then I booked a solo tour of western Canada for the spring, and it felt like I was all-in all over again. It’s pretty amazing when you make that decision. You start putting that energy out there, and it kind of comes back to you. It was a very interesting year.”
After recording bed tracks at Little Bullhorn Studio in Ottawa with producer and engineer Dave Draves, Potvin took the reins and finished the rest of the album at her home studio where she invited some good friends to contribute to the project including her current touring partner, Christine Bougie.
Bougie’s discography is staggering. She has contributed to over 40 recordings with artists like Jason Collett, The Good Lovelies, Amelia Curran, Justin Rutledge and Joshua Van Tassell among many others. She also found time to release three of her own albums, a film soundtrack and many collaborative projects. Her musical voice is as broad and diverse as they come, with pedal steel and guitar work drawing comparisons to the likes of Steve Dawson and Bill Frisell.
Potvin and Bougie will perform as a duo Thursday May 26 at Ringo’s on Smythe Street.
To learn more about the inaugural Living Roots Music Festival (artists, schedule, ticket info, venues, etc), visit their Facebook page.
