This show is presented by the West End Cultural Centre. This show will be in the ACU Hall
Singer-songwriter-pianist Jeffery Straker performs over 100 shows per year across Canada. He has recorded for CBC radio’s ‘Canada Live’, had a music video chart in the top 10 on Much More Music Canada and has toured internationally as far as Peru, Mexico and Chile. His tour stops range from intimate house concerts to club and theatre shows and include recent sold-out concerts with several Canadian symphony orchestras, performing his own songs. Canadian Musician Magazine has said, “Very much an artist to watch” while the Chicago Free Press has written, “Rufus Wainwright, as well as k.d. lang are among the Canadians making essential and beautiful music. Add the name Jeffery Straker to that list”.
Jeffery launched his latest full length recording, “Dirt Road Confessional”, May 19 2017, continuing to push the boundaries of what it means to be a piano balladeer. With themes both contemplative and joyous, the 12-song collection encapsulates the seasoned Saskatchewan singer/songwriter’s experiences of playing over 200 shows around the world since the release of his previous album, 2015’s “North Star Falling”. Straker regularly draws comparisons to a young Billy Joel or Elton John, with shades of Rufus Wainwright and Harry Nilsson thrown in, but on Dirt Road Confessional his personal storytelling style has evolved into his own unified voice. At the same time, he was determined to explore different approaches in the studio, which led the album to be constructed out of five separate sessions.
Daniel Ledwell (Jenn Grant) produced three songs in Nova Scotia, Royal Wood co-wrote two songs and co-produced them with Lawrence Katz in L.A., Dean Drouillard (Justin Rutledge, Amelia Curran) produced two songs in Toronto—where an additional track was also laid down with Robyn Dell’Unto—and Murray Pulver (The Bros. Landreth) co-produced the balance with Brad Prosko during sessions in Regina. Despite so many hands being involved in the end result, the foundation of Dirt Road Confessional is Straker’s unwavering sonic vision for the record, and its story about finding love while at the same time finding courage to pursue one’s art.
“Lyrically I share more about myself than I ever have before, and musically I’ve moved in a more roots-folk direction, in some ways because that’s the sound I grew up with. It seems like a really natural progression—dobro, banjo and acoustic guitar are featured, but piano is, of course, still at the core of most of the songs.” Straker, in fact, grew up listening to country music on his family’s rural Saskatchewan farm at the same time he was studying classical music and performing full sonatas and concertos by composers such as Beethoven and Grieg. Eventually, the work of fellow Saskatchewan native Joni Mitchell prompted him to begin writing his own material, and Straker’s focus shifted to poetry and pop hooks. This recording sounds, wonderfully, like his influences.
His previous album “North Star Falling” was released March 2015. The 12-song recording was produced by Dean Drouillard (Royal Wood, Justin Rutledge) and wove a new sound around Straker’s songwriter-piano-pop. Electric guitars, horns, & strings as well as acoustic guitar helped set the stage. The launch of the album (Acronym/Universal Canada) included 2 national tours with performances from coast to coast. The album rose to to the top 10 (#9) on the iTunes Canada singer-songwriter charts within its first weeks.
The work that helped Straker hit the radar of many in Canada was his 2012 recording, “Vagabond”, produced by Canadian multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter Danny Michel. It was a thrill for him to record it on Glenn Gould’s grand piano at the CBC studios in Toronto. The release met with critical acclaim with the Toronto Star giving it 4 (out of 4) stars and calling it “one of the most faultlessly conceived and meticulously executed albums in any genre to come out of Canada in a long time”. “Vagabond” debuted in the top 20 on the iTunes singer-songwriter charts and hit the top 10 on several college radio stations across Canada. Xtra! (Toronto) said of the album: “like the unexpected yet surprisingly down-to-earth lovechild of Neil Young and Elton John”.
Originally from small town Saskatchewan, the classically trained pianist was raised by a church organist mother and an auctioneer father. He swears he was born under the piano on the family farm. All this might explain his ability to share songs with audiences. In 2014, however, he definitely left the farm as he was thrown into the Latin American spotlight when his career was boosted via winning the prestigious Vina del Mar (Chile) song competition. Representing Canada while performing live to a festival crowd of 20,000 people and to a TV audience of 100,000,000 viewers across the Spanish speaking world, he quickly gained a fan following in Latin America where he’s performed multiple times.
Straker’s songwriting has seen him become a national top 10 finalist in the Canadian Radiostar Songwriting Competition and a top 20 finalist in the global Unisong Competition as well as twice placing in the top 10 in the prestigious Mountain Stage Newsong contest. His songs have been licensed to TV, film and for theatrical use.