[Bcma-l] Great Aunt Ida in Concert at AGSO (Penticton) May 1st

[bcma-l@museumsassn.bc.ca]

*NEWS RELEASE

For immediate release

April 18, 2007

Contact: Paul Crawford, Director/Curator
*The Art Gallery of the South Okanagan
199 Marina Way, Penticton, BC
Phone: (250) 493-2928
E-mail: agso_curator@shawbiz.ca

*Great Aunt Ida Performs at AGSO

*Vancouver’s Great Aunt Ida will be in concert on Tuesday, May 1st at 7 
pm, in the main gallery at the Art Gallery of the South Okanagan, 199 
Marina Way, in Penticton.

Formed in 2003, Great Aunt Ida is a Vancouver-based pop band led by 
multi-instrumentalist and composer, Ida Nilsen. A long awaited vehicle 
for Nilsen’s talents as a singer and songwriter, Great Aunt Ida also 
includes Barry Mirochnick (drums), Annie Wilkinson (bass), and JP Carter 
(trumpet).

Extolled for their contributions to some of the most innovative and 
acclaimed bands to surface amid Vancouver’s independent music scene, 
Great Aunt Ida’s talented co-conspirators provide the perfect foil for 
Nilsen’s pretty voice, instantly memorable melodies, and elegant piano. 
Their debut album, /Our Fall, /was released a couple of years ago, and 
they have a new CD out; /How They Fly.

/More akin to a song cycle than a concept album, /Our Fall/ plumbed a 
darkly enchanting vestibule of dreams, memories, and tales within tales. 
Hauntingly beautiful, melancholic yet never cloying, Great Aunt Ida 
takes stock of the debts and promises of a world unfolding endlessly 
upon itself. Revealing just enough of her secrets to seduce, Nilsen 
explores fragility, longing and relief in a sotto voce which reminds us 
just how much more less can be.

And now, with /How They Fly/, Ida Nilsen is making her voice a little 
easier for others to discover. The earlier disc was a sombrely beautiful 
collection of whispery monologues, but now Nilsen is singing from centre 
stage – and from a new place of confidence in her art. Ida’s world is 
less shadowy – not sunny, necessarily, but certainly more fully 
illuminated. And Nilsen, it seems, is blooming in the spotlight. Her new 
tunes are much more immediate, both in the way they were made and the 
way they strike the ears.

“A lot of them kind of came right away, and I didn’t have to do very 
much about them,” she notes. “It was just a lot more natural. And I find 
that’s true lyrically, as well; they’re not coded. They’re pretty 
straight up, although I don’t know if they’ll come across that way.”

Tickets for the Great Aunt Ida concert are available at the Art Gallery 
of the South Okanagan; $10 for Gallery members and students, or $15 for 
non-members. Tickets are limited to 50, so please reserve yours in 
advance. To arrange a media interview, reserve tickets, or for more 
information, please contact Paul Crawford at the Art Gallery of the 
South Okanagan, (250) 493-2928.

http://www.greatauntida.com

<http://www.greatauntida.com/> - end -