Rae Spoon | |
|---|---|
 Rae Spoon in November 2013 | |
| Born | Calgary, Alberta |
| Occupation | Singer-songwriter, short story writer |
| Nationality | Canadian |
| Period | 1990s–present |
| Notable works | First Grass Spring Fire, superioryouareinferior, My Prairie Home |
| Website | |
| www | |
Rae Spoon is a Canadian musician, composer, producer, performer, and writer from Calgary, Alberta. Their musical style has varied from country to electronic-influenced indie rock and folk punk. [1]
Spoon grew up as a transgender person in Calgary, Alberta. They were raised in a Pentecostal household by a paranoid-schizophrenic father. Spoon now lives in Victoria, British Columbia.
In 2003, Spoon said they identified as a trans man. [2] In 2012, during an interview with fellow advocate for the gender-neutral pronoun and cartoonist, Elisha Lim, Spoon noted a preference for the pronoun "they", [3] and has identified as non-binary since then. [4] They explained to Now Magazine , "after years of fighting to be called 'he,' the idea of coming out again made me tired. But now I feel kind of rejuvenated, ready to fight on some more. I think the 'they' pronoun is a pretty cool thing. It's letting a lot of people not have to identify as a man or a woman. Whatever it means to them." [5]
During the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, which forced them to cancel a series of tours, Spoon was diagnosed with cervical cancer. They said they did not know what the prognosis was at that point. [6] They underwent chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and surgery, and at one point were suffering so much that they considered seeking medical assistance in dying; however, by October 2020, they were declared cancer-free. [7]
How do you become a transgender country singer? For some, it's easier to be transgender from the start, and then work towards becoming a singer. For others it is better to play music first, and then come out as transgender. About ten years ago, I managed to do both in the space of a few months.
Spoon started performing before they started recording. They decided they wanted to become a songwriter while performing at the age of seventeen. [9] They emerged as a country and roots singer. Their early music features country imagery to the sound of acoustic string instruments such as banjo, guitar and mandolin. [10]
Spoon has performed with such artists as Annabelle Chvostek, Ember Swift, Kinnie Starr, Melissa Ferrick, The Be Good Tanyas, Bitch & Animal, Natalie Merchant and Earl Scruggs. [11] They have performed at festivals including North Country Fair, South Country Fair, Under the Volcano Festival, and the Vancouver, [11] Regina, Ottawa, Calgary, Edmonton, Brandon Folk, Music & Art Festival and Winnipeg folk festivals.
Spoon's breakthrough album, 2008's Superioryouareinferior, was recorded in Calgary and introduced some electronic music elements into Spoon's style. [1] Superioryouareinferior includes themes previously used by Spoon like Canadian history and culture such as the commentary on colonialism in their song "Come On Forest Fire Burn The Disco Down". [12] Superioryouareinferior was a longlisted nominee for the 2009 Polaris Music Prize. [13]
While touring Europe Spoon met Alexandre Decoupigny in Berlin. Decoupigny and Spoon collaborated in the album Worauf Wartest Du? [14] Decoupigny taught Spoon how to create music with a computer which inspired the musician to further experiment with electronic music. [15] The experimentation with electronic music influenced their subsequent albums and culminated in I Can't Keep All Our Secrets. [16]
They have also published First Spring Grass Fire, a book of short stories about growing up in Alberta. Arsenal Pulp Press released the book in the fall of 2012. [5] The book was a nominee for the 2013 Lambda Literary Awards in the Transgender Fiction category, [17] and Spoon was awarded an Honour of Distinction from the Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBT writers in 2014. [18]
Spoon has stated that First Spring Grass Fire was written to help them prepare for the production of a National Film Board of Canada documentary about their life and music, My Prairie Home , directed by Chelsea McMullan. The film was released in the fall of 2013. [19] [20] My Prairie Home , the album of music that Spoon composed for the film, was a longlisted nominee for the 2014 Polaris Music Prize. [21]
In 2012, Spoon and Ivan Coyote collaborated on Gender Failure, a touring multimedia show in which both artists performed music and spoken word pieces about their failed attempts at fitting into the gender binary. [22] A book based on the show was published by Arsenal Pulp in 2014. [23] Gender Failure was nominated for the ALA's Over the Rainbow Project List in 2015. [24]
In 2014, Spoon composed music for the feature film The Valley Below . [25]
Spoon began the music label Coax Records "out of a love for indie music and as an answer to under representation for many groups in the music industry." [26] The album "Armour" was released on Coax in 2016. [27]
In 2017, Spoon published a manual in the How To series, entitled How to (Hide) Be(hind) Your Songs. [28]
Spoon's young adult novel, Green Glass Ghosts, a queer coming-of-age story set in Vancouver, British Columbia and illustrated by Gem Hall, was published by Arsenal Pulp Press in 2021. [29]
Non-binary and genderqueer are umbrella terms for gender identities that are outside the male/female gender binary. Non-binary identities often fall under the transgender umbrella since non-binary people typically identify with a gender that is different from the sex assigned to them at birth, although some non-binary people do not consider themselves transgender.
Chad VanGaalen is a Canadian musician, animator, and artist from Calgary, Alberta.
Great Lake Swimmers is a Canadian folk rock band from Wainfleet, Ontario, and currently based in Toronto.
Daniel Mangan is a Canadian musician. He has won two Juno awards and has toured extensively throughout North America, Europe and Australia, having released 5 studio LPs and numerous EPs and singles. He has scored for feature film, as well as television for Netflix and AMC. He is also a co-founder of Side Door, a marketplace platform connecting artists with alternative venue spaces for in-person & online shows.
Shadrach Kabango, known professionally as Shad or Shad K, is a Canadian rapper and broadcaster. Beginning his career in 2005, has released seven studio albums and three extended plays. He won a Juno Award for Rap Recording of the Year in 2011 and five of his albums have been shortlisted for the Polaris Music Prize, the most short-list nominations of any artist in the prize's history. In 2013, CBC Music named Shad the second-greatest Canadian rapper of all time. Shad hosted Q on CBC Radio One from 2015 to 2016, and hosts the International Emmy and Peabody Award-winning documentary series Hip-Hop Evolution on HBO Canada and Netflix.
Vivek Shraya is a Canadian musician, writer, and visual artist. She is a seven-time Lambda Literary Award finalist and is considered a Great Canadian Filmmaker of the Future by CBC Arts.
Ivan E. Coyote is a Canadian spoken word performer, writer, and LGBT advocate. Coyote has won many accolades for their collections of short stories, novels, and films. They also visit schools to tell stories and give writing workshops. The CBC has called Coyote a "gender-bending author who loves telling stories and performing in front of a live audience." Coyote is non-binary and uses singular they pronouns. Many of Coyote's stories are about gender, identity, and social justice. Coyote currently resides in Vancouver, British Columbia.
This is a summary of the year 2012 in the Canadian music industry.
This is a summary of the year 2013 in the Canadian music industry.
My Prairie Home is a 2013 Canadian documentary film about transgender singer/songwriter Rae Spoon, directed by Chelsea McMullan. It features musical performances and interviews about Spoon's troubled childhood, raised by Pentecostal parents obsessed with the Rapture and an abusive father, as well as Spoon's past experiences with gender dysphoria. The film was shot in the Canadian Prairies, including the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology in Drumheller. My Prairie Home was produced by Lea Marin for the National Film Board of Canada (NFB).
Chelsea McMullan is a Canadian documentary filmmaker, best known for their 2013 film My Prairie Home, a film about transgender musician Rae Spoon.
The 2014 edition of the Canadian Polaris Music Prize was presented on September 22, 2014, at The Carlu event theatre in Toronto, Ontario. Actor Jay Baruchel was the host of the ceremony.
My Prairie Home is an album by Canadian singer-songwriter Rae Spoon, released in 2013. Written and recorded as a soundtrack to the documentary film My Prairie Home, the album was a longlisted nominee for the 2014 Polaris Music Prize.
The following is a list of notable events and releases that happened in 2016 in music in Canada.
Jeremy Dutcher is a classically trained Canadian Indigenous tenor, composer, musicologist, performer and activist, who previously lived in Toronto, Ontario and currently lives in Montréal, Québec. He became widely known for his first album Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa, which won the 2018 Polaris Music Prize and the Juno Award for Indigenous Music Album of the Year at the 2019 Juno Awards.
Yves Jarvis is the stage name of Jean-Sébastien Yves Audet, a Canadian experimental musician, singer and producer who also previously released music under the stage names Un Blonde and Faux Fur.
Cindy Lee is the performance and songwriting vehicle of Canadian musician Patrick Flegel, former guitarist and lead singer of Women.
Aquakultre is a Canadian soul and R&B musical project from Halifax, Nova Scotia, whose core member is singer and rapper Lance Sampson. They are most noted for their album Legacy, which was a longlisted nominee for the 2020 Polaris Music Prize.
It's close to 20 years since I came out as transgender and eight since I came out as non-binary.
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