Margins of Sound, a new cross-genre electronic and experimental music festival, will take place this weekend in downtown Nanaimo’s OV Arts Centre and include free performances in the Bowen Park amphitheater.
Josh Rudolph, one of the event organizers, said a primary goal for the Margins of Sound Society is to expose audiences to forms of sound art that they may not otherwise come across in an accessible way.
“What better way to encourage people to access this type of programming than just to make a large portion of it free for the public?” he said in an interview with The Discourse.
The free programming in Bowen Park will take place on Saturday, June 28 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The lineup includes a diverse spread of 15 artists including Ghanaian folk singer Pesewa, ambient beats by Kuma and Ora Cogan’s experimental folk and fiddle.
“Every artist has a different innovative way of performance,” said Priyanka Chakrabarti, co-organizer of the festival. “They’re not following a genre, per se, they are doing something interesting with their music.”
“I like to think of it as a listening festival,” Rudolph said.
The festival is also hosting a series of workshops, including a field trip that is free for kids by musician and biologist Tarun Nayar who will both perform as Modern Biology and lead an outdoor participatory field recording workshop that explores the “hidden musicality of the natural world.”
Another workshop by Alyssa Haas and Greg Borreson will introduce the visual programming software, Touch Designer, to local creatives.
The festival received an $8,000 grant from the City of Nanaimo’s downtown event revitalization fund that helped make it possible.
Margins of Sound will take place from Friday, June 26 to Sunday, June 28 at the OV Arts Centre and Bowen Park. A festival pass costs $80 or you can buy tickets for the Friday and Saturday showcases for $40 each. Workshops are individually priced.
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