Oliver Schroer
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| Oliver Schroer | |
|---|---|
| Origin |  Canada |
| Occupation(s) | Instrumentalist, Composer, Music producer |
| Instrument(s) | Fiddle, Violin |
| Years active | 1993–present |
| Website | OliverSchroer.com |
Oliver Schroer is a Canadian fiddler, composer, and music producer. Toronto critic Robert Everett-Green has described his style as a "fusion of Ontario fiddling traditions with the kind of architectural, string-crossing music of Bach's solo violin works."[1] Schroer's music also frequently employs violin harmonic and double stop techniques to create distinctly modern sounds.
A tribute concert for Oliver was held on February 19, 2008 at Hugh's Room in Toronto. It featured the Twisted String Project, seventeen kids, aged 9 through 18, led by two of Oliver's students. They raised the money through private donations to fly to Toronto from the B.C. coast, just so they could take part in the concerts. CBC recorded the concert and it was broadcast on CBC Radio 2 on April 7, 2008. The concert is available on CBC Radio 2's Concert on Demand web page.
Schroer has performed in Europe and North America in clubs, cathedrals, and New York's Lincoln Center. Altogether, he has produced or performed on over 100 albums of new traditional, acoustic, and popular music, and written more than 1,000 pieces of music.[2] He has recorded with artists such as Jimmy Webb and Barry Mann, Canadian singers James Keelaghan, Loreena McKennitt and Sylvia Tyson, acoustic guitar mavens Jesse Cook and Don Ross, East Coast rockers Great Big Sea, and West Coast rockers Spirit of the West.
His album Smithers is a thank-you album recorded for a certain special town – Smithers, BC, in the Canadian Pacific Northwest. Oliver taught and mentored intensively in Smithers over the past seven years. He wrote a tune for each of the young people he taught up there – 59 tunes in total – and recorded them with a talented young pianist from Smithers – Emilyn Stam.
The album Hymns and Hers is linked to the previous Camino CD in its deep emotion and spiritual feeling but the sound is quite different. By the time Oliver started to work on this album he had been diagnosed with leukemia. As of February 2008, he is still battling bravely.
His album Camino was recorded in churches along the Camino de Santiago pilgrim trail. Schroer walked 1,000 km of the trail in 2004 with his wife and two friends, carrying a portable recording studio. To save weight, he did not bring a violin case. He carried his instrument wrapped in a sleeping bag in his backpack, "like my own precious relic, carefully packed in its reliquary of socks and underwear."[1][3] The album features solo playing, occasionally against a background of local sounds such as church bells, birds, and monastic voices. [4]
Schroer has said of his composing work, "I used to write a lot of jigs, reels and waltzes - as a matter of fact I still do. But over the years new kinds of melodies emerged - more rarefied, harder to pin down. There were prayers, incantations, whimsies, melismas, mysteriosos, heisenbergs, fractal reels, forest blues, blessings.... They are not so much entertainment tunes, but music that expresses other important things about my relationship to life. This music is, dare I say, more spiritual."[5]
As a music educator, Schroer developed The Twisted String, a series of squads of young fiddlers and other musicians. Schroer composes the music for these groups.
[edit] Discography
- Smithers (Double CD, 2007), Big Dog Music
- Hymns and Hers (2007), Big Dog Music
- Camino (2006), Big Dog Music
- A Million Stars (2004), Big Dog Music
- Restless Urban Primitive (2001), Big Dog Music
- O2 (Double CD, 1999), Big Dog Music
- Celtica (1998), Avalon
- Stewed Tomatoes (1996), Big Dog Music
- Whirled (1994), Big Dog Music
- Jigzup (1993), Big Dog Music - Nominated for a Juno Award in the Best Roots or Traditional Album category
[edit] References
- ^ a b David Gordon Duke. "Camino project weaves a rich aural tapestry", The Vancouver Sun, Dec 2, 2006.
- ^ John Terauds. "Music to inspire the pilgrim soul; 'Crazy Canadian' with violin both welcomed, ejected from churches", Toronto Star, Apr 27, 2006.
- ^ Oliver Schroer - On the Camino Trail: The Diary. Retrieved on 2007-02-18.
- ^ John P. McLaughlin. "A musical pilgrim's progress: Concert brings to life Oliver Schroer's aural travelogue", The Province, Dec 1, 2006.
- ^ Oliver Schroer O2 Essay. Retrieved on 2006-02-18.
