| Veda Hille | |
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Hille on the 'Bedlam!' music video shoot, 2006. |
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| Background information | |
| Born | August 11, 1968 Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada |
| Genres | Indie rock, experimental, baroque pop, art rock |
| Occupations | Musician, songwriter, composer |
| Instruments | Vocals, tenor guitar, piano, accordion, keyboards, banjo |
| Years active | 1992–present |
| Labels | APE |
| Associated acts | The Fits, Duplex! |
| Website | vedahille.com |
Veda Hille (born August 11, 1968) is a Canadian singer-songwriter.
Contents |
Veda Hille was born in 1968 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. She started playing piano when she was 6 at her own insistence. Her family moved around a lot, from the city to the country and back again. Veda ran around in the woods and the streets, practiced piano, read books and used her Junior Scientist Microscope.
First she played classical music. Then came pop music, and a few years of jazz. There was the ill-fated year as an inept lounge musician. She attended art school studying sculpture, film, and performance art. Veda began writing music in 1990.
She put out an indie cassette, 'Songs About People and Buildings', in 1992. People liked it and she started playing around town. She slowly started the business of touring Canada, and also began a long relationship with the Canadian modern dance scene. In 1994 she released her first CD, 'Path of a Body', and has released an album roughly every 18 months since then. By the time she started working with her current band (assembled in 1997) she was regularly touring Canada, the US, and Germany.
Veda plays piano and tenor guitar, dabbles in banjo, accordion, and protocols, and has a new love affair going on with a nord electro keyboard and a handful of casios. She writes about the natural world, the trickiness of love, the constant threat of tragedy, as well as very Vancouver subjects such as the late painter Emily Carr ('Here Is A Picture') and the missing women of the Downtown Eastside ('Return of the Kildeer's 'Liza Jane').
Veda is also a member of two new bands: Duplex! (rock music for kids) and The Fits (vaudeville duets). She continues to make her own records, and does so in cahoots with Ape Records, run by XTC’s Andy Partridge. Veda is now the in-house composer for Theatre Replacement and collaborates with them on at least one show per year. She recently scored Bonnie Sherr Klein’s new NFB film Shameless: The ART of Disability, and has been producing records for other musicians as well. The PuSh International Performing Arts Festival in Vancouver commissioned part of the writing of Veda's next album, 'This Riot Life', which was released in 2008.
She is married to Justin Kellam of the bands P:ano and No Kids.
Since 1997 Veda has been working with Martin Walton (bass, lap steel, ukulele), Ford Pier (guitar, organ, French horn), Peggy Lee (cello), and Barry Mirochnick (drums, xylophone, singing saw, whatever happens to be lying around). She has recently added Patsy Klein (vocals, flute) to the mix. These people have toured and recorded together in various formations, playing hundreds of shows and festivals and have collaborated on 5 records.
In 1999 she joined forces with Oh Susanna and Kinnie Starr for the "Scrappy Bitches Tour".
Field Study has a specially designed formal show for small theatres and art spaces. In 2000 Veda commissioned Vancouver video artist Shawn Chappelle to make a 50 minute video that accompanies the music from Field Study. The video, constructed from footage shot in the northern landscapes of Canada, is projected on a large screen behind Veda as she plays the music on a grand piano.
Veda performs solo on tenor guitar, piano, and assorted keyboards. She plays a survey of her own work as well as a few covers.