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Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Sagapool making stop at Fitchburg State University

By Richard Duckett TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
rduckett@telegram.com

When: 8 p.m. March 31 Where: Weston Auditorium, Fitchburg State University How much: $15; $12 seniors; $5 students (978) 665-3347; www.fitchburgstate.edu/ cultural

Sagapool would like to make a name for itself down south.

It doesn't have to be that far south.

“We're only one hour from the border,” said Alexis Dumais, pianist and double bass player for the evocative-sounding French-Canadian instrumental band.

In 2008 the Montreal group changed its name from Manouche, reflecting a musical shift from gypsy/klezmer to a more all-embracing world music style. Most recently Sagapool really has been down south, renting a house near Asheville, N.C., for four days of intense rehearsal to get a show on the road that has included five dates in North Carolina before the band heads back north on an itinerary bringing it to Fitchburg State University Saturday night. The show at Weston Auditorium is part of FSU's CenterStage arts and culture series.

Manouche/Sagapool has played stateside before, but the total of 10 U.S. stops before the six-member band heads to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia on its current tour seems to reflect a desire for more of a following across the Canadian border. With a new album — “Sagapool” — just out, now might be the perfect time.

“It would be wonderful. I would hope the response would be good,” said Dumais during a recent pre-tour telephone interview from Montreal. “I'm sure there's a public for instrumental music.”

He was talking just post-release of “Sagapool” in Canada (the album was officially released here last Tuesday) and the initial reception had been great, Dumais reported in his thick but charming French-Canadian accent. “People that have followed us from the beginning are really happy and like it a lot,” he said.

The band was formed in 1999 by students at the Conservatoire de Musique de Montreal. Among the founders was violinist Zoé Dumais, Alexis' sister. He was a pianist and not a student at the conservatory but liked listening to the music the band was playing. Two years later they needed a double bass player — not (at that time) a pianist, but Alexis could play the instrument and volunteered.

Manouche soon won a reputation in Montreal and elsewhere in Quebec for its joie-de-vivre, vibrant music and original and dazzling repertoire.

In its early years it was a “gypsy-, klezmer-oriented band,” Dumais said, although he added with some pride that Manouche/Sagapool has always been difficult to definitively categorize. Folk, jazz, and what one critic has called “the rich cultural mosaic of Montreal” have been other influences. The band has played many times at the Montreal International Jazz Festival and won “Instrumental Album of the Year” at the Canadian Folk Music Awards in 2008 for “Episode Trois” (appropriately, its third album).

The album “Sagapool,” its fourth, comes across with quite a haunting introspection. It's a sort of meditative folk landscape and also an often beautiful one, although there is plenty of energy to the musicianship.

Sagapool clarinetist and co-founder Guilliame Bourque has said “Early on, we were bringing heat to the cold winter, but now we're assuming our northerness.”

Besides Bourque, and Zoé and Alexis Dumais, the rest of the current line-up is Luzio Altobelli (accordion, drum, double bass), Dany Nicolas (guitar, banjo, double bass) and Marton Maderspach (drum, double bass).

Dumais said that when Manouche started with gypsy/klezmer, the music “was new to us. We said ‘Let's try this, it's fun.' I believe we're living this again with our new style.” After a while, “we got to the end of what we felt was pertinent.” Plus, a number of other bands had followed in the same direction. “We started to do something more pertinent.”

The fans have stuck around. “Yeah, I believe because exactly like us their musical tastes changed,” Dumais said.

Fourteen years constitutes longevity. Nevertheless, Sagapool is not a full-time job.

“Everybody has other bands,” Dumais noted. A graduate of the University of Montreal with a BA in jazz piano, he has performed George Gershwin's “Rhapsody in Blue” for the Symphony of Winds of Montreal, and performed with Loco Locass, Polémilbazar, and Fanfare Pourpour. He also teaches jazz piano at the Music School of St. Lawrence.

Still, he keeps on jumping back into Sagapool along with his fellow band members to record, perform and tour, spreading the word and music.

Dumais said he has never performed in Massachusetts before. In Fitchburg, a French-Canadian shouldn't feel like a stranger, even though it is south of the border.

“In New England there are a lot of French names. I've noticed that,” Dumais said.  03/27/12 >> go there
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