Former Estevan resident Michael Dawson has received a $3,000 Independent Artists grant from SK Arts to write and arrange songs for a new album.
The money will also be used to conceptualize accompanying videos, design, visuals and photos related to the release and live performance.
“I truly can’t say enough great things about SK Arts. It’s truly such an integral of the fabric of our province,” Dawson told the Mercury.
This album will be a solo effort for Dawson, who has been a member of the independent pop group Library Voices for more than a decade. Five members of Library Voices are former Estevan residents.
He described his music as instrumental and ambient.
“I’m very much collecting and manipulating beautiful little scraps of sounds and … then repurposing them into new songs. Sometimes that means building lush synthesizer pads that sound like the soundtrack to a movie, but just as often it means I’m literally sitting with scissors and scotch tape, splicing little pieces of cassette tapes together into loops.”
The album is expected to be released this fall. Towards the end of summer, Dawson expects he’ll be sharing some excerpts, along with videos. It will be released on vinyl and be available on all streaming services.
This will be his second solo album. His first release, the self-titled Michael Scott Dawson, was released in October. It took about two years to complete, and was influenced by Estevan on a few tracks. The album cover was actually a photo he took driving from Estevan to Regina.
“A couple of evenings I dragged my mother along as I drove out to fields around the city and made recordings of birds and nature, that I’ve been incorporating into new compositions.”
Dawson still expects that Library Voices will regroup at some point and record another album, but for the last few years everyone had been busy with other personal, professional and creative endeavours.
“They’re all still my closest friends in the world and rarely does a day go by that I don’t speak with at least one member, so I’m confident things will line up at some point. I’m lucky to be part of a group with such great people who are far more talented than I am, but it’s felt so rewarding to work on music alone that hones in on my own tastes, interests, and personality,” Dawson said.
Independent Artists grants support Saskatchewan artists to pursue their creative work and careers by funding creative, professional development or research projects and the performance of artistic works. These grants support the ongoing development of artistic practice in Saskatchewan.
At the most recent grant deadlines, SK Arts awarded funding to 90 individuals and organizations, totalling almost $800,000. SK Arts funding supports a variety of initiatives, including organizations that provide ongoing programs in the arts, the creative work of professional artists, community art projects and the engagement of professional artists to work in schools with students and teachers.
Established in 1948, SK Arts is the oldest public arts funder in North America and second oldest in the world after the Arts Council of Great Britain. It provides grants, programs and services to individuals and groups whose activities have an impact on the arts in Saskatchewan and ensure that opportunities exist for Saskatchewan residents to experience all art forms. For more information, visit www.sk-arts.ca.
