Eh?!

Two master Canadian fiddlers/multi-instrumentalists with eclectic tastes team up with a brilliant young musician (piano/5-string violin). Eh?! creates music that is at once old and new. 4 and 5-sring fiddles, voices, piano, accordion, mandolins, guitars, percussion and feet all weave their way through an Eh?! experience. Eh?! is dedicated to exploring the myriad pathways between tradition, innovation, collaboration and improvisation. Anything can happen at an Eh?! event.

Drawing from many great Canadian fiddle traditions - Québécois, Metis, Irish, Cape Breton, Newfoundland and Old Time, Eh?! is never content to let old tunes lie. Alongside their own compositions, the tunes of several generations of Canadian composers rub shoulders: Emile Benoit, Louis Boudreault, Oliver Schroer, Brian Pickel. No rosin left unscraped, no bow left unturned.

Formed in 2009, Eh?! has performed at: Mariposa, The Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival, The Saline Celtic Festival, The Flying Cloud Folk Club, The McMichael Gallery, The Weeds, Algoma Trad Music and Dance Camp, Legless Stocking, Goderich Suzuki School, The Dan Dance, Celtic Christmas at the Assembly Hall, and many house concerts and clubs around Ontario.

Eh?!'s first, self-titled CD was released June 1, and features great Canadian musicians Andy Hillhouse (guitar) Joe Philips (bass) and Ben Grossman (percussion) alongside band members.

Emilyn Stam: is a young pianist and fiddler who worked closely with Oliver Schroer as a founding member of Twisted String. She is quicky being recognized as a brilliant improviser, composer and creative collaborator. She has worked with Pierre Schryer, Daniel Lapp, David Woodhead, Anne Lindsay, Bill Brennan, Casey Sokol, Soozi Schlanger and Jaron Freeman-Fox. Emilyn has released one CD of solo piano improvisations called Holding Time, and been featured on recordings by many other artists.

James Stephens: James is known both for his work as a performer and as a producer/recording engineer. In performance, he plays a multitude of stringed instruments with an emphasis on fiddling. He has an abiding interest in various traditional styles, and also works extensively with singer-songwriters. He was the principal songwriter in critically acclaimed pop/roots band “Fat Man Waving” and has performed with many Ottawa area singer/songwriters such as Lynn Miles, Ian Tamblyn, Melwood Cutlery, and Terry Tufts and was a member of Texas Swing group, The Black Donnellys and neo-traditional Celtic group, Six Mile Bridge. Currently, he performs with The Brian Pickell Band, Finest Kind, Ecosse (Bobby Watt, Duncan Gillis and Rob Graves), renowned clawhammer banjo player Ken Perlman, and JIIG (James, Ian Robb, Ian Clark, Greg Brown) whose self-titled CD won a Canadian Folk Music Award in 2005. James also teaches regularly at fiddle camps throughout Canada and the U.S.

Anne Lederman: Originally from Manitoba, Anne is an internationally-acclaimed fiddler, singer, composer, multi-instrumentalist strongly rooted in several musical traditions - Celtic, Métis and French-Canadian, Klezmer, Balkan and African music. Over her 30 year career, Anne has worked with such bands as Muddy York, The Flying Bulgar Klezmer Band, Siyakha, and LOKA and such artists as Harry Hibbs, Margaret Christl, Don Freed, Holly Cole, Theresa Tova, Tom Leadbeater and Garnet Rogers, among others. She has her own band, Fiddlesong, and also performs with Njacko Backo and Kalimba Kalimba. She has recorded four CDs under her own name: Not a Mark in This World, 7 Cats, Come From Every Way and Fiddlesong. Anne also composes for theatre and her own play, Spirit of the Narrows, about the Metis fiddle tradition, was featured at the Blyth Theatre Festival in 2004 and 2005. Anne teaches traditional fiddle at the World Music Centre of the Royal Conservatory.