Chickens, coyotes, and chukars – oh my!
Although known for always performing with a live snake, or snakes (typically, but not always, a red-sided garter snake, Thamnophis sirtalis), wrapped around her neck, resting on her shoulders, slithering up and down her head, burrowing themselves in her hair, Susan Israel – of the John Enns Chamber Music Ensemble fame, of the Winnipeg Mandolin Orchestra fame, of the Erin St. Ceili Band fame, of Mangy Coyote fame, of Meadowlark fame, of the Sam Baardman band fame – is, perhaps, depending on the person, their tastes, their whims, their flights of fancies, better known as a classical violinist and Irish fiddler, and on Snake Dance, she (and her snakes, which she is very kind toward and which seem to love the serpentine qualities, its ins and outs, its loops, its constrictions, for, although they have no legs, they move in a way that is indistinguishable from dancing; not quite the nagins of Indian charmers, but there is a similar hypnotic effect, a similar mode of induction, the result of which, if she has many of them on her, and that is often the case, makes her appear as though the snakes intend to lift her off the ground while she plays), she jigs, reels, waltzes, and polkas the listener across 10 lubricious tracks (for the rosin she uses is a combination acetic, propanoic, 2-methylpropanoic, butanoic, and methylbutanoic acids; trimethylamine; and 2-piperidone – this, mixed with mucousy cloacal plugs, is what gives the music its distinctive sound), music that travels the world, going from Manitoba’s Lockport to St. Boniface, to England and Paris, to Austria and Jerusalem, and, of course, Susan being an Irish fiddler, to Celtic shores; a music for which one kicks off their shoes in ecstasy as they flail around uncontrollably at a kitchen dance party, a party for which friends like Alice and Rebecca and Mary and Joanne all jump on in, adding guitar and bodhran and harp with wild abandon, to say nothing about her two children, Isaac and Rosalyn, and her husband, the aforementioned Baardman, the whole kit and caboodle of what gives life meaning and purpose and pleasure: friends and family and good times!
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To read the rest of this review — and more by Steve Schmolaris — visit his website Bad Gardening Advice.
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Steve Schmolaris is the founder of the Schmolaris Prize, “the most prestigious prize in all of Manitoba,” which he first awarded in 1977. Each year, he awards the prize to the best album of the year. He does not have a profession but, having come from money (his father, “the Millionaire of East Schmelkirk,” left him his fortune when he died in 1977), Steve is a patron of the arts. Inspired by the exquisite detail of a holotype, the collective intelligence of slime mold, the natural world and the suffering inherent within it — and also music (fuck, he loves music!) — Steve has long been writing reviews of Winnipeg artists’ songs and albums at his website Bad Gardening Advice, leading to the publication of a book of the same name.
