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Women in music and laughing about it

Edith Wallace joins like-minded talent in Women and Song for folk, world music, jazz evening

What: Women and Song

When: Thursday, Aug. 3

Where: Eagle Eye Theatre, Squamish

Tickets: $20/$15

An opening introduction to Edith Wallace over the phone was like stepping inside the creative space where she creates her music; a space of extreme sentiment and hilarity.

Only ever wearing what she jokes as stones and twigs, Wallace fills me in on how her husband gave her a sum of money to purchase jewelry to celebrate the couple’s 18th wedding anniversary last Monday. Wallace has no wedding ring. She opted for a new kayak instead.

Diamonds don’t dazzle this musical comedian. In a sea of sparkling whites, she was fishing for the gaudy purple amethyst, but settled on a square citron with diamonds down each side.

"Why would you pay thousands of dollars for a ring?" she asks. "It was the cost of a new kayak. So I went for the kayak instead… I have a dear friend who is a jeweler who said I needed to get into some good stuff. You should have seen the beautiful things we were looking at. I had to wipe my spit off of them I was drooling so much. I put on these pearl earrings and nearly fainted on the floor when she told me they were $4,000."

The charm of Wallace’s music rests in her everyday life: the sharing of what most people pass off as the ordinary, a vulnerability and honesty that goes as far as a song title called Man You are Fat and a sense of humour that lights the way even in the darkest of times – all coming together in a guest appearance in Women and Song Thursday, Aug. 3 at 8 p.m. at the Eagle Eye Theatre in Squamish.

Wallace will also be joined by Women and Song event host Imbeau as well as musical talents such as The Shirleys, Nadine McNeil and Ali Milner, all coming together for a mixed playbill of jazz, country, folk, world music and more.

"I’ve been to concerts where singers sing an hour and half of misery," she said, laughing. "You can’t do that. Some have tried, but I don’t think life is all sad or all funny."

Her second album, Bare Breasted in Bali: And Other Naughty Bits… And Pieces , illustrates the wonderful humour she brings to sentiments many women can relate to. Song titles include the Weight Watchers Blues, Come Rest in My Cleavage, He’s Got a Little Weenie (That’s Why He Drives a Sexy Car), and I Want a Man Like the Man in the Harlequin Romances – don’t we all.

However, her latest album, The Tree in My Garden , released in spring 2005 under the direction of Los Angeles producer Joe Biblasi, roots the musician’s work in less slap-you-on-the-back humour and more right-at-the-heart sentiments.

The title track, Tree in My Garden, takes on more of a whimsical beauty reminiscent of the storytelling magic of Loreena McKennitt than a stand-up comedy act. The violin line Wallace herself plays weaves in and out of soft crystalline top notes grounded with a rich lower register. Her musical snapshot of life shares the wonders of it all – the good, bad and ugly.

"I’m older now," says the woman in her 40s. "I am not 21 anymore. I have a different view of the world that is showing up more. When I was a teenager, I thought the world was so black and white. I see that in my 17-year-old daughter now. That is how it is meant to be then – that is how you form your opinions. In my song The Jerk Who Stole My Car (someone actually did steal my car), I was really ticked at the guy for doing it, but at the same time I was also able to understand that for a person to get to the point of stealing, life must have taken some very strange twists and turns to get there. There is always the good and the bad, the serious and the funny. All that happens. I am not writing to be a songwriter. I am writing to share what is going on in my head."

And there is a lot going on, including an incident where a driver shouted out at her "Man you are fat" one day when she was taking her then baby girl for a stroller ride.

"All of the joy of the day bundled up with the jerk who drove away with my happiness," she said. "I thought, ‘I could let this little twit be in charge of my life or I could write about it.’ Before I sing this song, I always precede it with, ‘If I ever meet the guy in the red Honda, after he regains consciousness, I am going to take him for lunch.’"

The song’s ability to hit both a soft spot in audience’s hearts and funny bones led to Wallace’s first of many national television appearances with her music. She has sung editorial songs on the CBC evening news and on CBC’s In the Company of Women. She also practised satirical cooking on Vancouver’s CTV Morning Show and was honoured to write and perform the theme song for the United Nations Year of the Family campaign in B.C. With the enthusiastic support of her husband, Fred Brumm, she has toured Japan, Australia, Europe, the U.S. and Puerto Rico with her music.

Illness kept the singer/songwriter close to home for the past year, however, well on her way to recovery, she begins her musical journey again with a performance in Squamish followed by concerts in the U.S.

"There aren’t many purer and more straightforward voices than Edith’s," wrote Vancouver Sun’s Malcom Parry. "She’s a local thrush with a smashing new album of original songs."

Tickets for Women and Song are $20 for adults and $15 for seniors, students and children. Advanced tickets are available at Billie’s Bouquet, Mostly Books, the Sea to Sky Hotel and the Squamish Days souvenir booth.