Jano Klimas recites Love Forgotten – a poem he just wrote from Kate Braid’s prompt to the improv accompaniment of Clyde Reed on February 26th, 2015.
About Thursday’s Writing Collective (2008-2018).
Link: http://www.thursdayswritingcollective.ca/
From 2008 to 2018, Thursdays Writing Collective (TWC) ran free, drop-in creative writing classes at Carnegie Community Centre for members of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, an area challenged by poverty-related issues and beloved by residents for its optimism, activism and creativity.
TWC included writers identifying as Indigenous, People of Colour, mixed race and white, trans and queer folks, survivors, and many other intersectional identities from different backgrounds. Our youngest writer is 18, our oldest is 87.
Collectively, we write poetry, short fiction, memoir, songs, prayers, rants, hybrid experiments and personal essays. We currently wish to share our writing, improve our writing skills and make connections within Vancouver’s literary community.
Since its inception in 2008, TWC has published eleven chapbook anthologies with the support of Canada Council, City of Vancouver, Simon Fraser University and Carnegie Community Centre.
Our programming came to an end in April 2018 with a legacy of support for literary programming at Carnegie Community Centre (CCC). Downtown Eastside Writers Collective: https://dteswriters.org/
About Voice to Voice project (2014-2015).
Link: http://www.thursdayswritingcollective.ca/publications/voice-to-voice/
In September 2014 we began collaborating on a year-long project writing about music and transformation, Voice to Voice. Here is an article from the Vancouver Observer written June 15, 2015 about the project, by new Collective member Anne Watson.
Below is the context and explanation of the project as we were beginning:
We’re creating original art song compositions based on our texts with UBC composers, musicians and singers under the guidance of Rena Sharon and Laura Barron of Instruments of Change.
The finished pieces will be performed in a concert in the DTES in June and perhaps at UBC in September. While the composers and performers work on their performances we’ll be busy creating our seventh anthology of creative writing, Voice to Voice, which will launch at the concert. The book will include a wide range of multi-genre writing related to music and transformation and the musical scores of the performed pieces.
About Elee Kraljii Gardiner | writer & editor
Link: https://eleekg.com/
Elee Kraljii Gardiner is the author of two poetry books Trauma Head, winner of the Fred Cogswell Poetry Prize, and serpentine loop, shortlisted for the Raymond Souster Award, and has edited two acclaimed anthologies Against Death: 35 Essays on Living (finalist for the Montaigne Medal) and V6A: Writing from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, which was a finalist for the City of Vancouver Award. An experienced mentor, Elee is the founding director of Thursdays Writing Collective, which supported emerging writers from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. She has performed her award-winning poetry and hosted events at festivals across North America, including the Vancouver Writers Fest, the Railroad Reading Series, and the Annual Creative Writing Conference at the University of Chiang Mai. Originally from Boston, Elee now lives with her family in Vancouver on the traditional and unceded territories of the Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh and Musqueam Peoples where she is a director of Vancouver Manuscript Intensive.
Video recording of the “Silence” poem from the Voice-to-Voice project:
World premiere of “Art song – the new frontier” on April 9, 2016 at
Roy Barnett Recital Hall
School of Music
University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
If you liked reading this blog, you may also like to read the following post about a Voice-to-Voice ArtSong here:
https://janklimas.com/art-song-the-new-frontier-concert-on-apr-9-2016/
Composer: Jan Klimas
Year Composed: 2015
Performance Date: Thursday January 1st, 1970
Instrumentation: Double bass
Duration: 0:23
Commissioned by/through: Thursdays Writing Collective