Kate Blechinger

BIO/DESCRIPTION

Kate Blechinger is an award-winning singer-songwriter, musician, educator, and arranger originally from Treaty 4 Territory, and now based in Amiskwaciy-waskahikan on Treaty 6 Territory.

At times poetic and playful, then introspective and honest, Kate’s music is a true hybrid of folk, jazz, and pop genres. Kate takes direct influence from the vast prairie landscapes of her youth to create expansive and evocative compositions that pair the harmony, improvisation and instrumentation of more traditional jazz forms with the lyricism of modern jazz and folk. With “a voice like liquid peace”, her lyrical observations of life, love, and loss shoot straight to the heart.

In 2015, Kate presented, ‘Making Myself with Joni: Rehearsal, Creativity, and The Production of Musical Subjectivity’, a presentation about her MacEwan University vocal graduation recital of Joni Mitchell’s music, at “Court & Spark: An International Symposium on The Work of Joni Mitchell” in Lincolnshire, UK. This project spawned Kate’s 2018 debut album, Under a Dancing Sky, which features innovative folk-jazz arrangements of Joni Mitchell’s compositions alongside several of Kate’s original compositions.

Kate won the Jazz Recording of the Year award at the 2019 Edmonton Music Awards for her version of Joni Mitchell’s ‘Night in the City’. Kate’s arrangements and compositions have been featured on CKUA Community Radio, CBC Radio-Canada, and CBC Radio Two, among other campus and community stations.

Kate is grateful to have shared her unique twist of folk-jazz at various festivals and venues around Alberta and Saskatchewan, and is currently workshopping new music with plans to record a sophomore EP in 2024-2025.