Kim Erickson is a vocalist/musician/composer who has achieved a varied and diverse professional music career over many years. She is a voice instructor for LU Music and has been a long time instructor of music theory, aural skills, vocal literature, opera studio, improvisation and world music for the Department.
Kim has performed her original work across Canada (Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival, Summerfolk Festival, Northern Lights Festival Boréal, Ottawa Folk Festival, Live From the Rock Festival, Winnipeg Women’s Cultural and Music Festival, Thunder Women Festival, LUMINA Concert Series) and overseas in Holland (Vredenburg Muziekcentrum and ‘T Hoogt Cafe and Cultural Centre/Utrecht, De Ijsbreker and the Stedelijk Museum/Amsterdam). She has worked as a solo artist, and in various duos and ensembles including Consortium Aurora Borealis, Kanteletar Chamber Choir and the acoustic trio Canto. As a mezzo soprano soloist she has appeared frequently with the Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra under conductors Geoffrey Moull, Glenn Mossop, Daniel Bartholomew-Poyser and David Bowser, and has performed orchestrations of several of her own songs. Her original work has been recorded and documented in various media (sound recordings, film, television, radio).
She has released three full length solo albums of original work. Two indendent releases, the intention, the blue (1987/2012) and Away (2000) have been followed by The Raven’s Wing, a critically acclaimed international release on the Route 61 Music label (Rome, Italy, 2015).
Kim is a performer, composer and music director of soundscapes for theatre and radio (Thunder Bay: Kam Theatre, Magnus Theatre, New Creations Theatre; Ottawa: Great Canadian Theatre Co., Penguin Theatre Co.; Saskatoon: Persephone Theatre; Edmonton: Workshop West Theatre; CBC Vancouver). With playwright Eleanor Albanese and choreographer Claudia Otto, she formed the Broken Moons Artist Collective, which created the inter-arts collaboration Dancing on Salt ‘n Snow. Recent collaborations with dance include work with dancer/choreographer Edgar Zendejas (Montreal), Michelle Silagy (Toronto) and Image Dance Studio (Thunder Bay). She received the 2008 CJ Arts and Heritage Award for Media and Performance Art.
A native of Northern Ontario, the landscape and spaciousness of that part of Canada influenced her from childhood. Kim moved to Ottawa where she received her B.Mus. First Class Honours from Carleton University; there she studied piano with Philip Adamson and Ross Pratt, and composition with Deirdre Piper and Patrick Cardy. During those student years, she also began working professionally within the Ottawa music community and toured across Canada with Ian Tamblyn, playing The Riverboat, Massey Hall, Place des Arts, the Ottawa Civic Centre, the National Arts Centre and the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. She also formed a piano duo with Lauri Conger, a founding member of The Parachute Club, and taught voice and composed for Le Groupe de la Place Royale school of dance.
Kim was awarded a Netherlands Government scholarship and fellowship in order to study composition for two years at the renowned Instituut voor Sonologie (Utrecht). While living in the Netherlands, she also studied voice with Anna Menso (Amsterdam). Interested in all things musical, she worked with American jazz pianist Robert Rowe and Dutch rock band Hi Jinx. Kim moved back to Canada and to Thunder Bay. A Canada Council grant later sent her over to the Netherlands again to study voice with Anna Menso, undertake independent research in eastern European folk music, and to compose and collect works for women’s choir. She also did masterclasses in French art song with master interpreter the late Bernard Kruysen and with Margriet Honig (Amsterdam Conservatory).
Back home in Thunder Bay, she continued her artistic work, commuted for many years to coach for performances and to study voice with the late Dixie Neill (Montreal), raised a family, initiated and developed several community choirs, implemented arts projects in schools and anti-racism and social justice projects in the region, studied and performed various forms of dance (including Bharata Natyam classical Indian dance under the instruction of Anuradha Naimpally), was a member of the AUUC Lakehead Mandolin Orchestra and Women’s Choir, performed music in hospital settings, and began teaching for the Lakehead University of Department of Music and in her private teaching studio.
For further details of her artistic work, please visit http://www.kimerickson.ca.
Examples of her work as a performer and as a voice instructor can be found at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOaYJYRin84lvl79Apoy0RA. Also at https://vimeo.com/user25260306