According to a press release, the LP is an “expressive, white-hot rock’n'roll statement” with lyrical concerns that include “pirates, war, dating, travel, the Smurfs, engines, the waterways, and movie-making.”

In the Rock Hall gets its name from a poem by late writer Paul Quarrington, which you can read here on Pau;’s website (http://www.paulquarrington.org/friends/78/moving-stories-in-winnipeg/). See a live version of the title track with Dave Bidini and Porkbelly Futures when they toured across the country in 2010 with the screening tour of “Paul Quarrington Life in Music” >> here … http://youtu.be/22y0Xhpo-3I

Bidiniband will be promoting the album with a smattering of shows in Canada’s eastern half. For the official CD release show on January 28 at Toronto’s Dakota Tavern, they will offer “surprise guests, noisemakers, amp throwing, squirrel-toss, balloon drinking, dart poker and underwear bingo. And, one really good drum solo.”

See the full schedule and the complete article PLUS plus download a track from the release on  Exclaim! Magazine website  … http://exclaim.ca/News/dave_bidinis_bidiniband_preps_in_rock_hall -

Bidiniband Tour dates – lots more on Dave’s website too >> http://davebidini.ca/

1/26 Hamilton, ON – Casbah Lounge
1/27 Toronto, ON - Toronto Reference Library
1/27 St. Catharines, ON – The Merchant Ale House
1/28 Toronto, ON – The Dakota Tavern (release show)
2/7 Halifax, ON – Carleton *
2/9 Charlottetown, PE – Stolen from a Hockey Card Show
2/19 Toronto, ON – Harbourfront Skate Festival

The Perfect Order of Things
by David Gilmour
Thomas Allen, 2011

Beauty & Sadness
by André Alexis
Anansi, 2010

Three gentlemen of Canadian literature. Three memoirs. One of them framed as a novel. One of them a celebration of life and critique of music. One of them a hybrid short story /essay collection.

One of them published posthumously.

Paul Quarrington wrote Cigar Box Banjo in the 12 months his doctors gave him after his lung cancer diagnosis. He’d already started it, but what had started as a reflection of his life-long interest (and career in) music became a reflection on the significant moments of his life and the strange space of his final year.

If you knew you had a year to live, what would you do? Quarrington makes it clear that he took his diagnosis as a gift. Of course he would have liked to live longer. Of course he was angry. But it could have been worse. He could have left with no chance to say goodbye, with no chance to do some of the things on his bucket list (such as record a song in Nashville with his childhood friend, Dan Hill).

And without that final year, we wouldn’t have this book, which is imperfect but also more than charming. It resonates with life-force, and it serves as a reminder that the well-lived life is possible even in the most trying of circumstances.

This blog began in 2008 with a report of The Writers’ Union of Canada’s AGM. Specifically, it recounted a session on the writing life led by Quarrington, Nino Ricci and Wayston Choy. Quarrington repeated some learned wisdom: “Bitterness is the writer’s black lung disease.” Quarrington said: At the end of the day, there’s the body of work. Be proud of it. Avoid careerism.

It was the only time I “met” Quarrington, and it was enough to understand that he is widely missed by friends, family and colleagues.

More at  … http://thenewcanlit.blogspot.com/2011/09/paul-quarrington-david-gilmour-andre.html

Four projects are up for the Allan King Award for Excellence in Documentary: Bert Kish’s Paul Quarrington Life in Music; Sturla Gunnarsson’s Force of Nature: The David Suzuki Movie; Mike Downie’s One Ocean: The Birth of an Ocean; and Josh Freed’s Where Did I Put My Memory?

Kish states,  “I grew up with the NFB in Montreal. My father, Albert Kish, was an editor/director there for over 25 years. The NFB’s original mandate was to present Canada to Canadians; when producer Judith Keenan approached me to do the Quarrington film I thought Paul was a Canadian that needed to be presented to Canada because of his unique voice and remarkable talents.   I hope we achieved that with this with the film, and that it helps Paul`s amazingly broad portfolio of creative work – novels, memoirs, journalism, music, film and television -  enjoy the legacy it deserves.”

The DGC Awards take place in Toronto on October 29, 2011 at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel.  Director Bert Kish will be in attendance.  For more about the film, visit http://bookshorts.com/pq_life_in_music/

Kevin MacDonald in Papillon

Comedy sketches come naturally to Kids in the Hall member Kevin McDonald. Writing anything longer than a few minutes does not, he bemoans in his famously high-pitched tone.

“In the past 15 years I’ve pushed myself to learn how to write hour-and-a-half things, like movies, or half-hour things, like pilots for TV shows,” McDonald said in a recent interview from Niagara Falls, Ont., where he shot a film cameo.

“At first they were like long sketches. (Then), each scene was like a sketch. And now I’m (thinking): ‘Oh, maybe this scene doesn’t have to have a horribly funny thing, just a mildly funny, witty thing. Because it adds to the next scene and the story’s important.”‘

It’s fitting then that his return to series television on Monday comes by way of what could be Canada’s shortest show — the four-minute “Papillon.”

McDonald stars in Bite TV’s offbeat farce about an ultra discount airline and its peculiar employees. The frizzy-haired funnyman plays Darius, a nebbish co-pilot with a fear of flying. Other characters include cocky pilot Cal (David Fraser), pragmatic flight attendant Marcia (a cross-dressing Randal Edwards) and the severe — and possibly homicidal — flight attendant Eva (Hannah Cheesman).

The outlandish comedy — in which the frugal airline eliminates frills such as drinks, meals and seatbelts — was created by late author, musician, filmmaker and playwright Paul Quarrington.

McDonald says it was originally envisioned as a 30-minute sitcom but evolved into a short series.

Bite TV — which populates the rest of its joke-heavy lineup with critical faves “Arrested Development,” “Extras,” and “It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia” — says the “Papillon” shorts will be packaged into 30-minute episodes at the end of August.

McDonald says the Internet has fuelled a renaissance in comedy shorts.

“It’s funny how modern technology advances make you go back. Like, now it’s three-minute pop songs that are the thing,” says McDonald, who co-wrote three of the 15 “Papillon” episodes with partner Paula Blair.

“That’s the way the world is going.”

“Papillon” starts Monday July 11 on Bite TV.

++++++++++++++++++

by Cassandra Szklarski, The Canadian Press

Date: Friday Jul. 8, 2011

Read the complete story at http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/Entertainment/20110708/KevinMcDonald-return-small-screen-110708/

Check your local listings!

In 2011, NXNE Film celebrates its 10th year as a unique, boutique gem set alongside the larger NXNE Music festival. Each year, NXNE Film programs over 40 music-themed films from around the world. From indie docs to concert classics, from punk to country to classical, from all over the world – NXNE Film’s programming is never predictable and always fascinating.

For the past decade, NXNE Film has screened World, North American and Canadian Premieres and – just like other film festivals – has hosted many acclaimed film folks, including directors like Don Letts, Guy Maddin, Stewart Copeland, Bruce MacDonald, and more. The Festival also presented Quarrington’s short dramatic film, Pavane, in 2008.

Fans can attend NXNE Film screenings one of four ways:

• with an NXNE Priority Pass
• with an NXNE wristband (5-day or 1-day)
• with an NXNE Film Festival-only wristband
• buy paying single-film admission charge at the door ($10 in nearly all cases)

Visit http://www.nxne.com to buy passes or wristbands.  The 2011 NXNE Festival of Music and Film runs in Toronto June 13 to 19.

REMINDER: if you can’t make it to the Fathers Day screening, buy your very own DVD copy with extra special bonus features – available at http://www.bookshorts.com/pq_life_in_music

Cole was competing for the Leacock medal against Todd Babiak ( Toby: A Man), Terry Fallis ( The High Road), Red Green ( How to do Everything) and David Rakoff ( Half Empty), each of whom will also receive a cash prize. He was in good company, as he is now as a medal winner, and he knows it.

“One of my personal heroes was Paul Quarrington,” he said of the late author and past winner of the Leacock medal. “I was quite young (when Quarrington won), but that made me really perk up and see this as something I’d like to win, not just because he’d done it, but he made me aware of the award and I was able to figure out just how important it is.”

“It’s a little darker than usual (for a Leacock medal winner),” said Mike Hill, president of the Stephen Leacock Association. Winners of the award often write “a lighter, brighter kind of humour.” “This is black humour, and it’s funny,” Hill said.

Excerpted from The Barrie Examiner, April 29, 2011 - read the full article here.

The documentary is an intimate portrait of an amazingly talented artist who is given a life sentence by one of the most ubiquitous diseases of our age – cancer.  Diagnosed at stage 4 (there is no stage 5), his lung cancer gave Quarrington only ten months to live.  But live he did, pouring his heart, soul and emotions into a host of creative projects: he toured the country and recorded a new album with his band Porkbelly Futures; made his first solo album called The Songs; finished writing his memoir Cigar Box Banjo: Notes on Life and Music; completed scripts for a dramatic series and a screenplay for feature film.  And of course he made this documentary film, capturing all of these endeavours on camera.

Though the filmmakers do hope to inspire audiences to live life to the full by sharing  Paul’s journey, the film is steadfastly not a “cancer film.”  There are no hospital shots or doctor’s diagnoses.  Instead, the audience witnesses an artist at the height of his creative process, delivering his story with humour, candour and poignant insight.  As Paul says himself, he wants his audiences to cry through their laughter, and laugh through their tears – that’s when a person is truly open to all the incredible experiences life has to offer, be it one year, or one hundred years long.

Hunter Todd, Chairman & Founding Director in his correspondence to the winners, states “It is very difficult to win a Remi in WorldFest… with so many entries, only about 15-20% are good enough to win the Award for Creative Excellence. In some categories, sometimes no awards are made because the entries that year did not score high enough to earn a Remi Award. My personal congratulations for a job very well done.”

WorldFest, founded as an International Film Society in August 1961, became the third competitive international film festival in North America, following San Francisco and New York.  WorldFest evolved into a competitive International Film Festival in April 1968 and has a long list of “discovered” film greats such as Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, David Lynch, Ridley Scott, Oliver Stone, Atom Egoyan, Randall Kleiser, Ang Lee, Robert Rodriguez, the Coen Brothers, John Lee Hancock and many others from their beginning efforts for film submissions early in their careers.  Multi award-winning producer/director Hunter Todd founded this film festival to honor all categories of film and video production continuing his long dedication of “Discovery,” spotlighting emerging Independent filmmakers as “the Spielbergs & Ang Lees of tomorrow.”   The Remi takes its name from the famous artist Frederick Remington, who captures the spirit of Texas and the West with his brilliant paintings and sculptures.

For more information and screening copies, contact:

Judith Keenan,  Executive Producer & Producer

Judith-at-bookshorts-dotcom

Paul Quarrington died of lung cancer a year ago today, on Jan. 21, 2010. To mark the anniversary of his death, his former bandmate Martin Worthy sent the Globe this story and a prophetic song that they recorded together in 2008 with their band, Porkbelly Futures.

Essay (with music)

Martin Worthy
Globe and Mail Online
Published Friday, Jan. 21, 2011 12:00AM EST

<< Read the whole story here >>

About Martin Worthy

Martin Worthy is Paul’s oldest closest friend and continuing member of the band Porkbelly Futures. He and Paul played, wrote and toured together for decades, the last 10 years in the band Porkbelly Futures. The band released a CD dedicated to their colleague called The Crooked Road, which has a number of tunes the two wrote together. Martin also heads up the Quarrington Arts Society; for more information visit www.quarringtonartsociety.ca.