Wendy McNeill & Band - First there were feathers – Tour 2024

In the organizer's words:

Atmospheric soundscapes from Canada: the fantastic songs from Wendy McNeill's 2023 album 'First there were feathers' are finally coming to German concert stages.

When multi-instrumentalist, singer and songwriter Wendy McNeill thinks back to her childhood in the Canadian province of Alberta, the musical memories of her parents' old folk and country records immediately come to mind. Joni Mitchell & Neil Young were often drowned out by Pink Floyd & Black Sabbath, the favorite rock music of her older siblings.

Wendy McNeill danced to ABBA in the morning in her Wonder Woman costume, played air guitar and dreamed of being a superhero or a pop star.

But at the same time, she fell in love with a duet album by Dolly Parton & Porter Wagner - the initial spark for her lifelong interest in songs with dark stories with a hint of hope, not necessarily with a happy ending. Over the course of her long career, Wendy McNeill has matured into one of the great musical storytellers of her homeland. The endless expanse of the Canadian prairies is reflected in her songs: boundlessness meets longing, both musically and lyrically.

Her current project "First there were feathers" is an artistic approach to the world of birds and the question of how their fate is linked to ours. To this end, she draws on science, literature, myth and personal experience. Her deep and sometimes bizarre stories are the focus of jazzy folk-noir songs, which she performs with multi-layered vocals plus accordion, guitar, kalimba and synthesizer in an extremely musical way.

Wendy McNeill has now recorded ten albums, worked artistically on indie films as well as dance and theater productions, toured North America and Europe, Brazil and Japan.

Whether solo, with a large symphony orchestra or, as tonight for the first time in Oldenburg (!) live with a band at Wilhelm 13 - this great artist with a soft spot for outlaws is as authentic as she is entertaining on stage.