Arts Roundup

Music

• Cadence Weapon, A.K.A. Rollie Pemberton, was profiled by The Globe and Mail in a feature on his new book and album, which describe his focus on authenticity across music, writing, and curation. His book Ways of Listening comes out on May 26, and his album Forager is out now.
• Loud in the Pines spoke to CKUA about the band's debut full-length album, Every Colour Left, winning a Canadian Folk Music Award for producer Ben Plotnick.
• New Music Edmonton has announced the lineup for the 15th edition of its Now Hear This festival, running June 5 to 13. The bill includes Pigeon Breeders, Alicia Proudfoot, Bekah Simms, and other local and national artists.
• Sparrow Blue was a guest on the Reluctantly podcast where the members talked about their recording and touring path, along with reflections on production and music-industry changes.
• Edmonton Symphony Orchestra will present Carmina Burana with four Edmonton choirs and soprano Claire de Sévigné from May 22 to 24.
• CJSR won five awards from the National Campus and Community Radio Association, including for The Purple Room, Fervor Coulee's Rootsicana and Bluegrass, The Caribbean Connexion, Labelicious Radio, and for its podcast, Accessing Home.
• Experimental rock duo Angine de Poitrine has added a second show at Fan Park on July 7 after the concert on July 8 sold out nearly instantly.

Visual arts

• High Energy 31, the latest exhibit at the Art Gallery of St. Albert, features artwork from the city's high school students. "These works hold a small moment that is specific to this time in the student artists' lives – a time that is in equal parts awkward and liberating," said curator Emily Baker.
• Salisbury Composite High School student Kayla Klita won gold in Fashion Technology at the Provincial Skills Canada Competition for the second consecutive year. The Grade 11 student will represent Team Alberta at the national competition in Toronto from May 27 to 30.
• Sturgeon Composite High School is hosting the travelling Generations Lost exhibit through May, which examines the legacy of Canada's residential school system. The public can visit it in the school's library.
• Stony Plain Road Business Association has issued a call for artists for five summer public-art sessions on assumptions and attitudes around tagging and graffiti.

Theatre and dance

• Citadel Theatre's new adaptation of Cyrano de Bergerac delivers an immersive, language-driven staging led by director Amanda Goldberg, Liz Nicholls wrote.
• Workshop West Playwrights' Theatre's season finale, Everyone Is Doing Fine, is a dark comedy about money, ethics, and arts work. "It's provokingly current," Liz Nicholls said in her review.
• SkirtsAfire's Shoe Project campaign has raised $16,500, and it has extended fundraising toward a $40,000 target for the next two years.
• The Grindstone Comedy Festival announced its lineup, which includes Shaun Majumder, K. Trevor Wilson, Brittany Lyseng, Chris Locke, and DJ Demers. The festival runs July 2 to 12.
• PlayWright has opened a new patio at Citadel Theatre, with seating and a free cornhole area.
• Ballet Edmonton's season finale, LUMEN, includes artistic director Diego Ramalho's works Indelible Stain and Valei-Me.
• The Ember Collective, which was born out of the Animating Archives Through Arts-Based Research project, will present From Me to You at Mile Zero Dance on May 22 and 23.

Books and publishing

• Historian Catherine C. Cole is gathering oral histories for a book on Mill Woods, with listening sessions focused on how residents experienced the area's growth and diversity. Cole, a resident of Riverdale, said the creative process for the book deepened her understanding of the people who make up Mill Woods. "It's really interesting hearing from these people in those sessions, and it's helping me with writing the book, because they tell me things I didn't know," Cole told Taproot. "They also give me a perspective on some things that I had already read about or understood to a degree, but they give you a different flavour of what really happened to actual people."
• Catherine Owen reviewed Marco Melfi's Routine Maintenance, calling the debut poetry collection a "delectable-for-the-ear examination of what we usually dismiss without the respect it deserves."
• Frank Farley and the Birds of Alberta by Glen Hvenegaard, Jeremy Mouat, and Heather J. Marshall is "a long overdue recognition of a man, and a time, that Alberta would do well to remember," according to Kevin Van Tighem's review.
• Skyborne Insight, Homemade Love by Katharine Weinmann was the top-selling poetry book on the Edmonton bestseller list from the Book Publishers Association of Alberta.
• The Stony Plain Public Library has joined other Alberta libraries in raising concerns about Bill 28, which it says creates new barriers to access, shifts decision-making away from local boards and trained professionals, and raises privacy concerns. The Coalition of Alberta Public Libraries has written to Premier Danielle Smith requesting a meeting.

Screen industries

• Dreamspeakers Festival Society wrapped its downtown festival run with screenings, workshops, and gatherings across several venues. Jessica Daniels, acting executive director of Dreamspeakers, said the move downtown was about centring Indigenous art in the heart of the city. "One of our goals is to see Indigenous art, Indigenous people reflected in the landscape and to be reflected in the spaces that we occupy," she said.
• Gabby Moukhaiber and Suzuanne Burwash with the FascinAsian Film Festival spoke to the Moving Radio podcast about the festival, running through May 16.
• Edmonton International Film Festival will launch a series of screenings to celebrate its 40th anniversary, starting May 28 at the Garneau Theatre with a 4K restoration of Bye Bye Blues.

More headlines

• The John Bosco Child and Family Services Foundation in northeast Edmonton has launched a podcast series on community belonging as it considers what to do next with its sizable land. The three episodes feature speakers from Amiskwaciy Cultural Society, Aboriginal Head Start, Sinkunia Community Development Organization, Bent Arrow Traditional Healing Society, and the City of Edmonton, and is partly meant to stimulate dialogue about plans to develop 1.5 acres of unused Bosco land near the boundary of Balwin and Belvedere.
• L'UniThéâtre founder Steve Jodoin and journalist Sheena Rossiter are among MacEwan University's seven Alumni Awards honorees for 2026.
• Explore Edmonton's Eat Play Laugh Pass is back for 2026, offering 15 tasting tickets for Taste of Edmonton, a 10-day pass for KDays, and an afternoon show at the Great Outdoors Comedy Festival for $59.
• Megan Dart, executive director of Edmonton International Fringe Theatre Festival, reflected on a panel hosted by Edmonton Arts Council discussing why the arts matter now, with CEO Renee Williams and Mayor Andrew Knack. "The arts are city-building infrastructure. Not only do the arts create a vibrant Edmonton by driving economic impact; they also grow empathy, spark connection, and help transform a city into a community."

Happenings

Here are some events coming up over the next seven days:

• May 15: The Carrot Friday Nite Live presents Loud in the Pines starting at 7pm at The Carrot Community Arts Coffeehouse
• May 15-16: Molly McDermott at Timms Centre for the Arts
• May 16: Sprouts: New Play Festival for Kids starting at 12:30pm at Fringe Theatre Arts Barns
• May 16: FascinAsian Film Festival Closing Banquet & Awards Night starting at 6:30pm at Dynasty Century Palace
• May 16: Elbows Up; A Tribute to Canadian Big Band Jazz starting at 7:30pm at Edmonton Public Library (Stanley A. Milner)
• May 16: Ticket to Hollywood starting at 7:30pm at ArtsHub Ortona
• May 17: Book Launch with Alice Major, Kate Rogers, & Angela Waldie starting at 2pm at Audreys Books
• May 17: Stories & Reflections - Where We Came From (and where we go from here): A Vietnamese Art & Heritage Exhibit starting at 2:30pm at ArtsHub Creative Studios
• May 17: The Sinners Cabaret – Half Way to Halloween Celebration starting at 6pm at Starlite Room
• May 20: An Evening with Louise Penny & Mellissa Fung starting at 7pm at Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium
• May 20: Leduc Music Festival starting at 7:30pm at Maclab Centre for the Performing Arts

And here are some upcoming events to keep in mind:

• May 22-23: Ember Collective at Mile Zero Dance
• May 23: Horizons in Unison - Across Generations at University of Alberta Botanic Garden
• May 27: Tin Can Lantern Workshop at Earth's Refillery Coop

Visit the Taproot Edmonton Calendar for many more events in the Edmonton region.