Au Parc concert series returns to L'Imagier for a third summer

Tashi Farmilo

Au Parc, the free outdoor music series staged by the Centre d'exposition L'Imagier, comes back for a third season this summer, filling the Parc de L'Imaginaire at 9 rue Front in Aylmer with four evenings of live performance that pair area musicians with a rotating cast of neighbourhood restaurants and breweries.

The concerts fall on August 8, 15 and 29 and September 12, each starting at 7 pm in the park tucked behind the gallery, a short walk from the Aylmer Marina and Parc des Cèdres. Admission is free, and a refreshment stand anchors every night, spotlighting a different local kitchen and microbrewery so the food and drink shift along with the bill.

L'Imagier was founded in 1975, it was the first contemporary art centre in the Outaouais and later helped shape the Parc de L'Imaginaire into a gathering spot for music and visual art. Programmer Philippe Bourdeau has framed the series as a way to pull new crowds into the gallery, knit the neighbourhood together and put a wide span of styles on the same open-air stage.

That mandate shows in a roster that crosses genres and generations. The opening night on August 8 brings Akeem Oh and Izzy Rose. Akeem Oh is an American-Canadian indie-pop singer-songwriter and producer, born in Philadelphia and raised in Mattawa, who cut his teeth on the Franco-Ontarian scene, turned up on TFO's JAM and played the Francos de Montréal. Adopted by white and Indigenous French-Canadian parents, he writes and produces most of his own material, which he files under "soft-boi-indie-pop." Izzy Rose, an Ottawa singer, moves between R&B, hip-hop, indie and afrobeats with a soft but forceful voice, and drew notice for her single "Ohwei," which landed on CBC Radio and passed six figures in streams before she took the stage at RBC Bluesfest.

Sallie Music and Che Nous share the bill on August 15, with Marie-Hélène Frenette-Assad and Céleste Lévis following on August 29. Frenette-Assad is a regional musician also known for her original scores and award-nominated podcast work. Lévis, from Timmins, found music after health troubles pulled her out of sport, then swept six prizes at the 2013 Ontario Pop competition, reached the semi-final of La Voix in 2015 and opened for Francis Cabrel in Quebec the next year. A nominee at the ADISQ and Trille Or galas, she has a new album due this fall.

The season closes September 12 with Nick Schofield and Pony Girl, both rooted in the region's own scene. Schofield, a Gatineau-based synthesist and producer trained in electroacoustics at Concordia, has performed at MUTEK, the Getty Museum and New York's National Sawdust. His latest record, the ambient-jazz outing Blue Hour, arrived in February and features trumpeter Scott Bevins. Pony Girl, an Ottawa art-rock outfit formed in 2012, has charted on college radio, aired on CBC Music and SiriusXM, taken home a Prix du Festival d'Été du Québec, and folds art pop, rock guitar, jazz drumming and electronics into its live shows.

The series runs with backing from the City of Gatineau, the Entente de développement culturel and the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, alongside Bureau60a, Amazonas, La Manne, Poukham, Ras l'bol, La Dérive and 5e Baron. Bureau60a created the visual identity for this year's run.